Category: Cultural Differences

Categories
Cultural Differences Politics

Democracy

I have been following the elections in Egypt semi-closely.

I have read 2 comments that gave me pause. I wanted to share them.

The first was from a friend of a friend. She was riding in a taxi. Apparently, it is very common to have a taxi driver ask
“Who are you voting for” during the ride.
This woman had, to her, a surprisingly in depth and intelligent conversation about the issues with the taxi driver.

The taxi driver could tell that she was surprised by his insights. He replied:

I maybe illiterate, but I am not stupid.

Another was a tweet from a woman working in a polling station. The woman was wearing a veil on her face. When asked which candidate she was casting her vote for, she replied: Sabahi.

The poller was surprised that the woman in the veil was not voting for one of the Islamist candidates and said so.

The woman replied:

The veil is upon my face, not my mind.

Categories
Being home Cultural Differences

Not in Cairo anymore…

Another one of those reminders about how different things are here. Not always better, not always worse, just different.

Yesterday I went to the pharmacy to get a prescription filled. The nice lady behind the counter checked and they did not have the item I required.

She offered to phone the pharmacy across the street to see if they had it.

I said that would be great and that I would do some other shopping while she did that.

I go through the store to get the other items I needed and returned to the pharmacy window.

The nice lady says:

Yes, they have it across the street. Here is your prescription.

and she handed me the doctors prescription sheet and smiled.

I blinked.

I blinked again.

Then it dawned on me.

They are not going to send “a boy” scurrying across the street to fetch my medication for me.

I WAS GOING TO HAVE TO WALK OVER THERE MYSELF. IN THE RAIN.

ay da?!

And this is supposedly a civilized country!

harumph.

Categories
Cultural Differences

Bye Bye piggies

Swine flu paranoia strikes Cairo, Egypt.

Pigs to be slaughtered.

and

Slaughtering has already started

Yes there are pigs in Egypt. Many of them. They are usually raised by the Christian garbage recyclers. They are used to turn garbage into protein.

The meat is available in some stores, butchers and restaurants. It isn’t the best pork I have ever had, but it is tolerable. Except the bacon. The bacon, from at least one store, tastes like fishmeal wrapped in saran wrap.

Anyway…

It is unclear to me whether or not the meat will be destroyed or just butchered and sold as it normally is.

I doubt with the paranoia about this that the meat will be sold. Especially since the government has closed at least one pig butchery in Alexandria.

It will be interesting to see if all the pigs are butchered and if this overwhelmingly Muslim state will allow pigs back into Egypt or if this will be used as an excuse to ban the animals.

Edit: May 2nd. Yesterday, we went to our favorite pizza place, Maison Thomas. It is own and operated by Coptic Christians and normally sells pork products, both as groceries (ie: a rack of pork chops, sliced ham etc) and on pizza. We were told “No pork products.”

I was unable to determine if this was a voluntary withdrawal of their pork offerings or if they were ordered to do so, or  if they were just unable to obtain pork.

I find it hard to believe that pork is no longer available due to the slaughter.

Categories
Cultural Differences The Ordinary

Fulfilling a promise

(not one of mine)

A Egyptian Coptic friend of ours invited us to attend the baptism of his son Bishoy. We were delighted.

He told us he would pick us up in his car and drive with us to where the bus would pick us up.

A bus? It turns out he had arranged a bus for all his family and friends and we all rode up together to the monastery.

The monastery in question is is St. Bishoy’s monastery about 1.5 hours outside of Cairo.

We had expected to go to a local church for the baptism, but ma’lesh.

We rode up to the monastery and we disgorged from the bus. This was on Friday. In Egypt, many Coptic churches have their services on Friday. Since Friday is the Muslim Sabbath, many businesses are closed (at least in the morning) and it is just easier to have the services the same day that the rest of the country is “down” for Sabbath.

The monastery is set a little way out of the near by town. It is walled in and has one main large church and at least one other side chapel that, apparently, used for baptisms.

We sat in on the big main service, which seemed to be one continuous service. Every time we peaked our heads in, it was still going on. We were there for about 4 or 5 hours.

