Life As I See It - From Egypt

The House in Marassi

We have finally moved into our new house up on the coast. As always, an adventure. First, no one gave us the ID card to get into the gated compound. We had to talk our way through. Fortunately we knew the name of someone else who lived there so we said we were going to visit him. Upon arrival, I found out we have a "house guy". He lives in a small, attached room behind the house. At first blush you may think, “So what’s the problem? Such a deal!” Well, I’m not saying it isn’t a good deal. But it is completely weird to have someone else in your house all day. He takes care of the outside maintenance, the kitchen, the floors and the dusting. I cook, Ron and I eat in the dining room. I come back to the kitchen, the pots and pans are washed and drying (there is no dishwasher here). I clear the table and take the dishes to the kitchen, he washes them immediately. TOTALLY weird… but not unacceptable! :)

We were told the house had heating and air conditioning. We came to look at it ahead of time and it had similar type units to what we have in Cairo. They have the heating and AC together in one unit and each unit is controlled separately by remote control. There’s at least one unit in each room. Guess what? The units here are AC only. It gets down into the 40’s on some nights! Last night was our first night and again, it was reminiscent of the Harrison Street house when we could see our breath in the air upon getting up on cold mornings. To make the situation more interesting, Ron was absolutely determined to make the unit in our bedroom have heat. He finally got the fan going (blowing cold air all over the place and taking the room from cold to frigid) and then could not get it to shut off. Oh happy day! At least it gives me something to write about!

posted by Teresa @ 1:31 AM