Blogger Help for New Readers and Call to all for Life Saving Donations

Hello New Reader! (If you are a long-time reader, skip this next paragraph)

If you are not familiar with blogger, then you may be confused by the posts you are seeing.  Blogger shows the most recent blogs first.  I wish I knew of an easy way to read a blog chronologically.  If you have come to my blog because we talked about Egypt or international teaching, and you wanted to know more, then I recommend that you start at the beginning and read this backwards starting from the 2016 posts. For reference, we were in Egypt from 2016-2019 and I was much more consistent about blogging at that time.

Help Needed:

The Children of the Exumas need you!

Shockingly, on many of the family islands in The Bahamas, children do not own lifejackets, nor do they learn how to swim, and yet, they often are transported to school by boat.  On a recent ride to school, a mother and her child fell out of the boat and nearly drowned.  No one on the boat had a lifejacket, and few were able to swim or even do a survival float.  Our friends on S/V Beachscape, Dave and Kim Leverich, want to change that.  They are looking for donations of new or slightly used lifejackets for children to be taken to the Exumas next season.They have also pledged swim lessons for any children who would like to learn to swim.  In order to accomplish this, this summer they will also be taking classes to become Red Cross certified Water Safety Instructors.  They are also looking for anyone who would like to pledge their time to help the children learn to swim.

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If you can donate lifejackets, or plan to be in the Exumas next season and can help with swim lessons, please let us know!  You can contact me at svupbound@gmail.com or you can contact Dave and Kim through their website at https://www.sailawaywithussc.com/

Our plan is to be back in the Exumas next December/January, so we can help transport some of the lifejacket donations. Kim and Dave will transport the majority of donations and will recruit other cruisers who can transport donations.

The Next Chapter, cont- From the beginning. Buying a boat in Italy

In March of 2018, we were back in Michigan for Spring Break.  We had a list of our wants and needs for a boat and we were actively looking on the internet for the “right” boat.  Ideally, we wanted a boat that had already sailed the world because it would already be set up with all those things we needed.  We wanted at least two bedrooms (called cabins or berths on a boat) and two bathrooms (called heads). I love me a good bath, so a bathtub was on my “if I can dream” list.  

 

Significantly, major hurricanes passed through the Bahamas and Caribbean the previous year, wrecking many sailboats, so we were advised that prices of boats in the US and Caribbean had gone way up.  It made sense to us, then, to look in the Mediterranean for our boat.

     I had signed up for a “Women Who Sail the Med” Facebook group in order to get more comfortable with the idea of sailing. One day during spring break a woman advertised her boat. They were a family of four with two young girls. They were going to be completing their circumnavigation in the Med in July and wanted people to be aware that they were looking for a buyer. This boat checked all our boxes, was in our price range, AND had a bathtub!  We emailed them to find out when we could see it, and it turned out that they were in the Red Sea, in EGYPT!  What were the odds?  It seemed like fate.

Upon returning to Egypt, we made arrangements to have a driver bring us to their location in Hurghada so we could see the boat.  It was better than we imagined. These parents, being ultra protective of their young daughters, had two of everything incase one thing went out.  They had two radars, two autopilots, two chartplotters, and parts to rebuild every system.  The boat was well-equipped with solar, water-maker, etc. It even had 3 cabins, so one could be used as a garage. It seemed to good to be true.

                              This picture was taken in Hurghada where we 

                              looked at the boat. We couldn’t find any other 

                              pictures from that day.

We kept in contact with the family for the next few months and Gary made arrangements to meet them in Italy at the end of July for a “survey”.  This is basically a complete inspection by an expert in boats.  We had no doubt that we would own this Beneteau Oceanis 44 by the end of July. It seemed ideal.

In July, Gary flew from Michigan to Italy.  I had booked him 2 weeks in an Airbnb to give him time to complete the deal before he would be able to move aboard.  He brought his bike over so he’d have transportation.  

                         Cute, reasonably priced Airbnb. Gary loved it!

love 

 

We were so excited, the family so relieved to have a buyer. 

