Nighttime scaries!

Maya has started to have some real fears at nighttime. Before Mike set off on his current business trip, she made him remove all items from the wall facing her bed. The first to go was the big Ethiopian flag on it because, well, as Maya put it: "Lion roar, scary".

Then we had to remove the little stuffed animals from that side of the room, plus her yellow diaper holder, plus her sticker reward chart. All of these items were scary. So they had to go.

Next, Mike had to have a little talk with the imaginary "people" in the corner behind Maya's dresser. Because, after all, the "people" were annoying her and making her scared. After Mike left, all the scary items were gone. But that doesn't mean we still haven't had to deal with the "people" in the corner every night.

So last night, Maya told me to "talk" to the "people". I went over and started gesticulating and talking to them. I told them not to bother Maya. But apparently they didn't listen because I was sent back to talk to them again. This time, I told them to turn around and face the wall, and to not even look at Maya. But those naughty people still didn't listen. So I picked them up by the scruffs of their necks and tossed them in the closet and shut the door. That took care of those people. In fact, they are still in the closet, or so I am told.

However, after I threw those people in the closet, some new people came and took their place. Naturally I couldn't just put the newcomers in the closet because, well, the old guys might escape. So instead, I very cleverly put them on "time out until daytime". So far it is working.

Funny Story

This morning, Maya was examining her yellow floaty ducky in the bathroom while I was getting ready for work. She pulled at its tail and said: "Look mommy, buckle."

OK, I can understand why she thought it was a buckle, because it is just a little yellow cloth flap on the duck's behind.

So I said: "Oh, yes, I can see why you would think that. It sort of looks like a buckle. But it's actually the duck's tail. It's where the duck goes potty."

So then I turn around to brushing my hair or whatever it is that I was doing. I can't recall exactly. And I hear this voice behind me saying: "Duck. Potty. Duck, make potty."

I turn back to look at Maya and see that she has put the duck in her little toddler potty -- yes in the actual bowl of the potty -- and is standing over it giving it instructions to go potty and hovering to see the result. I totally laughed my head off!

Now, some pictures

Here are some pictures from the past few days of playing in the park.

A Day in the Life ... of Mommy

Since I know people really have no idea what my actual everyday life is like (well, most people reading from outside Egypt anyway), I thought I'd give a rundown of a typical workday. And I chose today. So here goes:

7 a.m. -- I wake up. I think, wow, did Maya sleep through the night in her room? I don't remember her getting up. I roll over in bed, and there is Maya, sound asleep next to me. I guess she came in sometime in the middle of the night. But I don't remember it.

7:05 a.m. -- I get out of bed. Since Maya's asleep, I want to catch a few minutes of time for myself before she gets up. Plus I want to check on the phone and internet connections, which were cut off on Friday with no warning for lack of paying a phone bill that we habitually never receive. It is now paid, and the line was supposed to be switched back on by morning.

7:06 a.m. -- I hear little feet pitter pattering behind me. I turn around to see groggy Maya. So much for a quiet morning. I ask her if she needs to use the potty. She says no and asks to go downstairs. Meanwhile, daddy is stirring. I look at the internet router, which appears not to be working. I pick up the phone line. No dial tone. Grrrr.

7:09 a.m. -- I look at Maya's hair. Her twists are still in, but they are frizzy and wild because we washed her hair last night. I grab a tub of ponytail holders from Maya's room.

7:10 a.m. -- Maya and I climb down the stairs. She wants breakfast, yoghurt specifically, and so we go to the kitchen and I pull out a strawberry yoghurt. I offer her the choice of peach or applejuice, and she chooses peach. So she gets a glass of peach juice. I take her food to the table, pull the top off the yoghurt and get her a spoon. While Maya eats her breakfast, I sit at the table with her. I check my e-mail on my mobile phone.

7:30 a.m. -- Maya and I goof around a little while Mike takes his shower upstairs and gets ready for work.

8:00 a.m. -- I put Maya's hair into four ponytails. It's really easy this morning because the parts are already basically done because her head is already full of 6-day-old twists. I like the look that twists make when pulled into ponytails. It looks like wild little spiral curls.

8:15 a.m. -- Maya is getting anxious. She starts to call: "Daddy downstairs". But daddy isn't coming so we decide to make a trip upstairs to visit him. When we go up, he is just about ready. I go to Maya's room and pick out some clothes for her. Blue stretchy pants and a striped, long-sleeved T-shirt. Meanwhile, Mike changes her into her diaper. Then we slip her clothes on.

8:30 a.m. -- Finally it's my turn to take a shower and get ready. I hop in the shower, and Mike takes Maya downstairs. But after just a few minutes in the shower, Mike comes up to say he has to leave for work.

