Patrick Fitzsimmons Independent Study Egypt

Goodbye Tim

2008-07-19T15:16:00.001-07:00

Day 58 July 18 – Goodbye Tim

Today is my last day at Abassa, Egypt; and my last day with Tim Sprick. I spent the morning cleaning my room and filling my suitcase. After spending about an hour cleaning up, I cooked myself breakfast. Then I headed over to the office to find Tim already looking around the internet. It was then he told me that he was leaving at three to go to some church I had never heard of. He said neither had he but Dr. Samir assured him it was famous and worth seeing.

Well three o’clock rolled around and I said goodbye to my roommate of two and half weeks. I am sure we will keep in contact through his blog and facebook. So now I was alone and very bored; being the weekend I was the only one here. I spent the rest of the day getting everything ready and cleaning. I had to sweep everything, mop, clean the shower, and do the dishes. I also removed all of my old food from the fridge, I have a tendency to just push food I don’t want to the back.
I ended up finding plenty of old nasty food in there.

Here is the plan of my return home. Someone will drive me from Abassa to Cairo. Dr. Elghobashy will drive me to the airport. I will get to there early to make sure everything goes right. Then I will fly British Air from Cairo to London. Three hour layover. Long flight from London to Phoenix. Take shuttle from Phoenix to Speedway and Wilmont, Tucson. Someone will give me a ride home from there. Anyone want to take my bet that it will not all go that smooth?

Got an Email from U of A saying I will get my roommate assignment tomorrow, nervous? Oh yea, I don’t need a crazy.

2008-07-19T15:16:00.000-07:00

Day 58 July 18 – Goodbye Tim

Today is my last day at Abassa, Egypt; and my last day with Tim Sprick. I spent the morning cleaning my room and filling my suitcase. After spending about an hour cleaning up, I cooked myself breakfast. Then I headed over to the office to find Tim already looking around the internet. It was then he told me that he was leaving at three to go to some church I had never heard of. He said neither had he but Dr. Samir assured him it was famous and worth seeing.
Well three o’clock rolled around and I said goodbye to my roommate of two and half weeks. I am sure we will keep in contact through his blog and facebook. So now I was alone and very bored; being the weekend I was the only one here. I spent the rest of the day getting everything ready and cleaning. I had to sweep everything, mop, clean the shower, and do the dishes. I also removed all of my old food from the fridge, I have a tendency to just push food I don’t want to the back.
I ended up finding plenty of old nasty food in there.
Here is the plan of my return home. Someone will drive me from Abassa to Cairo. Dr. Elghobashy will drive me to the airport. I will get to there early to make sure everything goes right. Then I will fly British Air from Cairo to London. Three hour layover. Long flight from London to Phoenix. Take shuttle from Phoenix to Speedway and Wilmont, Tucson. Someone will give me a ride home from there. Anyone want to take my bet that it will not all go that smooth?

Got an Email from U of A saying I will get my roommate assignment tomorrow, nervous? Oh yea, I don’t need a crazy.

Salam Wallaycum

2008-07-19T13:58:00.000-07:00

Day 57 July 17 – Salam Wallaycum

This morning Tim got up early to see another harvest; I was lazy and decided not to go. I have seen plenty of fish harvests, I understand how it works. It really isn’t a complicated procedure, just time and effort consuming. I am happy to see how different farms do harvests but here it is simple; lower water, net fish, scoop in buckets up to side, sort by species and size.

Today is Thursday, the final day of the workweek so I need to say all of my thank yous and goodbyes. It was arranged yesterday that a car would come at noon to drive me to CLAR about ¾ mile way. I was perfectly happy to walk but they insist because they say it is hot and dangerous… Well at two o’clock I was tired of waiting around so I just walked over. There I said goodbye to Dr. Said, the director of CLAR, and the other top scientists. They conveniently all happened to be in the same room which saved me lots of effort.

I also wanted to thank the actual scientists who I spent about a week with actually learning the methods. I found them in their lab and spent a good hour saying goodbye and thank you to a bunch of people. One of the scientists was nice enough to give me a motorcycle ride back to my room.

I spent the rest of the day beginning to get all of my stuff together, after two months it seems to be everywhere. I did my laundry and did some of the dishes, we don’t have a dishwasher. As I took my laundry out of the washer I noticed all my whites had a distinct green tint, oops.

Because Tim had attended the harvest this morning he was given four Tilapia. We both agree that they look gross when they are just thrown on the fire so we cook them more. When we get them they look like black and brown blobs, so I peel the skin and fry the meat. Then throw that on some rice and it tastes pretty good.

Not For Chemical Fumes

2008-07-19T13:44:00.001-07:00

Day 56 July 16 – Not For Chemical Fumes

Today the big event was finishing the nitrate test we began yesterday. Tim didn’t know why this test is important but we will ask tomorrow. Yesterday we took a 50ml sample of each of the six ponds and filtered them. The filter used is very, what’s the word, precise? Therefore we must use a vacuum to pull the water samples through the filter or it would take hours. Then we put each of the filtered water sample is a ceramic dish. The last step we did yesterday was put the six ceramic dishes on a heater so today only the dissolved solids will remain.

Today we arrived to find all the water form the samples evaporated with only the salts remaining. Tim told me to add 1ml of some chemical to each of the samples. It is not that I wasn’t paying attention it is just the vial of chemical had no label. When I added the chemical and stirred it a horrible smelling vapor rose up. At this point Tim remembered that we were supposed to be wearing masks. Soon he handed me a dust mask, I asked what these were for. Tim told me that we had to wear these because the vapors are dangerous. I didn’t think these were meant for that so I checked the box; in big bold font the box said “Not for protection from Chemical Fumes.” Oh well.

The next part of the test needed to be preformed in a hood, a special table with a fan/vacuum to keep the worker from inhaling fumes. We had to add 4ml of 33% ammonium to each of the pond samples. This is where it got slightly dangerous, when adding the ammonium to the samples noxious fumes were given off. The hood didn’t work great so we had to be careful to breathe away from the samples. After adding about 45ml of distilled water to the samples we brought the samples back to the lab. The final step of the process was to take a very small amount of each sample and measure it under the spectrometer.

Later in the afternoon Dr. Gamal came by and gave us some Egyptian deserts. Most of them were very good, but there were a few that were…an acquired taste. I’m finally starting to get everything packed up, and cleaning us the dorm room.

This is Thriller

2008-07-19T12:56:00.000-07:00

Day 55 July 15 – This is Thriller

Today was a long day, busy busy busy. The first thing I did was work with Dr. Waheed as he stocked another net with four male and female catfish. Tim and I picked out the fish this time, Tim’s first time working with live catfish. I also looked at the hours old catfish fry that we worked on yesterday. The catfish eggs are much smaller than Tilapia eggs, the fry also hatch from their eggs much smaller.

Tim has a schedule that lists when he needs to perform the different tests on water samples from the pond. Some tests need to be preformed every two days, while other only need to be done once a week. Today it worked out that we had to do every single test. This process took almost three hours but game us something to fill our time, a nice change.

For about the tenth straight day we had pasta with tomato sauce on it for dinner. I think I will go into town tomorrow to get a haircut. It only costs a dollar here so I will do it now so I don’t have to spend thirteen dollars when I get home. I’m getting more and more excited to come home. I love to make fun of Tim because he has to stay here for another two weeks alone. I am so excited to hang out with Sean and go see all the movies I missed. And I miss my wonderful bikes, the trails are calling to me.

Afternoons here are pretty boring so we have to find ways to entertain ourselves. Tonight we watched Jurassic Park II, terrible movie. After that we just put iTunes, full blast on shuffle, hilarity ensues.

Family Fun

2008-07-19T12:43:00.000-07:00

Day 54 July 14 – Family Fun

Tim woke me up early this morning so I could see Dr. Waheed show how they perform natural catfish spawning. Dr. Waheed told us that the important factors of natural catfish spawning were water level, population density, and temperature. I was surprised to hear that the male to female ratio is 1:1.

The first step was to set up a net in a concrete tank which made a pen about 1 cubic meter in size. Then we picked out eight fish; four male and four female. We checked the color of the eggs but getting the right color didn’t seem vital. We then put the fish into the net. The water was about a foot and a half deep, warm, and clean. Putting the eight fish into such a small area made the population density slightly higher than what I have seen in normal ponds.

While I recognize that natural spawning is simple I think overall artificial spawning is better. Artificial spawning has much higher fertilization rates and a greater degree of control. Artificial spawning does require much more training but I believe the benefits greatly outweigh the costs.

Around 6pm Tim and I were sitting around watching the movie “Wanted” when the doorbell rang. Outside we found Dr. Gamal and his 18 year old son. Dr. Gamal introduced his son to us and after some chit-chat he left. After a slightly awkward goodbye I was left with the suspicion that Dr. Gamal wanted his son to stay with us. This was not at all clear but I asked Tim if he thought the same thing, he confirmed my suspicion. We agreed that Dr. Gamal meant us to hang out with his son so we headed out to find him playing soccer with his little brother. He seemed very relieved when he saw us and asked us to play with him.

