All week long there’s been so much talk about it, my attempt at seeking a way to escape was to no avail, it really got the crowds going. Egypt VS Algeria conquered roads&sidewalks, doors and windows, MSN and Facebook statuses, since they all showcase Egyptian flags, witty words and encouragements. Not to mention the people – drivers, sellers, neighbours, all the kids around here - basically everyone has been waiting for it anxiously. Apparently all people here share the same pre-match behavioural pattern. Cairenes, expats and tourists alike have had to put up with this atmosphere: really loud horn honking (I suspect it might blow out ears), lots and lots of flags (but they are really nice, in fact; and they're everywhere, sticking out from the cars’ windows, in childrens' hands, at Metro, on the walls, PAINTED on cars - yep, they’ve painted the flag of Egypt, it was not there a couple of days ago). And the neighbour’s kids have been driving me crazy with their songs – insert catchy drum tune here followed by MASR!
Well, it’s being broadcasted on TV right now, 1-0 for Egypt, but that’s not the point.
Ok, so yesterday I’ve seen a plethora of actors, singers, TV anchors and other people deemed to be famous in Egypt, they were all talking about the football match and encouraging The Pharaohs (The national team’s nickname). The Egyptians seem to harbour such bitter feelings towards Algeria. They said something about this on TV, but I could not get the grasp of it, the anchor was speaking way too fast. After resorting to the well-of-info-for-everything-Egy, my (poor) significant other, I understood that Egyptians need to win by three goals, otherwise – no qualification, bye-bye World Cup. And if they win by two goals, welcome to the playoff match. I’m not really into football, anyways, I blog about this cause they are broadcasting the match on T V and everything seems to have gotten to a hold here.
I have just started to get that autumn feeling. I do not have a lyrical soul, but I've just gotten a taste of Egypt's first autumn rain. It did not last long, but it was enough to satisfy my craving for it. I see the asphalt drying as we speak, but the sky looks rather gloomy. Guess what, it's raining again! Alhamdu lillah. I've been longing for rain since I left Romania and now I'm hearing raindrops falling for the first time in months!!! This means that I have to switch out clothes in my closet for autumn. It goes the same for the warm climate cosmetic products, someone is going to be so busy organizing stuff. And shopping! In sha Allah.
Later edit: after an unexpected burst of cleaning frenzy the house looks spotless, as if it’s not lived in. Since I have nothing better to do right now and I have to behave, cause al-Amir is sleeping (and I’m so accident-prone whenever I tiptoe around and strive not to make too much noise), here’s a pic showing you what Egyptian women favour when it comes to home cleaning:
It’s the good old and highly effective Dettol, it turned into the most important part of my cleaning-around-the-house habits. I am pondering whether I should take some with me when I go back to Romania, I grew so accustomed to its antiseptic fragrance that it seems to me no other product would do the job properly. Since Dettol is supposed to disinfect everything, I only use an all purpose universal detergent besides it. And what else we have – Windex, it seems to be the local version of Clin. And I should stock on it, cause Egyptian houses have so many glass topped tables, mirrors, shutters, sliding doors – and it’s a must have in every household.
Case in point: a plethora of (racist) commercials advertising cosmetic products that contain skin lightening agents. Most of them are featuring obviously Caucasian looking models. Unhappy because of your ‘dark’ skin colour? Chill, here’s the solution: use our skin lightening products and you’re not going to be a wall-flower anymore, you’ll be marriage material and you might also get the job of your dreams.
How to make such a commercial (yay, just check the ‘storyline’): cam focused on a girl’s face (she must be Caucasian, so the producer must use some special effects to make her skin look dull and obviously not-white-enough). Then he has to make sure she seems really unhappy because of her skin colour, since no one is aware of her existence and she is just sitting there, in a corner, socially rejected. Give the girl some face cream (or - even better - allow a ‘white’ & ‘successful’ friend to recommend it to her) – but be careful, it must read WHITE on it. The word combination is not very important, use whatever fancies you, but do not forget about the white thingy. Ok, then we get to the point when she uses the cream for the first time and as a consequence - people actually start to look at her… wait, it’s more intense, they stare like a bunch of freaks (men and women; they gasp in amazement when they see the white girl, sheeesh, where did they find women willing to play this part?! The staring&gasping part, I mean! It’s blatant racism), they are able to see that she is there, cause she has become whiter. This must be some miraculous product, so she keeps dabbing her fingers in the cream and spreading it on her face. The whiter she gets, the more attention she receives. Then she meets a guy who cannot take his eyes off her, strangely mesmerized by her white skin. And instead of telling that guy ‘Go away, superficial weirdo, you pervert!!!’ she sheepishly smiles to the cam. Or she shakes hands with her future employer, perfecting the deal, instead of telling him ‘You moron, skin colour has nothing to do with people’s intellectual abilities!’. End of commercial, everybody is happy. Except for the ‘dark’ skinned people, that is. Because they are being spoon-fed the idea that there must be something wrong with them. Shooo, go to get that cream, it will fix all your problems, duuuh!
