Saturday, October 23

Ramadan has proved interesting. From my point of view, (which is most likely not the point of view of Muslims), the day revolves around the iftar or "break fast." When the evening prayer comes on at 5:18 everyone stops what they are doing to eat. They are very serious about eating right when the prayer starts. The streets are almost empty. It's very weird because the streets of Cairo are always packed.

So far, I have had iftar with two Muslim families and it has been great. They serve lots of great food, and the meal is always followed by sweets. We didn't like the sweets at first, but then we discovered that they were liquid sugar and very delicious. We are having to keep ourselves from going to buy them. Joe's favorite is the kanafa. It's like shredded wheat but then it's soaked in honey and sugar. Usually it has some sort of cream or nuts with it. It's very good. It's pure liquid sugar to your bloodstream.

Great news! We are living the high-life. We now have a maid. I didn't want to get one at first. I thought it would be money we didn't need to spend, and that we didn't need it, but man, was I wrong! The maid did an awesome job. She lifted rugs, moved furniture, scrubbed the floor, cleaned the windows, etc., etc., etc. I never do all that. I told Joe I'm a bad woman! As soon as I saw the apartment after she cleaned it, I decided it is very much worth it. The price tag for five hours of work - 30 L.E. which translates into 5 U.S. dollars. You cannot beat that. Thank you, Egypt. It's great to live somewhere where it is economical to have these services. I've started tutoring a student in English so we are getting some extra income from that. It makes it much easier to justify the maid.

Other than this, we have just been taking it easy. We're getting close to the end of our first term of school. It seems like time is flying. Before we know it, the beginning of the new year will be here.