Dr. Gamal’s oldest son is named Mohamed and his younger son is named Akmed. We played soccer for a few hours, surprisingly we were evenly matched. We talked about what Mohamed was going to do in his first year of college, he spoke excellent English. After a few hours Dr. Gamal and his small daughter came and joined in the game. We all quickly got exhausted while playing a full speed game in the Egyptian sun. Soon we all headed back to our rooms for cold showers and drinks.

Ruby Slippers

2008-07-19T12:37:00.000-07:00

Day 53 July 13 – Ruby Slippers

Today I once again headed out to the ponds to check on the water levels of our ponds. We checked seepage and evaporation today because the workers refilled the pond this morning. Tim once again couldn’t reach the cover of the pipe so I had to go swimming. We had to record the initial water levels so future evaporation levels will be relevant. We didn’t have to change anything for the seepage, that is unaffected by the water level.

Home is getting closer and closer and I can’t wait. I’ve been away from home for long periods of time, but I have never wanted to be back in Tucson as much as I do now. Egypt is great but as Dorthy said, “there’s no place like home.” I wish I had some ruby slippers; they would be much more convenient than 17 hours of driving, jets, delays, and layovers. But I’m not looking forward to the five essays I need to write upon my return to Tucson.

I think I will talk a little about the clothes people wear here at the lab. The manual workers all wear one piece jumpsuits, similar to what you might see at a car mechanic shop. They don’t wear anything on their feet and most wear what looks like an old boonies hat. The scientist all wear long dress style pants with a long button down shirt tucked into them. They sometimes wear white lab coats if they are doing work outside of their offices.

Back to Work

2008-07-19T12:30:00.002-07:00

Day 52 July 12 – Back to Work

Today was wonderful; we had almost nothing to do. I woke up late and headed over to the office to see what we were supposed to do. After I found Tim sitting around and he told me what the days plan was, I joined him on the computers. After a few hours we went around to the other offices to check up with all the other scientists. I talked to Dr. Gamal about how I was going to get back to Cairo and the airport.

In the afternoon I needed to go into town to get some food, we were totally out. For the third time I invited Tim to come with me into town. Tim has always refused to come with me because he thought he wasn’t supposed to leave the compound. After explaining to him that I can only buy however much food I can carry, he volunteered to come. After ignoring the stupid warnings of my useless bodyguard Tim and I walked into town. Eventually we got a tuk-tuk taxi to take us the rest of the way into town. We got all kinds of fruit, bread, and chips - junk food. After showing Tim around town we headed back on a different tuk-tuk.

I was thrilled to find that Tim had all kinds of movies saved on his laptop, MOVIE NIGHT!! He copied all the movies I wanted to my computer so when I head home soon, I will have some entertainment. But I was nice to watch the movie Stop-Loss, a nice change of pace. It is a movie that points out many of the things I hate about the military but is also an excellent movie.

Early to Rise

2008-07-19T12:30:00.001-07:00

Day 51 July 11 – Early to Rise

Today I once again woke up at 6:30am to go measure the oxygen levels of twenty ponds. After spending twenty minutes of fiddling with the stupid oxygen meter, I finally realized I was the dumb one because it was working fine the whole time. I thought it was broken because the oxygen levels were much higher than I expected.

Usually, the ponds I measure in the morning have a dissolved oxygen level of .5 to 3 mg/liter. When the ponds I measured had an oxygen level of almost 7mg/liter I assumed that the oxygen meter was, once again, broken. After almost twenty minutes of fiddling with and calibrating I tested on another pond. After this I realized that it was just the oxygen levels of Tim’s ponds were dramatically higher than the other ponds. When I returned to the room I meant to ask Tim the reason for this difference but decided going back to sleep was much more vital.

At 2pm I woke back up and asked Tim about the difference between his ponds and the other ponds. Tim told me that he asked the same questions to his boss. He told me that there were a few reasons for this difference. First, his ponds have concrete walls but a muddy bottom. These walls prevent the growth of reeds, grasses, and other plants; while these plants create oxygen in the day they remove it in the night. So with concrete walls the daily variation of the oxygen levels would be much less than dirt walled ponds.

Another factor in the difference between oxygen levels is the fact that Tim’s ponds are not seeded. For some reason Tim’s ponds have not had chicken waste added to spur the growth of plankton. The plankton leads to natural food but also to a large fluctuation of the oxygen levels.

Phosphorous

2008-07-19T12:13:00.000-07:00

Day 50 July 10 – Phosphorous

Let me begin by explaining why my recent entries have not been so packed with information. First, I am nearing the end of my trip and I have learned the basics of all the relevant subjects. Second, my current project is working with my roommate Tim in caring for six ponds. This job does not require lots of time but enough that I cannot leave to go work with the other scientists here. While learning the science is important, actually being responsible for ponds is vital; perhaps even more important.

Today I once again got up early to go with Tim and take the dissolved oxygen levels of his ponds. Everything was fine so we headed back to the lab to perform a phosphorous test on water samples from each pond. We had planned on doing this test yesterday but were thwarted because there was not enough of a certain solution. So we made the missing solution but it had to sit for 24hours.

Today everything was ready so we began the test. The way this test works is you take a sample from each pond and put them into a spectrometer. The spectrometer is set to a certain frequency, 880nm, and the light is fired through the sample. The frequency used is specific to phosphorous and is interfered by it. The amount of phosphorus in the water can then be derived by measuring the amount of light lost as it travels through the sample.

This process might sound familiar because I talked about it a few weeks ago. This same process, using a spectrometer, can be used to measure many different materials in water samples.

Bodyguard

2008-07-19T11:41:00.001-07:00

Day 49 July 9 – Bodyguard

Last night I foolishly agreed to accompany Tim at 6:30am as he went to measure the oxygen levels of about 20 ponds. While normally this wouldn’t be too bad, that time is when mosquitoes are most active.

I was surprised to see how dramatically the oxygen levels had decreased overnight. I assumed that the oxygen level of ponds would only show substantial decrease if the pond contained a large fish biomass. I was surprised to see oxygen levels of 2units, compared to 8-9units in the day time in Tim’s ponds. I interpret this to mean the algae has a much larger affect on the reduction of oxygen levels than I originally suspected. It is also possible that even the small fish in Tim’s pond are making a substantial difference in the pond, but I doubt it.

At 9am we had an official weigh in for all six of Tim’s ponds. This was to be his first set of results, very exciting. We walked out to the ponds to find the working sitting with all the gear. It was not our place to tell them to get to work so we had to wait 20 minutes for Dr. Gamal to come and tell them to do just that. The workers would get into the ponds, they are about 4 feet six inches deep. They used a medium size net to catch about 20 fry, hopefully a random sample. Then Tim would measure and weight 15 of them.

The only problem I could see with this process was I don’t think the fish were an accurate random sample. First, the biggest and strongest fish would have a better chance of not getting caught in the net. Next, the fry were transported in a crate with holes it, allowing the smallest fish to fall out and not be recorded. Lastly, the person who handed Tim the fish seemed the grab the fish that he knew would be easiest to hold, the largest.

At around 4pm Tim had to go back out to his six ponds and measure the seepage and evaporation. There is a PVC pipe stuck in the mud and covered to prevent evaporation. We had to uncover the pipe and record the water level, this is seepage. Then we record the difference between the water level inside and outside the pipe, this is evaporation. We couldn’t get the top off one of the pipes so I got in the water to remove it. The water was so nice and warm I stayed in for a few minutes, until Tim reminded me of the snake… A few days ago we found and had a water snake removed from one of Tim’s ponds. This was adequate motivation for me to get the hell out of the water, flash back of Snakes On A Plane occurred to me.

Well I finally meet me bodyguard. We were running low of food so I headed back toward Abassa for the fourth time. As I got to the security gate the guard asked what I was doing, after telling him I was going to town he told me “no, too dangerous.” Then my bodyguard walks over, he is either in his late 40s or early 50s. He was unarmed and it was quickly obvious he could no more protect me than do a push-up. My bodyguard starts speaking in Arabic and pointing toward town and himself. Now I never asked for a bodyguard, nobody at Abassa asked for a bodyguard, and he is obviously useless. So I stop asking and more start telling him to open the damn gate, I can take care of myself. I tower over everyone else here, I’m fit, and always bring my knife with me when I go into town alone. Most importantly I have already been into town many times and never had any problems.

Eventually the guard opens the gate and I start walking away, ignoring the bodyguards Arabic. I wondered weather my bodyguard was going to walk the two miles to town with me, I wasn’t sure he would be able to. Therefore I was not surprised to find myself walking alone along the dirt street. Everything was fine in town and returned with some badly needed food.

Secret Service

2008-07-19T11:01:00.000-07:00

Day 48 July 8 – Secret Service

So during a short conversation with Dr. Gamal he informed me I had a bodyguard. It turns out when I registered my passport with the police department, to extend my visa, they took note. The police now have a guard posted at one the two gates. Dr. Gamal told me that he thought this was ridiculous and wouldn’t let the police man onto the grounds. He said he was posted there more to show off than to actually protect me. I think having my own guard is ridiculous; the only time I have feared for my safety was from a police man, now I’m stuck with one.

