A House Full of Women

About two weeks ago I had guests. My place isn't that big but I do have a guest-room. Of course as Murphey's laws have it, you never get one guest, they sometimes come in threes. No problem with that. I just bought a new couch which can double as bed tho my idea was to watch TV on it in a horizontal position with the option of dozing off (it needs a new cover and cushions obviously).

Pam and Alison shared the bed in the guest-room and Gilian, who arrived last and stayed shortest, got the couch. A coincidental run-in with Menna and Ilka and a planned visit from Salima brought the tally up to 6. Nick was in Dakhla so I was the only guy. They all look scared and frightened I know, but I assure you that's due to the unexpected flash of the camera. There was lots of hilarity (vibrating toothbrushes one of the main themes) and a fair amount of G&T's.

Just that morning Alison and Pam and Gilian left the flat at the same time as I did, after having taken showers and of course we all ran into my Bawaba, Umm Tamr, a little black-dressed woman, who greeted us with a cheery good morning, an impish grin from ear to ear and in my imagination a "two thumbs up" sign. It's good for my street creds on the Mohammed Mazhar. I'm the guy with three women now. Not sure I'm doing the reputation of foreigners much good tho....

Beginnings

Well, here we are, attempting to keep others appraised of what and where I am, even more irrelevant dots and ones cluttering up the Internet.

 I'm back home in Cairo and trying to balance the several projects that still need drawings done and making the flat more pleasant to live in. The very crudely patched hole in the bathroom ceiling doesn't help much. Nor do the several drawings that need to be finished before mid December. 

The hole happened while Antje and Micha, two friends from Hannover, were staying here for a week while I was down in Luxor (that's an entirely different story and a bit of a boring one). After innocently inquiring per text how things were, I was surprised to hear my bathroom being described as a construction site. Immediately on arrival I asked the Bawaba (Bab= door or gate, the Bawab is someone who sits in front of the door and does upkeep, small errands (or even larger errands), asks strangers where the hell they think they're going and in absence pays the weekly gas and electric bills) what had happened. A big bespectacled grin and a thumbs up sign, assured me that all was right.

My bathroom has never been the best the place in the house, even before my taking over the flat, but now it's pathetic. In a corner there's a 30 cm diameter splash of concrete smeared on the ceiling. Then there's the spray of concrete drops over the rest of the bathroom and the grimy hand-prints on the ceiling, which is slowly (though lately not so slowly) shedding its layers of paint; sickly yellowish paint. Renovation is desperately needed and I'm willing to, waiting to, wanting to but there's just too much work that I have to finish.