A Different Drummer

I have just moved into a new house - my seventh house in my 9 months in Egypt. Housing can be complicated here, although it doesnt have to be. Nearly all the other internationals I know here in Egypt have arrived and settled into a permanent place within a couple of weeks - but somehow I have had the curse of Ramses II following me wherever I go - causing a shopping list of random reasons why I end up packing my bags 4-6 weeks after moving in somewhere.

Anyhow, the latest place, which will hopefully be the last, is great. After living in Maadi for most of the time, I have missed out on a lot of the goodness of life in Cairo. Maadi is everything that Cairo isnt - green, leafy, quiet, peaceful and spacious. It is where the bulk of the city's expat Americans and British live, as well as ambassadors and diplomatic staff, and well off Egyptians. It's a great place to live when you first arrive in Egypt from another country, it is almost like a retreat back into your comfort zone when the madness of Cairo gets too much. But it is also massively disconnected from the rest of the city, and you really can live in Maadi and never leave the area, and effectively not be living in Egypt.

This is what a lot of the expats, especially the older ones, do - find a three storey villa in Maadi, complete with cook, cleaner and driver, who drives their giant imported SUV. You snd your kids to Cairo American College (CAC), the best school in Cairo, complete with yellow school buses and basketball and wrestling teams for the boys and the cheerleader squads for the girls. You shop in air conditioned supermarkets stocked with all the stuff from back home (Maadi is the only place in Cairo where you can find M&M's, Reeces Pieces and Hersheys Bars in the corner stores). You go for dinner at TGI Fridays, Fuddruckers or Chillis, or any number of the foreigner friendly Maadi restaurants that proudly serve bacon, beer, and anything else you could find back home. When you brave your way into Cairo, it is in the chauffered SUV, with the tinted windows up and the doors locked. Before you know it, you are in the flashy downtown areas of Zamalek or Mohandiseen, out the front of the cafe, restaurant or hotel where you are adventuring to that night.

Well, my new place is pretty much the opposite of life in Maadi. I'm in something of a baladi district. Baladi means "country" in arabic, in in Egpt the word is used to describe something authentic, old fashioned, lower class or rural style. If you are ordering food or drink, there will often be a baladi option, which is normally reminescent of the way mamma used to make it, or the way it used to be done before all this modern high tech shenannigans. Think of a steak sandwich at a country truck stop restaurant in Australia, or country style fried chicken and biscuits in America.

Baladi is about more than just food. An ahwa (coffeeshop) where old men sit on the street, smoking, drinking tea and playing backgammon, is known as an ahwa baladi. And a suburb where chickens run free in the street, donkey carts distribute fresh fish, tomatoes and other essentials, and the public space is pulsing with the noise of cars, donkey carts, buses, people, animals and every other major feature of egypt, is known as a baladi area.

I am smack in the middle of all of this and much more. My house is right across the road from a great ahwa baladi where a cup of tea and a shisha set you back LE2.50, which is about 40 cents US. Today for lunch I had half a grilled chicken, with a bowl of spiced tomatoes, fresh potato crisps, bread and tehina dip, for the grand total of LE6, about $1. And I just bought a kilogram of tomatoes for LE1, about 15 cents. What a great place.

I am amazed at how cool all the locals are with me. In most baladi areas in Cairo you would be getting funny looks, weird comments, and all sorts of people wanting to liberate you from your money in new and exciting ways. "No, I really don't need a statue of a stuffed rabbit smoking a shisha, but thank you very much anyway". In my area though, the people have been great, by really not caring at all about the fact that I am a big doofy looking white guy in the middle of a place with an astounding lack of big doofy white guys. They just go about their business with me like I was a local - but with a bit of extra curiosity about what I am doing there, day after day. For the first couple of days they probably just thought I was a tourist who had become fascinated with the area, but now that I am buying groceries and shampoo and spending some good quality time in the ahwa, I think they are getting the idea. And I asked the landlord and their kids to get the word out that I am here long term as well.

I am also working on getting some strategic people on my side. I am paying over-generous tips to all the guys at the ahwa, so that they know it is in their best economic interests to keep me feeling happy. And yesterday I bought Snickers and Mars bars for all my bawwab's (door-man's) little children - which he and his wife seemed elated about. The kids looked a bit confused about the whole thing, I'm sure they enjoyed the chocolates.

In these areas, it is vital as a foreigned to have the bawwab on your side. He transcends social and economic circles, and plays a fairly central role in the "talk" of the locals. When my "wife" comes down and starts being seen around the place with me, especially staying in the same house, having the bawwab on my side in the perceptions management phase will be very useful. I am an honourable man, whose wife lives here with him. Thats the story, and I'm sticking to it.

Anyhow, I'll get some photos up of my little baladi house and my little baladi neighbourhood. Its a really great place to live, and when Arthur and Brodie come here to visit, they will definitely get the full Egyptian experience. Be ready, boys.