a great day in Egypt

For those of you that asked, I am studying in Egypt for one month, not teaching. I am learning how to teach English. The new student finally arrived (she was supposed to arrive yesterday). She is in her 50s and is very strange. We are not sure if it is just because she was tired or if she is schizophrenic or something... I am not talking a little bit odd... VERY odd. She stayed for part of a class and then left because she was falling asleep. I will wait and see how she is tomorrow after a good sleep to make any real judgement, though. Other than that, today was such a great day. Classes went well. I had McDonalds for lunch because we were short on time. We had Hussein, our driver, take us to an ATM during the lunch break. After classes, we went back home and then headed out for some shopping, etc. We split into 2 groups because Bryn and Kate just wanted to go shopping but the rest of us were hungry. We wandered around until finally we found a 'Fat Boy' restaurant. We sat down outside and ordered our food and then a woman, Diaa walked up to us and started talking to us. She speaks English fluently. She is the manager of the restaurant, and she is a lawyer. She moved us upstairs so that we would have more space. Just after we got our food, a man walked up to the table to talk to us. He is the owner of the restaurant and several other branches. He lived in LA, where Alex is from, and where he owned a 20 foot yacht, and in Edmonton. What a coincidence. He owns several pharmacies in different places as well. He is a pharmacist. They told us to go there when ever we wanted and they would give us a discount and if we ever needed anything, to call them. Diaa wants to hang out with us. While we were there, there was a birthday party going on for a 9 year old boy. The 3 women that were there insisted that we join them. It was so fun.There was impromptu belly dancing and other dancing, singing and such.The cake was beautiful (and delicious). The women want to hang out with us. They work in a hotel somewhere. They said that we should go there before we go home. Other than the new student, everything here seems to be almost perfect. Hopefully her participation and attitude will be different tomorrow. Love you all and miss you.