Tim is sick and feeling lazy so I followed suit, this worked out great for me. The day was not a complete waste; Tim taught me how to do the phosphorus test. To do this test we made a solution, I have the formula here but it’s kind of boring. The next step would be to put the samples in the spectrometer to obtain a measurement. Tim told me that we will actually perform this test on pond samples in a few days.

Take Me Home Country Roads

2008-07-16T11:15:00.000-07:00

Day 46 July 6 – Take Me Home Country Roads

I left Cairo with Dr. Elghobashy at around 7am to drive back to Abassa. Having stayed up late last night, I slept most of the hour long ride. Upon returning to Abassa, I left Dr. Elghobashy to go back to my room to drop off the food I bought. Back at the room I found Tim who told me about what he had been doing over the last few days.
Tim won some contest so was given to opportunity to come and spend time here at Abassa. But this agreement comes with restrictions, his schedule is much more tightly controlled and he is not supposed to leave the “secure World Fish Center area.” He is also required to do a large scale experiment, which he is completing in the six ponds I previously mentioned. He is also required to write up a complete scientific article compiling all of his data and results. He has a lot of data, haha.
I once again started working with Tim, helping collect data and measure aspects of the water. Tim spent about an hour trying to get a spreadsheet to work correctly, while I read other journal articles on similar subjects. While there were many articles on the subject of Tilapia stocking densities, I couldn’t find any that measured so many parameters of the pond as Tim is doing. The fish in Tim’s ponds are about 2cm long, from what I have seen so far.
I have been trying to figure out what I need to do for the flight home. Do I need to confirm the tickets, I am flying British Air? If so, how early can I confirm them and can I do it online? When I go to the ticket counter what do I need to have with me?

Top Gear could be the greatest show ever.

CIPRO, one of the medicines I was prescribed for “intestinal difficulties” was urgently recalled because it caused tendon damage. Good thing I didn’t use any.

If I cut my own hair for the next 50 years I could save ten thousand dollars. One haircut every three weeks at 12.50$ for fifty years = 10,863.09$. I am going to buy a hair cut kit when I get home. (see what happens when I am bored for hours a day.)

Passing is Good

2008-07-16T11:12:00.000-07:00

Day 45 July 5 – Passing is Good

Well today I decided to officially decide what my five essay topics would be for college credit. The five topics are supposed to cover topics of culture and aquaculture. Here they are…

Enhanced Aquaculture techniques
Catching Jumpers- how often
Green Houses
Artificial spawning vs Natural Spawning
Biological filters - natural and artificial
Hormones – Testerstrone and Estrogen
Worms from Ishmail
Constant current
Paddle wheels
Mixing Tilipia, Mullet Polyculture

7 stages of intensification
Explain levels
Levels of Dr. Ishmail's farm
Explain factors cost vs benefit analysis
Problems in developing countries - power outages - unreliable water

Exanimation of Islam and its cultural effects
Clothing
View on Atheism
Separation of Church and State?
Religious divisions – Suni Shia?
View on other religions
5 pillars of Islam
Similarity to the five minute activity in Big Brother

Examination of Islamic Prayer
Movements
History
Scripture
Mosque
Dawn Prayer?
1pm prayer
4:30 pm afternoon
7:50 sunset
9:40 evening prayer
Ramadan

Super Male
Don’t have to pay for hormones
People don’t like hormones in food
One time investment
None of the small wimpy fish – more control
No unwanted mating
Done at ista 6?
Need 1000 to work Dr Ishmail had 30
Once done it will continue by itself

No Quiet on the Eastern Front

2008-07-14T07:19:00.000-07:00

Day 44 July 4 – No Quiet on the Eastern Front

Once again, Dr. Elghobashy’s son got kicked out of his bed, and was relegated to the couch. After sleeping till about 1:30 I got up and had breakfast. I didn’t have any plans so until about 5pm I just sat around and watched TV. At 5pm I just wanted to get out so I took a short walk over to the mango juice stand. For 50 cents I can get a tall glass of fresh squeezed mango juice, delicious. I can never only have just one glass.
My next expedition was a walk up the main street near the Elghobashy house. I walked about two miles up the street until it turned into a housing area, no shops or people working. While it is fun to go out and see the town there is one thing that drives me crazy, the noise. It is outrageously loud in the city, the cars and music become very frustrating.
When people in Egypt get married, instead of dragging cans or painting “just married,” they just lay on the car horn. It is also tradition for all the wedding guests to follow behind and do the same thing, sometimes with illegal sirens. While this is annoying by itself there are other factors that make it even worse.
Cairo is a very old city, the population has increased so dramatically while the size is limited by the surrounding environment. Because of these influences Cairo has built up, not outwards. The vast majority of the buildings in Cairo are multiple stories; the Elghobashy family lives on the fifth of six floors.
So when I walk on the streets of Cairo (no sidewalks) I am surrounded by tall stone buildings on all sides. These tall building amplify the noise, and the blaring car horns seem to make my brain rattle. People are constantly honking, there is usually only a second or two break between a blast of the horn. When walking along with a wedding procession the blaring horns are nonstop, literally. The deafening noise really gets annoying quickly; I was sorely tempted to profanely tell them to stop with the honking. I have to disagree with Simon and Garfunkel, the sound of silence isn’t so bad.
At night, around 9:30, I left with Dr. Elghobashy’s son to go see a movie. Two mico bus rides later we got to the mall. Once again I was very impressed by the largest mall in Egypt. I was disappointed that Batman and Wanted were not at the theaters, but I settled for What Happens in Vegas.

I miss 4th of July, one of my favorite American holidays.

Goodbye Fayoum

2008-07-14T06:58:00.000-07:00

Day 43 July 3 – Goodbye Fayoum

Sorry batteries on camera are dead, can’t find more. No pictures for a few days.

Well I found out last night that today was going to be my final day in Fayoum. Today the adviser picked me up and drove me to the same farm as yesterday. Again we did the rounds; looking at the ponds and adjusting food levels based on the responses of the fish. I got even more practice checking the farms by sight, and recognizing other “symptoms” of a pond.
After a few hours of walking around in the sun we took a break in a building for tea and lunch. I refused tea today because the last thing I wanted was a boiling hot drink, I was dreaming of Eegee’s. Turning down the tea made everyone concerned, I had to convince them that I felt fine and that I wasn’t sick. The lunch consisted of, you guessed it, fish. The way they cooked the fish was about as simple as it gets, just chuck it in the fire. They made a small fire and just laid the fish right down of the wood, ash, and embers. Five to ten minutes later they grab them out and plop them down on the table. Obviously, you don’t eat the skin; all burnt and nasty looking. But once you peel back the skin the fish tasted fine. Not good, fine.
I finally figured out why I have been feeling so awful whenever we drive in Egypt. I have never gotten motion sickness, or carsickness in my life; but I always feel terrible when we drive here. I realized that it is the combination of noise, THICK air pollution, driving style, and the roads. The noise is ridiculous, everyone is honking their horn, it drives me crazy. The air pollution is a major problem inside Cairo, I can feel it in my lungs whenever I’m there. The way the drivers are constantly swerving, accelerating and decelerating also contributes to the problem. The roads are so bumpy and uneven that you are constantly bounced into the air. It is necessary for me to sit in the middle seat, otherwise I constantly smash my head into the roof of the car. These things all put together make me carsick nearly every time we drive. I have been able to keep it down but I still feel awful.
After lunch we drove back to Cairo and I moved back in with the Elghobashies. I was happy to sit around for the rest of the day, update the blog, and catch up.

Nothin

2008-07-14T06:54:00.000-07:00

Day 42 July 2 – Nothin

Well today both of the men I have been working with are busy so I stayed in the hotel all day. I went swimming and read my book, that’s it. There is nowhere to go do touristy stuff so I laid around all day. At least I had a good dinner again.