And these commercials do reach their targets, mark my word for it. I have seen all these products in pharmacies and supermarkets, I’ve heard girls asking about them and I’ve seen people buying such things. I did not know that there’s a whole industry manufacturing products designed to lighten your natural skin colour. Of course I was aware that there are some face creams ‘committed’ to this purpose, but I did not expect to see that they’ve thrown on the market whitening scrub, soap, shower gel and body lotion. And I’ve just narrowed down the essential items most women need to perform their beauty routine. Their ‘whitening’ versions run on the borderline of racism, but (moral aspect put aside) the main problem is rooted in their ingredients, because most of them contain hydroquinone, able to cause irreparable damage to the skin, although they try to underline other components’ efficiency, such as Vitamin C, claiming they are the ones to do the trick. I do not think that these products are here to fill a market demand, because it’s obvious that most of these commercials try to induce the idea that skin colour lightening is on high priority, so that people might achieve what they long for: marriage, job, success and so forth. Don’t bite it, approach this in a safer way: go for an at least 15 SPF sunscreen, avoid sun exposure for the sake of your health and be happy with the skin colour Allah Subhanu Wa Ta’ala gave you!
I have another problem with some of the commercials around here, the ones featuring Muhagabas (women who don the hijab), but that’s another rant in itself, plus I have to research some more on this topic.
‘Would you trade your (not-so-great) one year old laptop for a brand new one?’
‘Mmm, but it looks in mint condition, we’ve been through thin and thick together, I have been upgrading it all this time and I also brought along nice fluffy extras, I grew so attached to it’.
Yes, I love my old laptop (not so old, in fact, I’ve been using it for one year and a couple of months). We’ve been through two car accidents together (Alhamdu lillah), and after the second one it did not respond very well, I had to fix it a little, but hey, it works just fine now! Not to mention how stupid and careless I used to be – for instance I left it in the trunk of the car for three (whole) rainy days, it never occurred to me that moisture would condense inside it. Stupid leather laptop bag that allows no ventilation (why go for leather anyway, I love animals!!! I received that laptop bag as a gift, but I do not think I am going to use it anymore). Oh, and when I found it all drenched inside there I was so upset that my significant other decided to offer me a Fujitsu Siemens - Alhamdu lillah - (in grey; lighter than my old laptop; superior technology; I’ve been using it for almost three months, but toying with it does not grant me that warm-fluffy-fuzzy feeling inside).
So I am stuck with two laptops and the possibility of selling the older one and putting the money towards a smaller&lighter notebook/laptop that might come in pink (that’s when I cringed), with rounded edges and an up-to-date configuration that would make me look tech savvy. I did what I usually do in such situations, I asked my brother ‘What to doooooo?’. His answer? – ‘Ehhh, women! Go for it, you know very well that technology is advancing at such a blistering speed, you must give up on it, get the new one, don’t grow attached to laptops and PCs, duuuuh! Just think how many things you can do with the new one, everything will work on it, games will be running at the speed of light!’. ‘Ughhh, but I do not play games, I need Internet connection and Microsoft Office…’ ‘Whatever!!!’. So that sums it up. When I was at home, I did not have to deal with such issues, my brother took care of trading our older gadgets all the time, so that we might enjoy more battery power and storage capacity, have fun while searching and learning the new positions of USB ports (yes, this might be misleading and tricky when switching to a new brand, after having used products from another company for a long time) and so forth. That reminds me how frustrating it was to work on a Dell brought from the US, the keyboard layout is different in comparison to the standard version we have in Europe, and that caused so many spelling mistakes, cause the Enter key did not span on two rows and I was constantly hitting this - \ - too bad that I had to give up on it just when I managed to use it properly.
So - getting a new laptop seems a good idea, because if I keep this one I know that I am going to give it away or sell it for an insignificant amount of money, it has been known to happen, no surprise. I feel sad because we’ve been through so much together and it never let me down (except for that time when the Windows crashed and I lost all the data, including a translation I was working on, without any possibility to recover it). I am aware that this attachment is too superficial to be useful, so in a bid to be rational I’ll go for the swap.
