busy bee

Looks like another 1-2 days passed with minimal blogging. But there is much on my plate, including a partly new job description in Cairo that I will discuss as soon as it’s publicly announced.

Otherwise, I have a birthday tomorrow (Saturday the 9th). I still enjoy birthdays, even though at this point each one is another ominous step on the inevitable highway to deep middle age. The tragedy of it becomes a positive, though, since you can use that as an excuse to do something very fun to distract yourself from it.

Last year I went to Sri Lanka, for instance (there’s plenty of time to do that while on sabbatical). This year, with only a long weekend to work with, Alexandria is my destination of choice. The trip begins a few hours from now. As stated here before, it’s by train, and it takes around 2 hours and 15 minutes.

Exiting the train in Alexandria, you feel an immediate rush of cool, fresh seaside air. Though I love Cairo, air quality is by no means the strong suit of the city. Alexandria not only has fresh air, it also has beautiful colors, of a pastel/technicolor sort. There must be something about the moisture up there that gives even minor objects a kind of faint glow.

The Cecil Hotel has a rooftop Chinese restaurant which, along with very good food, has a spectacular view across the harbor over to Fort Qaitbey at the point on the west of the harbor. It’s a medieval fortress, and also the apparent site of the Alexandria Lighthouse of “Seven Wonders of the Ancient World” fame, destroyed by earthquake. Much of the ancient city is said to lie under the harbor now.

Many travelers are disappointed by the city, but I’m never sure why. I suppose if you expected lots of ancient buildings you’d be disappointed, because there are barely any. But since I knew that before ever visiting, I was never disappointed.

Whenever I internally play the “if I had unlimited money” game, Alexandria always comes out pretty high on the list of places where I would spend much of the year.

Incidentally, I’m taking my laptop along, and since my net access is through Vodafone, I can blog from anywhere in Egypt other than deep in the desert where even cell phones don’t work.