We have joined the Gallipoli group, here in Istanbul and to be honest, it is nice to hear some Kiwi accents and hear some talk of home ( I know, I know, we have only been gone five minutes....)
We went out with members of the group for some tea about 5.30 and as a group tried to order food from a Turkish cafe. I wanted one chicken, which Ian and I had decided to share and one lemonade, which is called something completely different. What we ended up with was two chicken dishes, with chips, a salad and a seven up. I also sold Ian for four camels and a bong, offered to do the dishes and told the waiter his mother was hairy...... God, I miss a native speaker being with us all the time, which really means, what a totally spoilt experience we had in Egypt having a willing guide to take us everywhere and interpret for us. We were picked up and dropped of, guided, taken places. They bartered on our behalf, carried our bags, answered my incessant questions AND seemed happy to do it. At no stage during our time in Egypt did we feel unsafe, or unsure of what was expected. I sincerely hope Egypt is on its way back as a holiday destination.
As a sideline, I think it is only fair to say that many of my questions related to the common practice of being able to take FOUR WIVES, I am unable to get passed this and yet our Egyptian interpreter took it in his stride. He was so cool about it at times, I thought he was having me on! Apparently not! He only had one wife and she was a teacher ( go teachers! No second wives for us!) but one of our drivers had three wives and seven children! They can live in one place or multiple apartments if they don't get on and when I asked what happens if you get a mean wife, our guide just laughed and more or less said 'you be thankful for the nice ones, you take the good with the bad'. Every time Ian showed an interest in discussing this practice further, I distracted him at best and elbowed him at worst. I have discovered I am a particularly jealous wife....
We went out with members of the group for some tea about 5.30 and as a group tried to order food from a Turkish cafe. I wanted one chicken, which Ian and I had decided to share and one lemonade, which is called something completely different. What we ended up with was two chicken dishes, with chips, a salad and a seven up. I also sold Ian for four camels and a bong, offered to do the dishes and told the waiter his mother was hairy...... God, I miss a native speaker being with us all the time, which really means, what a totally spoilt experience we had in Egypt having a willing guide to take us everywhere and interpret for us. We were picked up and dropped of, guided, taken places. They bartered on our behalf, carried our bags, answered my incessant questions AND seemed happy to do it. At no stage during our time in Egypt did we feel unsafe, or unsure of what was expected. I sincerely hope Egypt is on its way back as a holiday destination.
As a sideline, I think it is only fair to say that many of my questions related to the common practice of being able to take FOUR WIVES, I am unable to get passed this and yet our Egyptian interpreter took it in his stride. He was so cool about it at times, I thought he was having me on! Apparently not! He only had one wife and she was a teacher ( go teachers! No second wives for us!) but one of our drivers had three wives and seven children! They can live in one place or multiple apartments if they don't get on and when I asked what happens if you get a mean wife, our guide just laughed and more or less said 'you be thankful for the nice ones, you take the good with the bad'. Every time Ian showed an interest in discussing this practice further, I distracted him at best and elbowed him at worst. I have discovered I am a particularly jealous wife....
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