8:40 a.m. -- I get out of the shower while Maya runs around wild. I pick out some clothes. I have to dress nicely today for a story so I actually iron my clothes. I get dressed.

8:50 a.m. -- Mike leaves. Maya decides to wash her hands in the sink, one of her favorite activities. I let her play in the sink while I collect a load of "whites" and throw them in the washer, then turn it on. I also stuff some clothes back in my closet -- because our cleaning lady is coming and I don;t want the room to be a total mess. While picking up, I find Maya's red comb -- the one I use to part her hair -- has broken. It needs to be replaced before the next time I do her hair. Aaah!

9:00 a.m. -- Maya is still washing her hands. The doorbell rings. It's Tiberh. I grab Maya and we go downstairs. Tiberh and I play with Maya for a couple minutes, then I continue getting ready for work. I have to make sure I have my press pass, cab money, and a sweater because the place I am going today is habitually freezing due to air conditioner overdrive.

9:30 a.m. -- I leave for the office. I grab a taxi on the street and arrive at the office about 9:45. I turn on my computer and check what is going on in the world. I am supposed to go cover a VIP meeting (sorry, but don't want to go into details of my work on this blog as I';m trying to keep that life seperate!). I find out that the driver we use at the office has called in sick, so I have to take a long and expensive taxi ride to where I'm going. Grrr.

9:45 a.m. -- I remember that I forgot to check with Ayman, our doorman (bowab), about the phone line when I left. So I call Mike and ask him to do it. I know he has Ayman's mobile phone number saved in his phone.

10:30 a.m. -- I head out to the thing I'm supposed to cover, and arrive just on time at 11:30 a.m. But the VIPs are late, so I have to sit around forever. Fortunately, I expected this, so I pull out my book and a diet coke from my bag. I am reading The Big Test, and it is pretty interesting. I want to check my e-mail on my mobile phone, but I had to relinquish my phone before I came in to cover this meeting. So all I can do is read. I read, and read, and read, and read.

3:30 p.m. -- Finally the meeting is finished and there is a press conference by the spokesperson of one of the VIPs. It only lasts five minutes. Not enough for me to write a story about. Very frustrating. But oh well. I find some colleagues and hitch a ride back to my office.

4:30 p.m.-- I'm back at the office. I check to see what else is going on. Not much. I check my work e-mail. Nothing much there either. I call a photographer colleague to see when she wants to schedule an appointment to take pictures on a joint story we are working on. We agree to decide tomorrow morning. Now there's no time left to start any work. I take a look at the feature I'm working on, make a few changes and leave it for tomorrow. Then I edit and send a story by a colleague to our editors in London.

5:00 p.m. -- Time to get ready for tomorrow. I prepare an item that will go out tomorrow that summarises the economic news of the day.

5:30 p.m. -- Then I sent a daily outlook to the editors and send them a message that I am closing for the day and I will be on call. Fortunately, one of my colleagues says the schedule has actually been changed and he will be on call instead of me. How nice! I leave the office, but not to go home. I need to go to the grocery store. Mike is going on a business trip and we have no food.

5:50 p.m. -- I arrive at the grocery store and race through the isles throwing things into my cart. I need to hurry to be home by 6:30 so Tiberh can leave. I remember to get a new comb for Maya to replace the broken one, as well as wet wipes, which we are out of. At checkout, I ask them to deliver the groceries, as otherwise I won't make it home on time. I run out and take a taxi home.

6:27 p.m. -- I arrive home. But the house is dark. I told Tiberh I would be home a little late today, so Tiberh took Maya to church with her to an Amharic service. They are not back yet. I run upstairs and look at the internet router. All lights are lit! The internet is back! I go downstairs for a few minutes of surfing before Maya comes home.

6:45 p.m. -- Maya and Tiberh arrive at home. Maya is happy from all the singing at Tiberh's church. Tiberh tells me that Maya learned how to say: "How old are you?" in Amharic, and knows to answer that she is two, also in Amharic. Then Tiberh leaves and it is time for dinner.

7 p.m. -- The groceries still haven't arrived, and there is no food in the house. So I take a can of tuna fish and a can of corn and mix them together. It's a sort of tuna and corn salad for dinner. Yes, not that great. But it's Maya's bedtime and I don't have time to make anything more complex.

7:05 p.m. -- Groceries arrive. They land in bags on the kitchen floor. Ayman calls up on the phone to see if it is working. I tell him, thank you, it is.

7:10 p.m. -- Maya and I finish dinner, then we run upstairs to put pajamas on. Maya goes potty, then puts her jammies on, then decides to wash her hands. I hand her her toothbrush and she sort of brushes her teeth.

