Detouring around Cairo

The P's arrived late on Thursday night and this weekend we took the chance to explore a few places we hadn't been to yet. Friday saw us go into the Wadi for a walk and a view over the south of the city and then a nice afternoon drink and dinner at the BCA. The P's went for BCA Fish and Chips while I went for my favourite sausages - yum!

On Saturday we managed to find time in the morning to get out to AlfaMarket on the Corniche. I visited here a few weeks ago with Sayno and we found it was a cross between the Grand Mall and Saveway - my two favourite things! Good buys this trip: some bunting made from the Ramadan material that are great fun although I'm not to sure what we'll do with them, then some tablecloths made really well with selected patterns from the Ramadan material, also managed to get some new Juhanya yoghurts and a yoghurt drinks with strawberry pieces in which I like - can't get them in SaveWay usually.

The best buy though was spied out of the corner of my eye - an Egyptian flag on a box in the board games section of the store. On closer inspection we found that this was not just Egyptian Monopoly, but 25th January Egyptian Monopoly. We bought two copies and at home found that it was all properly branded and made and everything. The streets have been renamed (with Tahrir Square being Mayfair of course) and Community Chest and Chance have been replaced by the Coalition of Youth and the Military Cuoncil and the card all rewritten. Wow!

We just had time to get back into the apartment and dump the shopping before we headed out again - this time on the main activity of the day; a tour tour organised by Casual Cairo Detours, a company that I'd hear of through a friend. Before the tour was billed as "a lazy day on the Nile" and that it was!

We were collected from the apartment and then drove on the ring road passed the pyramids and then head northwest towards where the Nile splits into the two branches (Rashid and Damietta) at Qanatir. At one point we are driving through a town, which our driver tells us is actually two towns - one on each side of the road. It's a busy day outside with people carrying their shopping and their wares all around us as we slowly drive through.

We're first taken to a fish restaurant where we choose our lunch. They have a range of sea food including calamari and shrimps, but we go for some fresh fillets that have been sea-caught, rather than the Nile perch which has had to drink everything tipped into the Nile upstream. At the last moment though DaddyP decides that he does want to give the Nile fish a try and so we get one of them too.

We don't eat there, but drive off to find Mr Ali's boat which is moored a mile or so away. It's a boat withview  and we climb aboard and spend about 30 minutes riding along the Nile beside the town we have just driven through. There are farmers in the fields, brick-makers at the factory and boys in boats on the river with us. The boys and young men are fishing using nets, but then beating the water to try and encourage the fish to swim into them. It's great to watch and hear the pattern being beaten out, but in this go they have no luck.

The boat turns around and we head back to where we cast off from - a guy is pulling up on a motorbike carrying a few plastic bags on the handles...our lunch. In the downstairs of the boat we feast on fresh fresh fish (freshly caughty, freshly cooked) that has been spiced in a lovely way, along with rice and bread and pickles and salad. After we have had our fill there is still a huge piece left on the platter. We wrap this up with the other left-overs and plan to have it for supper when we return to Cairo.

At this point the boat pulls out from the shelter of the small island we have been sailing past and into the main Nile channel. This is the point where the river branches and you can see the faster water rushing past us. We hug the island and look out to see a few other boats joining us (including an annoyingly loud "party boat"). One is a small speed boat with three guys on board. One of the has a rifle and so we assume they are the police, but then we see them pull up and try to shoot some of the birds on the bank. They are unsuccessful and get their cumuppance when they manage to beach themselves on a sand bank.

We pull in then to the island and climb out. On the island we meet some of the local farmers and they show us their man-made beehives (I've never seen bees in Egypt before and these are so large they look almost like hornets), cattle shed and dove coop (which is actually a series of large cans hanging from the ceiling in a cattle shed that they have all nested in. Our walk then takes us through their land on which they farm roses (we are given a bunch of flowers freshly picked and smelling sweet), corn, aubegine and bananas. The banana trees are amazing - they let the trees grow large on the edge of each field to protect the good trees in the centre, and each banana plant is covered by a blue plastic bag to again protect the crop. We are shown a banana flower and how that each petal is peeled back to reveal a (potential) bunch of bananas. It's amazing to see how these things actually grow. As we reach the end of the farmers land we see the drainage channels filling up with water that has been pumped in. Apparently they fill the channels every two weeks in the summer, but every two months in the winter. The water gradually fills each channel in turn and is followed by birds and donkeys after a drink.

 Back at the boat now and we pick up a warm fiteer that has been draped in the fresh honey from the island. This Egyptian pancake will be our dessert and even though we had no space to finish the fish we find space for the tasty butter pastry that has been thinly packed together and is now oozing honey.

