The Cairo Gyro

Assalaamu `alaykum and early Eid Mubarak to everyone! I took that picture at a bakery over here, aren’t the cookies so beautiful? Now, now, there are enough to go around, Eid goodies for everyone ;)

There have been quite a few changes in my life over here. Some of which include:

1. I’ve moved again. We’re no longer living in Maadi. I’m pleased to announce that we’re back in beloved Medinat Nasr!
2. We’re apartment hunting so we should be moving AGAIN within the next couple weeks.
3. We currently have highspeed DSL and are able to use the Vonage. (It works great alhamdulillah for the most part.)
4. I finished my classes at the Fajr Center Maadi branch and now I will resume them at the Nasr City Branch, insha’Allah
5. We’re in the process of finding a new Qur’an teacher and a nice gym over here
6. We visited Alexandria for a weekend and it rained the entire time!

I’m planning to go for Salatul-Eid at Masjid Bilal since, it’s RIGHT outside our window!

I will write more insha’Allah over the next two weeks since I’ll have some “time off”.

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I sit down at the make-shift breakfast nook with my mint tea and flat-bread sandwich in hand. The old nightstand and mismatched chairs Sammer hauled downstairs serves well as our only area to sit and eat near the kitchen. There’s not much to look at. The brown staircase leading to the bedrooms complete with an empty storage niche at the bottom fit for Harry Potter himself. The heavy white door to the kitchen that was built far too large for the door frame and never closes. An entryway to an unfinished bedroom, the sheets Sammer hung up as a curtain to give us privacy from the main road. And just to the right of that, the front door to the ground floor of our apartment building. The tube lighting above me buzzes as if, like everything in Egypt, it’s about to break but never does.

Somewhere outside, I hear a voice. It sounds beautiful and reposed as it descends the stairs outside my door. What surah is that? I listen harder but I don’t have to because the voice gets louder and closer. He’s leaving the building and I can hear him continue to recite to himself the whole way out. Some people whistle while they work or hum as they walk, but he doesn’t. This isn’t the first time I’ve heard this voice reciting Qur’an merrily as he walks in and out of the building but each time I hear it, it sets me at ease.

The athan sounds. Allahu Akbar. It’s carried on the air and into the room. A dozen Allahu akbars overlaying each other like bricks built upon one solid foundation, one unified call. In their loud unwavering voices, the athan is an unstoppable force, an assertion of religious identity that no Pharaoh or President could suppress. I proceed upstairs to respond to it. It amazes me how something so “overplayed” as the athan, 6 times a day (there are two for Fajr), can still have such a magnetic pull to it as it pulses throughout the busiest and most populated metropolitan city in the world. I think of how I have to change the Alarm tone on my cell phone every now and then lest my ears become immune to hearing the same one every morning and fail to wake to it.
Not with the athan.

After salah I sit down to do my homework, wajib as she calls it. After all it’s something compulsory that must be done! In a room with no TV, no phone line or internet, I often feel very disconnected from the outside world. Right now though it means there’s nothing to distract me from my wajib. I write the Hijri date at the top of my paper, it feels so nice to be able to do that, to be constantly reminded of the day when Prophet Muhammad salAllahu `alayhi wa sallam, made that brave and dangerous migration to Medinah. To remind myself that today is another day to follow in those footsteps and move from bad towards good in my own life.

A neighbor puts on a tape of Qur’an recitation and thankfully the sawt is wadih enough for me to listen along with. This beats having the TV on as background noise any day. The recitation is slow and almost mesmeric. I’m happy and content doing my work, guiding my pencil from right to left across the page, dotting the letters and carefully placing the vowels. Likewise, the Egyptian recitor gives each letter it’s due right as he enunciates, elongates, and stops on them correctly- upholding his people’s reputation for their superior mastery of tajweed.

The people here take these sounds for granted, the Qur’an tapes being played in neighborhoods and shopping malls, the athan calling them punctually for every prayer. It’s funny how these things, though they are a part of every day life here for the locals, manage to catch my attention so easily. I am comforted by this and wonder at how, in a sense, these sounds make me feel more at home here than I’ve ever felt before.

This is a view of Maadi, Cairo.

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That’s a real McDonalds Eid ad, heh. We’re planning to pray Salatul ‘Eid at Dar Faisal here in Ma’adi tomorrow morning insha’Allah.

Wishing you all a joyous and blessed ‘Eid ul-Fitr and many more to come, ameen.