7:30 p.m. -- We read five million stories together while I sit in the beanbag in Maya's room and Maya sits in my lap. We read: Brown Bear, Brown Bear; The Very Hungry Caterpillar; Fire, Fire; Families; and The Family Book.

8 p.m. -- Lights out. Well, except for the very bright nightlight, that is. Mike asks for a backrub, and wants me to sing: Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star to her. But when I start to rub her back she decides she actually wants a footrub instead, so I rub her feet and sing to her. She settles down, and then asks for "covers". I put her covers on her and sing a little more.

8:30 p.m. -- Maya is slowly drifting away when I hear the door open downstairs. Mike is home from teaching his class. He comes up and Maya wakes up and has to tell him about her day. I stay for a while, then go downstairs.

9 p.m. -- I put away the perishable goods into the fridge and leave the rest on the floor for Mike. One of the yoghurts I got popped open, so I throw it away.

9:15 p.m. -- Finally, some time for me. I get on my computer to write my blog.

An interview with Mike

So... Mike saw that our friends over at the Egypt4 blog did an interview a while back with Mr. Four. And since then, Mike has been agitating for an interview here. Every day, he says: "Cindy, when do I get my interview? Mr. Four got an interview. I want an interview, too."

Of course, when I ask him what he wants to be interviewed about, he has no idea. But he knows he DOES want an interview. So here goes:

Q: What is it like to be a dad to Maya in Egypt?

Mike: Being a dad to Maya is mostly a lot of fun. Mostly I just feel like I am an entertainment prop. Since I've barely been anyone's dad anywhere other than Cairo or East Jerusalem, I don't really know how to compare it to much else. But I guess one thing I would say is that to be a dad in Cairo is probably not that different from being a dad anywhere else. We get up in the morning. We spend an hour or so together. Then I go to work. I try to get home by 5:30 or 6 p.m. We have dinner together, play together and then we go through the trials of bedtime. Then we go through the same thing the next day. I am sure that would be the same no matter where we lived.

Q: What is your favorite part?

Mike: My favorite part of being a dad in Egypt, in general terms, is that I think Maya is really going to grow up to be a citizen of the world. Because every day she is around people from East Africa, Spain, England and of course the Arab world, as well as being raised by American parents. Of course, the availability of an Ethiopian and Eritrean community here for her that she is kind of an honorary member of is just a huge advantage. I don't think I realized in advance how great it would be. I now wouldn't want to move to a country that didn't have an Ethiopian community that we and she could access.

Q: What is your least favorite part?

Mike: That Egyptians in general are obsessed by skin color, racist against black people, have no understanding of adoption and generally are not open to the idea that different cultures might have some value. That's the worst part. I know that our family stands out no matter where we go in the world. And I don't actually mind that at all. I don't mind being looked at per se, but I do mind that when we are looked at here, people don't just think negative things but say them out loud. And now Maya is getting to the age where she will understand soon. People cannot seem to stop themselves from commenting on the "exoticness" of Maya or on her mere blackness, and speculating out loud how we could have possibly gotten a black child. This is the worst part of being a parent in Egypt.

Q: What do you like to do with Maya here in Egypt?

Mike: I like to go for walks with her around the park and to push her on the swings at the club. When Cindy is on the weekend shift, I like making Maya lunch and the two of us sitting down and eating together, and having her "serve" me food from the bowl. She seems very concerned that I don't eat enough. Most importantly, I like to take naps with her on the weekend.

Q: What do you wish you could do with her here that you can't?

Mike: I grew up in a cold part of the U.S., so I have a lot of special childhood memories that are associated with weather. Hay rides before Halloween, carving pumpkins, making a scarecrow, apple picking. And then playing the snow. Sledding and making snow angels. That kind of thing. I miss that and I think that I'll miss it even more now that Maya's old enough she could do these kinds of things.

Q: What is it like to be a father in a conspicuous family?

Mike: As I said before, I don't really mind being conspicuous per se. I don't think I really mind people looking at us. When we were last in the U.S., I felt people looked at us, but I didn't feel it was negative. We are unusual, so we stand out. I'm comfortable with that. What I don't like is that here people assume and express negative or offensive ideas about why we're different.

Q: How do Egyptians respond to you as a father?

Mike: There is another major difference, but it is less visible, which is that although there are exceptions, raising children is mostly women's work here. It's not that men don't love their children. Actually many Egyptian men are really good at playing with kids and more relaxed around kids than some American men. But often playing with kids is all men will do here. Once a child cries or has a dirty diaper or needs to be fed, it's a woman's job. So I think my fathering style is very different from the norm here. I don't think that this really causes any particular reaction from Egyptians. I think most Egyptians are aware that gender roles are very different in the West. In this respect, they might have more of a live and let live attitude. My last comment on this is that at my office I helped write a family leave policy that allows parental leave rather than just maternity leave, because I took a lot of time off after we adopted Maya. But I'm curious if over the next five years any male staff members will ever take advantage of it.

