5 Things That Make Egypt the Most Interesting Country Yet

I might say that Egypt is my favorite country so far as well, but that might be a bit of exaggeration and a lot of relief from the fact that we're going home soon… so I'll just use the adjective 'interesting,' and go from there.

Interesting can mean a lot of things. It can mean interesting as in "lots to learn about it." It can mean "slightly negative situations you're being polite about." It can mean interesting as in, "haven't seen this before."

So, without further ado, here's my list.

Italy in Haiku

Italy; haikus.

(I need to write about it,

And prose behaved not.)

Wrote this post before.

Did not work at all. Into

The breach once again.

Milano's Duomo. 

Building since one three six four.

Samsung ads on walls.

Goofed around on rails.

Took photographs one and all.

Laughed till stomachs hurt.

(On the train whooshing

Past the countryside, playing

On electronics)

In Torino, met

with penpals— Federica,

A nice friendly girl

Her mom, Maria

Rosa, guided us around

This superb city.

(Eyelash in my eye

Ow ow ow ow ow ow ow!

Couldn't get it out.)

Florence next, full of 

RAIN. Walked around in raincoats,

All day every day.

(Michelangelo:

Statues, paintings, ceilings, WOW.

They all come alive.)

Then Venice, full of…

Pigeons! Eat out of your hand,

Cooing and preening.

Canals, with people

Pushing gondolas past us,

Frosty winter air.

Next, near Napoli,

Greek ruins; superstitious

Romans preserved them.

(Stayed up late to write

NaNoWriMo [LINK HERE] has arrived!

Sore fingers; HAPPY)

Pompeii, destroyed by

Mt. Vesuvius— walls still

Here, mosaics too.

Herculaneum:

Same story as Pompeii— but

Rich people lived here.

Capri: amazing

Coastline, scenery, and caves

Blue Grotto was closed.

Napoli: Dirty.

Like India but with tons

Of dead umbrellas.

Napoli pizza.

Not the best, not the worst— good.

Pizza boxes pile.

Vatican City:

Long, long line, wrote postcards near

St. Paul's Cathedral.

Sistine Chapel, a

3-D experience not-to-

Be-missed. Like, ever.

Rome's Colosseum

Cruel, needless torture… ugh.

Skulls of innocents.

Many other things

But my rhyming's broken… oops!

Other posts are here:

Thank you for reading!

Haikus are hard, but I tried.

(It's better than prose!)

Greek Continent

Our first experience in Greece includes meeting Mom's lifetime friend's husband at the Athenian airport. We take a bus for a while… then have to get off the bus because there are strikes going on and public demonstrations.

Apparently this is the new norm in Athens.

It's kind of weird to say you're in Athens. For some reason, I think of this more as a history-book place, which I suppose is normal, since people do tend to read about it quite a lot in history books.

It does look like an Ancient History type of place, but mostly that's reserved for the museums and the ruins. 

We met Cristina, Maria, and Eleni again, had dinner at a Greek restaurant, watched the Romanian version of the camp presentation, and talked till after midnight.

(Some of us, however, (read 'we girls') laughed hysterically the whole night.)

The next morning, after talking a while longer, we headed to Ermioni (in a round-about way).

It took us 4 days to reach it, despite the fact that the trip could easily be made in three hours.

First we went to Meteora, where we visited 4 Orthodox monasteries.

It is so comforting to be somewhere where you know all the rules and how to act and everything seems familiar. Catholic churches, for some reason, don't feel like places of worship to me. Then you reach an Orthodox church and there are paintings of saints on the walls and icons everywhere, and the altar, and they're so cluttered, in a way, that you feel very very cozy, as if everything's alright and nothing can go wrong.

Greek Islands

Here's a secret. I'm not sure how to spell this island's name.

The view from our grandparents' hotel's balcony.

On the Facebook update it says Mikonos. In Remington Steele episodes it says Mykonos.

Family Meetings in Barcelona

Barcelona is the location where we will be meeting with Mom's half of the family. Our cousins, aunt and uncle, and grandmother have come to Barcelona for a conference, but they're also going to meet with us.

We arrive in Barcelona first. Dad somehow navigates to the apartment, drops us off, and heads to the airport to drop the car off (having trouble finding the way to the airport without any map he sees all of Barcelona). We meet Adina, a Romanian who's managing the apartment, and find out with crestfallen faces that instead of our apartment and our family's apartment being in the same building, we're 7 minutes away from each other on foot.

The only reason Dad paid for such an apartment was because he thought we'd be in the same room. Otherwise, we would have had a much cheaper place!

New Clothes, New Friends, and New Shoes

Berlin!

Some of the artwork on the remainders of the wall.

We reached this amazing city in the afternoon, bunked down in our bunks, and sent the parents out to enjoy themselves.

They bought Icebreakers for us— Ileana took mine (very happily), and I took her pink one temporarily. We exchanged it the next day for a beautiful dark blue shirt that makes me look like a completely different person. How do people handle changing shirts every day? I just can't figure it out.

Awesome Days in Prague

We spent about four days in Prague. We actually did interesting activities for two of them (well, rather, we did activities).

September 8^th was my name day. We walked around Prague, saw the enormous clock that hangs up and shows the saints that are celebrated on each day.

Teacups, Operas, and Kinder

I have a friend who frequently gives us all kinds of tips for our trip.

My favorite is this one, about New Zealand:

"Watch out for hobbits!"

Or mothers taking pictures of fire hydrants.

London

Ileana and I arrived in Heathrow Airport nonchalantly. We walked (or skipped) ahead of our entire plane, then lost our lead entirely by stopping at the toilets. 