What was great about this day out and the tour, was that we felt comfortable taking photographs (something that isn't really the case in many of the "off track" places we visit) and that it was so relaxed. The tour had so few things planned in it really, because it recognised that the delight of a tour like this was just taking your time and seeing what was there to be seen - not seeking something specific out. A great day to see things afresh.

Makan musical expereince

Makan normally hold their events on a Wednesady, which, as it a school night, means that we haven't managed to get over there yet. The P's went there last time they visited and really enjoyed the traditional music they played, so I was pleased when the email group said that an event would be on this weekend; Waterproof Live.

I went along with Phil and we were very happy to see what was on offer - even though we had no idea what it really was apart from being two visiting Ducth musicians who would play their "unique" music along with some cross-cultural collaborations with the Makan muscians.

You've got to be suspicious when you hear someone describe their music as "unique", but in the flyer it was also described as "challenging" and "modern musical expressions and techniques". Hhmmmm

Having the performance I would describe it as all of these things. I enjoyed the night, more for finding the music and its construction interesting than really appreciating and enjoying the music itself.

So onto the music itself; the first half was the Dutch pair with loops and brass. They had the loops set up and a console each. At first they played ih harmony (she on a trumpet and he on a tenor sax) then once the loop started they added in between the rests and on top of the original tune. Nice, nearly too "free jazz" for me, but cool to see it constructure. After a tame introduction they went on to some musical expressions. This tallied with the video - that was projected above them onto a beautifully crumbling wall - showing waves at first and then sea birds. The sound was smooth at first on the brass, but then when the sea birds came the sax suddenly became all squarky (!), forcing the sound through in an agressive way. The musician was contorting his body and putting himself between the bell and the microphone to distort the sound. This is what I guess they describe as "challenging".

Tea and karkade were indeed "served" as the flyer promised. Phil and I had some karkade and we added some sugar to sweeten, but not as much as you'd get in Fishawi's. For the second half some Egyptian musicians were invited to join them on stage for some collaborative pieces. These musicians included another sax player, a percussionist and then a female singer and a male singer who was also playing some percussion. The real addition here was the percussion, and the singers bringing in some strong voices to the pieces. Things got a bit experimental again when the female singer put some up-turned clay bowls in two deep trays of water and then started hitting them with sticks. A nice idea for a new sound, but unfortunatly nothing was raelly picked up on the microphones.

What was nice in a way was seeing the evolution of a piece - as the musicians were really "jamming" rather than putting on a polished performance. It was interesting to see the female half of the Dutch pair get up and signal to band members when they should join in, when they should take a lead part and when the piece should end. This wasn't always clear to the performers it seemed, as the female singer did look round a couple of times seeking approval or verification (!) but the performance showed they were listening to each other and trying new things out.

As I said. Interesting.



What I haven't said though was the two real highlights of the evening; the first being a trip to Gad and the second being the Metro ride.

Phil and I decided to get dinner together before the concert and with her love of Egyptian fast food we went to gad on Road 9. We've been to Gad by Attabba station before and although I've spied this one on Road 9 we've never been to it before. We sat in the restuarant part (no AC, so Attabba is winning here) and browsed the menu. It had the classic "see food" but no mention of the staple, koshary, on the menu. We asked and apparently although they do all the componant parts, they do not serve koshary in the restaurant.

We quickly form a back-up plan and I go for pasta with mince meat in a bechemal sauce (we know this is yum) and I also order some baba ganough. He asks if I want chips, which was a surprise to me and I ask for "baladi aish" instead (flat round bread). Phil's favourite is tameya, which she orders, but I encourage her to order something else, as surely two little falafel will not be enough. She hasn't tried mashi before so I get her to order that - the mixed stuffed vegetables. It is here that our fist highlight takes place - Gad serve the best mashi I've tasted. Maybe it was because they were so fresh, but the stuffing was so tasty with a little tang of tomato and spice. Yum!

On to the Metro now and we find a space to stand in the women's carriage. After a few stops it is clear that this is the busy time, as lots of women and their children are getting on the train. We joke that it is like a creche here. We then hear a "meow" and look down to see a girl playing with one black and one ginger kitten around the bottom of her mother's gallabeya! She is happily playing away when we notice a boy has something in his hands; a frog! Where has he got this from and how did we end up in the zoo carriage?! While she plays with the kittens he is busy pushing the frog into people's faces and then putting him on the floor and banging the ground beside him to try and make him jump!

We nearly jump a moment later when an older lad walks down the carriage - he is selling something and brandishing his wears and nearly steps on the poor froggie. We both put our arms out to stop him, but he has seen the frog and starts to chastise the boy for scaring the women (we think). This over, his sales picth begins. He has what looks to be a kitchen implement with a wooden handle and metal stick with maybe a whisk on the end. My first guess is that it is for frothing your coffee, but then he pulls out a courgette - it is actually a corer to prepare our new favourite dish; mashi!

