The return of the philosopher and our Duty Free lucky break

Courtney came back in the middle of the night. I didn’t hear him come in or even get undressed, but felt his body heat enter the blankets. A light whiskey breath turned towards me, I put my head on his arm and within minutes light snores filled our bedroom.

The next morning we stayed in bed for a long time, and Courtney told me everything about the Kant conference, the people, his travel mishaps, the food and the philosophy. As I had predicted, the trip had been a very successful encouragement; energized he discussed his work and his ideas, and related everything to the general field and other philosophers’ work. A professor from our home university, the Catholic University of Leuven, had also attended the conference, and Courtney found himself surprisingly happy to chat and spend time with this particular professor; it was as if the familiarity and the professor’s news from the Institute gave him a feeling of home, and this had added a special bonus to the trip.

The whiskey breath was explained by the fact that Courtney had stopped at the Duty Free shop at the airport before going home, and had decided to have a taste of his main purchase before going to sleep. If you buy your quota at the airport, you can get four bottles, whereas if you wait until the next day to go to the Duty Free shop here in Maadi, you only get three bottles. We still went to the Duty Free the next day though to get some candy, and as it turned out (or rather; as luck had it!), the man at the airport had neglected to mark Courtney’s purchase there, so we were offered to buy three bottles of alcohol in Maadi as well. Now you may think, why the enthusiasm? Well, if you were used to having a glass of European quality wine with you dinner, a French avec with your coffee, or a luxurious Belgian beer on a lazy afternoon for so many years, and then suddenly found yourself able to buy nothing but Egyptian Obelisk or Sakkara, you too would excite over the three extra bottles. Courtesy of a five-day trip to Turkey, the content of our liquor cabinet had suddenly tripled!

Although Courtney has needed some extra rest since he got back - his travel schedule was, to say the least, inconvenient - he's back at work, more enthusiastic than before, and the Turkey conference that didn't seem like such a great idea a week ago when the paper was taking too much time from the dissertation completion, turned out to be a very good trip indeed.