"Crazy House"

Tomorrow morning at 4:15am, we are departing for a trip to Dahab, which is a beach town in Sinai on the Read Sea. We are looking forward to six days of vacation. We return next Saturday night, and begin new faculty orientation on Monday morning. I will not be posting to my blog during the trip, but if you want to picture where we are, you can check out the Blue Beach Club (and yoga shala) in Dahab.

We are getting picked up for the trip by a great taxi driver we met last week at a neighborhood midan (literally plaza—think traffic circle). We got his card and call him whenever we have need. He speaks excellent English, and his favorite word is “crazy.” On our first ride with him, he was driving us to Zamalek (a neighborhood located on an island in the Nile River), and he says, “Crazy cinema.” We did not understand until we saw a film crew shooting and blocking the street. He saw a group of police officers, minding their own business: “Crazy police.” A driver cut him off: “Crazy driver.” The difficult roads in our neighborhood: “Crazy roads.” And then we drove by this architectural marvel in my neighborhood—a building that stops me dead in my tracks every time I walk by it: “crazy house.” I am posting a picture of it here. I don’t really know much about it, other than that it is awesome… Check out the spiral staircase immediately beyond the front gate!