Picture Blog

(a ferrel kitty)

Pigeon poo towers

View of the Oasis from Dakruh mountain

The Oracle

Town

Driving home. (this is not me by the way)

Cleaning the Spring

An enlightening experience in the dark

When the electricity cuts out in siwa, which happens often and by often I mean at least once a fortnight, the whole town plunges into darkeness (as you can imagine). This usually lasts for around 10- 15 minutes whereby everyone either remains in position awaiting to be reboted, or attempt to carry on their business as usual about town. On most of the occasions this has happened I have been in the shop/office. I too tend to wait in the darkness, occasionally peering out the door to witness another seemly invincible boy on a bicycle nearly plough head-on into an oncoming donkey cart. Today however I was fooled into thinking that the 5 minute wait was all that was install for us. I sat patiently torch in hand hoping no one would raid the shop whilst I went unnoticed in the corner.

In this time Fathi the Siwan man who we rent half the shop from turns up. I had been designing some book covers for him recently and for this he decided that in return he would give me something back. Fathi is a quiet, deeply religious man with a big beard to prove it. He has written many books about Siwa and Siwan life which he sells in the shop and elsewhere in the town. His most recent book is a "fictional"

account of a man who took more than two wives. The book goes into depth about how manipulative they both were and how the poor man had to cope with their unreasonable demands which made a very unjust existence for him.

After reading it the only thing I could think was THAT'LL LEARN YER.

Anyhow, Fathi works as an anthropologist and is a very respected writer and man about town. He told me had for me a gift for me, a document which he had headed "Hi Anna". I could take it on a memory stick home with me or I could read it here in the shop he offered.

With nothing much else to do I decided to read it in the shop in the dark on his laptop which was still powered up. The page of writing began by thanking me for all the help I had been giving him with his book covers etc etc. Followed by how he would like to repay me. Oh, I thought, hoping the next sentence would read something along the lines of..."so here's a million pounds.."

But no, it was just going to tell me all about Allah.

What followed was a fairly detailed overview of life and the afterlife (if you made it that far) according to Islam. This was interesting, except from the part which informed me that I would burn in the Firey Pits of Hell should I ever deny the word of the Prophet Mohamed.

Well, I thought. What a lovely bit of light reading. I thanked him graciously and had a short conversation about where exactly I could find more information on the internet when the electricity comes back on.

I didn't not find this insulting, forceful or rude in any way. Isalm is a rich, virtuous religion and the many Muslims I have met in my life so far, all of them have been extremely kind and lovely people, Fathi being no exception.

The thing that unnerved me was not the fact that Fathi had decided to bestow upon me an enlightening introduction to his religion. What disturbed me the most was the fact that It made me realise that for the whole time we have known each other, somewhere along the line he must have come to the conclusion that I was in desperate need of reforming in some way.

The lights were still out by this time so I decided take my wayward self home. It took three times longer than usual as I had to pick up bread, meaning I had to cross the donkey gauntlet in pitch black, twice.

Finally I reached home with chicken shit on my shoes and crud up my legs from the inevitable sludge-filled pot-holes which lurked like wet poo traps in the road.

I did however manage to avoid falling into Hells Fire...which I was pretty thankful for.

What a nice start to the New Year

At a New Years Eve Mass at the Al-Qiddissin Church in Alexandria, a bomb exploded which killed 21 people and seriously injured a further 70. It reminded me that every year the majority of us have the privilege of celebrating these events without loosing anyone we love. So many people do not have that luxury. Television here doesn't censor graphic content like it does in the UK and the rest of the western world. I often think that to an extent this is the way it should be. To sugar-coat such heinous events is as bad if not worst than pretending they don't exist. Footage was broadcast of the carnage. Blood and remains strewn across the ground and up the walls of the Church. It made me aware of how desensitised we have become to scenes of such violence. This made me a bit sad.

