just laura

Well, it’s that sad time when my holiday is coming to an end and I know the real world of work is lurking right around the corner. Sinai for new years was amazing… we had a big group staying at a beautiful eco-lodge in the desert/mountains. We slept in mud huts, didn’t have electricity, ate around the campfire at every meal, and were attended to by the nicest Bedouin hosts. Samer and I also went to St. Catherine’s for a day trip to hike the mountain and see sunrise (just as Moses did when he went to Mt. Sinai). We left our camp at midnight to get to the top of the mountain by 6am, and while it was freezing cold and super windy, the sunrise and the company were well worth it! I’m now down to my final day in Egypt and I leave Cairo on Wed morning for the trip back to Seattle. Hope everyone is well!

Tuesday night we did some last minute shopping and a dinner party with some of Samer’s friends. By 2am I was at the airport, in tears from saying my goodbyes, spending my early AM hours waiting for my flight home. The time in Egypt wasn’t long enough and I’m already missing it. After 20+ hours of travel, a layover in Amsterdam, and about a half hour of sleep on my first flight, I’m home and exhausted. Seattle welcomed me with sunny blue skies and freezing cold weather, and with a guy giving me his phone number in our airport shuttle. I’m exhausted but trying to stay up till 1am to get my body on a normal schedule. Seems Seattle is expecting snow on Thurs and Fri, which seems less than desirable to me right now. I think I’m going to go out and run some errands (namely depositing my paycheck from a few weeks ago, buying food for my empty fridge, and returning an overdue Lonely Planet – Egypt to the library). Take care!

The trip started with a brief visit to Amsterdam… where my lovely host Wouter lent me gloves and a sweater so we could ride around town on bikes all day in the freezing cold, taking breaks here and there, seeing the sights, and taking pictures in a crazy santa wonderland place. If was a (freezing) fun day! :)

Note: See the snow on the trees? It wasn’t real. Yep, the Netherlands were cold enough to have ice on the streets… but there wasn’t snow. That was fake in the wonderland place where we took pictures of Wouter with Santa and photos of me riding a reindeer. Now compare that lovely, temperate Seattle. We “never get snow,” but somehow the weathermen are predicting snow for the next few days? Makes me wish I could stay in Egypt for a few more days. The weather was warm, there was still much to see, much to say, and much to sort out.

I want to work out. I really do. I always want to, but admit I’m alternately good about it and (more often) not so good about doing it on a regular basis. This time I’ve got the classic motivation: the date for my 10 year HS reunion was just announced last week. This means I’ve got 6 months to lose the weight I put on over in the last 4 months! I might even be willing to join a gym for the first time in my life!

Anyone know anything about Seattle gym options?? What’s good? What’s affordable? Let me know if you have suggestions, guest passes, or other ideas for working out in the cold, rainy season. Thanks!

Before I forget to mention it, I’m coming home for a record SECOND and THIRD time in one year! I’ll be in Houston in Feb for Crow & Ajit’s wedding, and will come home again to Austin in July for the reunion. Don’t forget about me before then, and get your babies ready to be cooed over!

Love,
Cat

PS Remind me to start looking at jobs in the airline business. All of this travel stuff is getting costly!

Check out CNN… Seattle’s been named the “fittest city” by Men’s Fitness magazine… and Houston won the title for “fattest city” for the fifth straight year! I’ve lived in both cities and could have easily predicted either of those rankings! :)

Learning the lute (a traditional Egyptian instrument)

After Amsterdam, I went to Cairo where Samer arranged for me to meet up with his friend Marwa before I headed out on my own for a week of sight seeing. I couldn’t have been luckier in his choice for a first contact (thanks Samer!). Marwa was a most gracious and generous hostess, her family was super cute and giving, and more importantly, she herself is a talented, fun, and amazingly sweet individual. My first she arranged for me to go to Cairo’s famous bazaar, Khan el-Khalili, then we went back to her place for a lute lesson, dinner, and dessert. What a terrific taste of Cairo in one short night!

Ramadan Lantern
Islamic Cairo, Egypt

By request, here’s more info on the mosque:

“The Sultan Hassan Mosque and madrasa (School) is considered stylistically the most compact and unified of all Cairo monuments. The building was constructed for Sultan Hassan bin Mohammad bin Qala’oun in 1256 AD as a mosque and religious school for all sects. It was designed so that each of the four main Sunni sects (orthodox Muslim, or Sunni rites, consisting of Shafite, Malikite, Hanefte and Hanbalite) has its own school while sharing the mosque. The cornices, the entrance, and the monumental staircase are particularly noteworthy.

