Volume One

Hello all,
It seems a lifetime ago that I was home. In this whirlwind of stuff that is going on Paula and I are having a great time. Nelly (our cat from Canada for those who don't know) is good although he's a little weirded out it seems. We live in a fifth floor apartment and we are one of two apartments on the top floor. Our kitchen has a walk-out terrace which we just bought some really comfortable chairs for and sat and relaxed last night. The school and the people are great and Paula and I are settling in slowly.

Our terrace looks to the north and we want to have something made to create shade (a hot commodity) for comfort's sake. I say we can see the pyramids from it however that depends on smog conditions. We live in a city of approximately 20 million or roughly 2/3 the population of Canada. WOW! We take taxis to most places for 3 pounds (or 50 cents US) and we live in a suburb called Ma'adi. It is a very english-speaking part of Cairo although there is no mistaking that you are in Egypt. If Ma'adi is roughly a circle it is about 3km across and we do try to walk places however with no stop signs, traffic lights or street signs, getting lost is easy (as we can testify from experience).

There are what they calll Midans or roundabouts which can be insane to cross with the cars trucks and buses all honking at you and eachother for usually no particular reason. Cairo is somewhat comical in that respect and you get used to it quickly. Taxis are everywhere except when you need one or are late....murphys law I guess.

Our flight from Canada to Frankfurt, Germany was nice although flying out of a sunset and into the sunrise was odd to say the least. We spent just over two hours in the Airport before our flight to Egypt. After a slightly rough and nauseating landing we could feel nothing but heat in the plane. It was a mere 32 degrees C and that is relatively low for August. Today is 38C, HOT!
We were awake approximately 27-28 hours from Canada to our hotel rooms in Ma'adi but that helped us get over our Jet Lag to some extent. On the Friday Paula and I went out on a nice air-conditioned bus with about 14 or so people to look for apartments. After roughly 8 hours of apartment shopping and 15 apartments we found ours. We love it and so does Paula's friend Yvonne.
Although I will try to send e-mails often, recieving and reading responses from everyone I send to might be difficult. I think the next Volume of my Pyramid post will detail a trip to the Pyramids hopefully and maybe someone will ask a question that will lead to a funny story.
If you want to mail something to Paula or myself this is the address:
Grant Welsh (or Paula Welsh)
c/o The American International School in Egypt
P.O. Box 8090 Masaken Nasr City 11371
Cairo, Egypt
F.Y.I. If it is something big check first as duty here can be hefty, like 200 US Dollars to get a shirt and 2 books. The Flatter the better! We can't recieve mail at our apartment as it is unreliable.

Looking forward to school,

Talk to you later,

Grant and Paula