The baptism was fairly short. They stripped the baby, dunked him, fished him out and dressed him in some snazzy duds.

baby bishoy

Afterwards one of the English speaking priests chatted with us and we got a short tour of the place. We had a nice picnic lunch.

The interesting part, to me anyway is this:

As we were sitting around after eating I was talking to Samah, father of Bishoy, about the day. I said

This is kind of far from Cairo to go to a baptism. I realize that your son is named Bishoy and this is the monastery of St. Bishoy, do most families go to the church or monastery of their child’s namesake for the baptism?

He replied:

Well, no. For 2 years we try and no baby come. So I make a prayer to Saint Bishoy, that if he gives us a baby, I will name him Bishoy and have the baptism here with all my family. So….

and he shrugged. He was beaming, like he is in that photo. Proud, happy, tired, relieved and grateful to his God and Saint Bishoy. It was completely unaffected.

Sometimes, I envy faith like that.

Categories
Cultural Differences

I have a bad case of Mono.

No, not “the kissing disease”.

I suffer from mono-culturalism. (is that a word?).

i live in a mono-culture within a mono-culture.

Egypt is the larger mono-culture.

  • Religion. The vast majority of residents are Muslim. I have nothing against Islam. I don’t find it any more or less “fanciful” than Christianity, Judaism, Buddhism, or Zoroastrianism.
  • “Lifestyles.” While having more than one wife (at a time) could be viewed as alternative to the western mainstream, the day-to-day SAME-ness of things is getting to me. Coming from a place with a certain level of diversity (Seattle) to here is a bit jarring.
  • Homogeneous population. Hair color, eye color, skin color, hair texture, “porn star” mustaches. It all blends together.
  • Cuisine. There isn’t a lot of variety in the cuisine. There is an appalling lack of “ethnic” food. Or rather an appalling lack of appealing ethnic food. There is plenty of bad “italian” and worse “chinese”. One can only eat so much schwerma and kofta.

And then my social life is a smaller mono-culture within the larger context.

It is also rather homogeneous, though I suspect several people would object strenuously to that generalisation. (Too bad. Get your own blog!)

  • Professors. How many times can you discuss cheating, lazy students etc and still have it be interesting? I mean really. Branch out. Go out on a limb. Talk about something else. ANYTHING else. Please.
  • Politics. (Ok, so maybe almost anything else) Most people seem to be fairly liberal big “d” democrats. Like most people back home in Seattle. I have nothing against that. I think their earnestness is so cute. But, like most people in Seattle, living here gives them a distorted view of the political landscape. “EVERYBODY they know is voting for Obama. It is going to be a LANDSLIDE“. I am sorry to say that I think they are mistaken about the outcome in November. (Assuming, and I quote, Obama manages to keep “that woman” from “stealing” the nomination.)
  • Race. Most of the American faculty are Caucasian. Not a big surprise, as most Americans are Caucasian. And most American college faculty are Caucasian. But it is still strange to me that there aren’t more minority faculty members.

The one place that the faculty has great diversity is in their travel. The people here have traveled quite a bit and have seen more of the world than most people. Talking to them about that is fascinating.

So what is the cure for Mono? Rest. Drink lots of fluids.

Well, 1 out of 2 ain’t bad.

Categories
Cultural Differences

What is this “off the clock” of which you speak?

Working hours are long here in Cairo.

It is completely normal to have a Doctor schedule an appointment at 9 or 10pm. That same Doctor will give you his mobile phone number and you can pretty much call it anytime you like.

Lectures of visiting professors and other “people of interest” at the university and other research centers often start at 8 or 9pm.

There is little if any concept of being “off the clock”.

While this can be very handy if you are on the consuming side of these services, it is a royal pain when you are expected to be providing these services.

Students expect teachers to list home and mobile numbers on the syllabus. As well as personal email addresses.

Many instructors here do just that.

A closed office door just means “knock once and then walk in without waiting for acknowledgment.” When I need to work in Kaddee’s office, I lock the door. People will knock and try to enter. Then they will knock again and rattle the door knob.

It is, apparently, incomprehensible that one would lock one’s door while trying to get work done.

So why do I bring this up now? The good doctor was notified, on Sunday, that she was expected to have a presentation ready for Tuesday, to give on Friday at a mandatory faculty retreat.