The girl with the kittens is about to get off, so she picks them up...but the arm! Oww! In the bustle of the train stopping we suddenly can't see the kittens anymore, but then we hear a rustle and see some movement of a black and orange shape in a white plastic bag. Yes - she is now carrying them home in a plastic bag!

As you can tell, it was an eventful journey and a great evening out all in all.

Dinners out and a brunch

We've had a few nice meals out since getting back to Cairo, so I thought I'd add a few of them here for the record!

The Mermaid
Yes - can you believe it that four years after our introduction to Pharaohs Revenge in Cairo, we revisited the Mermaid restaurant on Road 9? It was the Hums night out and Sarah suggested it as she had eaten there recently and found it to be pretty good. It also got the thumbs up for serving beer! It was a good night out, and the restaurant was pretty busy, although it was a little dimly lit. Food-wise we had no problems (!) but for the price there are probably some some better places to eat. Here you are probably paying for the privilege to have a beer with your meal - something we are quite happy to do!

La Rosa (Otlob) for Games Night
A good, entertaining night around at the new commune for a few games. We ended up playing a music quiz (Spot The Intro I think it was called!) which of course Scotty excelled at! It brought back a lot of mid-90's memories and had a pretty good format with questions and then snippets of songs to identify. Dinner was Otlob - of course - and after a few goes of finding somewhere with a range of veggie stuff (Phil!!) we ended up with La Rosa. No complaints from me about having the best thin crust pizza in town! A new discovery this evening was that don't need a pizza knife, or even a knife to cut pizza....just a pair of scissors.

Budda Bar (Senior Dinner)
"Senior Dinner" - it's in the name surely? But not so this year. A great night to see our senior students enjoying themselves but the emphasis seemed to be on the venue this year (private hire!) rather than any attempt at a decent meal. Don't quite know what went wrong this evening, but every table ended up with a series of appetisers - thai, salads and sushi - but no main meal or food with substance ever appear. Came home and had a slice of toast.

The Experimental Roast
A dinner out for us, but a wonderful homecooked meal with some nice wine to boot. This was entitled the "experimental roast" as our hostess had not cooked beef before. She gave it a good rub and the timing was perfect for some lovely pink and juicy slices. Served with mashed sweet potato and southern beans - some proper soul food (that we'd just learnt all about on Billy Connelly's route 66) - these beans were tasty having been fried up with some onion and peppers. Yum

Gaya (followed by Stavolta)
This was a bonding expereince - our team for the Pharonic Race were out to get to know each other and make a few decisions. Decisions made (i.e. who would run the first leg and what or team name would be....everything else we can sort out on the day!) we get down to some Special K Pork-ing! It was a rowdy night in Gaya - a Korean stag-do of sorts seemed to be in progress, but the food was good as always and a beer with your meal is never a problem.
After eating we did the right thing by walking by Stavolta - the boutique ice cream place that opened about six months ago. We try a few flavours out; hibiscus, cream, kiwi anyone? But then settle on a scoop of dark chocolate and a scoop of coconut (make your own Bounty bar!) for the walk home. Good times.

Brunch
And of course a brunch. Can't start the year off without a good brunch to get you going. This was a "thank you" brunch for the commune but was a treat all round as we'd been going on about the brunches you can get in Cairo for a while. Delicious as always, but it's so sad to think that for the majority of the time we were the only people there. The small custom doesn't mean they hold back at all with a huge table full of salads and starters (I nearly had half a plate of smoke salmon and the ceasar salad was good too) then a roast (Scotty's favourite bit!), freshly cooked spring rolls and dumplings, then a whole back row of main meals and another large table of individual deserts. I didn't think I'd excelled myself particularly this time, but apparently managed six plates to everyone elses five. Freshly made pasta is always a tough choice to make (so tasty, yet it's a carb) and Phil discovered the mushroom soup this time too. The only error was maybe our pause mid meal to talk - which allowed our food time to digest and our stomachs to realise that we were nearly full!
We did our best to follow Howard's rules though and hope we did him proud.

Top Tips: Theatres

Another nominated and published (but not winning) tip :-)
This week the theme was "theatre" and I nominated an amazing company whom we've seen perform twice at Sziget.

Pan.Optikum, Freiburg
Pan.Optikum create giant street theatre that happens all around you. You look in one direction and the actors are coming towards you on huge platforms, then you hear a voice behind you and another actor is climbing a back-lit scaffold structure. All this happens as an emotionally stirring soundtrack plays around you. Their productions include pyrotechnics, singing, cantilevers, acrobatics, lights, silhouettes, music, video and different languages; a sensory experience that cannot be matched. See them at home in Germany or catch them on tour.
gemeinnützige GmbH, Engesserstrasse 6, +49 761 503 9449, www.theater-panoptikum.de/index.php?id=1
Alip


http://www.guardian.co.uk/travel/2011/oct/04/readers-tips-theatres-round-world

Relentlessly Cheerful Art Fundraiser!

