Greetings my friends and welcome to the first official post of Andrew's Blog.
My journey started when leaving my house at 3pm American time and arrived at the JFK airport where i went through the wonders of the security system at the airport. So as always i get stopped when i enter through security, but this time things went extremely smooth and i actually almost made it when they scanned my digital camera and it came back "positive" for possible residues of explosives. This set off an alarm where guards came as they then had to completely dissect my entire luggage and after they saw that i had nothing they rescanned the camera and it came back negative, they all apologized and said this is the second time it has happened. Praise God for this wonderful experience he has put me through.
The plane ride was relatively comfortable, i felt special when the stewardess would speak in english to all the american passengers but spoke arabic to me. Thank God she asked me extremely basic yes no questions and things like "inta ashruby eh?" (this means "what would you like to drink") or "shey wa a-hua?" (tea or coffee?). We arrived in Cairo at 12:30pm egypt time (thats 5:30AM in New York time) After the plane ride i my friends Hanan and Fedyia met me and helped me go right through customs since they were friends with the people there. After taking a bus to the main gate i was met by a driver holding up a sign saying "Mr. Andrew Nader Ghobrial" where he continued to refer to me as Mr. Andrew and carry all my bags and do everything for me. For those who dont know me very well i am not used to being served at all i prefer being the one serving, but i feel that God is perhaps putting me through this to learn a lesson in moderation and giving others a chance to serve (i am very stubborn though so this may take awhile)
I am currently in Heliopolis at my cousin Hala and her husband Ramses's house. They let me sleep and served me lunch where we had very pleasant conversations. Hala is at Rizalah which is a beach resort. I am going there tomorrow to meet up with my Tunt Nabila and see my kid cousins. Ramses and i went downtown to do some grocery shopping and to buy me a beard trimmer. The pricing system is very different here in Egypt instead of seeing $5.99 or something like that you see $500 or $360 and other prices similar. The exchange rate here is for 1 american dollar its approximately 6 egyptian pounds. So something for 300 pounds is actually 50 dollars, got it?
My day wouldnt be complete if i didnt screw something up, so as we were at the grocery store i dropped a packet of pudding and one of the packs broke and spilled on the floor, its funny because it happened as i was avoiding to knocking some eggs down since i didnt want to break them. Anyway this soon turned into an arguement between me and the grocery store owner of whether to charge me for the 4 packs or just the 3, he kept saying i am only charging you for 3 and i kept saying it was alright i want to pay for all 4...he eventually won and i payed for only 3. Now i am back here in Ramses's home and i am typing this blog entry. I hope you enjoyed this and i know this post is long. I apologize for the length i am going to make the next ones shorter so that people dont get discouraged to reading these.
Tomorrow i am going to the pyramids so i'll take some pictures and post some. God bless you all I am going to go read my Bible.
I hope Joe got to read this
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14 comments:
Sounds great man. I'm glad to hear about your experiences. Doesn't sound like you're doing much house building yet...slaker. Keep the posts long, they're interesting.
Get some pictures of Heliopolis too!
i miss my bwudduh :(
ps, for some reason my page is in french...hmmm?
i was almost discourged and was going to stop reading about half way down but then came the spilt flour. hehe. (joking) sounds awesome, don't break the pyramids, theyre world wonder, ok?
i want to see lots of pictures on this page. :D
ps. you didn't pick up when i called saturday night to say toodles. :I
Hello Mr. Andrew
I seriously just burst out laughing during several moments while reading this blog. It was very entertaining. I especially liked the part you went grocery shopping...and bought a beard trimmer. Priceless. I love long posts..you have seen my long emails. Please keep this up!! GOD BLESS!!!
Andrew! You're in Egypt! Land of the Sand! This post made me giddy because I love Egyptians (I also HATE them) and I miss Egypt dearly. Do me one favor Andrew Ghobrial: Whenever you see a donkey, can you pet it for me? Show it some love, hug its neck, and always carry some bits of apples and feed them. They deserve kindness they work so hard! I'd also ask you to carry some pieces of chicken for the stray cats but then your pockets will be stinky.
WAIT WAT IS GOIN GON ANDRW ARE YOU THER? i THOUGH THIS WAS CHAT.
Seriously, though, that first paragraph made me laugh out loud. Incidentally, I am at the Sirkman's, because I locked myself out. My parents are gone for another week, but fortunately my brother gets home tonight. At 4 am (that's 11am your time).
ANDREW! i want you to take a pic of urself in front of a pyramid with both hands in the air acknowledging that you read this post and so that i can feel special : p
Hey Andrew,
I'm glad that things went relatively smoothly at the airport. A trip isn't a trip without the hassle of putting your wallet in a dirty bowl, and having sock feet where hundreds of other people have had sweaty sock feet before you. - I can totally picture you arguing with the store owner about paying for the fourth pudding packet. Good man.
I thought about trying to hide that Easter egg today... I'll see what I can do.
I see Egypt has not changed a bit since the last time I was there.
It is funny, i vividly remembered saying with quite the assurance that the pyrimads will be out of fashion in six months. Boy, was I wrong!
i have to agree with marc, i laughed out loud, too. i am so happy you're doing this.
What an adventure! You are an excellent writer.
You argued to pay for all four and he argued for three? This is such a whimsical world you occupy Andrew...
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