I’ve been busy lately, but not with soap-opera worthy things, all gone, Alhamdu lillah, I am just basking in a spectrum of calmness and serenity I've been longing for and craving badly for a long time. Alhamdu lillah for everything!
Anyway, I am going to blog about the things I do not like here for a starter. And we have a winner: traffic ranks supreme!!! Before I came here, I was aware that traffic is a big issue in Egypt. I know that they say ‘if you can drive in Cairo, it means you can drive anywhere else in the world’. Guess what, I disagree! Risking your life, the passengers’ lives and the other traffic participants’ safety does not really make you a good driver. I got a taste of their driving style soon after the plane hit the tarmac, because getting my visa and finding my bags took little time, Alhamdu lillah. But all I had previously read about the driving style here could not have prepared me for the scariest taxi ride of my life. It was 4 AM and the roads were crowded. Fancy cab, relaxed driver, total disregard when it comes to sticking to common-sense rules, speed limit or positioning the vehicle on the (right) lane. He did not slow down to pass over speed-bumps (oh, so many here) or take a turn, not to mention the squeezing into small spaces between other cars. Petrified, I kept asking myself whether he holds a (valid) driver license; but my hosts, who were riding along, looked serene, contemplating the view and calmly answering my questions, amidst all that horn honking – so it hit me – that’s just the normal way of driving round here. Cooled down, recited some short Sooras and then - snap - safely reached destination, Alhamdu lillah. There was more to come, because I got a taste of the bumper to bumper traffic during daytime, sometimes it takes like forever to get from one place to another. And yes, Cairo is really-really big and full of people…
On the other hand, their infrastructure is great and the asphalted roads are way better than the Romanian ones, chapeau bas!
Pedestrian issues - during my first days here, I was terrified to cross the street (lame, but I never risk uselessly). I did not venture alone, nooo, but the Egyptian pedestrians have a certain way of crossing the street, and I did not manage to get a grip on it yet. So whenever I go out alone, I stay on the sidewalk and I wait until the traffic seems less congested or till I spot a slow moving vehicle and I cross. Sometimes the drivers invite me to pass, I guess they think I am nuts to run and get in front of a vehicle that does not seem to slow down… I love rules and I abide by them, there are laws imposing speed limits, there are rules for pedestrians - why not stay on the safe side?!
Driver issues - of course, at a certain point I was tempted to drive and I made a first attempt at it. But with almost inexistent traffic lights and lane markers (especially in smaller cities, because I thought it wold be easier to go straight ahead, since I do not know Cairo and I cannot find my way around the city), I never know if I am allowed to turn left, not to mention the U-turns that are killing me. When I drove through the small cities it got even worse, I never knew whether I have to give right of way… Usually the drivers horn to state their intention, but I do not get it how is this possible – so, you are coming from a secondary road, making your way into one of the lanes of the main way, and if I’m driving straight ahead on the main way - you expect me to give you the right of way?! Just because you horned when turning left? I do not think so, it is beyond logic!!! I did not cause any traffic jams so far (gasp!), but I got some weird looks (hey, I’ve seen that) and some bad words (I guess…).
Then there’s a deep contrast between the brand new cars and the (extremely) old ones, sometimes I stop and I gaze at certain oldies that catch my eye, I’m shocked to see that they are still functioning! I used to work as assistant editor for an auto magazine a couple of years ago and I cannot help staring at (some) cars since then. I have also noticed that most carmakers give a different model name for the products they commercialize here, in comparison to what I’ve seen in Europe (in most European countries they get on the market under the same name and we all know them like that, rarely do they undertake this type of badge engineering). For instance the Hyundai Lavita is known as Matrix in Europe, Hyundai Verna (extremely popular here) is Hyundai Accent in Europe and so forth. I’ve seen a lot of cars from Mitsubishi (especially the Lancer) and Honda (the Civic, of course; but only the Sedan version, the three / five door model is just for Europe, awww, I just love that hatchback – if you ask me ‘What’s your favourite car?’ I’m gonna say this without even trying to catch my breath: Honda Civic Hatchback, five doors model, 2006, black!!! I love it, I love it – but do you know how much gas it takes to fill its tank?! A lot, it’s such a high maintenance car for my budget, anyway it would make it a lot tighter than I care to deal with, see, I’m planning ahead, cause getting the car is not the most difficult part, maintenance kills us all -siiigh- ok, move on, honey!) – as I was saying, Egyptians seem to be really keen on these cars.
