Total Loss

There is a brand of candy made in Holland called Total Loss. How do I know this? I spent 7 hours in the Amsterdam airport wandering around peering at things through a jet lagged haze.

So lets see where to begin...

My Aunt, Cousin and Clara the German exchange student arrived in Nanaimo on Friday. We spent the day showing exploring Nanaimo. We returned home only to discover that Jimmy had taken over the living room with some of his buddies in order to play some kind of online game. We giggled amongst ourselves, at the follies of geeks killing Zombies, as we went upstairs. Ha ha ha nerds, we laughed as we sat there watching youtube videos of the muppets (Danny boy and mahna mahna). Clearly we were much cooler. Saturday we headed down Island through Chemainus and Duncan and onto Victoria. We checked into the swan hotel down near the harbour and had dinner at the reef (go there!! Best food ever!!). That night we made our way out to Butchart Gardens to see their annual X-mas light display. About ten years ago Valerie treated Heather, Kim, Cameron and myself to the same adventure and we had always planned to go back. It was a bitter sweet evening. The lights and displays were delightful but there was a certain sadness that comes with all things related to Cameron. We left the island Sunday morning.

I stayed in Vancouver until Tuesday night when I flew out to Cairo via Amsterdam. I really like being back in the Gypt. I arrived at 2:15 am Cairo time and Valerie and I stayed up chatting until nearly 6am. I am not quite back on schedule yet, this morning I think I was awake around 4am. yesterday we went to a giant craft fair that was held at a local sporting club. To say the least it was a little strange. To be in a Islamic country walking around booths with home made christian X-mas trinkets was surreal. Some of the items on display: Italian designer knitwear, homemade cookies, Kenyan crafts, alabaster crafts, dollar store style X-mas trinkets, Bedouin jewellery, aprons made of fabric covered in ancient Egyptian designs, etc, etc. Almost all of Valerie's co-workers were there, they all had this week off in celebration of Eid.

I don't know whether or not I will get paid for doing any work at the school. There is a slight possibility I will be working with a sixth grade class for a week. I will be doing drama with at least two of the classes, Valerie's current class and her class from last year. There are a lot of new teachers at the school and they all seem pretty cool.

I have been offered a position teaching summer school again this summer and I am mulling it over.

Valerie has her sites set on positions for next year. I think the most likely scenario is her moving to Syria and working in Damascus. The owners of CISE are opening a new school there and she is hopeful they will consider her for one of the initial positions.