Blood and Shisha
Last Saturday we journeyed to downtown Cairo for our mandatory AIDS test. Egypt requires all foreign workers to give a blood sample as it is illegal to work here if you’re infected. The Health Ministry building we waited in was not the epitome of fashion, cleanliness, or comfort (only a few chairs were available for waiting, and the place was very crowded), and some in our party soon began to panic about how the actual vital-bodily-fluid-extraction would be done. Images of rusty needles passed from arm to arm invaded several minds, I think, though, I am pleased to report, not mine. Egypt doesn’t have the resources of the West, of course (see the following post), but many of their medical people are well-trained and knowledgeable, and I was confident they knew the basics of safe blood-collecting. And, in fact, this proved to be the case. The man who drew our blood used individual needles attached to little tubes and was so capable and efficient that the process was virtually painless. We had to wait a bit to get the blood taken, but once we stepped into his little room we were done in about ten seconds.
After this, some of us joined Amr, who is the school’s Human Resources person, for a drink of guava juice. We pulled up to the curb beside a fruit store and, a couple minutes later, two men came out with big mugs of dull-green-colored juice. It was quite good—good enough for me to finish off the remainder of another teacher’s mug. She couldn’t stand it, but was afraid of offending Amr, so we just switched mugs when I had finished off my first one. Yum!
(Fortunately we were seated way back in the van!)
Afterwards we went to Amr’s hangout—a cafe/shisha bar in his neighborhood. It was a delightful little nook. Because there was no wall facing the street, the cafe was flooded with natural light and the sound of passing cars on the nearby narrow street, while the fanlike leaves of mimosa trees danced close by. The cafe was narrow and maybe only 30 feet deep. Four men at a square table played a quick-moving game of cards involving slapping cards on the table and shouting out energetically. A TV hanging from the ceiling presented a continuous stream of videos—including ones by an Egyptian eroto-goddess named Ruby, who apparently has just come out with a movie we hope to see. She is very controversial in Egypt, but, judging by the fact her videos are everywhere and everyone knows who she is, she also must be popular with at least a sizable minority of people. (Amr at one point glanced up at the TV, nudged me, and said with a mischievous grin, “Sexy?” “Yes,” I answered: “Very impressive.” Needless to say, however, Ruby is pretty tame by American video standards. She gyrates, shows off her midriff, and looks about seductively, but that’s about it. One big difference between a good-girl image and a bad-girl image, apparently, is how much you move around while dancing. Apparently she moves around a great deal.)
As for food and drink, we ate spicy falafel sandwiches wrapped in a kind of pita that were truly wonderful, and drank both lemon-flavored and grape-flavored iced beverages that everyone found original, excellent, and refreshing. But then it was... shisha time!!! Amr suggested it, we all had talked about trying it previously, and so I jumped in and said, “Let’s do it!” Soon three shishas were out and we all were, as I like to call it, “taking a ride on the shisha camel.” Now, seriously: to look at these 3 foot tall water pipes, the average American would be appalled: they look like the hugest bongs imaginable and it’s almost impossible to look at them without believing they must be used to smoke some really heavy, nasty stuff. The opposite, however, is the case: there is, indeed, tobacco involved, but there is also apple flavor, molasses, and probably some other ingredients as well. You ARE smoking, but the smoke is very light and pleasant and not remotely as acrid as a cigarette. (It’s more like breathing incense than tobacco smoke.) Everyone, I’m sure, is familiar with what it feels like being in a crowded, smokey room. Well, here in this cafe there were at least half-a-dozen shisha pipes going and none of us experienced the slightest amount of discomfort. Having said this, there IS an effect since, if you inhale deeply enough, you get a bit lightheaded as your lungs constrict or fill up with smoke or whatever it is that they do. I’m sure it’s not particularly good for you—though I suspect some shisha puffing every month or two is much less worse for you than living in the pollution-heavy atmosphere of Cairo day in and day out. In any case, we don’t intend to make a habit of it, though it should be fun enough every now and then.
Anyway, while talking and eating and drinking and smoking and looking around it somehow came out that Amr was in the military for three years but then got out when it didn’t suit him. Military service in Egypt is mandatory, lasting from one to three years depending on an individual’s situation. University-bound young men need serve only 1 year. Those with nothing else in particular to do, it seems, get three whole years. I don’t know what Amr’s specific reasons for being in three years are, but I do know that his uncle is in the military and so it seems reasonable that he would have tried it on for size. Why it didn’t work for him was made more obvious when he showed us his picture: there he was, looking sharp, a bit younger, dressed neatly in a clean and dark pressed uniform with a white hat and—a big grin on his face! We all laughed and I told him how American soldiers all have tough expressions in their pictures, almost as if they’re worried their enemies might get hold of them and think they’re pushovers. I’m not saying you need to be mean to be in the military, but Amr was probably too sweet of a guy to make it. I’m glad he got out and is working now at the school.