She will board a bus Friday morning (Friday and Saturday being her days off), ride for 3 hours to a “beach side resort” (on the Suez Canal. Lovely view of tankers). Then spend 2 days in a room giving and listening to presentations.

Then back on the bus to Cairo. Should get home around 10pm Saturday.

Of course, this is the end of the semester, so luckily there aren’t tons of exams, homeworks, lab reports or papers to grade. Or finals to write. Or schedules for next semester to hammer out.

And that whole being prepared for lecture is over-rated anyway.

BUT, it’s all ok, cause they are going to feed her (2 whole meals: dinner Friday, breakfast Saturday. The bus leaves “before dinner time” so they don’t need to feed her then) *AND* she gets to take her spouse. (ahem). So its not like she has any right to complain.

PFers.

Welcome in Egypt.

Categories
Cultural Differences Out and about The Ordinary

Ramadan Kareem

(which roughly means “Happy Ramadan”)

As has been written by any number of bloggers and others, Ramadan can be a stressful time. 12 hours or so of no food, no water, no caffeine, no sex, no nicotine (all those things that make like worth living) can make one irritable.

There is a great deal of lamenting in the local press about how “Ramadan just isn’t the same as when I was a child….”

People are more materialistic. They are too stressed about keeping up with the Joneses (El Din’s?) in regards to their Iftar spread.

People were kinder to people on the street

People knew what the meaning of Ramadan REALLY was…

The traffic is SO much worse these days

All in all, it sounds a lot like the grumblings one can hear and read in the Western press about how people have “lost the meaning of Christmas” in all the commercialism.

Apparently everything was skittles and ice cream in the old days.

Anyway, some of the taxi drivers we encounter are Coptic. Some of them are rather sarcastic about Ramadan. They will point to shouting matches and fights on the streets, smirk, say “Ramadan Kareem” and shake their heads.

And fights on the street are common towards the end of the day. Most fights in Egypt in general are little more than slap-fights with a bunch of shoving. Strangers will rush in to stop a fight before it gets serious. I am not sure if that is function of the over-crowding here, or some other aspect of the culture.

What it means is that one can be fairly confident that if one were to get into a scuffle, one would only get to throw (or receive) one punch. One could extrapolate that to mean that is one of the reasons that scuffles happen so frequently, because people know the chances of real physical harm is minimal. It allows a blow off of steam in a (mostly) harmless fashion.

Don’t get me wrong, you don’t see fights “all the time” here. But I have seen more fights broken up on the streets here then I have in any period of my life, with the possible exception of junior high school 🙂

People were more cranky than usual the other day. On a taxi ride from campus to Zamalek (about 10 minutes drive, about a 40minute walk) I saw 3 separate fights.

The first involved 2 taxi drivers. I was moving past this one, so I did not see it in detail.

The 2nd involved drivers of private vehicles: both cars stopped and blocked traffic while they shouted and pushed at each other for a while.

Then the drivers got back in their respective cars, continuing to jabber at each other. Then they got BACK out of their cars for more nose-to-nose yelling. At which point the police came over and sent them on their way, mostly because they were completely blocking traffic.

The 3rd fight was in among a crowd outside the local post office.

It was this 3rd fight that prompted my Coptic taxi driver to wryly wish them a “Ramadan Kareem”

Categories
Cultural Differences

Ramadan II, this time it’s personal.

This is our 2nd Ramadan here in Egypt. However, it is new in some ways.

Last year, when we arrived, Ramadan started about 3 weeks after we arrived. People talked about the crazy traffic and the tiredness of folks that made it difficult to get things done, and the noise at night.

When we arrived last year, the traffic all looked insane, getting ANYTHING done took a ridiculous amount of people AND time, and the streets were always noisy with traffic and people.

When Ramadan arrived, the only real difference I noticed was that you could manage to get from one end of town to the other in about 10 minutes just before, during, and after iftar. [If you could find a taxi, that is.]. And everything was closed from about 2 hours before Iftar to about an hour after.

Looking back, all this was because we didn’t have a baseline of “normal” yet for Cairo. When you are still trying to figure out how things work and a major disruption like Ramadan comes along, it can be hard to see the forest for the trees.