If you have been on our boat, or if you’ve followed our journey, you may be asking, “But, UPBound isn’t a 44 foot, 3 cabin Beneteau? What happened?”

This “dream boat” had a problem.  

In an effort to make it “perfect” and as safe as possible for his daughters, the owner had decided to have a whole new hull put on it, in Croatia.  He noticed what he thought was an osmosis bubble, and some unscrupulous business people had taken advantage of his lack of knowledge and convinced him it would be best to tear the whole bottom off the boat and rebuild it.  Except, Croatia has NO regulations on the boat repair businesses.  The family pulled into port, full of emotion at just having completed an amazing adventure. Gary was there to greet them. Their boat was pulled out of the water for the inspection, and immediately the whole hull began to bubble.  Our inspector explained to them and to us that the people in Croatia had failed to put the hull on correctly, totally skipping a layer of epoxy. He estimated this boat would have sunk within 2 years.  

This picture shows the damage from the moisture that penetrated the fiberglass

We were heartbroken, but this young couple was devastated.  Likely they had spent the majority of their life’s savings on this boat and adventure, only to end on such a sad and sour note.  

A new hull could be put on the boat, but this would take a lot of time and cost a lot of money, and still not be guaranteed to last very long, so we walked away.

After that, Gary enjoyed a lazy, solo beach vacation in Italy, then returned to Egypt early to welcome the new Schutz staff and give them tours around Alexandria.

                                            Trieste, Italy  This is where he flew in to Italy.

                   Gary was able to ride his bike from his Airbnb to visit this uniquely walled city.

                                                 Palmanova, Italy

                                          But, he spent most of his time at this huge beach.  Grado, Italy

 

 

Siwa's Nicest Resident

 I like things to be researched and planned out.  It makes me somehow feel like I am in control, I know what to expect, how much money we will spend, and I won't regret the things I didn't get to see and do, because I will have prioritized my time and plans.  I didn't do that for my 4 day Siwa holiday and truth be told, I was feeling pretty anxious. I had booked a hotel online on a whim at the last minute.  It seemed most hotels were booking up fast, and so I booked, not even calling to check for a resident's rate.  I didn't notice that I had booked an Ecolodge - no electricity and dirt floors, 10 km from the city.  I didn't  book a guide - something you always must do when traveling in Egypt.  Instead, I asked the hotel for advice and they just said "Come and we will arrange tours".  

My thinking immediately turns negative when things are not as I expected, Gary is much better with uncertainties.  He has more of the adventurer's spirit.  He trusts that things will just work out.

Which leads me to the story of how an unplanned adventure down back streets in the Siwa oasis, 20-some miles from the Libyan border, in 100 degree heat lead us to meet the sweet man in the photo above.

It was our first full day in Siwa, and we had decided to take a cab into town to see what all the fuss was about.  We had been told "Siwa is one of my favorite places in Egypt"  "You just have to go"  "It is really unique", but very few details other than that.  

So, we got to town - and other than a big falling down castle looking thing in the center, it looked like the rest of Egypt.  We weren't impressed and Gary wanted to just call the driver to take us back.  I just wanted to get a little exercise, which I thought meant we would walk around town and look at the various shops.  Gary decided he would like to walk to the lake he saw on the map.  Thinking it would be towns and shops most of the way, we took off with one bottle of water each.

After walking nearly an hour, mostly through sparsely populated areas and date palm areas- we lost all internet and phone connections.  Our water was getting very low, it was almost 100 degrees, getting close to 11am and the heat of the day.  No internet meant no Google maps, and were we even on the right road to get to the lake?  How did the Bedouins and other desert dwellers survive?  I was ready to start a fight - turn back to at least find some internet connections again.  Gary was sure the lake was "right around the next corner".  Turns out, it was.  Turns out, we were back on a main road and we had an internet signal again and phone service!  The lake was a big disappointment - not fresh water as we had assumed, but dirty and salty, right next to a waste water facility!

So, it was time to call for a driver and wait out our time under the date palms near the lake.

As soon as we entered the grove, we saw this shelter.  You will notice in the second picture, that the shelter even had some shelves inside, but no sign of anyone currently living there.

