Back in Cairo

We are back in action in Cairo after a terrific vacation in the US. We are jetlagged. It is circa 4 a.m. and I am wide awake, as are Maya and Mike although the girlie appears to be getting grumpy, which I interpret as a sign of tiredness.

Arriving in Cairo, as we stepped onto the tarmac at the airport to board the bus to passport control, we were hit by that sweet "Cairo" smell that is sort of a mix of sweat, dust, car exhaust and must. I'm sure it isn't great to my body, but it sure did smell like home. And made me smile.

Maya was asleep in my arms and Mike had all our carry-ons, and we rushed in to get ahead of all the tourists who have to buy visa stamps before they can enter the country -- thank God for the benefits of resident visas. We got our bags and proceeded on to customs and the taxi stand. I noticed once again that we have turned into those families that we always gawked at in the past -- the ones piled high with zillions of bags that don't even fit on a cart. We had one cart piled high, plus another big checked bag we were wheeling, plus Maya in her stroller with the basket and handlebars weighted down with all our carry-ons. Okay, so there are still some Egyptian families that have us beat, but we are definitely in the running.

At customs, the guy asked what was in our suitcases. I said clothes.

"Just clothes?" he said. I said: "Mainly clothes."

Then he said: "Are you sure you have nothing to declare?" as he patted a bag that had a bright red "heavy" tag on it. "Nope," I told him, nothing to declare.

According to the customs form I don't think I have to declare anything we brought in with us. It was a lot of stuff, but it is all for our personal consumption. I was thinking about how he would respond to the comforter we got in the U.S for Maya's big girl bed, or the zillions of children's picture books, or the year's worth of Flintstone gummy vitamins in our bags. And I was a little happy that I had taken off the tags from all the new clothes so he wouldn't be able to tell what was new and what was old.

But the agent just took my word for it and waved us through.

To be entirely accurate, I have never actually had my bags searched in Egypt as foreigners appear to be typically immune from such searches due to Egypt's desire to draw in and welcome as many tourists (and their hard currency) as possible. This was the closest I have come.

We took an airport taxi home, and Maya immediately ran to check out all her old toys that she had left behind. She is quite happy to be home and can't wait to see Tiberh. She doesn't understand why we can't go out for a walk, or on the balcony, in the middle of the night though. I think we are going to be seriously sufering from jet lag for a few days.

Mike immediately went to unpack and I put Maya's new comforter on her bed. It looks very nice.

Bye Bye Bottles

On another note, Mike also threw all of Maya's old bottles in the trash as soon as we got home. It marks a very big turning point for us, as we can now say that we successfully gave up the bottle entirely. Yeah! Three cheers for Maya. Now we have to get back into the habit of going to bed by ourselves and continue the struggle to sleep through the night.

Oh yeah, and I will try to post some more details of our trip a little later, as well as some pictures.