This year is different. We have adapted to what passes for normal in Cairo. This year, the disruption of Ramadan is much more noticeable. Don’t get me wrong, I enjoy the positive aspects of it as well, but we now see how different the days and nights really are.

Categories
Cultural Differences

Mabruuk Nadr and Georgette!

We almost blew it, but we were invited to a wedding.

One of the bartenders, Nadr, at a club (The British Community Association) we frequent spoke to me last week. He said that he was getting married this Thursday and he would like to invite us. I was very happy for him and congratulated him. He took out a piece of paper and started to give us the info. But then the club got very busy and I did not get a chance to talk to him again that evening. This was on a Thursday. I assured him that we would be back Friday and we could talk then.

Friday came and went, and we never made it back to the club that night. We were there Saturday, but Nadr was not working that night. We were next there on Monday night. Nadr seemed a little miffed. I had said I would be there Friday to get the directions to his wedding and I did not show. I don’t know if he thought I was avoiding him or what. But I made it a point to speak with him Monday night and congratulate him again on his upcoming wedding. I apologized for not being at the club Friday night.

That seemed to ease the strain and he then asked again if we could go. I said of course and directions were obtained.

The BCA is a bar, restaurant and club house kind of place. They serve alcohol and pork products. Every one of the staff, afaict, are Coptic. [Coptic’s are the Egyptian branch of Christianity. Similar to the Greek Orthodox branch. But the Egyptians, naturally, feel that the Coptic religion is the TRUE Christianity. After all, monasticism started in Egypt. And Jesus and the Holy Family hid out in Egypt for a while. And the Coptics consider themselves the guardians of Christianity from heresy. Anyway]. While some Muslims are tolerant of alcohol use, especially by non-Muslims, very few are tolerant of pork products. No “good” Muslim would work in a place like the BCA].

Now, what does one wear to a Coptic wedding? Does one bring a gift? If there a reception? How long does it take?

Well, Thursday night we found out.

The wedding was about an hour long. All in Egyptian Arabic, and some Coptic. [Parts of the liturgy are still recited in a dialect of Coptic]. It was a rare display of efficiency that is really witnessed in Egypt. The weddings were planned back-to-back-to-back.

We arrived at 7:30 and there was a wedding going on. While the wedding was proceeding in the central nave, minions were scurrying and setting up arbors and flowers etc in a side nave. When the wedding was over, the wedding party is funneled out the side door to a small area. This area is where the receiving line is staged and the photographers take photos with the bride and groom and guests.

While the wedding party is exiting, the previous arbor is removed, the new arbor is deployed, the flowers and white runners are deployed in the central aisle. The next wedding is set to go.

It literally was the single most efficient logistical deployment I have seen in my time in Egypt. If the rest of the country ran this well, it would be a site to behold.

So after that first wedding was over, I went outside to try and snap a few photos of Nadr’s bride, Georgette arriving. I ran into Nadr. He was a very nervous looking young man. :-). But we was SO HAPPY that we made it. He really was just so pleased. It is hard to explain and it makes me sound like I am bragging, but he really was surprised and pleased to see me and asked about Kaddee. I told him that she was inside and that we were very happy to be invited.

We then went inside for the wedding. It is an interesting ceremony. There is a lot of sit down, stand up, chanting, singing, ululating. Guests walk up onto the altar during the ceremony to take photos with their cameras and cell phones, children are running around.

The bride and groom get a cape and a gold crown to wear.

The couple before them looked terrified. Nadr had a smile on his face the entire time. Georgette started out looking terrified, but she relaxed and smiled as things got started.

One thing that we had been “warned” about was that as obvious foreigners, we would be featured in videos and photos.

In the previous wedding, we went inside to watch to figure the protocol. The wedding is videotaped, and the videographer walked up and down the aisle panning across the guests. He spent a LOT of time on Kaddee and I and the other foreigners. We chuckled. I do wonder, when that couple watches their video, if they say “Who are those khwagate(foreigners)?”. We could hire ourselves our as official wedding foreigners.

The same thing happened during Nadr’s wedding. We got a lot of “face time”.

