Cairo Cairo and more Cairo...

Back from Cairo. What an overwhelming place. A city of 20 million people with 5 million more each day coming into work. Possible the most insane place I have ever been. I though after India, nothing could surprise me- wrong! Rules don't exist- each time you cross a street- it seems like it will be the last moment of your life. There are street lights- but they havent worked in 10 years- cars dont use lights- there are no lanes and cross walks dont mean anything- gets your adrenaline going with every cross!

Cairo is almost a combination- in looks, of Paris mixed with Agraba (remember Alladin?)- never stopping, sleeping- the worlds trash on its streets- unbelievable poverty in places, but a preservation of phenomanol beauty in ancient art and culture.

In the center of the city is a cemetary- 20 kilometers square- each grave is a small masoleum- so it looks like a weird little town- BUT- the extremely poor have moved into these masoleums as houses, and now live there too- it is called "city of the dead"- extremely creepy, sad and full of crime and violence.

Unfortunately came back with some crippling stomache thing- after traveling time home of 14 hours- wanted to kill myself halfway through and get it over with- it hit after hour one on the bus! So here are some pics:

Gal and the Captain The famous Egyptian cotton

In the market- millions of lanterns

Unbelievable pita balancing

The three of us on a bridge over the nile

me and T and the Sphinx

The unbelievable sphinx

Tamir riding off into the desert

The quiet beauty of the desert

This is how i was dressed...

This is how i needed to be dressed... I was a little off...

The most crowded candy shop in the world!

check out the lasr sandwich- have no clue on the Viagra sandwich....

A bit extreme, don't you think?

All in all, an amazing experience. Will probably take me three days to recover from this stomache thing, but I imagine I will manage. Nice to seen green again, after such bleak deserts and heat. The heat never ends- there is no place to hide from it... that's life in the desert.

Egypt Awaits...

so- off to Cairo tonight! If it is anything like trying to get a visa- should be nothing short of an adventure. The Egyptian consulate was a hair shy of efficient- and that's stretching it. After sending me around the city to make copies of my forms, they told me to come next day to pick it up.
So, I arrived and was told to go buy stickers. Just that! What kind of stickers and for what- no clue. When I sked, I as told loudly "YOU ARE DISMISSED!
So I bought stickers- plain- not wth Sponge Bob and came back- apparently to write my name on the passport- Isuppose stickers are not in the consulate budget- Iasked when to pick it up- after asking 2 times and still not sure I WAS DISMISSED AGAIN!!!
In the end, we got out visas and are leaving tonight- staying over night in the desert in Israel, and getting to the border early tomorrow to try and figure out how to get the bus to Ciro- which is supposed to be a gorgeous 6 hour drive through the Sinai mountains!
Maybe fun and thrills at the border crossing await us- the Egyptian guard are always so delightful- maybe we should come with muffins...
But cairo sounds super cool and different, and after traveling through India- the "oh, what a dirty city" doesnt phase us.
So, back on Tuesday with stories and pictures galore... Bye

It Must be Love

okay- i have developed deep feelings for jewelry. Sometimes I make something, and I just fall in love. Today it happened to be this purple majestic necklace- looks almost medieval... magical... glowing... I am going to spend some quality time alone with it whispering sweet nothings to it- giving it meaningful glances...

I think I need to get out more in the sunshine and be amongst people... no?

Fun in the Sun

Nothing is more stress reducing then a day at the beach-the water in Israel now is so warm nand clear, it is like liquid turquoise- which I have been spending too much time with lately in the solid form- one of the best place to people watch and generally do nothing and think about nothing. Gal and tamir did their surfer guy thing and i read a book- heaven...

Has there ever been water more sparkling than that?

The Art of Domesticity

Today I put on my domestic goddess shoes. They have been gathering dust for quite a while- as apparantly has the general dust been gathering when these shoes are packed away. Too many other things have been far more interesting than the mundane tasks of this goddess. My jewelry workbench has been seeing far too many hours and today i said there would be no jewelry creating (well, in the end I had to make 2 things- my fingers started to itch).

Anyway, the whole thing began when Tamir came home with a crate of figs from Daddy in law- and they were taking up space on my counter- low and behold, jam was born. And nothing is better when everything is just mixed and the sugar crystals are not quite melted but mixed with fruit and you lick it off the wooden spoon- so hot it almost blisters, but the end result is worth the risk...

The jam and its original components

From there, my kitchen got into full swing- felt the need for chocolate and cupcakes- not that I would ecer eat them, but I do force them on my son- and I watch vicariously through his every bite. Then I thought, why not combine the cupcakes with the jewelry making... two birds with one stone

The cupcake with Chinese Turquoise

And this my friends, is more than enough domesticity for a day...

What's wrong with my cat Santa? Cats should not sleep this way!!!

Lila Tov le cu-lam!!!!!

The fruits of my labors...

I spent the better part of today trying to draw a mermaid! Sounds like I need to prioritize, right? Well, needless (maybe need-ful actually) to say, she needed to be drawn first before I could make her out of silver.

As it turns out, I can draw about as well as my cat. You would think that a few lines and squiggles should not be so hard- but yikes! I definatly will not pursue any career options that involve a pen or pencil. But in the end she turned out lovely in silver:

And now that I spent about 22 hours on various stages of mermaid-ing... i have hungry kids, hungry cats, an upside down house, laundry oozing out of every crack, dishes scattered all around the garden- not sure why- hopefully nothing to do with the cats...

speaking of which, the obnoxious overly large kitten, Santa, who likes to sit on top of the fridge, fell off between the fridge and wall and got stuck- 7:30 am and in my little nightly yanking out the fridge to save a ridiculously clumsey say- I thought they were supposed to be graceful!!

Things that made me smile today

Sometimes all it takes are a few little insignificant things to make me smile. Things that come out of no where, and for no particularly good reason, they give me a brief moment of entertainment... respite from the norm.

Today was a boring errand day. Wandering through the scorching hot and humid streets of Tel Aviv- buying silver and stones... looking in windows... people watching.

In Tel Aviv, that area is called Allenby Street. This is the melting pot of the down trodden... foriegn workers... drug addicts and working girls... mixed in with the shop owners that have been there forever. It happens to be where the jewelry supply shops are located! it is tel Aviv's equilavent to 42nd street in New York.

So wandering there I happened upon a kiosk- a health food store, as it called itself.

There next to the enormous carrots waiting for juicing and fresh mangos and kiwis- is also the large display stand of cigarettes and rolling papers. Small bottles of cheap vodka rests next to beets and celery. The proprieter stands at the entrance smoking and simultaneously hacking up some frightening substance and spitting it onto the curb. Now, doesnt that whet your appetite?

Needless to say, I passed on a peach smoothie.

By the time I got home.. covered in a city's worth of sweat and grime with fading visions of the slightly sad and dirty and forgotten, I went upstairs to change and found my cat once again sleeping "downhill"- which for some reason is the position of choice for the past 2 weeks.

And these were the two things that made me smile in my completely ordinary day.