And just as I was taking this picture, a middle-aged man, the man in the first picture I posted, stepped out from behind one of the palm trees, barefoot, dressed in a gallabaya (a long, cotton dress-like outfit that is common here)

Oh no!  Had we trespassed on his home?  We gestured we were very hot and could we stay?  We gestured we were waiting on a ride back and we had taken a long walk.  He gestured for us to follow him back into the denser part of the forest.  My fatalistic mind went right to "Oh my gosh, no way, he probably has a weapon or something back there and we are going to be robbed."  But Gary said, "Let's just see what he wants to show us".  So we took about 20 steps to where he had some palm branches spread out on the ground and he asked us to sit with him.  

As I looked around, there were more of these shelters. What was this place?  A homeless area or something?  

We heard a donkey braying in the distance.  "Is that your donkey? Gary asked, imitating the donkey's bray.  He laughed and nodded his head.  He gestured and asked us if we are together.  I had Gary show him his ring.  He laughed and smiled - a big, toothy smile.

 I said "Ana Laura" (Meaning "I am Laura" and Gary said his name and we asked him his name.  We aren't sure if he didn't want to tell us, or wasn't sure what we were asking, but after trying "Mohamed?" "Youseff ?" "Ahmad?"  He finally said "Mohamed"

Our driver called and wanted to know our exact location.  I had sent him the google map location, but he could not believe we had walked there, so he was sure we were mistaken.  We handed Mohamed our phone, and he and the driver talked.  Mohamed explained our location, then looked at us and gestured walking.  We laughed and nodded our head and his eyes got big as he told our driver that we had indeed walked there from where we had been dropped off.  Mohamed questioned us how we had walked that far, so I pointed at my tennis shoes and said "Good shoes"

Soon, he gestured he had to go.  He went back further into the forest, soon returning with some white date tree flower type branches that he wanted to show us.  Gary gestured to ask him if he eats those?  He handed one to Gary and gestured that he should smell it.  Gary mimed biting it and he laughed and shook his head no.  

He then pounded the branch on his hand and white dust flew up.  "Oh," Gary exclaimed, "He's pollinating the trees!"  He left again, returning with many of these branches, holding the material from his gallabaya in his teeth to make a pouch for these branches.  I asked if I could take a selfie with him.  

This is the photo I shot.  What I didn't expect was his reaction.  As I turned on my camera to take this photo, he seemed confused.  His teeth still held his gallabaya.  He seemed to slowly realize the person in the camera was him, letting the material out of his mouth and raising his head a bit to get a better look at himself. SNAP, I had the volume turned up on my camera and it seemed to surprise him as the picture momentarily froze, then disappeared.  I tried to offer him a little money for letting us stay there and for letting me take his picture.  He absolutely refused and I didn't want to ask again for fear of insulting him.   When I put the camera down, he pointed at my phone. I was still not understanding his fascination.  I assumed he wanted to see the picture, so I showed him.  He wanted to see this camera again.  I handed the phone to him on selfie mode.  I was still not getting it.  I was thinking he just wanted a better picture of himself, so I snapped a picture when he had his head up high (first picture) and then it all became clear.  I sat back and just let him be - my camera on my phone on selfie mode, him, quietly studying his aging face for what may have been the first time.  He turned his head back and forth, looking closely at all his features.  When he handed it back, I decided that maybe he would be even more amazed when he saw the video feature - so I took this short video.

By this time, we were fast friends. 

Gary then wanted to know more about how he pollinates the trees, so we asked him to show us.  Obviously, I will never be a vlogger or photo journalist, because he gestured for me to video-tape him, but it didn't click in my mind what he was asking. Gary figured it out.  However, by then, he had already shimmied up the tree and was in the palms.  I took a poor video of him up in the branches, but then my phone rang and it was the driver - and the phone stopped video-taping.  He came down the tree and again talked with our driver, who was on the road just out from the date palm grove we were standing in.  However, we didn't know this, so Mohamed gestured that the driver was here and we should follow him.  He walked us to our car, but before we could get there, he asked me to show him the video.  Unfortunately, we were again in the sunlight and what little bit of video I got could not be seen.  We thanked him over and over and parted ways.

