I had great fears before Christmas that the time I would spend without evening English classes or work in the school to keep me active and occupied, and no serious travel plans, other than a Christmas retreat in Tanta which I wrote about already, I would be left with days of loneliness, boredom, and depression. But instead, I have been delighted to experience some of the best weeks in Egypt yet. Really, it's been great.
I met a family in New Beni Suef near the beginning of my time here through their father, Youssef (not Abouna Youssef, this Youssef is the non-priestly one) who speaks Engish really quite well. I often get invited over to their home after the Coptic orthodox service on Friday mornings and we sit around Youssef's shop together, drink tea, eat "breakfast" together (most copts fast before the mass service and then eat "breakfast" in the afternoon) teach each other English and Arabic, respectively, and I get to play around with his children a bit, two older boys (one 23, one 14) who also speak good English, and two young kids (kindergarten and grade 1).
His shop is a big room with walls covered in shelves of electrical equipment and a solid black counter/desk in the middle of the room which we sit around. When we eat breakfast Youssef's wife brings down bread, foul (beans, like canned beans but much, much tastier), and a tray of fresh vegetables, and we eat together in the shop around this table. It's wonderfully freeing to eat together from one or two bowls of beans using the bread to scoop up the foul, vegetables and pieces of bread scattered over the surface of the table, free from plates, placemats and utensil. I really like it, and I'm starting to figure out how to get away without over-eating at every single meal without feeling like I am insulting my hosts, as they endlessly offer more foul, more bread, more vegetable, offer to go and cook more food, etc, etc. The hospitality is intense, but I appreciate it more and more as I understand it better.
Anyway, on one Friday I had no plans whatsoever for the rest of the day, or the next either, and Youssef seemed quite pleased to have me stay with them for as long as I could. Somehow the idea came up that we could go and visit the extended family in Beba, a town maybe 30 minutes away by car, and so we piled into the family station wagon and headed off. The part of Beba I saw as I was toured around from flat to flat, exchanging greetings and drinking tea with cousins, aunts, uncles, grandparents, and goats, was a maze of dirt streets winding among four or five storey buildings. One flat had a little courtyard with what looked like a kids play house, but then a goat poked his head out the door. As a small insight into Egyptian family life, the first flat we visited welcomed us into one of the bedrooms where grandma, uncle, and a couple of aunts, were sitting together on a big bed, and Youssef's family piled right on as well, spilling out onto chairs around the bed. It was indeed a big bed. We sat and talked and they laughed and tried to get me to dance. I try to imagine visiting my extended family and piling onto a bed together to chat, and the picture is just too funny. Yet I really like the closeness among family here, so maybe I can bring back a few Egyptian customs. We ate lentil soup, tuna and vegetables together, but not in the bed, we moved to a table for that.
On the return voyage an uncle joined our station wagon as well, so the family spilled into the open area in the back. Returning to Beni Suef we went clothes shopping for Coptic Christmas, celebrated on January 7th, when almost everybody sports new clothes in honour of the celebration. So I was toured around the cool and hip clothing shops in Beni Suef by the older sons and the uncle, being asked to offer my opinion on various pants and shirts, whether they were 'chic' or not. I was amazed at the patience of the mother, younger kids and older sister as they sat in the car while we walked the streets, retuned to the car to move to a few streets over, walk the streets some more, on and on into the evening. Near the end I sat in the car with the ladies and had a good chat about life in Egypt, fending off offers (how serious, I don't know) to marry various cousins and aunts I had met earlier in the day.
I stayed the night in their flat, donned some borrowed Egyptian pajamas (matching baggy sweatpants and sweatshirt) and hung out together watching TV and eating some more food. It was delightful, sitting together in a row on a bed, huddled under blankets (it's cold here in the evenings with no central heating), watching an Egyptian comedy on TV.
I awoke the next morning to the uncle, young daughter and 14-year-old son jumping onto my bed, the uncle huddling under the blankets with me. It reminded me of being woken by my younger cousins when we would stay together and I would try to sleep late into the morning.
We ate breakfast together as a family, with Abouna Youssef and an electrical contractor joining us to discuss the building of a new church. Business meeting at the family breakfast table, us in our pajamas, followed by tea.
The oldest son and I spent most of the day listening to Arabic music on the computer, him translating the lyrics and sharing the songs that were most meaningful to him, which led to some really good conversation about love and life in Egypt where we learned a lot from each other. He is a good friend.
And so ended my Egyptian immersion experience. I feel like I learned more about Egyptian family life and how to speak conversational Arabic in those two days than I had in many weeks on my own at the retreat centre. I was not only welcomed into their family, but I really felt like a relative while I was with them.
I had the pleasure of eating the Christmas feast on January 6th with Youssef and his family as well. After a long, long evening church service (7-12:30, some of which was wonderful and meaningful, and some of which was hard to enjoy when I didn't know the hymns or the words) we ate a huge plate of rice with chunks of moist bread in it and lots of garlic, great chunks of lamb and a breast of duck, with a dessert of bananas, oranges and yogourt.
That morning Abouna Youssef picked me up to see the Coptic Christmas celebrations in town, which was a riot. Christians were crowded in the street outside the main church in town, and even more so in the courtyard inside. I apprciate being tall in moments like that, seeing above the sea of black hair, taking in the energy of the atmosphere filled with loud talking and laughing. I was able to greet the bishop and then sit on a chair in his room while hordes of people flowed in and out, greeting each other, greeting the bishop and all the priests in the room. It was a huge mass of happiness and new clothes. Many Egyptians who I knew came through as well, so it was really great to say merry Christmas to my own friends.
Abouna Youssef kindly invited me to his family Christmas meal out in Maghagha, and although there was no visiting while crowded onto the family bed witih Abouna, we did eat turkey, and I enjoyed meeting some more family, getting to practice a bit more Arabic, and learn some more Egyptian culture.
I have my first evening English class tonight after the Christmas break, and life will probably start to get back into a bit more of a rhythm. But I feel this holiday season has given me not only wonderful memories, but greater confidence in meeting and speaking with Egyptians, and living life here in Beni Suef. I feel better about being in this small Egyptian city all the time, and look forward to the new challenges of the new year.
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