Q: What do you look forward to as Maya grows older?


Mike: This is the one thing where my answer now is the same as it was on our original adoption applications. The older she gets, the more I'm getting to know her because the more personality she has. She is learning to talk now and I want to know what she has to say. I want to know what her opinions are. I want to know what she'll pick fights with me about. I want to know what she is going to be like with other people. So it's kind of like as she gets older, I'm getting to meet a very exciting person very slowly.

Q: Anything else you want to say?

Mike: No. That's it. Thank you for interviewing me so that now I've no longer been outdone by Mr. Four.

Why I love the nannies at the park!

I wanted to write an ode to the nannies at the Gezira club. They are mostly either Ethiopian or Eritrean, or Filipina, or Sudanese or even Nigerian. But whatever their nationality, they all watch out for Maya. And I love them all, Tiberh included.

I was off for two days during the week this week in exchange for having worked this weekend. And I took Maya to the park both mornings.

Maya is used to playing in the area of the toddler playground where all the nannies congregate. She knows all the nannies and their toddler charges, and they know her. So as soon as we get into the park, Maya starts running toward the special "nanny" area shouting "Denanesh, denanesh." (That's How are You in Amharic).

They all talk to her, and welcome me into their circle as well. The other day when I got to the park, one of them took Maya and her own toddler and put them both into swings and started singing an Amharic lullaby to them, which Maya repeated back to her. She also went through all the animal names and animal sounds with Maya. Then we all went to the slide and the kids all played on the slide for a few moments.

Maya knows all of them by name. And they all pay attention to her -- even at the expense of their own kids. Maya has encountered some mean kids on the playground from time to time. But the nannies make sure that all of their kids are nice to her. They share their toys and snacks with her (asking me first, of course). When they make a mudpie for one of their kids, they make one for Maya too.

The nannies also just treat Maya like a normal kid. That's in big contrast to many Egyptian moms on the playground, who ooh and aah over Maya like she's some exotic species and just stare at her for extended periods as a curiosity. The nannies are much more genuine. They also never question my status as her mother except for polite inquiries. They don't think it's strange that Maya's learning Amharic. They think it's terrific and they participate. They compliment Maya on things other than her phsyical looks -- for example on her verbal skills or athleticism.

And all that is in spite of the fact that the nannies at the club are often harassed by the male security staff, who seem to get a power trip of demanding that the nannies wear special "nanny" jackets that identify them as nannies.

Back from a "business" trip

Guess where I was yesterday?? In Luxor for the unveiling of Tutankhamun's mummy! Which I got to see in the flesh! OK, OK, yes it was for work. But hey, it was exciting! I was excited about it. Anyway, sorry for my absence over the past week. I have been crazy busy with work and trying to get in a little time with Maya at home. But now she's napping and I have some catch-up days off work to hang with her.

Maya is learning a little bit about the feeling of regret we sometimes get when we give in to our crazy impulses. The other day, before I went to Luxor, we were playing on the floor in our living room when she got up, grabbed something, ran to the window, and chucked it up and out. Even as "the thing" was flying out the ninth story window, Maya was bursting into sobs of regret.

I ran to the window just in time to see something falling, but I couldn't tell what it was. Because she was crying so hard, I thought it might have been Lalla, but then I looked around and all three Lallas were accounted for. Mike and I tried to calm her down so we could ask her what she threw out the window. But she was completely unconsolable. She cried hysterically for at least 10 minutes.

Finally, she calmed down to tell us what happened.

"Hat. I throw it," she said.

She had thrown her hat out the window. And it was not just any hat. It was her Ethiopian hat that Tiberh had given her for her birthday that has the colors of the Ethiopian flag on it -- and which she had been proudly carrying around the house all day. After she told us what happened, she burst into tears again.

So Mike said he would go downstairs to see if he could find her hat. He grabbed the flashlight (it was dark out) and went out the door. Meanwhile, Maya was calmed only by the idea that daddy would "get it, hat". Alas, Daddy came back empty-handed, as the area where the hat had likely fallen was in a courtyard that is part of our local dry cleaners, which had already closed for the night.

That provoked another bout of screaming by Maya, who was calmed only when we explained that we would try again in the morning. She fell asleep quickly.

The next morning, Mike took her downstairs and they found her hat at the dry cleaners. But it seems Maya may have learned it is not wise to throw your toys out the ninth story window.