We had a phenomenal day in a village north of Irbid, near the Syrian border and the occupied Golan Heights.

Arab hospitality is legendary, and our hosts made us feel very welcome.

We went to greet one of our host's daughters who will be a Fullbright Language Instructor at HWS next fall. The family was so warm and welcoming to us. They went so far as to cook an Indian inspired meal when they realized that we were vegetarian and I was of Indian heritage. It was very touching and we felt bad that we could not have enjoyed the rest of their cullinary expertise.

We explored several Roman ruins, peered into Syria and Israel, toured a community charitable center (which is desalinating their water with solar power), ate wonderful home cooked meals until we were ready to burst, took busses, taxis, and service taxis all over the countryside.

Jordan is a conservative country and yet it has some of the warmest and most welcoming people we have met in our many travels. Yes, we're a bit smitten with this place.
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Greetings from Jordan. We had a wonderful flight. A bit of a delay landing allowed us to see spectacular views of Amman and the Dead Sea.
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We went to dinner with a couple of my former AUC students at the beautiful Azhar Gardens which overlooks the Citadel and Sultan Hassan Mosque. I was really happy to see that they are pursuing interesting and challenging careers. It is kind of true that Aucians get great jobs.

They concurred with our sentiment that there is more open dissent with the regime on the streets. However, it is not clear, in their opinion, that the Brotherhood would necessarily receive a majority in open elections.

On the topic of the AUC they still thought that the new campus out in the desert was a bad idea. Not only is it a logistical nightmare, it has also diverted too much attention away from the academic mission. Hopefully, some if these issue will be remedied in the near future as people get settled in.
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Today on the way into the airport, we were at a ticket booth where a machine stamps out a timed ticket before automatically lifting the gate. In this though there was an added feature, a young man was hired to hand the ticket across the seven or eight inches to the driver. It was such a brilliantly rational solution to both revenue and employment problems, that we had to be impressed.

The airport terminal itself is getting very swanky by the way.
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Saidolatry: 1. The worship of Edward Said; 2. The favorite religion of pseudo-intellectuals in the Cairo.
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Yesterday, we saw a new Maserati prowling the streets of Midan Bolivar. I had to wonder what kind of a person buys a car like that (actually two since the luxury tax is over 100%) when nearly a fifth of the population is struggling to survive on two dollars per day.
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As we were waiting to meet with an embassy official today, we ran into one of my former students/TA's. I was delighted to see that she had accepted a position in the US embassy after a short stint w/the Egyptian foreign service. I was proud for her. We often don't see our students after graduation, so it makes me happy when I see one who has succeeded in a career that builds on their training.
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As our taxi slinked by the NDP headquarters in Mohandiseen/Dokki our driver mumbled the words in English and let them trickle down his lips, then he said to us in English, "It is neither democratic, nor a party." We had to giggle at this profundity stated so succinctly.
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Today our cab became so lost we were stuck in a ditch over a precipice on a construction site. We were able to get out only after some severe dammage to the under carriage of the cab.

Stacey said our journey took on Homeric proportions and I'd have to agree.
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We spent yesterday evening, our 5th anniversary, at the hunting lodge of the former Khedive. The lodge was built in 1869 directly across the street from the Pyramids. The lodge is now an Oberoi Hotel.

The fact that the Egyptians would award this hotel to an Indian firm speaks volumes.

While I am still ambivalent about Oberoi, I do think that the Taj chain is the best in the world. So it is certainly a fair prize, although hopefully an Egyptian firm will one day be given the contract.

In any case, we ate at the Mughal Room, the site where we had our first wedding anniversary dinner, and the fifth best Indian restaurant in the world.

It was wonderful as we expected. We requested "Chandini ki Chand" and "Chalte, Chalte." They also played "Khabhi, Khabhi" -- all the songs that I associate with driving around the US with my parents. Songs that are stitched into the American landscape in my mind.

The rest of the audience was not schooled in popular Indian music, so they seemed vaguely uninterested, which is sad for them. I wonder if they even recognize Umm Khoultum's voice as they travel through Egypt.

By the end of the evening we were in an enchanted mood and I was in a food coma. A wonderful night.
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This morning we headed to AUC, as we approached the entrance I got out my passport to show as ID. The guard asked, "Doktur where is your AUC ID card?"