Keel Haul

2008-07-14T06:43:00.000-07:00

Day 41 July 2 – Keel Haul

Today I went to a new farm with a different adviser. This farm was also on that giant bird reservation. The Egyptian version of SpeedRacer was our driver to the farm. The drive there is beautiful, some of the most amazing sand dunes I have ever seen. The colors are so uniform that is impossible to see any detail, I couldn’t tell if what I was looking at was near hill or a far mountain.
As we were walking around the farm I noticed lots of little frogs, then lots and lots of little frogs. Looking down into the nearest pond I realized there was an infestation of inch long frogs. I was very surprised to see them in the water; I assumed to fish would eat them. I took this assumption from an experience I had at the family farm in New York. I was playing with a little frog then, taking it out further and further down the dock and watching it swim back to shore. Until one time I took it too far and a big fish swallowed my little friend. The adviser assured me the fish would not eat them because Tilapia are not carnivores. I would disagree because they eat mosquitoes and mosquitoes larvae. He said the frogs are a problem because they eat the fish food, but they also disappear three week after the pond is filled. I believe the fish grow large enough to eat the second generation of frogs, but the adviser does not think so.
I was also told that the color of the water is important as an indicator of water quality. If the water is dark green it indicates an abundance of phytoplankton; if brownish-yellow, zooplankton. Having zooplankton is better but both are necessary. The concentration of plankton can be influenced by introducing fermented chicken manure to the pond (yummy).
Once again I decided to take my afternoon swim, today I went out much later than yesterday. I finished my swim about 30 minutes before sunset but decided to stay in and watch it. After a beautiful sunset I swam back to the rocky shore. Normally I can easily step over the submerged wall which is used as a wave break. When the sun goes down the wind really picks up. This caused the water level to rise on my side of the lake, making it necessary to crawl over the wall. The waves caused by the wind made this treacherous and now my hands, feet, and stomach are covered in cuts from the barnacles.
For some reason my room is infested with tiny little ants, they are in everything. They crawl into this laptop’s keyboard, into my socks, my shirts, even into my hat. We can add those ants to the list of things in Egypt that drive me crazy; flies, mosquitoes, and ants.
For some random reason all the restaurants were closed tonight. Therefore my dinner consisted of a 7up, two HoHos, and a bag of chips. Because there is nothing to do here I end up reading a lot. In the three days I have been here I’ve read I Robot, Foundation, and Siddhartha.

Have you ever read a book you liked so much that other books you read seem unimpressive by comparison? Like having your first car be a Ferrari then being stuck with a Corolla the rest of your life.

SoRy Mi Englash iz no Gud

2008-07-04T06:07:00.000-07:00

Day 40 June 30 – SoRy Mi Englash iz no Gud

Before I start I actually saw a calendar and realized that today was the 30th, that means two days have disappeared from my blog. Don’t worry I’m sure your not missing anything interesting, I probably just slept the whole day and didn’t bother to write about it.
Well I found out the town I am living in is named Fayoum, it has a few restraints and a salt factory.
Today I woke to a knock on the door, room service brought me breakfast, cool! It was a very typical Egyptian breakfast. It was that round flat bread, tomatoes, cucumbers, white mystery goo, and eggs. It was ok but I would pay good money for some honey nut Cheerios and milk. I went down to wait for the car at 7:58, I came back up at 8:45 after getting bored. The car eventually came and Mr. Akmed Shariff took me to the farm he was advising that day. As usual, before we started work, we stopped for 30 minutes for tea.
Akmed told me how he is hired to come to this farm twice a week, he does everything from testing the water to changing feeding levels. As you might have guessed from the title, Mr. Shariff’s English was not great, but I am grateful he tried so hard. At the end of our work my notepad was covered in drawing used to communicate.
I found that on this farm they don’t feed the fish on Friday, the hope is the fish will better utilize any natural food present. This would save money is the short term but I am not sure that the longer growing season would make this profitable over the long term. They only run the paddle wheels during night, they rely on plankton to create oxygen during the day. Sandy bottoms are better than muddy bottoms. He told me that during the climax of summer the salinity is much higher because of increased evaporation in the watershed. Their growth/feed ratio is 1 to 1.3-1.5.
After checking all the ponds we went back to the little one room building for more tea. While there Akmed suggested I visit a city on the coast, a nice tourist destination. The conversation eventually lead to the fact that there is a sanctioned Egyptian price and a tourist price. After I made a sour face he asked what problem I had with this. I told him that I thought I was unfair that for the same services I have to pay more money. He argued that Egyptians are poor so should get a better price. We agreed to disagree.
There are some cultural differences that I have mentally classified as un-American ideas. For example: Baksheesh, a poor person believes they are entitled to your money, they deserve your money because they are poor and you are rich. In the US poor people must beg for money, they must acknowledge that they are at the givers mercy. Another is this foreigner/Egyptian price difference. If in the US there was a sign saying “Entrance Fee” Americans 5$ Mexicans 2$ Europeans 10$ Africans 3$ people would be outraged. There would be a racial discrimination lawsuit in the blink of an eye. As I said, to me, these ideas seem distinctly un-American.
I finally found a good place to eat dinner, had shrimp and tilapia. Turns out is was also a chicken farm, he invited me in to see the chickens. Realizing, as they climbed all over my shoes, that getting Avian Bird Flu would probably suck.

Once again I took my afternoon swim in the giant lake.
Ants seem to have a strange fascination with this laptop.
Ants seem to love the inside of my socks…yea not cool.
Dinner cost 34 pounds ~ 7.50$
I guess guests at Egyptian hotels don’t need toilet paper.

It’s Been A Bad Day

2008-07-04T05:55:00.000-07:00

Day 36 June 26 – It’s Been A Bad Day

Well today was very divided, it began well but ended horribly. I left Abassa at around 6:20am and drove almost 4 hours, trough Cairo, to a new town. We drove into a large bird reserve while also contained a fish farm. The fish farm seemed normal but I was impressed that all the ponds used paddle wheels. They were not running but I was assured that they run at night. I followed around a group and was impressed by how well everyone watched the fish. They mentioned that yesterday the fish didn’t eat much food, implying a high level of ammonium, so they reduced the amount of feed for the fish tomorrow.
After a short ride we stopped to see the only waterfall in Egypt, a nice 12 foot fall. It was all artificial and worked by a pump but was still nice. I still love how everyone goes swimming fully dressed, long sleeves and long pants. Most of the women swimming were still wearing head scarves. Then again they weren’t actually swimming, they clung to inner tubes for dear life after the water got 5 feet deep. It was a horribly hot day and I really wanted to go swimming but wasn’t dressed appropriately. Well I guess I was dress socially appropriately but I had no intention of getting my nice clothes wet and dirty.
I discovered I was staying at a hotel, once again feeling bad because it was probably expensive. It is right on the beach of a massive saltwater lake, at least 5 miles wide and many more long. Winter is the tourist season and right now most of the tourist locations are abandoned. It was awkward as I sat in the 30 table cafeteria in the hotel and ate alone. Next at about 2pm I decided to go swimming, I walked down to a very secluded area so I felt fine going in just my shorts. I swam a mile or two up and down the coast seeing many people on their tubes, none more than 100 feet from the beach.
This is the point where my day turned for the worst. I headed up to the room and took a little nap, and discovered the room only has a tiny fan. After I woke up, covered in a fresh layer of mosquito bites, I came down for dinner. I was surprised to find the hotel abandoned, it was about 9pm. (no it is not too late people here eat dinner really late, lunch was at 3pm.) True, I am the only person renting a room but that should mean the service is excellent. After a while I decided to just leave and find food myself. Then I discovered every door is locked, yea what the hell? So I wander around the hotel yelling hello and Salam trying to find anyone to let me out. No luck, I’m getting really hungry now, all I have are bags of skittles. Well eventually I have to climb out a freaking window to get out. After climbing the locked security gate I walked down the road to try and find a restaurant. I found two places that looked promising but when I went in I was pretty much told they don’t serve food. One had a sign with a picture of a dinner plate with food on it.…
Eventually I came to a place where the man took me to a table and gave me a glass of water. I communicated that I wanted to eat fish, I said “Samak” he nodded and said “fish” and made a eating gesture. After sitting there for about 30 minutes I got suspicious, I walked over to investigate. After repeating the message the metaphorical light bulb lit up above his head. I thought to myself, what the hell did you think I meant with I said fish, do you think I wanted to watch them from the deck?!?! After paying far too much money for a damn glass of water and an empty table I stormed off. All that was left was the Egyptian equivalent of an Am/Pm. My dinner consisted of a little bag of Doritos, a bag of skittles, and a water bottle. So now I’m writing this in a very bad mood, oh well. Tonight I hate Egypt and just want to go home and sleep in my own air-conditioned room.

Mas Comida

2008-07-04T05:50:00.000-07:00

Day 35 June 25 – Mas Comida

I couldn’t sleep last night, I think it has something to do with walking up late and laying around all day. I got up at 4:30am to call home, dad had said to call at 6:30pm; I guess without checking the time difference. I walked across the farm and climbed to the roof of a building. I watched the sunrise then headed back to the room. As I retuned to the room I saw a driver who was waiting for Tim. I went in to make sure he was awake, then said goodbye. He was headed off the see the pyramids.
Tim returned much faster than I expected with food, delicious food. After almost two weeks of frozen chicken, bread, and chips I was thrilled to eat something else. He got some juice, pasta, candy, and other stuff. Best of all he got me a box of skittles, SKITTLES! Too bad I am leaving tomorrow to go to a fry farm, if the food is gone when I return I may have to murder my new roommate.

Friday is my Favorite Day

2008-07-04T05:47:00.000-07:00

Day 34 June 24 – Friday is my Favorite Day

Friday is my favorite day here in Egypt because it is the beginning of the weekend; it is my day to do absolutely nothing. I think I woke up at around 1PM then moved 20 feet and laid down in front of the TV. A while later Tim came in telling me that he locked his keys in the office…YAY an adventure. Well I was bored so I volunteered to help, got my leatherman, laptop, and headed over. First we checked the windows, not going to work. Then we tried to mess with the handle and door but also no luck. Then I hooked up to the wifi and looked up “picking locks” on youtube. 5 minutes later we had to door open, I love the internet.
I spent the rest of the day screwing around on the internet and listening to Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows on audio book. Egypt is pretty boring on the weekends when your stuck at Abassa.

