Don't step on the cracks

or you'll break your grandmother's back. This, according to Mr C is a rhyme kids say when they're avoiding cracks in the pavement, but in my case, its all about avoiding the cracks between the tiles in our kitchen. The kitchen has been designed with such gross idiocy that it is just breathtaking. Firstly, the kitchen surface is tiled with the same tiles as the floor, with dirty grouting in between them. Why they couldn't put down something smooth and easy to clean is beyond me..tiling is obviously going to get filthy. If anything falls off my chopping board, it has to go straight in the bin. Secondly, they put a cupboard directly above the sink, at head height. So if you want to wash up, you have to bend backwards, or duck your head under the cupboard, which you can imagine is fairly uncomfortable. Grrr.

That said, I did do some cooking. I made stuffed peppers and imam bayildi, which means 'the imam fainted' - it's a famous Turkish dish made with aubergines. Legend has it that an imam fainted when he tasted the dish, because it was so delicious. Mr C did a mock faint when he had some, but then he's not an imam so I wouldn't expect him to be affected in the same way. I also tried out making kheer (rice pudding) but used lemon zest instead of rose water which turned out all right.

For Eid, we went to Imam Suhaib's house after prayers for breakfast. There's a nice community here, even though you don't generally see people as often as we have in the past couple of days - everyone's busy with studies and their families usually. I wasn't well so the rest of the day wasn't too exciting - we just stayed at home.

Yesterday, we went out to City Stars Mall to eat at Chili's. It should have been good except that on our way there, we stopped about five taxis and they all refused to take us! Puzzled, we rang Bikey who said that was normal, but she didn't know why, maybe because it wasn't far enough to be worth it for them. We got there eventually - there was lots of traffic - and ate our meal, but then had to try and get home. Again, no taxis wanted to go there. After asking 8 or 9, one agreed, but then said we had to pay 30 Egyptian pounds (Bikey said normal fare is 3 or 4!) so we got out. After finding a taxi driver who agreed to 10, we got home, but when we gave him the money he told us we said we were going to pay 20 and threw a hissy fit, which was scary because we were still in his car. Mr C, bless him, put his utmost feeling into his broken Arabic ('Qulna Ashrah! Ashrah!) whilst waving 15 pounds at him - our compromise for a quiet life. We got out and left the 15 pounds, and he drove off still cursing us.