Thursday, September 4, 2008

First day back business

We just got back from the Duty Free Shop. There are certain things an expat has to do when returning from a trip abroad, and one of the things is buying the tax free booze. We had already put a very generous supply of our favorite drink bourbon in our checked luggage coming from the US, so there was no actual need in that department, however we did restock our red wine supply, and bought a bottle of bubbles for New Year’s Eve. The Duty Free shop holder informed Courtney that one can only shop at the Duty Free Shop four times/year and that this was his last purchase this year, so unless I miraculously end up going on some trip abroad in the next four months, this is all the alcohol we have to settle for (which is fine, considering the circumstances).

Some of the other things we did today were:

*Called our cable company to find out why our satellite television wasn’t working
*Called Francis at CSA to find out when the boys’ Taekwondo classes start
*Acquired Egyptian pounds from the bank, but not from the account we had intended (to do that we would have had to enter the bank, which proved impossible; hundreds of Egyptians squeezing up to one slow moving bank attendant was not something the Professor could handle on this jetlagged day)
*Bought groceries for nearly 500 EGP
*Concluded that the water boiler in the upstairs bathroom has seen its best days
*Concluded that if we keep the water boiler in the upstairs bathroom unplugged, the breakers stop tripping
*Unpacked an impressive amount of books and sorted out last year’s school books
*Did a ton of laundry (that still needs to be folded and put away)
*Had lots of Hibiscus tea and fresh peaches
*Hid birthday- and Christmas presents away in my closet, and wished I had been able to get a few more things
*Unintentionally had dinner right at the call for Iftar

It was a slow yet quite productive first day back. The weekend starts tomorrow, and we will use it to get as much ready as possible for the new academic year that starts on Sunday. As far as we’ve heard, the new campus has a lot of potential, but is not finished and very dirty (it’s in the desert). Courtney might have an office, but no proper class rooms. Hopefully the bus service works.
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1 comment:

MsTypo said...

Welcome back! :) Interesting (if depressing) to know that they actually enforce that four times per year thing.

Friday, September 5, 2008 at 11:33:00 AM GMT+2

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