Don't pick up my kid!! And don't stare!!

I had the most annoying dinner the other evening filled with nosy, annoying people. OK, so here's what happened. Mike had to pay Tiberh her salary, so we all walked out to the cash machine to get money so she could get paid before the weekend. We got cash, and paid Tiberh, and then we decided to walk to the Marriott to have a quick dinner in the Tea Garden, which is one of our favorite Cairo haunts because it is a garden cafe-type place where Maya can run around outside while we wait for our meal. Plus, it's just a 5-minute walk from our apartment.

So after Tiberh walks away, Maya is spaced out in her own world. We call her to "come with mommy and daddy" and she starts crying because she wants to continue walking in the same direction as we were going before. But within a few seconds she turns around to follow us. Then some random Egyptian guy who was standing near us beckons to her, and tells her in Arabic: "Oh, don't worry, your mommy went that way" as he swings his arm toward Tiberh in the distance. Grrrrrrrrr. (Of, course, I'm not meaning to dis Tiberh in any way though, as she is way cool!)

Anyway, so we continue on to the Marriott to have our dinner. There are some new guards at the gate -- who don't know us as we have been on vacation in the US -- who stare at Maya and do the typical quizzical stare at us, look at each other, and say: "Izzay????" We hear that word behind our backs so much. And when they look at Maya and us, they tend to extend the last syllable into a little whiney pitch. It means, essentially: "How the hell?"

We ignore that and go on to our dinner. All the waiters already know us and Maya, so they give us no reaction. We set the typical Maya parameters, which are basically that she can wander around within about 10 feet of the table, but no further. Of course she immediately goes farther than that, Mike runs to get her, has a little chat with her again about boundaries, and then lets her free again. She again starts to sprint away from us as fast as possible, so she gets a one-minute time out.

After her time out, she starts wandering yet again to a table behind us. I turn my head and start calling her to come back. As I am calling her name, telling her to come back, and waving my arms at her to demonstrate that she must return to the table, the Egyptian woman at the table behind us extends her arms and beckons Maya to come to her. Of course, that pleases Maya to no end, so she goes to the woman, who then picks her up and places her in her lap. Seriously, what is with that? So Mike had to go forcibly take her back from this woman, who then asks: "Oh, is she yours?" Hello!!! We were only calling her name, waving at her, telling her to come back to the table.

But our dinner comes and we get over that incident. Then a group of young, upper class Egyptians comes and sits at the table next to us. Maya of course sees this as a great opportunity to go make friends. So she gets down from the table and walks over to them. At this point, I see where she is headed and see one of the girls at the table getting ready to try to pick her up. So I get up from my chair and take Maya's hand just as this woman is reaching down to lift her into her lap. As I put Maya back into her chair, I catch snippets of their conversation. They include the ubiquitous, whiney "Izzaaay?" I also hear the word "Samra", or black, and "bint" or girl. But I just ignore it.

Yet as we are waiting for our bill, I feel them staring at me. I turn around and every single one of them is staring completely unabashedly. So I turned back around to face Mike so I couldn't see them. Maya clearly feels our discomfort and starts crying. Great! Finally the bill comes and we pay and get up. As we turn to get up, I see they are STILL staring at us. They cannot take their eyes off us.

One of them says: "Is that your daughter?"

I say: "It is not very nice to stare at people."

He says: "Yes but is that your daughter?"

Me: "Yes, she is my daughter. But it is RUDE to stare at people just because they are different."

Then we walked away as they continued to STARE and totally didn't seem to get what we were annoyed about. Mike thinks I shouldn't have even answered their question, but I guess it's easy to say that in hindsight. But I am pretty proud of myself for at least saying something, since I am usually too hesitant and the moment just passes.

I think it is hitting us how much people stare and make rude comments here because during our 3-plus weeks in the US, hardly anyone said anything to us, and we didn't notice anyone staring -- at least not like they do here. It was really nice to just go around in the US with people pretty much ignoring us.

Anyway, in other news, Maya is finally getting over her jet lag -- this morning she woke up at 4:30 a.m., which may sound bad, but is at least almost morning. And we are slowly turning Mike's old office into a play area for Maya. We have dismantled the computer desk and transplanted the bookshelf, and concocted a way to babyproof the sliding glass door. So Maya is well on her way to having an indoor place to play when it is too hot to go to the park -- ironically just in time for the onset of winter. But it will be great for next summer.

Changing Languages

During our trip to the U.S., we were really worried that Maya's Amharic skills would get a little rusty due to a prolonged lack of exposure. And my worry over Amharic was heightened after a trip to an Ethiopian restaurant in Seattle during which Maya refused to respond when our waitress spoke Amharic to her. I don't just mean she didn't answer, but she didn't respond at all. I was a bit worried that all the progress we had made in the weeks before our vacation was for nothing.

Then we got home to our apartment in Cairo, and Maya ran in and saw her ball on the floor.

"Kwas, Kwas," she shouted, followed by "Tibi, Tibi" (Her nanny's name).

So Maya clearly remembers that she speaks Amharic. It was a very strange experience that was later repeated in Arabic. Here is the Arabic example.

Maya asked for yoghurt and Mike went to get it for her. When she saw he was getting yoghurt, she said: "Shukran, shukran" ('Thank you' in Arabic).

I guess we will have to see how the Amharic goes when Tiberh comes back tomorrow

One more Seattle photo

I couldn't resist just one more.

Maya in Seattle

As you see, our vacation had a very water-oriented theme.

Maya in Albany

I woke up from my 3-hour nap that I hope will help fix my jet lag. Hope you enjoy the pictures. These are from Albany.

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.

Sushi!!

Mike requested that I add to the blog another pronouncement from the doctor's office. Mike wanted to know at what age could we give Maya sushi, so he asked the doctor at our appointment. Apparently, we were the first parents to ask such a question, but our doctor took a poll of his colleagues and the results came back at between 2 and 3. Yeah!

The doctor didn't seem bothered by the question, but was curious if we could get good sushi in Cairo. And the answer is: Yes!! We have great sushi in Cairo, and in a couple months when Maya turns 2, she can eat it too.