And I said ‘most carmakers’ because of course it’s not the case when we talk about BMW or Peugeot, for instance, who use the same numbers as in Europe in order to brand their products, so does Audi, while Mercedes has always used alphanumeric names for their marques, so their products have the same names anywhere in the world (@Mel & to whom it may concern: I am Romanian and I can rant only (a tiny bit) about what we usually have on the European market, ok… I’ve no clue about the system US carmakers use, but maybe you can shed some light on it). I'm still thinking about that awsome little car. Rant off…
P.S.: I'm going to post some pics as soon as I find the cable for my camera.
June and July were very happening months, to say the least! June was the determinative one for sure, because it changed everything: location, goals, priorities etc. In a nutshell, it went like this: the things that were keeping me in Bucharest were lessening, personal discomfort was on the rise, so the right thing to do was pack&leave, cause my nature does not allow me to just burst, cool for the moment and then stand still waiting for ‘miracles’ to happen and things to improve. No, I believe that what went wrong once, twice and thrice – will keep spinning this way. Wrong, that is! Almost all the people around me, including some of my ‘friends’, did a great job at making me feel hopeless, over-filling my mind with their insecurities and dismays. I seem to naturally attract people with problems, seeking my understanding and compassion, a shoulder to cry on, but I got to that point where I refused to absorb their negative energy. And fragile and precious as I am, why would I put up with this and let it affect me? So I just snapped out of it and it was the best thing I could do, Alhamdu lillah. Beware and behold, there are evil people out there, willing to cause you harm completely uncalled for and without any remorse. It’s amazing how much I learned from the situations that came across my life lately, Alhamdu lillah. And I forgave them, even those people I wish I had never crossed paths with. Because right before the first day of Ramadan I felt the need to clean my heart. Alhamdu lillah. But I crossed them off my list. And I really do believe in this, X-ing and pretending not to be aware of their existence is the best thing to do sometimes.
So after peeling away (part of) the pain, packing the essentials, giving away stuff and throwing a lot of things (sigh!) I was ready to leave. My policy was not the best approach, everything was so sudden and most of my acquaintances were shocked when hearing how I chose to deal with this, but stubborn as I am, the moment I made up my mind – I just did it. I had no plans, I just went, but who needs plans, anyway?! Had I had any plan, I am sure I would have ended up feeling unorganized and unprepared, because I always think too much and seldom am I satisfied with what I manage to pull out. Ok, full of mixed emotions – but first of all feeling blessed and relieved – Alhamdu lillah for everything, I ended up in another city. Everything went smooth, because no matter where you are, you'll always be what you are (modesty kicks in again, yes, I love myself). And then things fell into place in a way I never imagined, Subhan Allah, nothing happens too early or too late… To be continued, cause I feel my English has gotten a bit rusty, so I should brush on it a little.
First of all, a rather belated Ramadan mubarak to all the Muslims who happen to drop by my blog (as late as I might be, but better late than never). May Allah Subhanu Wa Ta'ala accept our fast, prayers and good deeds.
Awww, Sarah woke up as a happy camper today! Alhamdu lillah, I received a package this morning, in good order, yes, yes, yes - 20 hijabs, three prayer outfits, hijab pins (in black and white), colourful underscarves and siwak (some sort of natural toothbrush) - sent all the way from Jordan. Now I just have to distribute them to sisters who are in need of such items, In sha Allah. May Allah Subhanu Wa Ta'ala reward our sisters from Jordan for everything that they've done, In sha Allah, Ameen ya Rabb. Yes, and all in all, I'm happy, Alhamdu lillah!
Yay, I've been missing my blog! From now on I'm going to upload many many pics, In sha Allah! So I guess the page will take like forever to load... Just kidding, but I do carry the cam everywhere I go and taking the weirdest shots!
Lots of changes: working full-time and loving it, I'm considering getting a divorce, I am sleepless though I'm so tired, chain-smoking although I feel sick whenever my eyes fall on the pack of cigarettes, confused, guilty, under the weather, worried, naive and that sums it up. Alhamdu lillah, I have plans for the future, I'm waiting for my eeman (faith) to go uuup again, In sha Allah! Speaking of plans, I have a meeting to attend tomorrow morning, but somehow I cannot sleep, though I am aware that I need it despreately. Work spread ahead of me, as usual, but of course I do not feel like working. I should just hit the 'Publishing post' button and head to bed. And that's what I'm gonna do, but I'll be back In sha Allah.
Nattering of a girl trying to find her way in life
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About Me
SARAH
Muslima by choice, Alhamdulillah, intelectually very curious, exuberant, hyper, yet sooo shy, but sometimes acting like a drama queen with too many labels to count...