We carried our bag of bagels throughout the baggage claim area, very happy that we didn't have to stop. As we walked through the store that comes just before exiting into the wide world that is England, I looked around at the perfumes. Why would anyone shop for perfume just before exiting the airport? It doesn't make sense to me. 

Welcome Home

Africa can be summed up in two words:

Welcome home.

You Should Visit Kruger While You're Young

When I say 'young,' I'm assuming the following things:

- You have the ability to sit in a car for an entire day, with set rest stops where you can get out and stretch your legs. (Assume three hours, max, between rest stops)

You may want to cry when you see the car in the morning.

Problems in Madagascar

When we tell people we're going to Madagascar (or, later, have been to Madagascar), their first reaction is "Whoa! That's so awesome!"

And it is awesome. But beyond that, it's really hard to go to Madagascar. Don't get me wrong. It's a beautiful country. There are amazing animals— lemurs, for example, are only found in Madagascar, and there are x73 species. And chameleons are everywhere. Not to mention snakes, spiders (there is a spider here that is huge, completely non-poisonous, and whose silk is used for making Kevlar vests), and a variety of flowers and butterflies.

As well as lemurs. Everywhere.

The 200 Day Mark

We've been on the road for two hundred days! Since last time I wrote a collection of anecdotes, I think it's a great idea to write another. Excuse the lateness; I've been bad at keeping up with blog posts, as you may have noticed.

Let's recapitulate where we've been since Hong Kong.

 We've been in:

Macao

Cambodia

Thailand

New Zealand

Hawaii

Australia (though I won't write anything about here in this post)

The trouble is that

A Whiz Through Malaysia

Please get ready to hop into a vehicle that will whiz you through most everything we did in Malaysia at record speed. Please keep hands and feet inside the vehicle at all times, and make sure to close your eyes if you start getting dizzy.

…  ready?

Singapore and Writers

In August 2011, I participated in Camp NaNoWriMo. Like November, the goal is to write 50,000 words of novel in a month. The idea had come all of a sudden, and I couldn't wait to write it. About midway through, I found another writer whose story looked interesting. I PMed her to tell her so, and as we were talking, I think I whined a bit about my word count (always an important consideration, though in 8 events I've never lost once).

"Oh, there's a writing group I help run. It's on TinyChat, if you want to join in."

The Indonesian Omnibus

Growly Dog Attacks

Our first impression of Bali is hot, humid, and pressing. We're back in the tropical heat of the equator. In a way, finally! In another way, it's very, very hot.

We take a taxi to the house we rented. It takes a while to figure out if we're actually in the right spot, and when we do realize we're in the correct location, and try to find the house by going through the complex, two growly dogs bark at Dad and me. Loudly. Right at our feet.

A New Campervan

Near Darwin: We pick out a powered campsite, probably somewhere near Litchfield, and relax a bit before a dinner of pasta.

The mosquitos are lethal here. Ileana went out to wash the dishes and came back after only five minutes, looking desperately throughout the camper for the repellent. Her back was bright red. I've got more bites on my legs than I know what to do with. It's so hot that our clothes are sticking to us and I don't even mind the oppressive heat and humidity any more… I just try to avoid heat rash— the sweat heats up and then you get a burn in the worst of places— knees, thighs, armpits… mostly thighs, since we walk all the time. It's annoying. 

And it gets hot in the day. We are almost liquid if we ever don't have the AC on.

An Australian Mozzie's Guide to Gorging

AN AUSTRALIAN MOZZIE'S GUIDE TO GORGING

Section B, Camper Vans

Locate any and all entrances into vehicle. Check the edges of flyscreens, as these often come undone during the many bumps these crazy humans encounter along the road. Hide within the curtains which they draw at night for 'privacy' to escape their extraordinary hand-eye coordination.

When they are asleep (also known as temporary death— recognized by slowed breathing, absolute quiet, and odd mumbling sounds that sound like 'talking'), slip out of the curtains. Bite most fleshy parts— calves of legs, thighs (unfortunately often covered), underarms, neck, and cheeks. Hide in curtains again until day, when they open the Door. Slip out as unnoticed as possible. Make sure you are not discovered when they pull the curtains!

REMEMBER: All humans are highly territorial creatures. They WILL KILL if they discover a mozzie, often relentlessly. HUMANS DO NOT FORGET YOU ARE THERE!

Camping in the Outback

From the sky, the land around Alice Springs is red. A bit rusty of a color. It melts into a purple for a few inches, and then turns into a hazy blue— the clouds. It looks beautiful from the sky.

As we approach the ground, you can start seeing the green. There seems to be more green than I'd been expecting from the air.

We land in Alice Springs and Dad heads off to rent the jeep that will serve as our transportation vehicle for the next six days. There's a tent in a duffel bag in the back that will serve as bedroom.

Melbourne, in a bit less glory

Melbourne. It's a masculine apartment with one dark gray wall, dark gray carpeting… dark gray tile in the bathroom and open kitchen… there are black shades over the windows to stop too much sun from coming in. The granite countertops are black.

On the first day we actually took out our red Marmots and hung them up on a chair just to brighten up the space.

There are enough beds for six people, but Ioan elects to sleep on one of the couches instead of bringing out the folding single bed.

We watch TV. The person here has a collection of movies (almost none of which we find interesting-looking at all), which includes Ghost Town (Ricky Gervais, Tea Leoni; a man going in for a routine operation dies for seven minutes while under general anaesthetic, and finds he can see ghosts)… and some Pierce Brosnan movie with the… Vietnam war? I didn't watch it, so I don't know. Rest assured though, I heard a great deal of gunshots, groaning, etc, and I read the back of the DVD cover, so I know enough to be able to say why I didn't want to watch it.

It's a pretty big city, this. We generally walk to the tram station,