The madrasa was originally introduced to Egypt by Saladin to suppress non-orthodox Muslim sects. There is a difference in congregational as opposed to Madrasa style Mosques such as the Sultan Hassan. While some congregational Mosques have been used as schools, those designed for that purpose generally have smaller courtyards (Sahn) and the buildings are more vertical, allowing for classroom space.

Many consider the Sultan Hassan Mosque to be the most outstanding Islamic monument in Egypt. It is of true Bahri Mameluke origin, built of stone, and while it is entirely different in design, it shares a like boldness to the Ibn Tulun Mosque. There is no architectural indulgence here, but rather self confidence in its clarity of execution and restraint. In allowing separate schools for the four Sunni rites, the Sultan Hassan is based on a classical cruciform plan, meaning that the Sahn opens from each of its sides into a separate liwan, which is an enormous vaulted hall, each serving one of the rites. While the design of liwans predates Mohammed (Peace and Prayers Be Upon Him), it was the Mamelukes who arranged them in the Cruciform manner, and as in the Sultan Hassan Mosque, advanced this architecture with the addition of a domed Mausolea. However, this Mausolea is empty, for Sultan Hassan died several years prior to its completion.

Structurally from the outside, the Mosque is very impressive, holding its own with its impressive cornice and the protruding verticals of its facade, even though it stands in the shadows of the massive Citadel. As one enters the Mosque from Sharia el Qalaa, there is an impression of height, especially from the towering doors decorated in a Mameluke fashion. Even during the Mameluke error in Cairo, building space was at a premium. Thus the outer walls are somewhat askew, in order to fit the available lot, but these designers had a wonderful way of creating the impression of uniform cubistic effect inside regardless. “

Frisbees… they’re perfect for scraping the snow off your car when it’s covered in a few inches of fluffy white stuff. (Just in case you were wondering… we got our first snow of the year this morning). And just in case you’re wondering I’m back at work again today. We’re moving to a new office building which means in addition to lugging desks, filing cabinets, art supplies, libraries of kids books and other resources down three flights of stairs and to the new location, I’m also sorting through 10 years of program history. It’s not a quick process, but is a well needed purging of outdated papers and files that I’m excited to do.

That said, it’s snowing outside and I’ve got a million errands to run and people to see since I just got back in town… which leaves me debating the merits of working another long weekend day or leaving to go for brunch. Happily I had a nice break from work yesterday and got dinner with Samantha, Ryan, and Stephanie, so there’s been a little balance so far.

To recap my exciting life:
Got home Wed and slept
Thurs worked till 4am, then slept 3 hrs before going back to work
Friday worked then slept
Saturday worked, went to dinner, then slept
Sunday work

Hope your 2005 is shaping up to be just as exciting! (Just kidding… I wouldn’t wish this on anyone!). :) Take care y’all!

Many thanks to Samer (one of the best boyfriends ever) and his friends for suggesting Al-Karm for New Years and for including me in their tight knit group of friends from university. We pretty much had the whole place to ourselves and it was an amazing trip. Gorgeous setting, great hiking, intriguing local culture, delicious food, hot sweaty days, and cold nights perfect for snuggling and star gazing around the fire. When Samer and I decided to leave the group for a few days to do a night hike on Mt Sinai, the good folks at Al-Karm even managed to arrange for our transport out across the desert… what a bumpy and sandy ride!

From the web: “AlKarm offers a fantastic lodging in the local style and yet with all the facilities modern man needs like bathrooms and toilets and a decent kitchen. It has no electricity and mobile phones don’t have coverage there…. Manager is the amazing Jamil Atteya who not only is familiar with all the trails and forms names but is a walking encyclopedia of Bedouin-culture who doubles for a poet.” -SaharaSafaris

“Inaugurated in 2002, the mountainous retreat was built on the ruins of original Bedouin houses in Wadi Araba. It acquired its name “Al-Karm” meaning the “Grapes Garden” in Arabic, from the fact that this area was known for grape cultivation, but that was back in the heydays when rain was not as scarce as today…. Amm Gamil, a local Bedouin who is in charge of Al-Karm, is a reverent man who literally radiates peace and serenity. He, as the majority of the Bedouins living in the area round St Catherine Monastery, is from the Gebeliya Tribe… In contrast to the majority of Bedouin tribes of the Sinai and Negev deserts, the Gebeliya tribe is not descendant of Arab origin, but rather of, oddly enough, eastern European. It is believed that the Roman Emperor Justinian I, who ordered the building of St Catherine Monastery during the sixth century, had sent a hundred or so guards to protect and serve the monastery. They later intermarried with the locals and formed a separate tribe. Though they converted to Islam with the Arab conquest in the seventh century, the Gebeliya maintained a symbiotic relationship with the monastery’s monks. No one can ascertain for sure the guards’ origin. Some claim they were Romanian while others go for Macedonians or even Balkans. Mohamed El-Hebeishy” -Ahram Weekly