After the wedding, we went outside to shake hands with the bride and groom. ALL the foreigners got their picture taken by the official photographer with the bride and groom. I have been told that it is kind of a big deal to have a foreigner at your wedding. Not sure why, but it sure seemed that way.

Anyway, there was no reception that we were aware of anyway. There were about 10 or so folks from the BCA that had gone to the wedding, so we all met back there for a few drinks.

Oh, yes I almost forgot. I was using my little point and shoot to record the sound of the ululating in the church when I caught this amusing little vignette.

Categories
Cultural Differences The Ordinary

It takes a village, a taxi driver and somebody’s mom

It is Ramadan. I only mention this because it means that traffic is much worse than normal during certain times of the day.

During one such busy time I was sitting in a taxi on a side street. We sat there for some time. While sitting there, I saw a scene that reminded me of growing up. What follows also greatly reminded me of my childhood.

I see 2 boys fighting. I saw the entire fight develop from start to finish. More on that later.
My taxi driver looks over to the sidewalk and sees these 2 boys fighting.

One short, scrawny looking kid with glasses. Maybe 6 or 7 years old. Let us call him Mido.

One taller, beefy kid. Maybe 9 or 10 years old. Let us call him Achmed.

They are in that stage of the fight, familiar to all boys as “the hold”. Neither is really swinging at the other or inflicting any damage. They are just kind of hanging on to each other and pushing.

The taxi driver yells at them to stop. They ignore him. He looks around and sees a woman of indeterminate age and of large proportions, wearing a headscarf and an abaya similar to this one. She, and women like her, are an ubiquitous sight on the streets of Cairo. He says something to her and points at the boys.

She reacts in almost comic book fashion: The eyes go wide, the mouth opens and then closes in a look of grim determination. She storms over to the other side of the street and starts berating the boys.

Neither one lets go of the other. She forces them apart and then proceeds [I am guessing here based on the scene and the body language and gestures of everyone involved] to yell at the larger boy,Achmed for picking on the little kid, Mido. She is yelling at him and smacking him on the back of the neck. [Here, hitting someone on the back of the neck is a humiliating gesture. One used to punish, berate or otherwise display dominance. It is not as insulting as showing someone the bottom of your shoe or hitting them with the shoe, but it is up there]. She says waves the the little kid, Mido, off.

The boys disperse, the larger boy being chased by a flurry of invective from the woman.

Mission accomplished, she walks back to the other side of the street and exchanges some pleasantries with the taxi driver. They share a laugh and the contentment of “having done the right thing.”

This reminded me of my childhood in that it was very common for strangers to question, and correct, the behavior of children that they did not know or knew only as being from the neighborhood. Many people would have no problem with breaking up a fight between 2 kids and demanding to be brought to the parents so that the parents could be informed of “these shenanigans.”

It happened to me and my friends more times than I could count.

I wonder if the same thing is still done in the US? Someone I doubt it.

The other part of this story that reminded me of my childhood was this:

I saw the entire fight. Because of the placement of vehicles and sight lines, the taxi driver could not.

The little kid, Mido, started it. Or at least started the aggression. I am sure there was some provoking event/word or score to settle, real or imagined.

But Mido ran up behind the big kid, Achmed, and started punching him in the back of the head and the back. Achmed turned around and tried to grab hold of Mido to stop the blows. Mido was then able to squirm free and punch Achmed in the face. Achmed was then able to pin Mido’s arms to stop the onslaught. He would hold him and say something to him and then let him go.

Mido would stand there and glare at Achmed. Achmed would then turn around and start to walk away. He would get about 2 steps, and Mido would renew the attack.

This repeated itself 2 more times before the taxi driver notices. By then Achmed had pinned Mido’s arms again and was, it appeared, reluctant to let him go, again.

But when “justice” was served, Achmed must have felt that he got treated unfairly. And no one can cry “that’s not fair!” like a child.

I wonder if he thought to himself “Where was that crazy old woman when Mido was punching me in the back of the head? I shouldda just smacked the crap out of Mido. I wouldda been out of there before anybody noticed.”

Ed donya kiddah. [Which is, roughly speaking, the Egyptian phrase for “C’est la vie”]