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The Mogamma’ is likely to be the only place in Egypt that’ll give you a terrible-horrible-no-good-very-bad-day (in the words of Alexander). Ironically, although I had my fair share of Mogamma’ mayhem, my day was quite the opposite of Alexander’s description (and all sincere loving praises are due to Allah.)

The Good morning: My roommate and I woke up bright and early, got all ready, and waited outside for our ride to show up. The school she works for arranged for one of their employees to drive us to the Mogamma’ and help us with the process for free. The ride shows up an hour late (but hey, were you honestly expecting anything else?). We were escorted to the Photo Studio where we took care of our Passport size Photos needed for the Mogamma’ business. Then we drove down the Corniche of the Nile, and ate the beautiful breezes for breakfast. Believe it or not that was our first time seeing the Nile up close since we’ve been in Egypt. It was stunning. Then into Tahrir we went, it looked almost just like I’d pictured kind of European. Shortly after, we arrived at the Mogamma’ around 10 AM. We walked next to a painfully thin, pale, little, old white woman who was going in the same direction as us. All was well..

The Bad beginning: After paying 200 LE for a Visa that should have only cost me 183 LE and not receiving any change in return I was feeling pretty gypped. It occurred to me right then that one should come to the Mogamma’ with their pockets loaded with money…something I didn’t do!

The Ugly in-between: I wasn’t feeling well today and that place sure isn’t somewhere you want to be at a time like that, or any time for that matter. At the risk of sounding wimpy, pain was hitting me pretty badly and I wanted SO badly to sit down somewhere but the floor would have been my only option since all the chairs, corners and walls were taken. So I had to suck it in and be tough. Tough like that lady with blue eye shadow behind Window #43 who was in charge of the Residential Visas. Sitting at a desk and having a constant flow of chaos and confused foreigners shoving their paperwork in her face, she remained, unflinchingly, as cool and as cold as her eye shadow suggests. I sure as Helwan didn’t want to lose my patience like the little British woman a couple windows down. She yelled, no..sorry- she bellowed as much as her bony body allowed, at the woman behind the window: “NO!! YA3NI, WHOT’S GOWWING ON!? WHERE ARE MY DOCUMENTS? I WANT THEM…NOW!!!!” Then she punched the window and all of us in the neighboring lines looked at her dumbfounded. No way! It was the same tiny pale woman we’d passed by on our way in an hour earlier; boy could she pack a punch!

Her fury and outburt scared me and I was reminded of the beauty of fasting and patience. Masha’Allah I saw so much patience amongst my brothers and sisters in there…

I decided it was a good idea to come in Ramadan so that I could test my own patience.

That’s what I kept telling myself as I was sent back and forth from Window # 43 to #12 to #38

to #1 and back to #43 and then back to #1 and oh yea, back to #38. And when I was told my Visa expired yesterday and I’d have to pay an additional 150 LE on spot. And when I had to get a new copy of my Passport on the spot since they didn’t accept mine.

The Beautiful end:

I challenge the one who says that patience doesn’t pay off. After over 4 hours I finally walked out of their with a 1 year residency Visa neatly placed on page 14 of my Passport. Alhamdulillah.

After that we decided to check out the bookstore at the American University of Cairo across the road. We had heard about the enormous collection of English books they sell and decided to check it out for the first time. It was really nice masha’Allah, we found tons of books we’d love to buy but probably never will. One in particular that I do plan on buying, insha’Allah, is: Apricots Tomorrow. It’s the sequel to The Son of a Duck is a Floater, an Arabic proverb book that I wouldn’t want to travel without. It was also a treat to get to walk through the AUC campus, which – I must say – was very charming.

It was time to go home after that so we decided to do yet another first: we took the Metro home! It was only 1 LE! What can we say other than we loved it, alhamdulillah. Clean, fast, simple, and not a single obnoxious taxi driver in sight! The first two cars are for women only, thank you.

We made it home in time to freshen up, get food for futoor, and break our fast. It wasn’t long after that we headed out again. This time we went somewhere I’d been anticipating the entire Ramadan and perhaps even before. We went to Masjid `Amr ibn al-`Aas where al-Qari’ Muhammad Jibreel came to lead the 27^th night of Ramadan Taraweeh after his annual Worldwide Taraweeh Tour. An entire road was closed and used for praying in because of the crowds. Cars were parked madly yet methodically just about every where on the neighboring road. People were there hours beforehand to save the best spots. By the time we got there the streets were so packed we couldn’t get anywhere near the masjid. They set up speakers in a nearby garden of a fancy Café called Fustat and that’s where the rest of us hundreds arriving had to pitch our rugs. Can you believe we didn’t even get to see the Masjid?! SubhanAllah I’ve never in my entire life seen such a crowd for Salatul Taraweeh.