“Apart from running what are probably sinai’s only composting toilets, al karm is providing the Bedouin experience par excellence. The lodge is efficiently run and the simple food is excellent – frankly, better than many multi-starred hotels in sharm al sheikh. The local staff take care of their guests very well, and provide a host of hiking and trekking opportunities in the area. Marketing, however, is lacking and for the time being the lodge remains if not a completely undiscovered jewel, at least an under-discovered one.” Matthew Carrington – AmCham

“For reservations, costs and hiking arrangements out of Al-Karm, call Amm Gamil at +02 010 132 4693. As there is no mobile network in Al-Karm, your call to the above number will be automatically diverted to a voice mail. Leave a message with all the details and Amm Gamil will get back to you. Don’t worry; his replies are prompt.” Mohamed El-Hebeishy- Ahram Weekly

Building a mosque bring good points (good karma) to Muslims, so there are many, many mosques in Cairo for the 17 million (mostly Muslim) inhabitants. Five times a day the melodic call to prayer is projected into the city streets urging all of the devote to take a break for prayer. This Ahmed Ibn Tulun Mosque is one of the older ones in town, built around 868 AD.

In Egypt I found that many men, both young and old, were thrilled to see me when I passed down a city street… all wanting to hold my hand, wanting to walk me to my hotel, or (as was often the case) wanting to be my husband. This gray haired grandpa in Luxor wanted nothing more than for me to dance with him in the streets. With a smile like that, how can a girl refuse, especially me a girl who loves to dance?

…it pours!

My week meant moving to a new office building, spending two days orienting a new employee, having to go to many, many, many meetings, suspending/firing another employee, sending another employee to the ER multiple times, and me not being able to be everywhere for everyone all at once. Balance that will, well, nothing much and it basically meant working all week, just like last weekend. Happily I got away for one dinner… a long awaited lovely dinner with Caroline and Phil at Bamboo Garden… an all veggie restaraunt near Seattle Center. I’ve heard of it forever, but never made it out there. The company was fantastic, the food was fantastic, and I hope to go again soon. For now, I’m heading back out of town this weekend and going to Canada. Y’all stay warm and take care!

As usual, when there’s too much going on in life, I tend to leave the blog blank. Know that I’m well, just busy processing, coping, thinking, and analyzing… on just about all of the standards… life, job, grad school, boys, potential move, etc. I recognize I was debating these exact same things at this time last year too, and the year before, and a few years before when I quit my tech job in Jan and moved to Seattle for the nonprofit scene. Perhaps the annual January analysis means I should just ignore it and know that it’s my annual time to overanalyze? Or maybe that means if the questions haven’t been answered in over a year since last Jan and the topics can still dominate my thoughts, then maybe it’s time to finally do something about it? But then again, why should I expect questions can be answered? Do we ever really have the answers to life’s questions? Maybe other people have the answers? While I feel very fortunate for most opportunities I’ve been given in life, I’m pretty sure I’ve never been given the answers… But that’s just me. I’ve had a good long tiring weekend in Canada, and today had a long day of work and a long night of talking. I’m now tired and ready for bed. G’night y’all…

A week ago we had snow and I was cranking up the heat and wearing scarves, coat, gloves, and hat. This week we had flooding. Today it’s unseasonable warm (62 degrees!) and unusually sunny. I’ve got my windows open and am happily wearing short sleeves. What a bizarre January. I love breaks in the weather like this… makes the whole winter more bearable!

On an unrelated note, last night we did dinner at Marrakesh in Belltown. The Moroccan food was good and I was thoroughly entertained by sitting on cushions on the floor and by eating with my hands (it’s quite messy!). No belly dancers on Tuesdays, but still a fun place worth checking out.