Add the Blue Stuff to the Red Stuff

2008-07-04T05:37:00.000-07:00

Day 33 June 23 – Add the Blue Stuff to the Red Stuff

Today Tim and I measured the alkalinity of his six ponds, Tim showed me how. We measured the alkalinity by the process of titration. I didn’t have an opportunity to look up what alkalinity was and how it is caused and effects fish, so comments would be helpful. We took a small water sample then added 5 drops of ethyl orange as an indicator. Then we slowly added a different chemical (sorry forgot the name) until the sample turned pink. At that point we write down the amount of mystery chemical it took to turn the sample pink. We then use a formula to find the alkalinity.
The next and final stop with the international students was a demonstration on how to feed fish. Most of it was pretty obvious but I did learn something. I saw the workers adding small amounts of water to power fry food. This causes it to sink in small chunks instead of just sitting on top of the water. Then Tim taught a short class on what he was doing at the six ponds to the rest of the international students. Before Tim could start he was interrupted by the other students getting all worked up about a water snake in one of the ponds.
I have not been impressed by the international students. Not because they don’t know very much about fish or fish farming, which is true, but because they don’t really seem to care. For example, during the floy fish tagging three of the adult women were more interested in using the shiny plastic tabs as jewelry than listening. They used to tabs as forehead decorations and added them to their earrings. They even distracted everyone else by giggling and talking during the presentation. Now I’m all for slacking off in big classes, 50 or more people. But not paying attention in a group of 8 people with the teacher right there is not cool.
The scenery was beautiful this morning; a mist was rising off the rice paddies and ponds. Because of the mist you couldn’t see the ground; you could only see the palm trees and buildings in the distance.

Ave, Morituri te Salutant!

2008-07-04T05:26:00.000-07:00

Day 32 June 22 – Ave, Morituri te Salutant!

Well today’s big event was a post-mortem investigation of a fish, well I guess it was pre-mortem until we killed the fish. Anyway, first we examined to fish’s exterior; we looked at the gills, skin, eyes, and fins. We make sure that the eyes were not bulging out or retracted into the skull. I also looked for bloody spots on the skin, a sure sign of infection.
Next we cut a big hole in the side of fish so we could see the guts. We checked to make sure everything was the correct size and color. I also saw the little heart of the fish still beating. I was poking around when I accidentally ripped the spleen open. The spleen was full of nasty green liquid which got all over my sleeve. I asked the teacher to show me where the pituitary gland of the Tilapia was, I had only seen it in a Catfish. PETA would not have appreciated my activities over the last few days, I dissected a fish just to see what was inside, and performed minor surgery for practice. While yes, they were under anesthesia it was obvious they could still feel what was going on. Almost makes me feel bad for them. Then again, their sole purpose to exist is to die so I can eat them.
After taking a group picture with the other students from the international group I worked with Tim. We walked out to the six ponds Tim is using to experiment with different stocking densities of Tilapia. Periodically throughout the week he measures pH, dissolved oxygen, nitrate, nitrite, alkalinity, temperature, hardness, phosphorus, ammonium, and mortalities. Today we measured dissolved oxygen and temperature levels of the six ponds.
Dad told me a while ago that algae in the ocean is a major contributor to the creation of global oxygen. I also learned in my marine bio class that while algae is found in every ocean around the world, sometimes it is very densely concentrated. This is known as an algae bloom. When the conditions are just right there can be an explosion of algae growth; this creates vast amounts of oxygen and sequesters large amounts of CO2 on the bottom of the ocean. I wanted to see this in the real world so when I noticed that a corner of a pond had turned dark green from an algae bloom I had to investigate. Most of the ponds we tested had a dissolved oxygen level of about 12 (ppm I assume), The algae bloom area had a dissolved oxygen level of 19ppm. That is a 58 percent increase in dissolved oxygen caused by the concentration of algae.
Today’s movie is Gladiator! Ave, Morituri te Salutant! I wonder if this is what the fish thought as they saw their impending death.

Sweeny Todd

2008-06-27T06:44:00.000-07:00

Day 31 June 21 – Sweeny Todd

I got a call this morning on the home phone, this is how I discovered we had a home phone. It was Dr. Gamal inviting me to join his international group of students for their week long training program. This is the program my roommate Tim has been working with for the last few days. I said ok and headed out with Tim as he checked the pH and Ammonia levels of the six ponds left to his care. Measuring pH was easy, just stick this thingy into the water and press the pH button, easy. The Ammonia test was slightly more involved. Take two test tubes and fill them with 5ml of water. In one tube place 2 drops of Nesler Reagent which will change the color of the water based on the amount of ammonia in the water. Then place the tubes in the plastic device which has lenses you look though until the colors of the water match. Then record the number the device shows, this is the ammonia measured in ppm.
Next was a demonstration of how to remove the pituitary gland from the brain of a catfish. Been there, done that; let somebody else get covered in catfish slime and blood.
Then there was a very interesting class on tagging fish. Tagging fish is important in a research environment because sometimes it is necessary to be able to differentiate between groups of fish in the same pond. There are a few methods of tagging fish, each with their own benefits and drawbacks.
Fin Clipping – This method is simple and very non-invasive, you simple cut a simple pattern into the dorsal fin. The results of this method do not last long because the cuts simply grow back. Another problem with this method is it can only differentiate between a few groups, it is not useful to separate individual fish. This method would be useful if you need to distinguish between fish that had and had not been given a treatment. But both groups would have to be cut anyway otherwise the operation would influence some fish and not the others.
Brand – Another simple method of marking fish is branding them like cattle. Simply use a modified soldering iron to burn simple marks into the fish’s skin. Because the brand only works directly on skin, only scaleless fish can be used, like catfish. Like fin clipping this method only has a few possible combinations, the more burns the more invasive. Anesthetics are necessary to make the branding process easy and reduce the trauma on the fish.
RFID – This method is very interesting; it uses small radio chips to identify fish. A worker uses a large needle to make an incision and push in a transmitter about the size of a small pill. If the transmitter can fit inside of the fish’s abdominal cavity then the scientists can make it work. This method is great because it is able to differentiate between specific fish, each transmitter has a unique code. This method also requires the use of anesthetics. This method is invasive and has a small mortality rate. It is expensive to buy the transmitters but they can be reused many times.
Flowey – This method uses a needle, string, and numbered tag to identify fish. This is another method that can be used to identify specific fish. The needle is disinfected then poked through the fish between the lateral line and the dorsal fin. Then you pull the string through but leaving enough length for the fish to grow. Before a knot is tied a plastic tab must be put on the string to keep it from being pulled though the fish. While this method is cheap it is also very invasive, unlike RFID, the tags impede to movement of the fish.
After work I was bored and hungry so I decided to head into Abassa, the nearest town. It is about two miles away but when it is so hot I prefer to take a tuk tuk taxi, and it only costs 50 cents. I walked through town buying bags of chips, tam-may-aah, and bread. That is about all the food in town that is worth buying. As I was getting ready to get a tuk tuk back to The World Fish Center I saw a barber shop. I walked in pointed to my hair and the kid walking by who had a short hair cut. It doesn’t look great; there are funny little likes in hair. While I was in the chair I had the random urge to get a shave with the old straight edge razor. After communicating my desire I began to get nervous, I just watched Sweeny Todd. Well my worry was misplaced, he did an excellent job. The best part was the cost, a haircut and shave cost 2$, how cool is that! I took a taxi home and watched Black Hawk Down on TV, awesome.