Sometimes it is best just to go with the flow.

Electrical Appliances and Outlets

While looking on Amazon for Christmas gifts, I may or may not have started looking for some things I might like to buy for myself. (shameful, right?!)  One of the things I was thinking about was a new blender for the boat, like a Magic Bullet.  Then I stopped myself and was inspired to write this blog. 

 I thought this might be interesting to some.  You see, in my newly built apartment,  I can plug in things from the US as well as things from Europe and Egypt in the same outlet!  Isn't that smart?!  But, our next home is a sailboat, made in Europe. I am quite sure it does not have cool outlets like this, and for some items, like appliances, besides for the different shape of the plugs in the USA and Europe, the power needed is different.  Sometimes I forget these little details.....

By the way, I have a lot of posts in draft form.  Not sure when I will publish them.  Some have told me they enjoy my posts.  Comment below if you read.  It would be nice to know who stopped by!

Beginning of our Second Year in Egypt

October 13, 2017  Our second season of living overseas has begun and is actually well on its way!  We are almost done with the first marking period and have already taken our first trip outside of Egypt. I am obviously way behind on this blog.

What is new this year?
Well, this year my classroom is now in the elementary building rather than in the high school.  This makes a lot of sense since most of the students I see are elementary students. The classroom space became available due to the issues with the government floating the Egyptian pound on the world market making things much more expensive for the local people, and the subsequent inflation causing the school to need to increase tuition, along with some new Egyptian laws that make it illegal for our school to accept any new Egyptian students.  Because of these things, our school has about 15-25 fewer students, mostly in the elementary school - which meant they now had space to move my classroom.  I have more space and more light.  I enjoyed the high school staff, but it is nice to now get to know the elementary staff better.  Last year I struggled to find manipulatives- this year I am in the building where those things are more readily available.

Using Barton tiles to write words on board

One of my goals is to raise awareness of learning differences through-out the school

Volleyball tournament on campus

Middle School Discovery Day - Gary taught compass course.  Schutz needs better quality compasses, but the kids did pretty well anyways.

Another thing that is new is staff.  International schools often have a pretty high turnover each year.  I think that is one thing that makes international teaching both exciting and difficult.  You meet friends, live and work with them for a whole year, then a portion of them get jobs in other places and move away and you are forced to say good-bye.  However, we also realize that means we now have people we can go visit in even more places, and thanks to Facebook, it is easier to stay in touch. The exciting part is that each year you get to meet new people. This year we have 3 new staff members who live on campus - all three are experienced, long-time international teachers.  I hope to learn a lot from all of them. They all seemed to assimilate quickly and have social lives outside of campus.  This is in contrast to when Gary and I arrived, and probably all of the teachers who started with us last year because we were all new to the international teaching field.  New experiences are always exciting - and I would imagine just going to a new international school is a bit of an adrenaline rush even for experienced international teachers - but I can't imagine that there is anything like your first international teaching/living experience.  Much of last year is a blur, so I am glad I wrote down my feelings and experiences as they happened, whenever I could.  The wonder and amazement and appreciation I felt about everything for the majority of last year is something I am now struggling to hold on to. Don't get me wrong, I still feel incredibly privileged to be living this life, but this year I find I need to remind myself to continue to get as much out of this experience as I possibly can because I know there is a cost to having this incredible life experience -  I am missing out on a lot of time with family.  Which brings me to what is new #3.

Two of our friends from last year who are thankfully still here this year.  

One of our new friends.  This guy has introduced Schutz to the exciting world of Maker-spaces.
We now have Virtual Reality, 3-D printers, and robotics.  Even our elementary students are learning to code.  And, I now have classroom touch-screen Chromebooks!  

Last year I was so overwhelmed with everything that when people spoke Arabic, I only heard a string of sounds - nothing sounded like words.  Then, in December, Cassandra arrived.  Within a month she had already picked up on more words than I had in my first 4 months!  She helped me to be able to distinguish various words during the Call to Prayer and when people were talking.  I didn't recognize much of what was said, but I could at least distinguish the words I knew.  I have decided that now it is about time to start Arabic lessons.  So, starting on Sunday, I am officially going to start trying to learn Arabic with an Arabic teacher who will come to our apartment.  My vocabulary right now is only my numbers to ten and about 10 other words!  I am hoping to at least double that!

