Holiday in Dahab

Ok, i know this post should've come here a month ago, but i completely forgot i didnt post anything about my holiday in Dahab.

We had a one week holiday at the beggining of October, for the Eid. The Eid is a big thing here; it marks the end of Ramadan, when all the fasting is "khalas"; it is a bit like our Christmas day. So, me and Nichole plus some other work mates embarked on the first bus to Dahab. Dahab is a nice little town by the Red Sea - actually more the Gulf of Aqaba... It is close to Sharm el Sheikh, but more relaxed, cheaper, nicer in a very bedouin style.
We stayed at Dyarna Hotel - realy pleasant - not too pricey, with a nice swimming pool and breakfast included.

We went snorkelling by the Lighthouse and it was amazing!!! It was my first time snorkelling but i enjoyed it a lot!! We tried to snorkle further up but it was so windy and i got so many bruises from the reef!! Nichole got excited because she saw a lion fish and got near, without knowing they are poisonous and you can die if you touch them!

Second day in Dahab i tried scubadiving; it was an intro dive and i promised myself that was my first and last experience of that kind.

The water presure was too strong for my ears, plus i didnt see any fish!! Snorkelling was so much better! I went 8 or 10 m under water, which is quite of a thing for me! Well now i can say i've done it!

We couldn't have missed Sinai, so we took a night bus to St Catherine's. It took us 2 hours to get there. We started hiking at 2 am and got to the very top around 5 right in time for the sunrise. Numerous groups of Russians were up for the same thing as us, so it made it even harder to get a good spot at the top, in order to see the sunrise. It was packed!!!!!! We managed to find a spot, which was a bit dangerous, but we were able to enjoy our experience - sunrise from the top of Sinai mountain.

The whole hike was an adventure, with a crazy bedouin who made fun of all the Russians, and staring at the girls' bottoms, saying "babushka".

I forgot to say that the best place to eat in Dahab is the Funny Mummy - the atmosphere is amazing and the guys that work there are really great!!! the owner remembered Nichole, who's been there right when she arrived to Egypt. They have good sheesha there and the best chocolate milkshake in the world!!!!!!

Dahab seems to be out of Egypt, as there are many foreigners there and the rules that apply when living in Cairo, dont apply here ... you can wear any type of swimming suit you want, you can hold hands wt your bf/husband/fiancee ..whatever...

It is a cool place to go to! you can see Saudi Arabia from there!

I love my job!!

As i said before... after a long week, Thursday came!!! Last day of the week, had my kids only until 11:30, i had plenty of time to do some more stuff (working on setting up a shop in our role-play area - i've been collecting empy cans, cartons of milk and juice etc for more than 2 weeks).
There were some experiences this week that made me doubt my teaching skills (one of those moments when you feel the kids just dont get it!), but on Thursday one thing happened. We were watching a Barnaby Bear video, part of our Social Studies curriculum and one of my little boys looked at me and said: "Miss Mocanu, you are a very good teacher!!" He just made my day!!!

Planet Gaby 1

I felt very tired this whole week and i found it hard to get out of bed every single morning. I am supposed to leave the house at 7:30 am, if i plan to walk to school. Well, guess what? every single day of this week, i was still in bed at 7:30!!! My body was not responding at all, but once i got to school, everything went well.
We also had an open evening for the parents to come in and have a look at our classroom etc. Earlier during the week, one of the parents of our kids asked me: "So, what are you doing on Wednesday?" I thought she was asking me if i have any plans after school, and i replied: "Nothing!" She went: "GABYYYYYY!! How come? It is the Open day!!" I gave her the weirdest and stupidest look of all, because i had completely forgotten about that!!
It all went great (i think!); apart from a small detail: open day was on Wednesday and on Wednesdays i have PE the last thing of the day, so i just went to school in PE clothes. Right when we left the flat, Nichole said: you're not wearing that for the Open Evening! I said: yes, of course i will, because i didnt bring extra clothes to change. When i got to school, everyone was dressed smart, so i kind of felt bad all day. I did go back home after classes to get changed!!
I always do stupid things like this!! I guess i need to be more formal and pay more attention to details etc. I call this "Planet Gaby" because i feel i am in my own world at times, with rules and ways that others cant understand.

Ethiopian food!!!!!

I have spent a lot of time lately with Sara from Ethiopia, Bronwyn from South Africa, Ellien and Nichole (my roomies) from Sweden and the U.S.; when we do something, we usually do it together - we call each other and make arrangements. Usually Bron has the initiative!