We had to tell him that I actually had resigned two years ago and had been living and teaching in the US. But it was nice to feel like I had not been forgotten.

We managed to meet several friends and work out a good deal with the bookstore for books our students will read next year.
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Having run a few budget numbers, and heard rumors that the Hilton has been bought not by Sofitel but the Ritz Carleton, we are now considering the Flamenco Hotel in Zemalek. (There is really no way we would have students stay at the Ritz) The Flamenco is a four star which is frequented by Europeans.

We know of the hotel because it is in our old neighborhood, but we had not thought about it until now. It is strange how there are some hotels which are just off of the American tourist grid. I wonder why there are these exclusive networks in an industry which should be globally oriented (perhaps it is a quirky preference of the hotel owners). We will have to pay the hotel a visit and check out the rooms. Anyway, it is not centrally located, but it is is a good neighborhood and its across the street from an internet cafe and grocery store. It might be nice to let students explore Zemalek on their own, where they will not have to really negotiate traffic on the scale of downtown... Crossing the road in Tahrir can be harrowing. I have been knicked a few times but it does not frighten me (although we did have a close call last night).

Ultimately we will have to rely on travel agents to get good group rates, but we are looking at the rooms and facilities. We have talked to a couple of major companies. We will hopefully convince some of our favorite agents to also put in a bid.

We are a bit concerned about getting reliable estimates because the economy is so unstable since the goverment announced a 30% increase in wages for bureaucrats. This decision is rippling through the economy at the same time as the food crisis. Apparently renting a bus and driver has shot up from LE 500 to LE 600 per day.
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Cairo is really a place where networks of friends matter. Luckily, we seem to know a pretty cool lot who live here, love Egypt (and Cairo in particular), speak arabic, and can tell wonderful stories. We feel like we can come up to speed on so many issues and events in just a few nights of chatting.

The best and most dreadful story so far is one about dodging a cow that fell off a truck going at 120 km/h on the ring road....its kind of like an Egyptian version of the Matrix movie, which unfortunately led to a loss of life for both the cow and an innocent driver as the cow bounced through a wind shield after missing the first two cars which swerved successfully. Any one who has driven in Cairo can easily imagine this story.

The sad thing is that so many of our friends will be moving away in the next few years. Cairo is really like a village and the departure of any friend is felt deeply by the community they inhabit. We will certainly maintain our friendships but there is nothing quite like the warmth between friends and a shared space that they have come to know together.
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Cairo to Maadi

Hotel limo: 150 LE
Hotel taxi: 50 LE
Yellow cab: 20 LE
Cairo subway: Priceless
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Egypt's economy appears to be experiencing some strong turbulence in recent months with rising inflation, particularly in food prices, at least this is our impression from our conversations with friends.

However there are some longer term trends which are positive. For example, Egypt appears to be surging as a new IT call center. Even Indians are outsourcing to Egypt. Data on the service sector is not very reliable but I have read that some new call centers are opening in Maadi.

The hotel trade is still booming. Even the disputed land in the middle of Tahrir will now be transformed into a major hotel.

The QIZ is still improving textile exports to the US (although the US is now the number two trade partner after Italy).

These industries are not a long term solution for the Egyptian economy, but they are helping to create some jobs at different ends of the labor market.

In general there appears to be a set of related bottle necks to the economy: congestion, pollution, subsidized petroleum, inflationn potential political instability. I will be interested to see what our friends think about these issues. I know the state has banned trucks in the capital durin daytime to release some congestion.

I am also concerned that some of the industrial options available are in sectors that only add to pollution.
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So we moved to a nicer room with a functioning AC after our room became overwhelmed with paint fumes. Why the hotel decided to start painting the room next to us in the early morning is just a mangerial mystery. Our new room is much nicer but it still has that pleasant feeling of fading glamour. Our friendly front desk clerk said the new room has a nice "banorama," and he is right as we can see the Nile and northern Tahrir square at the same time.

We have stayed in hotels in Egypt that were never glamorous and some that are a bit too glam. Stacey says that fading glamour is also glamorous. To me this hotel evokes images of our old friend George Scalon dancing with Rita Hayworth in a swankier era of a cosmopolitan Cairo, now long gone...

For students coming for just a few weeks visit a place like the Hilton should suffice... I wonder if they will appreciate this old lady though.

