#MiminginSiwa

My friend Abigail pointed out to me, one day we were walking up, or rather being pulled up Chancellor hill by her, now deceased, Great Dane, Blue, that I told her that I was going to learn Spanish and that I enrolled in the Venezuelan Embassy's excellent and free classes (where I met Rebecca whose daughter went on to 're-enact' me in a documentary about the evolution of my relationship with my father over our lives- but yes, that's another story) and a few years later I was fluent in Spanish and Living in Peru (where she came to visit and i hogged the radiator). Abigail told me this to point out how When I set my mind on a goal I achieve it which in turn had inspired her. I hadn't seen it like that. I was just living life, perhaps just as I had witnessed my father do.

The point is Abigail made me see me differently. She uplifted me by enabling me to appreciate a quality of mine which maybe I didn't see clearly or in a certain context. She made me feel accomplished and confident and she, in turn, was inspiring me. Abigail is one of the most sensitive people I know. She's my go to friend for when I want a friend who will cry with me not like that Michele who is my ' let's analyse and solve it' friend - more the type of friend I am. The point is Abigail had me feeling good about myself, pleased with myself. Another friend, and she is a kind and smart and supportive friend, more recently said to me, "Well you're bad with languages"... It's not often I bite my tongue, but I did - mainly because she has strong opinions and I've learned it's not worth it- probably the only friend I have who I bite my tongue with. The feeling she inspired in me was more ... grrrrrr... and a bit of "I'll show you" which I was not actually about to do... I only speak one foreign language so i really could not refute her statement. Maybe she was right. I let it go (VERY unlike me). What's my point? Maybe a bit about my approach to languages or rather, learning or not learning them.

In my first week in Paradise Hotel in Siwa I met the wonderful Ahmed who left Egypt at 16 I think and decades later, is now back – he’s here 3 years I think. He said he was going to deny everything I write but I think that was more about the time he 'tried to kill me by motorbike'-I'll save that for another day. We got on really well for a kazillion reasons a top one being we love exploring new cultures and trying to understand how they work or don't. Ahmed has the advantage of being fluent in Arabic although he'd deny that too and say his Arabic isn't 'The Arabic' which I get but I certainly can't identify the nuances. Ahmed was staying on the posh side of town (far from my side) and we'd explore by day and then have dinner. A couple of nights like after the motorbike debacle, we ate in my hotel so he knew the staff well and anyway Egyptians are gregarious (kinda Trini-like). The scene is: Ahmed talking to the other Ahmed, or was it Shekerr, whose name I still can't pronounce after 3 months. A whole long engaging animated conversation which went on as I sat watching and listening, really trying to magically understand the words through osmosis. When Ahmed (I really think it was him) left I asked 'my' Ahmed what the conversation had been about. "You know what we said". For the millionth time in the country I said, "I don't speak Arabic". Ahmed said, "Think about it. What were we talking about?" I rolled my eyes and started from when Ahmed walked over to us. To my amazement (not Ahmed's) I related practically the whole conversation to him. In the telling I became ultra conscious of body language, tone, any word I recognised, English or Arabic (at that point alhamduleh and Salem alekum were probably my only recognisables). Munching into flatbread, Ahmed gently said, "I told you so", with his eyes - some variation on an eye roll.

Some young shopkeepers I mime with on occasion here in Siwa.