One other funny thing: there are, naturally, many different levels of English-competence you encounter in this country. Some people are quite fluent, some moderately so, some barely so, some know only a few words. Amr is somewhere between barely fluent and moderately fluent. He seems to follow what you say much of the time, but his own communications can sometimes be uncertain or obscure. At one point during our cafe-time together, he said the funniest thing. He mentioned how one of the teachers with us, Elizabeth, was always very quiet. And so I said to him, “you know, Amr, there’s a saying: quiet waters run deep.” “Ah!” he answered, nodding with total comprehension: “she has an expensive head!” Now this, surely, must be one of the benefits of imperfect English: his intention was clear and made perfect sense in its way, but his phrasing was far more original than any fluent speaker would say.
Pretty fun.
After this, some of us joined Amr, who is the school’s Human Resources person, for a drink of guava juice. We pulled up to the curb beside a fruit store and, a couple minutes later, two men came out with big mugs of dull-green-colored juice. It was quite good—good enough for me to finish off the remainder of another teacher’s mug. She couldn’t stand it, but was afraid of offending Amr, so we just switched mugs when I had finished off my first one. Yum!
(Fortunately we were seated way back in the van!)
Afterwards we went to Amr’s hangout—a cafe/shisha bar in his neighborhood. It was a delightful little nook. Because there was no wall facing the street, the cafe was flooded with natural light and the sound of passing cars on the nearby narrow street, while the fanlike leaves of mimosa trees danced close by. The cafe was narrow and maybe only 30 feet deep. Four men at a square table played a quick-moving game of cards involving slapping cards on the table and shouting out energetically. A TV hanging from the ceiling presented a continuous stream of videos—including ones by an Egyptian eroto-goddess named Ruby, who apparently has just come out with a movie we hope to see. She is very controversial in Egypt, but, judging by the fact her videos are everywhere and everyone knows who she is, she also must be popular with at least a sizable minority of people. (Amr at one point glanced up at the TV, nudged me, and said with a mischievous grin, “Sexy?” “Yes,” I answered: “Very impressive.” Needless to say, however, Ruby is pretty tame by American video standards. She gyrates, shows off her midriff, and looks about seductively, but that’s about it. One big difference between a good-girl image and a bad-girl image, apparently, is how much you move around while dancing. Apparently she moves around a great deal.)
As for food and drink, we ate spicy falafel sandwiches wrapped in a kind of pita that were truly wonderful, and drank both lemon-flavored and grape-flavored iced beverages that everyone found original, excellent, and refreshing. But then it was... shisha time!!! Amr suggested it, we all had talked about trying it previously, and so I jumped in and said, “Let’s do it!” Soon three shishas were out and we all were, as I like to call it, “taking a ride on the shisha camel.” Now, seriously: to look at these 3 foot tall water pipes, the average American would be appalled: they look like the hugest bongs imaginable and it’s almost impossible to look at them without believing they must be used to smoke some really heavy, nasty stuff. The opposite, however, is the case: there is, indeed, tobacco involved, but there is also apple flavor, molasses, and probably some other ingredients as well. You ARE smoking, but the smoke is very light and pleasant and not remotely as acrid as a cigarette. (It’s more like breathing incense than tobacco smoke.) Everyone, I’m sure, is familiar with what it feels like being in a crowded, smokey room. Well, here in this cafe there were at least half-a-dozen shisha pipes going and none of us experienced the slightest amount of discomfort. Having said this, there IS an effect since, if you inhale deeply enough, you get a bit lightheaded as your lungs constrict or fill up with smoke or whatever it is that they do. I’m sure it’s not particularly good for you—though I suspect some shisha puffing every month or two is much less worse for you than living in the pollution-heavy atmosphere of Cairo day in and day out. In any case, we don’t intend to make a habit of it, though it should be fun enough every now and then.
Anyway, while talking and eating and drinking and smoking and looking around it somehow came out that Amr was in the military for three years but then got out when it didn’t suit him. Military service in Egypt is mandatory, lasting from one to three years depending on an individual’s situation. University-bound young men need serve only 1 year. Those with nothing else in particular to do, it seems, get three whole years. I don’t know what Amr’s specific reasons for being in three years are, but I do know that his uncle is in the military and so it seems reasonable that he would have tried it on for size. Why it didn’t work for him was made more obvious when he showed us his picture: there he was, looking sharp, a bit younger, dressed neatly in a clean and dark pressed uniform with a white hat and—a big grin on his face! We all laughed and I told him how American soldiers all have tough expressions in their pictures, almost as if they’re worried their enemies might get hold of them and think they’re pushovers. I’m not saying you need to be mean to be in the military, but Amr was probably too sweet of a guy to make it. I’m glad he got out and is working now at the school.
One other funny thing: there are, naturally, many different levels of English-competence you encounter in this country. Some people are quite fluent, some moderately so, some barely so, some know only a few words. Amr is somewhere between barely fluent and moderately fluent. He seems to follow what you say much of the time, but his own communications can sometimes be uncertain or obscure. At one point during our cafe-time together, he said the funniest thing. He mentioned how one of the teachers with us, Elizabeth, was always very quiet. And so I said to him, “you know, Amr, there’s a saying: quiet waters run deep.” “Ah!” he answered, nodding with total comprehension: “she has an expensive head!” Now this, surely, must be one of the benefits of imperfect English: his intention was clear and made perfect sense in its way, but his phrasing was far more original than any fluent speaker would say.
Pretty fun.
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