What else is new?  Well, this year I am assistant advisor to the Interact Club (High School aged Rotary students) and assistant advisor to the Middle School Model United Nations Club.  Our Interact Club has cleaned a beach in Alexandria, is raising money for blankets for people to stay warm this winter and  is raising money to put on a Christmas event for our employees and their families, among other things.  They also plan to support an orphanage, but I am not sure which orphanage they plan to support and how.  This is a student-run organization, so the kids make the decisions.  The Middle School Model United Nations club makes me wish I had known about this years ago as they study world issues, various nations, and pretend to write and debate policies.  It is very interesting.  We will be traveling with the students to Turkey for this activity where the kids will be simulating the UN with other students from all over the region.  Fortunately for us, the recent restrictions on traveling to Turkey only apply to US citizens traveling directly to Turkey from the USA.

Beach clean-up with Interact, Volleyball players, and staff families from Schutz. This young friend worked so hard! (We will miss her next year when her family moves on to another school!)

Estimated 800 pounds of garbage picked up from the beach!

Baskets made by the kids we visit at the orphanage

Kids at the orphanage are learning how to make wicker furniture

The Alexandria Rotary Club paid for this new kitchen to be built at the orphanage

Another new experience this year is to get massages at the Four Seasons.  The Four Seasons is only about 3 blocks away and has a nice spa and massages for about 50% of what you would pay in the USA.  I like this change.

We also tried out a restaurant in the Four Seasons.  We have now found a place for delicious Australian rib eye steaks.  We also ate at a place near the Greek Club with the elementary staff.  It had a great view of the city and some delicious food. Some of the people on campus have found some great bakeries with delicious chocolate cakes. By the end of last year, I did not want to see one more grain of rice, one more spaghetti sauce with olives, or any more Egyptian food -  and I was really looking forward to going back to the USA to eat a great steak, chicken noodle soup, raisins, and some good chocolate desserts.  I am happy to say that between cooking more in our apartment and finding some really good restaurants and bakeries, food might not be as much of an issue for us this year.  (Although we still have not found good raisins)  I didn't lose much weight last year because I wanted to try everything - I am not losing much weight this year because I have found too much I like to eat!  Oh well.

This is celery!  I would have never recognized it because it is so small, but our friends told us to expect it to be miniature size of what we would expect.  I made potato salad and chicken noodle soup - the celery made all the difference!

Our apartment this year is new to us, but we are not yet in our "new" apartment.  They moved us inside campus because this year we have fewer staff members and so apartments were available. Last year, the school rented from another company that had an apartment building just outside the wall.  It was cool to live in the "real Egypt" - being forced to step outside the campus each day to see every day life in the neighborhood and it even gave us empathy for those who have to live every day with internet so slow it might take an hour to watch a 30 minute Netfix show.  Even uploading pictures to this blog was a test of my patience - sometimes it would take all day.  Now, writing a blog and posting pictures is so much less frustrating!!  The other teacher who lived off campus with us said it was a "psychological break from work" just stepping outside the wall - knowing that you have a place to work and a place to live.  I understand that more this year.  Campus is really just a slice of America - if you never go outside the walls, you can almost imagine that you are living in the USA.  The internet works so much better on campus as I have stated, the grass is green, well, the fact that there IS grass is quite unique here! - the flowers are beautiful, everything is kept so clean.  While living on campus you have a ready supply of people to do things with and we feel "more-connected" to everyone. 

The building we are in this year is part of the original villa that served Missionary families on retreat, and later was used as a boarding school for missionary children.  In the 1970's, the building was converted to apartments for foreign-hire teachers.  The ceilings are at least 12 feet high, and each apartment is unique and funky.  For example, between all these rooms is a hallway that is big enough to be made into another room.