Zagazig

2008-06-27T06:12:00.000-07:00

Day 30 June 20 – Zagazig

To be honest I realize why the scientists here are not paid the big bucks, they really don’t seem to work that hard. They seem to do a little work then go sit in the office and drink tea and Turkish coffee for hours. Now don’t get me wrong, I’m all for sitting around and chit chatting, but nothing seems to be getting done. They are at work from around 8:30 am to 2:00 pm. They take at least 40 minutes for the prayer and prayer preparation, they pray twice during the working hours. Another 50 minutes is spent eating lunch and walking to the cafeteria. This leaves a four hour work day, and it is wishful in the extreme to imagine they work those whole four hours.
After a while I headed off to see a new lab, a branch of the genetics department. I was given a quick explanation of a method in which a geneticist can change something inside the egg. They can change fish into ha-bloids or tetra-bloids. To be honest I was pretty much as confused as your probably are right now. I asked “What is the benefit of having a tetra-bloid?” the response was “Yes, Yes, very good.” Here is that language barrier again. I didn’t stay long because I was so confused I wasn’t learning anything. But he did mention that he had an easier way to make YY SuperMales. Three scientist then gathered around me and each tried to draw their own diagram (at the same time) to try and explain how they would do it. I saved the paper because I thought it was funny because it was so confusing.
Well just before I was going to start walking home my friend Ahmed asked me if I wanted to come to Zagazig with him. I hesitantly agreed and drove to Abassa to get some stuff to spend the night. It turns out Zagazig is the third most populous city in Egypt, according to Ahmed. He says the city has over three million citizens and it sure was crowded. Now I have been to the three most populous cities; Cairo, Alexandria, and Zagazig. We then drove the half hour to Ahmed’s home; there I met his niece and sister. Ahmed is twenty five, his first sister is twenty; they live at home with their oldest sister, her daughter, and the grandparents. The whole three hours I was there I never saw the oldest sister or the grandparents, but they were home. I was purposely separated from them, no idea why. We had lunch there and talked about many things including the Iraq war and Israel.
After sunset I left with Ahmed to meet with some of the other scientists from CLAR for a night on the town. We drove around and saw some of the sights, then parked to walk around. After a short walk we stopped to get some fries, unfortunately it took them 30 minutes to cook fries. While we were waiting somebody, a young teenage girl, got hit by a car. It was not very serious but she was defiantly crying, her friends helped carry her away. I knew it was going to happen, it was only a matter of time, somebody was going to get hit.
After a few more hours of wandering and looking around we headed back to Ahmed’s aunts old house. The house was empty but I was ready to go to sleep. Unfortunately there was no AC and no fans. It wasn’t as hot as Tucson is right now, heat wave; sucks for you. Well I got into my shorts and just lay in bed, miserable and sweating just sitting there. Well I used Uncle Chris’s excellent method of laying a wet towel over yourself; once again Penny’s bandana was invaluable. Early the next morning we took the bus from Zagazig straight to CLAR.
During the conversation with Ahmed, and his sister we talked about how Muslims are treated in the US. I was surprised to discover that they thought Americans completely ostracize Muslims. I admitted at right after 9/11 that was true, but I don’t think that is still is. I can only speak form my experience but I have never, with my own eyes or ears, seen a Muslim being mistreated because of their religion or dress. I explained that I knew of three Muslims in my high school. Ahmed asked if I became friends with any of those three and I said no. He took this as proof that Americans ostracize Muslims. I unhappily defended myself by explaining that there were three thousand people at my school and I wasn’t friends with the vast majority of them. I also pointed out that if I feared Muslims I wouldn’t come to a Muslim country alone for two months. They remain unconvinced.

Useless

2008-06-25T06:44:00.001-07:00

Day 29 June 19 – Useless

Today was gloriously useless, I woke up at 2:30PM (might be a new personal record.) I spent the day messing around of facebook.com and watching movies. I watched Pluto Nash and Anchorman. Both of the movies were pretty stupid but my movie selection is somewhat limited. I discovered I have a next-door neighbor, a black French woman about 35, she doesn’t speak any English.
I am so tired of bread and frozen chicken.
I have had the same conversation with about three Egyptians about the election. He asked me if I supported Obama or John McCain? When I told him Obama he makes a strange face and says “but he’s African?” I thought it was strange that an African would seem surprised that I supported an African. Sorry Opa, but McCain? Not a chance.

It's Good For You

2008-06-25T06:28:00.000-07:00

Day 28 June 18 – It’s Good For You

Today I spent the day at the Nutrition Department laboratories; there are three of them at Abassa. One is a lab for making experimental fish foods, one is a wet lab for testing the fish food on tanks of Tilapia, and the third is a lab used to analyze the chemical makeup of foods.
Here is part of what I learned today..
1Kg of Tilapia Fingerlings Feed consists of
140g Fish Meal (ground up dried less valuable fish)
365g Soy Bean (provides plant protein)
165g Wheat Bran (ground up- adds mass to the food, filler)
195g Ground Corn (provides plant protein)
20g Cod Liver Oil (provides amino acids)
20g Corn Oil (also provides amino acids)
10g Vitamins (C K E D are the major vitamins)
20g Mineral Mix (Fe Cu Mg)
25g Cellulose (makes it all stick together)
40g Starch (also helps it stick together)
*This mixture is 35% protein
*Fish meal can be 75% replaced with dried chicken parts at 1/7th the price
*Adult fish are given 25% protein in their food.

The fish pellets are made by a quick and simple process. First, all the pieces are ground up until they resemble a powder. Then each ingredient is precisely weighed and added to a large pan. Once all the ingredients are added, everything is poured into a large industrial blender/beater. The “cook” then adds the correct amount of water to make the food just sticky enough that it will hold its shape. Then the mixture is scooped into a giant machine that spits out fish pellets. The pellets are still very soft so they must be dried in an oven for approximately one hour before the food can be given to the fish.
The water content of the food is also important. The perfect amount of water is between 9 and 10 percent of the foods weight. If the food has too much water it will mold and made the fish sick. If it is too dry the food will be too hard, making it hard for the fish to eat. If it is so hard it will also sink, most fish food is eaten at the surface; some of the food that sinks in wasted.
After another good discussion about the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan I headed home. I laid around with nothing to do for a few hours until I found Gladiator on TV. After everyone goes home this place is pretty boring, especially with no internet.

Egypt is Paradise for Parasites

2008-06-25T06:02:00.000-07:00

Day 27 June 17 – Egypt is Paradise for Parasites

Today was my third day with the people from The Fish Diseases Laboratory. I sat down first with Sofia who was messing with a bag of blood and guts. She told me she was examining the entrails of dead fish to discover what was causing the lumps, hemorrhaging, and discoloration of the intestines. This was done by using small medical scissors to cut open and examine what is inside of the intestines, especially if there are any parasites. So let me clarify, there is fish poop inside fish intestines, outside of the intestine is slimy and covered in fish blood and guts. I joined in the fun and also tried to cut the toothpick think intestines open lengthwise, not easy. Then I would smear whatever is inside onto my hand to see if I could see any little parasites. After 4 hours of work we found 5, actually she found 5; all I found was fish poop.
The lady on the other side of the table was examining another type of fish for a similar condition, a different species of worm. This parasitic infestation was much more severe, her method was to cut open the intestine and put everything in a Petri dish. Then she would use a small paint brush to pick up the worms. I would estimate she found about 500, she said this was not a severe infestation, it can get much worse.
At about 11AM one of the women closed the door, the windows, and turned off the fans. The room quickly became miserable, then she turned on a giant Bunsen burner… I asked what she was doing and she didn’t immediately answer, only when she put the cover back on the Petri dish did she respond. It turns out she was testing a tissue sample for bacterial diseases. (I’m not sure I completely understand this so please leave comments if you can clarify) This is done by taking a small tissue sample from the possibly infected fish and placing it in saline solution. Then the scientist must make a medium for each disease that might be present in the sample. The medium is a mixture that encourages the growth of the bacteria of the disease while inhibiting growth of anything else. So when the scientist smears a tiny bit of the sample on the medium, if anything grows you know the specific disease is present. The reason the fans had to be turned off was so that the medium would not be infected by any other bacteria in the air. The Bunsen burner was used to sterilize everything that comes in contact with the medium.
We finished the work at around 2PM and I headed back to my room. On the way back I had a discussion with a scientist about Israel. He believed that Israel started the Yom Kippur war with the intention of simply killing Muslims. I think that is ridiculous, I don’t know if Israel was right or wrong but I don’t believe that was their intention. I also disagree on the point that Palestinians are without blame. I think both sides are wrong.

ACTG

2008-06-23T09:34:00.000-07:00

Day 26 June 16 – ACTG

Ok so today I worked with the genetic machine I looked at yesterday. Well the man who taught me was very nice and patient with my lack of Arabic, but we had communication issues. Most language barriers can be overcome with drawings, hand signals, or help from others; complex explanations of genetic procedures are not one of those things that can be overcome. I think the name of the machine was the PBR, PCR, or something like that. I was trying to organize my explanation of the machine and the process involved but realized my understanding was laughable, I didn’t even understand the damn name….
I feel really bad when people here buy me stuff, even if it is customary. Went into the village after work and I asked what a food item was. He insisted on buying it for me, despite my best efforts. Now the thing cost 12 pounds, a little over 2$. Now two dollars is nothing to me for lunch, it's a bargain. Then again it is one eighth of his monthly pay. It is annoying but I guess if the tables were turned i would be doing the same thing for him in the US.
When I come hope I promise to figure out what the machine did and how it works. For my own reference, look up master mix and lycera.

By the way ATCG are base pairs, I think. They are abbreviations for the four chemicals that make up DNA. Hey any scientists reading this, any help would be appreciated, or anyone with WIKIpedia and time to kill.

Abassa, Mi Casa

2008-06-23T09:13:00.000-07:00

Day 25 June 15 – Abassa, Mi Casa

I left early with Dr. Elghobasy to head back to Abassa, I had not been back for almost two weeks. We stopped to pick up some food on the way there. I returned to my room to put away my food and found that I had a roommate; the evidence was his dirty dishes.

I was then taken to the Infectious Diseases Laboratory to spend the day. There I learned that there are two categories of diseases, infectious and deficiencies. Infectious diseases include Fungal, Bacterial, and Parasitic. Deficiencies, an example would be a vitamin C deficiency.