One note to ourselves, it is good to fly into Cairo on a Thursday and use Friday to ease into the city and sleep off jet lag.
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The exchange rate is $1 to LE 5.34.
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It is late in the evening, local time, and Cairo is humming with life. The nighttime's barely audible but constant buzz of taxis is reassuring to me after living in sleepy small towns in America for the last two years. Cairo is just so much more interesting at night, to me anyway.

The level of pollution seems astonishing, but maybe we have just been away for too long. I can hardly make out the citadel on the hill from my window. But then again, I guess it was almost always like that when we lived here. The air does not agree with Stace who developed asthma while we lived here.

Our hotel room is comfortable, but the AC struggles to keep the room at a decent sixty-five degrees. We may have to change. Stacey and I are used to the notion that an AC is mainly a crude air filter, but we are paying a lot of money to be only semi-comfortable.

I also forgot to chain-lock the door before we went to bed, which led to a confusing intrusion, and jet lagged pantomime by housekkeping and me.

The rooms do have good automated safes which will be good if our students stay here. The Hilton is also using its iron gates at the front horseshoe drive way. Nevertheless security is still a bit more lax than at the Marriott from what I remember. There is a general assumption that a pink colored person or a wealthy brown one does not really need to be screened when entering. By contrast, over at the Four Seasons I have seen how galibiya clad peasants are sometimes treated by security staff. Of course we feel safe but I wonder how students will react to this local modus vivendi.

We have heard that Hilton is selling this hotel and so we will be curious to learn from our friends who will buy it. This will definitely impact our decision about basing students here. What we like about this aging hotel is that it is still the grande dame of Cairo. The lustre is gone but it is still filled with an interesting mix of people. The Hilton is a familiar, central, and respectable address without being flamboyant.

The Hilton Business Center is also reasonably effient if over-priced. LE3 for two photo copies. There is apparently free wireless throughout, but we have not checked it yet.

Tomorrow is the Friday sabbath, as we call it, so Stacey and I will nurse our jet lag at the pool while the rest of the city takes a half day off. Soon our schedule will be as hectic as one can imagine.
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We just arrived in Cairo. The airport has new fancy sticky visa for sale at $15 and LE 83. It is also pretty convient to change cash at the same time.

The limo company charged LE 80 for a ride to the Nile Hilton after some useless bargining. The man who booked the cab also insisted on a LE 10 tip. It's a rip off by local standards, but we are in a nice AC cab. We will have to tip the driver too.

Stacey is getting nostalgic.
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Greetings from London. Actually we are just in transit. I am mainly interested to see if our international e-mail service works from a relatively simple foreign location.

We had a generally uneventful flight here. Bland food, somewhat clean surroundings... American Airlines continues to embody all that is lame about the corporate service sector in the US, particularly speed over efficiency and professionalism without grace or charm. Luckily for the company, most of their customers do not expect much better, particularly those in coach. The airline is a step up from what one finds in the developing world, where one struggles to find competent service professionals, but it is not in the same league as the leading airlines whose coach service rivals the business class service in the US. Like most American service sector corporations, one opts for the service on the basis of price and convenience, but not out of much customer loyalty. One simply suffers through with little expectation that there will be much memorable beside mild discomfort.

As a pretty seasoned traveller who has been on comically bad airlines and some simply dangerous ones, I ordinarily don't care much as long as I make it from point a to b. However as a political economist I do wonder about the US service sector's competitiveness.
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So Stacey got the TSA treatment this time. It was pretty thorough. We kind of had to chuckle at the insistence that this was "random". Stacey says its all rather Orwellian.

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Well we weighed our bags at the bus station. Stacey had one bag weighing 45 lbs. and my bag came in at 20 lbs.
There is something nice about knowing one can travel light. It reminds of the days in grad school when all of my worldly possessions fit into the back of a mid-sized car.

Stacey is not as psyched about this as me. Then again she is carrying most of the gifts and four pairs of shoes.
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Today we begin our month long journey to Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon (Stacey), and India (me). We have arranged to have e-mail access as we travel and so we hope to be able to post regular updates to this notebook for family, friends, and students.

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The website for our proposed HWS-Egypt short course will be available at:
http://people.hws.edu/vyadav/egypt/, or by clicking on the image.

Here is the slideshow we presented to HWS students interested in the proposed Summer 2009 three week trip to Egypt.

Labels: teaching, technology