Breaking News!!

My cooler-than-ever sister-in-law got to meet my fave presidential candidate today at a rally in New Orleans. She shook his hand and invited him to visit the school where she teaches at (a girl's gotta dream, right?). Oh yeah, and did I mention she shook his hand!!! Go Michelle!!

I guess the chances are pretty low that he'll come to Egypt to campaign for the expat vote... Darn!

Maya knows her name (almost)!

Maya knows the first four (out of six) of her names! If you ask her what her name is, she will say: Maya Meron Ruth Bababa!

OK, well, she does need a little prompting. The real conversation goes like this:

Me: What's your name?
Maya: Maya Meron!
Me: Maya Meron what?
Maya: Maya Meron Ruth!
Me: Right! Maya Meron Ruth what?
Maya: Maya Meron Ruth Bababa!
Me: Right! Good job!

And just to clarify, her fourth name is not Bababa, it is Abebe (pronounced: Ababa) which means flower in Amharic. But she says Bababa. And she thinks it is funny because it sounds like what a sheep says. But hey, as long as she learns it, that's OK with me. We can pin down the pronunciation later. Now all we have to do is teach her her two last names... But we are definitely making progress!

I voted in the global online primary

I am very happy to report that I voted in the global primary today. We expats will get 22 delegates. Yeah!

I am sure many of you already know who I am voting for. I won't say here, but you can probably figure it out from my demographic. You know, the under 40 mother of a black child. My child, of course, has already made an endorsement on this blog...

Did I mention that I am also a former resident of the state of Illinois? (hint, hint)

Beautiful Ethiopian braids

Tiberh did Maya's hair yesterday in seriously beautiful traditional braids. They are absolutely gorgeous! I had asked her a couple weeks ago if she could do a traditional hairstyle for Maya, but I was not expecting it yesterday!

I was jaw droppingly awed by Maya's hair yesterday. I wonder if I will ever be able to do braids this beautiful. Here are some pictures of Maya eating pomegranate this morning with her new hairstyle.

False alarm!!

Woo Hoo! It's a false alarm. Maya's friend doesn't have chicken pox after all!! Well, I don't know if that makes his life any better, since he's still itchy with a rash. But the good news is he's not contagious so he will be going to music class tomorrow and Maya will get to play with him!

Chicken Pox Scare

Guess what's going around Cairo! Chicken pox!

We just had our first chicken pox scare!! Aaaaah! It turns out one of Maya's closest friends has just come down with chicken pox. He was apparently just days away from getting the immunization when he broke out in spots. Poor boy!

Anyway, his mom called me to let me know what was going on and to check whether Maya had had the vaccine. I couldn't remember and had to summon Mike to look in her vaccination records. Fortunately, we found Maya's records, and she had the vaccine a year ago!

It doesn't mean she can't get chicken pox. I looked it up on the CDC website! But the chances of her catching chicken pox from this exposure are pretty low, and if she does catch it, she will likely only have a minor case. We will know for sure we are home free in a week or so... But in the meantime, please send Maya some special vibes to ward off chicken pox! Oh, and also please send some special vibes for her friend that he feels better soon!

Maya at the park

Our Internet connection has been awful recently due to some undersea telecoms cables getting damaged in the Mediterranean Sea. We never lost our connection entirely, but it has been slow. Supposedly, Egypt is supposed to be back up to around 70-75 percent of capacity by now. But the network is not expected to be completely normal for a week or so.

Anyway, here are some recent park pictures of Maya to tide you over (if I can upload them on this connection, that is).