Muhammad Jibreel’s recitation has changed yet again (I find he likes to change it up every year or so). Just when I think I can start to predict how he’ll recite certain ayat he goes and surprises me with something different. Amazing! TabarakaAllah..

The Du’a ul-Qunoot was an hour long and yet we all could have wished for it to be longer. I ask that Allah accepts it from us…ameen. Alhamdulillah I’ve been in plenty of Qunoots but this one was definitely one to remember. The Ameens could be heard from all directions…loud and strong. At that moment I felt the strength we have as an Ummah when we are united.

Another thing that Muhammad Jebril is known for is his eloquence, masha’Allah. Seriously it’s like no two du’a qunoots of his are the same. At times the men praying behind the Imam were weeping so loudly that we could hear them almost as loud as the Imam’s voice! I tried leaving my digital recorder on to record it but it didn’t come out too well because of the makeshift speaker system we had to pray in front of. I might still upload it for you all though, after Ramadan insha’Allah.

Here is a picture I took of the crowd going to their cars after Salah.

[To be added soon insha’Allah]

Here is a pic of the closest I even came to the actual Amr in al Aas Masjid L. Lol

[TBASI]

Ya Allah…make us from those who gain the rewards of Laylatul-Qadr. Ameen.

Today turned out to be a very eventful day. Just goes to show you can definitely survive the Mogamma’ and still manage to have a great day. Alhamdulillah!

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Ramadan seems to want to run away from us, doesn’t it? We’re already within the last ten nights. Someone once said that the Qur’an is like a date, the more you chew it, the sweeter it tastes. Pun totally intended: I say, Ramadan is like a date. The more you get into Ramadan the sweeter it becomes…until you find yourself within the last ten nights and just when you thought it couldn’t be sweeter, it is!

Alhamdulillah we prayed Taraweeh at the following masajid:

Masjid Bilal – Madinat Nasr

Masjid as-Salam – Madinat Nasr

Masjid as-Siddiq – Masr Gadeedah

Masjid Dar Faisal (?) - al-Ma’adi

Masjid ar-Rayyan – al-Ma’adi

And October 8th Muhammad Jebril is coming back to Cairo insha’Allah so we’re planning to attend that at Masjid amro bin al-Aas. (!!)

Out of the four masajid we’re prayed Taraweeh in so far, I think my favorite has been Masjid ar-Rayyan here in Ma’adi. I’m making a mental note right now to find out the Imam’s name, insha’Allah. The masjid is within walking distance from our new house, the sound system is excellent, it has the least amount of crying babies/children, the Imam’s recitation is the best I’ve heard in Egypt thus far and the quality of the Taraweeh and the khutbah is top notch, alhamdulillah. The Imam weeps at certain ayahs and then rows of the jama’ah can be heard weeping along with him…if you don’t understand the ayahs he’s weeping over then that experience alone will make you eager to look up the translation once you get home. I’ve used my handy dandy digital recorder to record the Taraweeh so insha’Allah I’ll be uploading it soon, probably after Ramadan.

Man…I’m going to miss Ramadan in Egypt. Around half an hour before Iftar, volunteers can be seen on the street passing out free water bottle and dates (sometimes throwing them in cars for people who will be stuck on the road when it’s time to break fast). We were rushing to buy mineral water from a corner store one evening when the athan sounded and we hurried to open the water bottle to break our fast when, to our delight, the store owner reached over and handed us a handful of dates J. It’s nice to be able to be out in public and not have to feel like the only fasting person within miles, alhamdulillah.