I know I’ve been slow posting this month and you have my apology for slacking off. Life has been a little hard this week, but I’m a trooper and am surviving. The updates you might be curious about… Samer and I pretty much broke up last weekend (ended our long distance thing) and that’s sad because while the distance is awful, he is fabulous. In other lame news, I had to fire one of my employees on Thursday (not something I ever enjoy doing). In addition to the straight up pain factor, there’s always the worries… are they going to fight it, will they take me to court and bankrupt the agency, will they hurt someone, will they hurt them self? How will the rest of the team respond when I tell them? How long will it take to hire and train someone new? Such fun. To cap the week, despite copious amounts of anti-bac and hand washing and intentionally normal eating and sleeping, I still couldn’t avoid catching the sickness that is going around. One third of my staff has been out sick, my roomie’s been sick, and I’m now feeling sick too.

On the brighter side… I’ve been able to catch up with a lot of friends this week! Italian with Rod, Moroccan with Will, Mexican with Dieter, Thai with Jacob, Indian with Erin D for her birthday (happy birthday Erin!), and a movie with Caroline. Tonight and tomorrow are two more dinners and two parties. Yay life balance!

My grandfather in North Carolina is a funny man and when we were growing up he always knew how to make us laugh. Whether he was doing a cannonball into the pool, telling dirty old man jokes, or giving bad driving directions (“just reverse till you hear glass!”), he kept the atmosphere light around the house. He served his country in the war (he and some buddies from high school voluntarily enlisted in the Air Force the day after Pearl Harbor) and served his community as a high school teacher and then Red Cross volunteer for 20+ years after he left the military. His home is the gathering place for the whole family, and he’s very generous with his house. He is the kind of guy you want to sit around BSing with any day of the year. Last week he went into the hospital and today he was diagnosed with a terminal disease. His doctors are giving him less than six months to live and he’s already been approved and accepted for hospice care (it started today when he came home from the hospital). I suspect I’ll be making a trip out to visit sometime soon and I know he’ll be in my thoughts often. If you have a moment, think some kind thoughts and send them his way. Thanks…

Currently reading: Bowling Alone (Robert D. Putnam)
Currently listening: Spoon (Kill the Moonlight) and The Killers (Hot Fuss)
Currently renting: Six Feet Under – Season Two
Currently feeling: Sniffly and exhausted

Just read: Another Roadside Attraction (Tom Robbins), Holidays on Ice (David Sedaris), and Divine Secrets of the YaYa Sisterhood (Rebecca Wells)
Just watched: Napoleon Dynamite

My gallery show was tonight and I declare the night a success! I stayed up late framing and setting up earlier this week, so tonight all I had to do was show up and be social. I didn’t have time to do any public advertising, and instead just invited friends and coworkers. Happily, they showed up and were really supportive! What could be a better Friday night than seeing friends, eating food, and talking about travel and photos? I was content! I also got the added ego boost of actually selling a bunch of photos! I can honestly say I didn’t expect to sell anything and was just excited about the process and idea of showing to a public audience. Imagine my surprise when Dot showed up first and instantly threw down money! Then Ray and Rebecca showed up and bought another picture! And then Nancy showed up and bought two! And then more and more folks showed up, and rotated through, and bought stuff too!

This proves two things:
1) I really should’ve priced them a bit higher.
2) I’m a very lucky girl to have such supportive friends!

The real credit goes to Matt for the opportunity, Loriana for helping hang, Caroline & Dieter for photo pickup, Phil for serving, and Sam for bread. And the Roomie of the Year award goes to Erin! My amazingly supportive roomie not only helped with photo selection, she even brought wine and flowers and friends! I’m so lucky to have her!

The girl rubbed the sleep out of her eyes, stepped off the plane, and bravely headed for the passenger pick up area. If she felt a tiny bit tentative, outside observers wouldn’t have been able to notice. She knew little more than the friend of a friend’s drove a red car and sported a leather jacket. She was thankful he had offered her a ride and a spare bedroom, and she wasn’t above accepting kindness from strangers. When she arrived at the house there a small party was going on downstairs. If she felt a tiny bit tired and overwhelmed, she tried not to show it. Perhaps they both needed air, or perhaps the connection was immediate, but they left the house again within minutes. He drove her to an overlook she later learned was called Kerry Park. It was smaller than any park she’d seen growing up in Texas, but the night view of the city skyline and the Puget Sound was awe inspiring in her tired eyes. And at that quiet moment on top of the city, she knew she was embarking on a grand new adventure that was to be filled with amazingly generous people and fantastic opportunities she hadn’t yet dreamed of.

I just realized with delight that it was four years ago yesterday when I stepped off that plane and first set foot in Seattle. The gallery timing wasn’t intentional, but looking back I couldn’t imagine a better anniversary than being surrounded by friends at my show last night. Thanks for all of the memories and the celebration.

Cairo, Egypt