I was shown an example of a fungal infection in the laboratory next door. Fungal infections are usually secondary infection, meaning they get this because they are already sick. The fish can easily get these diseases due to improper handling. If the slime is scraped off of a fish, the animal becomes much more susceptible to infection. This can occur when fingerlings are moved from pond to pond or anytime fish are moved with nets. The fish I saw looked like it has cotton balls growing off of its sides, under the fungus was an open wound. The fish’s fins were also rotting and looked terrible. We scraped off a small piece of the cotton ball and examined it under a microscope.

Then I left with a geneticist to look at a machine used to compare genetic material. I think the name was the PBR machine. The geneticist told me that the basic purpose of the machine was to compare two pieces of genetic material and tell if a certain strain is present in both samples. I am looking forward to working with this machine tomorrow.

I feel bad for the lower level of scientists here, even with a masters degree they still make 100 pounds a month, yea 20$, that sucks. They work for this small amount of money in the hope that they will move up the ladder where they can make much more money. Most of them also have side jobs; one owns her own veterinary clinic, another has an internet shop. Only after then asking many times did I actually tell them that at Pizza Hut I earn their months pay in three hours.

Pictures!!

2008-06-20T08:38:00.000-07:00

I Guess Egypt isn't so bad ;)

Dirty Disgusting animals, I nearly got flung off every time the thing would stand up or sit down. They are crazy tall.

As I expected most of the pictures of the show didn't turn out well. This one looks pretty good.

TIme Fears the Pyramids

2008-06-20T08:23:00.000-07:00

Day 24 June 14 – Time Fears the Pyramids
Today is the big day, I’m going to see the pyramids.

I left at 1:30 to take the bus ride to the pyramids. Now unlike buses in the US you don’t have to be at a bus stop to be picked up or let off. Now because of this little fact the trip took ten times as long as it should have. Lazy people would make the bus driver stop 50 feet after the previous person so they wouldn’t have to walk so far. I guess you get what you pay for, the hour bus trip cost 50 cents in USD. Before long I could see the pyramids rising above the buildings…
The pyramids were amazing, I was not disappointed. After the 5$ entry fee, I had access to the 6 pyramids and the sphinx. There are the three major pyramids and three tiny ones. The stones are amazingly large and it boggles the mind to imagine people moving them under people and animal power only. It was an amazing sight to see and I will never forget it, a high point in my life.
But this amazing place was also marred by people looking for a quick, unearned buck. The first was quickly after the front gate, “ticket” said a poorly dressed man, I ignored him until he said “hey I’m with the government.” Of course I didn’t believe him but I also didn’t want to press my luck. So I showed him my ticket but refused to relinquish it when he tried to take it from me. I walked past him to look at some of the tombs when he followed me and started guiding me. Now this guy is already on my bad side for claiming to be with the government, so I attempted to wave him off and said no thanks. When he ignores these, really getting on my nerves at this point, I stopped looked him right in the eyes and say “STOP, Go Away, Leave me alone.” That did the trick.
As I passed between the first and second pyramid a police officer waves me over. He tells me to go part way up the pyramid and he will take my picture. Now I know he is going to ask for money and I can live with it if he takes a picture. But when his friend comes over and also asks for Baksheesh, I unhappily say “you didn’t do anything.” Well that didn’t make him very happy, and he starts angrily taking in Arabic, but he had a big gun and I didn’t so I gave him a pound to leave me alone. After waving off many camel rides I decide to head out into the desert to take some pictures. I also craved a moment with out people bugging me.
This is where I really enjoyed myself, nobody bothering me; just me and the pyramids. It was just like in the movies, sand dunes as far as the eye can see, nobody in front of me. I made a big circle all the way around the pyramids, about three miles, taking lots of great pictures. The best part was on the top of a hill, I could see all six pyramids, the Sphnix, and the city of Cairo. I put the camera down on a big rock and did a bunch of timer shots, put the camera down then jump in front of it and smile. I sat and looked around for almost two hours on top of that hill.
On the way out I feared, for the first time, I was going to either be robbed or get in a fight. Ironically, by the police. I am starting to get the typical rapper’s outlook on the local police. As I’m leaving the pyramid area, at or near closing time, an officer orders me over. He points at his friend and demands that I give him Baksheesh. First I pretend like I don’t know what he is talking about. Then claim not to have any money, growing more and more angry all the time. When ever I would try to walk away he would yell and tell me to stop. I have no intention of being forced to give anybody money. First, I’m not getting robbed; Second, all I have is a 50 pound note and hundreds, neither of which he is getting. Well eventually the officer starts saying “Give him money,” well I just flat out said No. He was furious and started yelling at me, I thought that would be a good time to leave. So after flatly refusing him I just walked away, I ignored his order to stop. He followed me for a while but didn’t speak to me again. That was the only time I’ve really been worried about my safety here in Egypt.
Next I pulled the classic tourist trick, take your money out of your wallet and put it in another pocket. Then when someone asks for money you can show them your empty wallet. Knowing that I would have to pass many other police checkpoints I thought this was wise. But the rest of the day was free of armed men demanding money, but plenty of unarmed people did. I planned on going to the Sound and Light Show so I made my way toward the Sphinx.
The Sound and Light Show started at 8:30 so I had two hours to kill, so I took the long way to the Sphinx. I went down a small market street in the right direction. This time it was kids on bikes that wanted my money. They would ride next to me ask where I’m from, my name, then say “you give me money.” I think if I gave everyone money that asked for it today I wouldn’t have the two pounds for the bus ride home. Well eventually the streets got narrower and I became less sure of where I was going. Well as I was looking at a funny camel with designs cut into its hair a man asked me if I wanted a ride. Since I thought I was lost I thought this would be a great way to get unlost (probably not a word). Two birds with one stone, get to ride a camel and figure out how to get to the sphinx. Foolishly, I expected this man to own the camel; instead he says “follow me I take you better place” which I’m sure means his friend. Well he takes me down a few houses to a different camel. After asking the man about 5 times to actually tell me the price for a ride to the sphinx we settled on 20 pounds.(5$) I expected the camel guy, a kid my age, to walk in front of the camel and guide it while I sat on the saddle, like everyone else I saw. No… he told me to move back then hopped up there with me… I laughed when 20 feet later we see the Sphinx, I guess I was going the right direction.
Well I still had and hour and a half to blow so I told the kid to take me on a longer trip. I was glad I did this because 30 minutes later we were riding in the dunes up to a vista where we could see everything. There I saw the sunset over the pyramids and Cairo, something I will never forget.
At 8PM we returned right outside of the sphinx to the father and camel owner. First he was saying 130 pounds (26$) and I laughed and said no way. I talked him down to 70 (14$), a good price considering he was going to charge me 20 pounds for a 5 minute ride at first. Well I hurried over to the line for the Sound and Light Show.
As I have been in Egypt I have found that people here are not big on waiting in line. They don’t stay in their lines in cars, in line at the subway, and definitely not in line to buy tickets to the show. But this was different, they had velvet ropes and everything, everyone was waiting in line except the guy who cut right in front of me at the front of the line. As nicely as can be done I pushed him out of the way and told him to wait his damn turn.
The Sound and Light Show begins after dark, it is a light and laser show that showcases the sphinx and pyramids. There is also some history but mostly it’s a light show. The commentary was way overdone but it was entertaining, not sure it was worth 75 pounds (15$) but still cool.
I couldn’t find the bus I was supposed to take home so I took a quick taxi ride to the closest subway station. The Egyptian people redeemed themselves in my eyes when I was lost. I couldn’t find an English subway map and asked the subway guy for help. He didn’t understand but the person behind me told me to just follow him. He took me half way home and took me all the way to my next connection and made sure I got on the right train.
It was an amazing day here in Egypt, I got the see the best and worst Egypt has to offer.

Camels are disgusting animals.
Sound and Light Show is expensive.
Egyptian cops suck
Baksheesh is Bull$hit

Tourist

2008-06-19T07:34:00.000-07:00

Day 23 June 13 – Tourist

Most of the places I’ve been over the last two weeks were very un-touristy. But back in Cairo it is a whole different story. Shop keepers yell at you to get your attention, little kids ask your name, where you’re from, then tell you to give them money. The most annoying is the taxi drivers, as I’m walking along they slow down beside me and lay on their horn until I look at them. The one that really pushed me over the edge was a guy who comes up stops right in front of me so I have to stop. Then reaches down grabs my hand, shakes it, and doesn’t let go. Now I’m already not liking this person and when after I try to pull my hand away, twice he continues to hold my hand tighter. So, angrily, I shove him away and tell him to do something very profane to himself.
Well after that episode I walked around the markets for a few hours seeing the people and what they are selling. I was surprised to see that the majority of street vendors sell car stuff. Like aftermarket horns, probably because they overuse the ones they have. I couldn’t believe the amount of car stuff they were selling, anyone need new windshield wipers or sparkplugs?
Well after about four hours of wandering around, and failing to find the movie theater I was looking for, I headed home.