We all thought it would be a good idea to have "a traditional day" when we'll take turns and cook food from our own country and do some other stuff.

So, Sara volunteered to be the first one; last Friday we went to her place for some Ethiopian food. They cooked it for about 6 hours!! We had potatoes and beetroot, lentils with onions and spices, cucumber with youghurt, sheep stomach with carrots and something else, beef in a spicy sauce.

Of course, the beef was too spicy for me (me and spices = not good friends), the lentils had just enough spices that i could take, the sheep stomach i couldnt eat, just because our Romanian "ciorba de burta" - which is soup with cow's stomach and i find it disgusting, although i have never tried it. It was all served on a pita bread, which was more or less like a pancake or crepe. I did enjoy the meal and had more than enough.

After the meal we were served Ethiopian coffee - we were presented the whole process - frying it etc. Sara's friend has made it for us. You can see her in the pic - she is wearing an Ethiopian traditional costume. Coffee was served 3 times - that's the way they do it in Ethiopia. I had it just once, because it was very strong (just like my mom makes it) and my stomach is too sensitive!!

We enjoyed the meal very much and the whole day we spent together!! We listened to music and tried some salsa moves. :D - me= disaster!!

Sara has braided my hair and it looked pretty. We had Barbara (Ellien's friend from Germany) with us and it was cool that we were all from so many different countries!!!

Rain!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

It does rain in Egypt!!!!

We were at Sarah's house on Friday and suddenly the wind started blowing really hard and to our surprise it started to rain!!!

I Could not believe it!! it is the first time i see rain in 3 months!! I asked Barbara (she is a friend of Ellien from Germany) to take a picture of the rain and she was so surprised that i am asking that; at first she thought i was joking, but then she realised how serious i was.

On Saturday i talked to my mom and she was telling me how cold it is getting there and how they've put the heating on etc. It seems surreal ... i dont feel autumn here ... it is like a continuous summer. And now i think how i never liked autumn, and i always got depressed at this time of the year ...

I would love to see autumn in the nature here ...

An afternoon at Al Azhar

After the whole "ant incident" i got a call from Bronwyn and she invited us to go and have lunch in the park - Al Azhar (finally i managed to spell that properly).

We drove there, paid 5 LE entrance and the funny thing right at the entrance: a note saying what you can or cannot bring to the park; among the things you cannot bring one got my attention: "alchoholics" - they should've left me at home!!! LOL (i did get a bit dizzy two nights before after having some lemonade with vodka).

We had lunch at one of the places there - the service was kind of bad, we had to wait a lot for our food and drinks to come, but it was nice to just chill there.

You can get a nice view of the Citadel from up there.

There is also some sort of a fountain that reminds me of one of the Romanian sea resorts - Mamaia.

We chilled on the grass, tried to get ice-cream, but the man said it will come in two minutes (two min in Egyptian time means more than an hour, or it could even be days), so we just left.

We got ice-cream on the way home, from Road 9 and came home to have coffee as well.

It was a nice afternoon, and luckily when i got back i was in the mood for planning, so i did some work too!!

TerminANTor

Saturday morning.... what i thought to be a calm morning (trying to enjoy my day off), turned into a chaos; i went out of my room, thinking i will have a nice breakfast but to my surprise the girls (Ellien and Nichole) were bouncing around the bathroom, taking everything out of there. Then the news came: there are ants in the bathroom. I was not surprised, as we have ants in our house most of the time anyway - it is part of Egypt; it's like one of those packages you get - 3 in1; The news was that we actually have LOTS of ants in our bathroom. I thought: we'll just spray them and it wil all be ok, coz we had the same problem in the kitchen. Only that, this time, the ants were coming out of the wall.... we sprayed inside the wall, untill we had no more spray, we couldnt breathe anymore etc. The ants kept coming out of the wall; they were bungee-jumping out of the wall, because of the spray - poor creatures, they needed air, but to their surprise, even more spray was waiting for them outside the wall - actually death was waiting for them! Me and Ellien didnt know what else to do - Nichole went to get more spray and we just sat there, feeling like Terminator or TerminANTor; in the end we put scotch tape on the crack and they died there. Some of them, the smart ones, i assume, started coming out on the other sie of the wall which is the kitchen wall. So, the "party" starts again - let's go into the kitchen now and do the same thing.

It was just terrible!!!!! There were like, at least 100 dead ants on the bathroom floor. It was ok, in the end - we killed them all.