There’s also a dose of commercialism that comes with Ramadan in a Muslim country. The holiday lights go up, even the Masjids are decorated! For some odd reason I’ve been told they play the best/most movies on TV during Ramadan. The best sales go on during Ramadan…which lead people to crowd the market places unfortunately (thankfully most businesses close by 3:00 during Ramadan and don’t open again until night time. Shops and restaurants are open for erratic hours.) Even the laundry detergent is sold in the shape of a Faynoos (Ramadan Lantern). Spinney’s (which is a Dubai owned super center that puts Wal-Mart to shame) has awesome food sales during Ramadan. Vimto is even on sale from its original price of 20 LE down to 15.99 LE which is ~ $3.00! Egyptians don’t play when it comes to food shopping. It’s almost impossible though to buy dough for samboosak (samosas), or canned chickpeas, or fresh cilantro among other things during this month because it’s usually SOLD OUT. Speaking of which, something we’ve found strange and quite saddening is that most restaurants stop making Kushary for the e-n-t-i-r-e Ramadan! :(

One of my favorite memories so far is one that I made last night. We were on our way back from buying food for iftar when, yet again, the athan bellowed. We found ourselves right next to a tiny local Masjid that resembled a Bangladeshi Masjid and at first glance I was ready to assume they didn’t have a women’s prayer area. My roommates rushed down the road to buy some water and I stood next to the Masjid curiously looking for a women’s entrance. An energetic man on his way into prayer spotted me and my initial reaction was to look away and act uninterested in the Masjid. Memories of countless times in Bangladesh where men would scold or turn women away from the masjid stung in the back of my mind and I proceeded to turn my eyes away. Suddenly the little bearded energetic man did something that I wish Bangali men would have the decency and sense to do. He called out to me, “3ayza Gami3a?” (Do you want the Masjid?). I was at a loss for words and all that came out was “…wha?…uhh…”and so I nodded and he kindly showed me to a door on the other side that lead to a quaint wudu and prayer area for women! The sound quality was great and to my further amazement there was even an air conditioner in there!

Alhamdulillah, it’s really nice to be in a Muslim country where spiritual equality of men and women is recognized. My Dad has dreams of bringing that to Bangladesh one day and I pray that it happens, insha’Allah. Until then…Egypt is surprisingly setting a good example.

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The weather is beautiful, masha’Allah! Remember that scorching heat I described before? It’s pretty much gone now. Fall weather is slowly coming in with windy days and very cool nights. Though the sun is still shining all day it’s less harsh. Here’s a pic I took of the beautiful morning sun shining through the bedroom window…

Thursday night we rolled our clocks back one hour, so we hear the Maghrib athan at 6:00 PM now. Or should I say 18:00? I’ve been practicing time on 24 hour clocks since that is what is universally used. As an American I feel ashamed to have never been taught 24 hour time. Growing up we always referred to it as “Army Time” or “Military Time” because only the military uses it. Later on in life after traveling quite a bit I came to know that the entire world uses 24 hour clocks apart from us! For anyone still unfamiliar with it, here’s an example of a 24 hour clock:

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With Ramadan just a few days away these decorative lanterns are being hung all around the city. You can purchase them from a vendor on the side of the road. At first sight during daylight hours I thought they were tacky, but at night my opinion of them changed…they’re actually really pretty.

I’ve been told that during Ramadan people can be seen carrying Qurans with them out and about. Even on the micro buses and metros people sit and read Quran. On Friday I saw shop keepers, guards, and random people reading from the Quran (most likely Surat al-Kahf) and I was deeply impressed even with that.

We’re still living in Madinat Nasr and we won’t be able to move into our new house for another 10 days, insha’Allah. We’re not complaining at all though, it’s been great staying here we’ll miss it. Our plan is to go to a different masjid each night for Taraweeh for the first week of Ramadan. If anyone has any suggestions of where to go please leave a comment and let me know.

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Assalaamu `alaykum everyone,

I just wanted to drop a line and let you know I have been taking lots of pictures. Every time I go to either attach them to an e-mail or load them into a blog post it just takes forever to load and in the end I give up and close it. I’m really not sure why this is happening because the wireless net I’ve been picking up is full strength masha’Allah and very fast. So I don’t see a reason for this annoyance. I’ll try to load the pictures some other way, they’re all on my computer just not loaded to the net quite yet.

So please bear with me as I solve this problem. In the meantime my posts will have to be unadorned but I promise, bi ithnillah (by the permission of Allah) to go back and insert pictures into related posts.

Thanks for your patience. After all…I am in Africa! lol

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Sammer and I have been getting really excited about the fresh fruits here. Every time we pass a fruit merchant we look with eager eyes and inhale the yummy fruity scents. Currently watermelon, pears, guava, grapes, mangos, figs, pomegranate, and bananas are in season (there may be more I don’t know about yet). The guavas are light green on the outside and soft and white on the inside, very different than the guavas I’m used to in my dad’s country which are usually dark green on the outside and pink on the inside. I prefer this white guava more because there seems to be more fruity flesh to eat and less seeds compared to the pink kind.