Egypt's reaction to the event was of course firstly point the finger at the Muslim community then swiftly to an foreign extremist group, and then cut all mobile connections in Egypt for the whole of the next day. What they were hoping to achieve by doing this no one quite knows. Phone tapping might have been a more useful strategy.

When somebody blows up a church full of innocent people we all realise that whoever we are, and whatever religion we subscribes to, in this age it's not enough. Religion asks us to segregate ourselves form one another, yet in the same light embrace and accept others with different beliefs. It teaches us tolerance towards others yet strikes fear in those who doubt their faith and the faith of others. It also teaches us the nature of forgiveness and not to kill or harm one another.

For the next five days hundreds of Christians fought in the street with Muslims and the police.

What on earths gone wrong.

My next post will be less morbid I promise.

NYE Siwan Style

The evening before New Years Eve I finally managed to get my hands of some gas. Claudia's friend Fathmi managed to get some on the down low off some 70 year old man who apparently has always tried to sleep with him. I was touched that he went to such extreme measures just so I could poach an egg. But thats what most of the boys are like. I thanked him and gave him a gift of some "special water" and we sat having a drink whilst he told me all the souk gossip from the last 10 years.

I have so far not managed to find out the truth as to what exactly happened the night of the debacle outside my apartment but from what Fathmi was saying, (and he is one of the only lads in town I trust) is that it's safe to assume that there is a fair chance that Mouhi would have had sex with khaled for money. It's not unusual for some of the boys to do this in Siwa and when you ask them they often openly admit to it. Khaled has clearly fled Siwa for a while as I have not heard or seen from him since that night. He may, or may not return.

Word on the street was that there were a few parties around the oasis happening on New Years Eve. The way the party thing usually goes down is that Penny or Claudia gets tipped off that there is a possibility of a shin dig at a certain camp. We all bundle in the back of the Jeep, often with a hand full of siwan guys and a few sneaky beverages. Once rocked up to the venue, fully shaken and a little stirred, we sometimes have a hot spring under the stars and then drink vodka disguised in water bottles and listen to the Siwan Band, occasionally ending up considerably shit-faced. Siwan music is very tribal and rhythmic. The boys dance by shaking their hips and butts like women. Its pretty unique to Siwa. The band consists of a couple of guys on drums and one on the flute. Drums being more bongo than rock and the flute more wooden and stick-like than your average polished number.

NYE Started off in a similar fashion although this time we were defiant we were to find the best party. This meant we were to go on a camp crawl. Firstly Cleopatra spring which looked lovely by candle light but was dead. We stayed for one and then hastily legged it to Al Masa which was slightly more upbeat. The band was playing and if it wasn't for the long faced Egyptians who looked about as enamored as a bunch of potatoes it would have been better. The only remotely exciting thing that happened was a super morbidly obese Egyptian girl who would barely walk managed to waddle over to where we were sitting and puke all over Sasha's sandals. The two puppies who live at the camp then came over and proceeded to eat it.

So it turned out it was third time lucky with the location, or may have been that we were a little red faced by the time we got to our third and final destination. Ali Khaled's camp is quite a bit further out of town than the rest but we arrived armed and merry. I was infront as we were all making our way through the undergrowth towards the tents and the sound of music. I couldn't see a thing so just carried on hoping that the most likely thing that could happen would be to lead us all in the wrong direction. Turned out I managed to nearly fall face first into a hole full of water. After everybody had stopped wetting themselves and managed to pull me out I finally made it to the tents with one sodden and freezing leg and arm.

It was Sheiks R' US at Ali Khaled's camp. Bearing this in mind we tried to be on our best behaviour. However, Things got a little animated and before long the girls were up dancing and the band were at full throttle. the five of us conducted a rather loud count down to 12 O'clock at which everybody just stopped and wondered what the hell we were doing. Then we all carried on as if nothing had happened. Sasha and Claudia ended up being paid 200LE each by one of the Sheiks as they ended up providing most of the entertainment by dancing for two hours straight. I'm considering becoming Claudia's Dance pimp. She doesn't know it yet.