Today, as I woke up early in the morning, I was ready for a great day at the village. What I got was a genuinely fantastic experience there.
I was going to go with a few other people to the village. We had to leave in a bus that would take us all together. The bus left at 8am. Even at this time, the roads were packed.
In typical Egyptian fashion, the drivers would wind through the car maze. A special variation of a normal maze, because all of the borders move! This is normal for every Egyptian in the city.
As soon as we arrived, we were met with friendly faces that looked intently at our weird clothes. What were we wearing, you may ask? Just normal everyday clothes. Well, not really normal for them. Most people, even the women, wear gallabeyas. Gallabeyas are a type of robe that has an opening at the top for your head, and two openings at the side for your arms.
We headed to a small church at the edge of the village. Arabic church services are very different to the church services I have at home. The women would sit on the left of the church, and the men would sit on the right. There are some small fences that mark the border between them. Also, the Arabic people sing with all their might, soul and strength. So loud in fact, that most of the time, the speakers couldn’t handle such levels, and would peak.
After we finished attending the church service, we ate some food and left for the farms. People there mostly live off the produce that they grow. They are subsistence farmers. In the first field we went to, they were growing a plant that they would feed their donkeys with.
The people that lived there offered us some tea, which is typical of the people in the villages. They asked us a lot of questions about how people in western societies live. Our methods are very different than theirs. For example, in most western families, the child will leave the family for college and will not come back. On the other hand, Egyptians, and most other Arabs, will stay with their families and children in one house. Each family with their own floor. The grandparents will live in the first floor, the parents on the second, first son on the third and so on. This is very different than our western cultures.
Anyway, as the evening started to come upon us, we headed to another family’s house. They live on this small corridor that is basically their street. Children play ball in these corridors, throw trash there and do all types of things there.
Finally, we headed home. By that time, it was already getting very dark and we headed back to the bus. What an interesting day! It would be great to come back! (And we will!)