Last year we ordered some art from our fabulous friend, Jim Jeroo, but it got lost in the post between the US and the UK. He is such a lovely man that not only did he resend the prints to us, but he threw in some extras. That man!

Jim's little girl has been really unwell and so we decided to try and help them by organising a fundraising event at our apartment. His 'Hugs for Maddy' campaign had been raising money to fund a diagnostic exam that is only offered in two states in the US and insurance would not cover the trip or medical expenses, which would reach $25,000 Reading Maddy's story we really wanted to help, but seeing Jim's art we really wanted to promote that too.

So we had his signed prints, and invited friends around to bid on them in an open auction. We put a reserve price of 150LE for each framed print, and planned to close bidding at 7.15pm.We hoped to entice friends with the idea of seeing and possibly owning some of his brilliant art, and tasting (or possibly buying) some of our beers. We'd bee stocking up and had six cases of different beers ready. 

So Thursday came around and the Relentlessly Cheerful Art Fundraiser was nearly ready. We took down all the pictures we normally have in our living room and hung Jim's pieces instead. We then moved all the furniture around so that we had a large open space in the middle of the room (chairs hidden away in the spare room!) and we have to admit it did look pretty much like an art gallery! Then the fermenters came out and with a few ice packs in we split the beers around the room (on offer were Ale Ahram, Sauce of the Nile, Wheat for Yourself, Just One More, House Elfish and Hand Me Down). The final thing to get ready before the punters arrived was our specially brewed "Relentlessly Cheerful Cider" which was only just finishing fermenting (!) and so was mixed with some pre-bottled cider to get the best taste.  

So here is how things went down!

Welcome Back (Gig)

One For The Road (rebooted) were invited to play the BCA welcome back gig this year - pretty cool, eh?! We thought so too, until we realised that of course 'welcome back' means that it has to be at the start of the year!

It made a hectic start to term with just a week of inset and a week of kids before the Friday gig, but we managed it with a few evening rehersals and a Saturday afternoon too. To be honest it was actually quite a good thing to have the gig to focus on and give us a defnite distraction from work.

Our line-up changed a little this year as Ehab has joined us on percussion. He was persuaded to buy a cajon and his set-up included the cajon but also a side drum and cymbol. Hands, feet and brushes were all required to play (as well as socks!). Another new addition was Phil who was a newbie this year that we'd heard lots about; "an Irish music fanatic" apparently....well that we have to see! Phil managed to bring a lot of his instruments over - including pipes, a concertina, harmonica and a set of bones. Phil was great at just picking up what we were playing - we would start a tune and then he'd join in on the concertina for a bit, then swap to the harmonica and maybe the bones for a while too to see what fitted best! A very talented natural!

A last minute addition to the set was a song for Lynda, who's birthday it was. At Christmas we stuck into the set "Must Be Santa" which was great fun to play and sing, so we changed the lyrics to descirbe lovely Lynda! She really enjoyed it and was all smiles at having a song written and played just for her :-)

The set otherwise included our favourites of Little Boxes, Little Lion Man and Waterloo Sunset. We also included a reworked Danny Boy with the low whistle taking the melody and no vocals to let us all take a moment to think of Daniel who was resting up in hospital (Daniel normally sings the song too).

There are no photos that docment the night, but rest assured a good time was had by the band and by the audience. It was really nice to play for the newbies and some of the Irish contingent who came to the St Paddy's gig also came along when they heard we were playing. The evening also reminded us how out of practice we are to the heat here at the end of the summer! We were playing indoors and with only two standard ACs for the whole room we were soon dripping and the audience looked thin on the ground (when in fact they were in the corridors outside the room where there was more of a draft! Great night - now when is the next one?

Grauniad Travel Tip - Narrow Dog to Carcassonne

Narrow Dog to Carcassonne, by Terry Darlington

I love to travel slowly. This book describes the adventures of a family (Terry and Monica Darlington and their dog) as they travel by narrowboat across the Channel and then through the waterways of France. It closes with a stanza from a most beautiful poem: Ithaka by CP Cavafy (tinyurl.com/ithakacavafy). The poem describes how the journey and adventures on the way to Ithaka are more important than any destination. A great motto for anyone who loves travel, and one that inspired my husband and me to choose it as a reading at our wedding.

Alip

Not a winning tip, but was published (and deemed phot-worthy!) in the paper today :)