The living room and bedroom both have doors that go out onto a big covered porch area.  Therefore, these apartments do not get much light during the day.

The newly-built apartments on the 4th floor of the elementary building are nearing completion.  We are hoping we will be moved in by Christmas. There was some talk about getting us in by the end of October, but that may have been optimistic.  That being said, I believe our exact apartment might be completely done as they did haul furniture up there and used our apartment as the model for the school board.  We snuck up a few weeks ago and admired the open kitchen/living room space and the beautiful big windows.  They also used some nice wood-looking tile for the outdoor hallway between the apartments and some pretty tiles inside the apartments  The recessed lighting is very nice as well.  I don't think I got any pictures while we were up there, so you will have to wait until we actually move in.  The hardest part has been the fact that we have not yet unpacked all of our boxes at this apartment because we keep expecting to move over there soon.  Tonight we sat on the steps of the elementary building when the Call to Prayer started up.  Someone installed a speaker that is pointed right at the elementary building. They seem to blast that speaker louder than all the others.  It so loud in fact , that the sound is highly distorted. Even if we COULD understand Arabic, no one would be able to understand what is coming from those speakers.  Our Egyptian friends have told us that some mosques will purposely turn their speakers in the direction of where they know there are foreigners in order to try to convert us!  I don't know if that is true or not, but if they really wanted to convert people, I think they might have a chance at being successful if they would speak their message clearly in English and have their speaker turned to a reasonable level so as not to make the foreigners upset.  Anyhow, we now know our new apartment will be in direct line of that awful speaker.


We have submitted our intentions to stay another year, as long as the school still wants a Learning Support program and still wants me to set it up so that it can be sustainable.  Next year's head of school and his wife both have backgrounds in special education, so as long as they are willing to have me stay in my current position of coordinating the program, we will be here again next year.  If not, then Gary will move forward to find us a sailboat for the next chapter.

Speaking of which, Gary has signed up for a IYT crew and captain courses in Thailand in December.  Once certified, we will be able to rent a sailboat for our Christmas vacation and sail by ourselves!  In addition, Gary will be qualified to work on other people's ships, if he wants to do so.  We have rented a sailboat for 10 days during Christmas, and I am really looking forward to finally finding out if the sailing life will be for us.

Gary had also been asked to chaperone the elementary soccer team on their trip to Italy in November.  I think he is getting more out of this experience not working than I am while working!  Italy will be his second country that he has visited that I never have.

The Eid Break happened in September.  It was shorter this year, just 5 days.  We spent our time in Greece, mostly along the beaches of the Chalkidiki peninsula of Sithonia and a day in the city of Thessaloniki.  The beaches were nice, all with various coarseness of sand, but not much to see while snorkeling.  We took a drive through the mountains, and visited an old village.

Map of the area we stayed.  We stayed on the middle peninsula. This is the area that Odysseus is said to have recorded his travels.  We did not see any Cyclops.  I think it was FAKE NEWS! 

There is a law in Greece that the restaurants must give you your receipt FIRST and it must be kept visible on your table in case the authorities come and ask for it.  Once you leave, it is fine to throw it away!

Greece seems to sell a lot of good quality mink coats.  There were fur shops everywhere!

This is a colorful house in the old town part of Thessaloniki, behind the wall

Notice the old wall behind this beautiful tree in Thessaloniki

View of Thessaloniki from the White Tower, part of the old wall

Inside a small chapel in Greece

Mt. Athos - This peninsula is only inhabited by monks and no women may enter for any reason.  Men who are not monks may visit only with special permission.

One example of memorial buildings that can be seen all over Greece.  They are usually filled with photographs, religious Greek Orthodox or Roman Catholic icons, and a lit candle.

Greece is very hilly

Nice restaurant next to the yacht harbor

This beautiful yacht came in while we were eating

Fun to admire the boats and catamarans

Enjoyed many beautiful sunsets in Greece. #Nofilter

Soon we will have a long weekend when we will get to travel to the Sinai Peninsula to enjoy snorkeling on the beautiful coral of the Red Sea and we also have plans to climb Mt. Sinai, where Moses supposedly encountered the Burning Bush.