The juice bars are here are also definitely worth stopping at. They sell at only a pound or two for a cup (or a plastic bag with a straw in it depending on what they have at the time). They make fresh juices by pureeing fruits on the spot and serving it cold. My favorite so far is the watermelon juice. They mix a zing of ginger and a hint of lime to it and blend it up. It’s deliciously refreshing and light compared to the mango juice which is much too thick for my taste -they really should water it down instead of just serving the mango pulp as a drink. Seriously. Sammer on the other hand took a fancy to the sugar cane juice, which was also pretty good, alhamdulillah.

I really can’t stand the soda in this country (so far all the soda I’ve tried is too sweet). So alhamdulillah we have fresh juice we can either buy in cartons at the supermarket or sip from cups at the juice bar. And on top of everything else, the best thirst quencher is water. Living in the desert really does make you appreciate water, subhanAllah.

Those red fruits on the side are fresh dates straight off the tree! 

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I think Arabic is one of the most polite languages on this earth. Don’t get me wrong it can also be very harsh when it wants to be. But I’ll save our stories of rough encounters for another post insha’Allah. For now let me tell you about the nice people…

Incident #1: We’re riding in a taxi with an elderly cab driver and as he’s driving us we’re all speaking in English in the back. Then my friend tries to tell the driver to stop so she says, “3aleh gammeh” and he corrects her with a light chuckle and says very slowly, “3ala Gamb”. He picked up that we were Arabic Students so he patiently taught us the correct way to say it. Then when we got out of the cab and my friend handed him the money he says in Arabic to leave it, like he wasn’t going to accept payment from us. So she insisted and he kept refusing to take it until finally he accepted it. I found this to a very polite gesture because from what I’ve heard and seen so far, most Egyptians are all about money, but masha’Allah he was different.

Incident #2: One of my roommates and I took a taxi to the airport today because she wanted to say goodbye to a sister she knows who was leaving back to England. When we finished and we went outside to take a taxi home my roommate goes up to a cab driver and tells him where we want to go and asks if he’ll take us for 15 guinneh (Egyptian pounds). He appeared to be very practicing taxi driver, according to his dress..and so he says no to 15 guinneh. We thought he was being a typical Egyptian taxi driver and that he was trying to demand more fare. So imagine our surprise when he says, “3ashara!” (ten!). My friend looks at him like she heard wrong and repeats the number 15 to him but he insists to take us for less and says, “3ashara!”. Masha’Allah for once we got a cab driver who didn’t rip us off. We ended up paying him 20 at the end of our ride, just because of that.

Incident #3: Another taxi story (sorry but a lot of our day is spent riding in taxis, that’ll soon change though once we move next week insha’Allah). We were riding home from somewhere and it was really hot out, so the cab driver got his water bottle out and took a swig. Before closing the lid though he offered his water to the rest of us (we politely refused of course). That’s when one of the sisters whose lived here for a while said that it’s customary for the drivers to offer you their water if they drink it in front of you. Masha’Allah! I love it when practices from the Sunnah are embedded into the everyday customs of the people.

Incident #4: After receiving a job offer to teach at a school here, two of my friends accepted it and I was left with the choice to either join them in accepting the offer or turning down the offer. After consulting with my wise mother (may Allah give her Jannah) I decided to turn down the job offer for fear that it might take away from my energy and objective to study full time here. Yesterday morning I called the administrator to tell her I wouldn’t be coming in that day to sign the contract because I’d decided not to take the job. To my surprise she was very sweet to me and she said, “Alia, we are friends now and I want you to know I wish you were joining our staff at the school but even though you’re not, I wish you the best. I’m here for you and if you ever need anything during your stay in Egypt please call my mobile any time!” Masha’Allah! I was very impressed at her hospitality considering I’d only met her once.

In general the people here have a very charming way of speaking. Egyptian dialect is very light hearted and I find that it suits their personalities to the tee. They’re ready to find something to joke about at almost any moment. For the most part I don’t think the men have a staring problem like they do in my dad’s country.

After buying something from a shop, the salesperson says to us, “Mabrook!” to congratulate us on our buy. Almost everyone, including taxi drivers, will always reply to your salaam (which is a big deal for me because in my dad’s country people have abandoned the wajib of replying to salaam).

Alhamdulillah for the above incidents and I hope to experience many more…

Ramadans coming up so let’s hope it brings out the best in our manners insha’Allah.

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