El Mashrabia

For the first time this year, A. and I could spend a day off together -he does not have a fixed day off. We slept in, had brunch outside, bought the newspaper, and drank tea in El Mashrabia. I had my hair cut and in the evening we had dinner in Miramar where we also watched football. If only we could do this every week!

One day trip to Sweden

Last weekend, I went to Cairo with my Swedish colleague to visit the one and only Ikea shop in Egypt. We took the special "Ikea bus" at 4am and arrived around 9.30 to have breakfast in the Ikea restaurant before the shop opened. Ikea has always been one of my favorite shops ever and I remember we used to go there on rainy days in Belgium just to pass the time and get inspired as it was only 10 minuts away from my home. 

 I found it cool to see how they adapted the showroom to Egypt: balcony with a view on the city of Cairo :)

 The package came with typical Ikea weather: grey and rain, I felt so at home!

 At 1pm we could put our purchases into the bus and continued shopping in the next-door shopping mall. We hoped to buy some things at Zara and H&M but not all the shops were open yet. We did enjoy the "window shopping" at Zara Home, Marks & Spencer, Pull & Bear. I bought sandals for A. and some beautystuff at the hypermarket of Carrefour. 

It was so nice to have almost all of the shops for ourselves as the Egyptian families only started to arrive around 4 pm (everything is open until 11pm). Just in time for the mass to enter, we headed back home to Hurghada where we arrived around 10.30pm. The way back took longer than expected due to the bad weather conditions and the lack of benzine in all the tank stations on the way. We made it in the end, tired but very happy.

Below some photos of my Ikea booty (not everything is shown):

 It is silly how these little items can make such a difference! 

Because I want to take care that A. still feels at home too ("it is starting to look a lot like a Belgian flat, no?"), I tried to incorporate some Egyptian touches too:

  

 "sparkling flower lights", (a gift from A.) together with Ikea vases and tea light holders

 Family photos of A. (left: he (right) and his father in Alexandria, right: his sisters and their children in Sohag)

Conclusion: perfect day! I only regret I didn't buy below trolley for the kitchen (but hey, that's another reason to go back!)

Flower power

Something to think about

I actually attack the concept of happiness. The idea that - I don’t mind people being happy - but the idea that everything we do is part of the pursuit of happiness seems to me a really dangerous idea and has led to a contemporary disease in Western society, which is fear of sadness. It’s a really odd thing that we’re now seeing people saying “write down 3 things that made you happy today before you go to sleep”, and “cheer up” and “happiness is our birthright” and so on. We’re kind of teaching our kids that happiness is the default position - it’s rubbish. Wholeness is what we ought to be striving for and part of that is sadness, disappointment, frustration, failure; all of those things which make us who we are. Happiness and victory and fulfillment are nice little things that also happen to us, but they don’t teach us much. Everyone says we grow through pain and then as soon as they experience pain they say “Quick! Move on! Cheer up!” I’d like just for a year to have a moratorium on the word “happiness” and to replace it with the word “wholeness”. Ask yourself “is this contributing to my wholeness?” and if you’re having a bad day, it is.”

Hugh Mckay

source

Team work

 Ann and me

Gina and me

Visa issues

What happens when you ask for a working visa in Egypt? HR lets you take photos, fills in papers, makes a stop at the souk, the labour office, a coffee shop, his home (the Wife also gets some vegetables and sandwiches), and after 4 hours you go back to work (to not check your emails, I suppose).
(do you spot the cat?)

Souk revisited

Windy desert walks