My favorite tourist moment was when some kid about 12 years old starts walking with me. He starts chit-chatting, he was too friendly; my spider/tourist sense was tingling. As I expected he says, oh look here is my family bazaar please my friend come in, come in. Well I was already shopping so why not. I go in to find tourist stuff, little statues, little pyramids, papyrus pictures. Well let me describe the store owner, anything I looked at got a full description, I was the center of his world. So after about 5 minutes of him telling me how good of a deal I was getting I said, ”No thanks, have a nice day.” He looked utterly crestfallen; he looked like Cesar would have as he muttered “Et Tu Brutus?” As I left I heard him quietly, sadly ask, “what happened my friend?” I thought that was a classic tourist moment.

Some Egyptians have aftermarket hors that mimic police sirens, that would get you thrown in prison so fast back home.

I think every Egyptian merchant has learned how to say “hello my friend. British? American? Australian? Come see my Bazar?”

Sorry no pictures today

Going to the Pyramids tomorrow, Boom Shakalaka!

If They Say It Can’t Be Done, Do It

2008-06-19T07:12:00.000-07:00

Day 22 June 12 – If They Say It Can’t Be Done, Do It

Today was my last day at Cafrashey, I was sad to go and say goodbye to Dr. Ishmail. I got up relatively early and watched another fingerling sale; that is the third time this week. Dr. Ishmail was feeling sick today so he stayed in his room most of the day. Ahmed ran the show again today because Dr. Mohamed was gone and Dr. Ishmail incapacitated.
After the fingerling sale, during a break, I played football (soccer) with the workers. I’m in good enough shape to keep up easily but I havn’t played in years are I was awful. I made one goal while allowing about 5 or 6. Also, Egpyt is, as you can imagine, pretty damn hot. I was drenched and nasty after the ten minute game.
The next order of business was harvesting an old brood stock. Mothers and fathers are used three times then given a year break. Once they can no longer produce, like these fish, they are sold for food. These were big fish, each full adult size. The fish are harvested from a very muddy pit, this was the first time I decided to “just watch.” I was leaving soon and didn’t feel like doing all the work to get clean, cleaning really is a process when nobody has outdoor hoses.
Well the time had finally come for my thank you lunch of steak and soda. I quickly found that this was not going to be as easy as I thought. No coal, cook was not informed and used some of the meat, timing was bad. Well after about 30 minutes I recognized that all of these problems were in people’s heads. All I had to do to make it happen was, as Nike said, “Just Do It.”
With a little help from Dr. Ishmail, who made a brief balcony visit, I cooked everything. Everything went great and I think the workers appreciated it. I said thank you to Dr. Ishmail but was sorry that Dr. Mohamed was no there for me to thank also.
Then I took the ride into Cairo to go back to the home of Dr. Elghobashy and family. Once there I spent the last few hours of the day taking full advantage of the Elghobahys’ all you can eat high speed internet.

Motorcycle Diaries

2008-06-19T07:05:00.000-07:00

Day 21 June 11 – Motorcycle Diaries

So I have been living out of my backpack for the last 12 days, I left my suitcase at Abassa. I brought clothes, books, and some accessories with me. The books I brought in my backpack were The Sun Also Rises, Riding With the Blue Moth, and Heart of Darkness. I started Heart of Darkness, quickly got bored with it, then read the first ten pages of The Sun Also Rises and they sucked. So then I read Riding With the Blue Moth, which was amazing, and now I,m bored because the only other two books I have are awful. I know, someone is reading this saying, well you only read the beginning of those classic books, they will get better. Well no, if a book sucks in the beginning I will assume It’s going to suck in the end. All of my favorite books are good from page 1; that is one aspect of what makes them such good books.

So today was another day when I wake up and find the house empty. It turns out that Dr. Ishmail left really early in the morning to drive over the Suez Canal to Sinai with a load of fingerlings. Because Dr. Ishmail was gone until the afternoon, I worked with the third in charge, Ahmed Faruqe. We did lots of everyday work, feeding fish and checking on the other workers’ progress. Then I helped him do his English homework, I am always amazed how driven people are to learn English. Helping someone learn English makes me realize how bad my own English is. Cuz and K (because and ok) are not real words, at least by Scrabble rules.

When Dr. Ishmail came back he reminded me that I was leaving tomorrow! I have not been keeping track of what day it is very well, the plans are made around me but I’m usually lost. Well I had mentioned before that I wanted to do a BBQ for Dr. Ishmail and the workers to show my thanks. So I talked to Ahmed about it and he offered to drive me into the nearest town to get the supplies. I agreed and we got onto the motorcycle just after dark.

On a side note: Some of the workers own their own motorcycles at the farm. They are used to both drive to work and to shuttle between the two farms, which are 1/3 mile apart. I have often ridden on the back of the motorcycles between the two farms. The motorcycles are usually 150cc bikes with a top speed of about 60mph.

Well I’m just going to apologize to my mother now because she will not like this next part at all. So we head off, or course without helmets because this is Egypt. Sunset is the time mosquitoes come out, mosquitoes are attracted to light, so we ride without the lights on…. Now remember Egypt is a third world country, they don’t have nice roads, but they do have random speed bumps. So we are driving 50mph down a dark and broken road without helmets or headlights. I have having more fun than I can describe because what I was doing was so wonderfully ridiculous. Well the ride was lots of fun and we quickly arrived in a small city named El Hamol.

I quickly realized El Hamol was not a tourist destination by the amazed stares of little kids and adults alike. This is not the first time I have been the target of stares because I’m white but it always surprises me. Well Ahmed showed me around town and we got soda, steak, and spices. The steak defiantly wasn’t USDA triple A choice prime rib, but I am pretty sure it came from a cow…

The ride back was lots of fun, I really want a motorcycle. Sorry Mom. At least I said no when he offered to let me drive…

Moving Day

2008-06-19T06:37:00.000-07:00

Day 20 June 10 - Moving Day

Today’s main event was the selling of fingerlings to a neighboring farm. Many of the local fish farms are much less advanced than Dr. Ishamil’s. They do not have the know-how or facilities to keep a brood stock, collect eggs, hatch them, feed them, and make them all male. For many of the other farmers it is easier to just buy inch, to two inch long fish. Dr. Ishmail makes even more money at the end of winter when he is able to sell babies when most of the other farmers cannot get their fish to reproduce because of the cold.
It is a pretty simple process but it was done so quickly and efficiently I was very impressed. It was obvious Dr. Ishmail already had this process planned when he had the farm built because the holding area was the perfect size and in the perfect location. In the fresh (unused salty water) canal there are concrete barriers the size of nets.
The first step is to catch all the fingerlings out of the green house tanks. The greenhouses are the trick that lets his fish reproduce in the winter. Unlike the harvest, the workers must be careful not to damage the fish. The fish are then placed into nets stretched over the special canal, this acts as a holding tank for the fish.
Next, Dr. Ishmail personally comes over and counts the number of fish in one scoop of the net. Dr. Ishmail feels it is his personal responsibility to ensure that the correct number of fingerlings are sold.
Next a person fills a four foot long by one foot diameter plastic bag with about 2 gallons of water. This bag is then held open for Dr. Ishmail who puts one scoop full, about 330 fish, inside.
It is then passed down the line to a person who inflates the bag from a tank of pure oxygen. This allows the fish to travel much longer distances than if they were simply filled with air. The bags are then stood up in the back of a pickup truck. What is amazing about this procedure is the speed with which it is done. Each bag can be filled, populated, oxygenated, and stacked in about twelve seconds.
The rest of the day was fun, I sat around watching CNN until I found a great movie. AIR FORCE ONE!!! I have been stuck watching CNN and Aljazeera, while entertaining they are both depressing. They make you think that the world is either going to melt, the stock market is going to crash, or world war will break out at any moment. So Air Force One was a wonderfully welcome respite from sensationalist news. My favorite line is “I would turn my back on god himself for Mother Russia!” With the combination of overly done fake Russian accent and the super dramatic music makes it a classic.

Catfish

2008-06-09T14:45:00.000-07:00

Day 19 June 9 – Catfish

Today Dr. Ishmail and Mohamed went to Cairo before I woke up. I woke up a little late so my first meal was lunch. We talked yesterday about how everything tastes better grilled so Dr. Ishmail said we should have grilled catfish for lunch. So at noon we headed up to the roof to cook, they use a metal box on top of the tile roof. After about 5 minutes the fire went out on the coal/wood so they used a gallon jug to pour lighter fluid onto the hot embers... Well as you are probably now envisioning the jug caught on fire in his hand. Being on the roof it is not like he can just drop it and wait for it to burn itself out. So with the burning jug of lighter fluid in his hand he decides to throw it off the third story roof into the drive way. The ensuing explosion was pretty damn cool; the dogs, cats, and people in the driveway were less enthusiastic. I attempted to stomp out the square meter of burning spilled lighter fluid left of the roof. After the first stomp I, quickly and painfully, realized the rubber flip-flops I was wearing were inadequate to fight the flames. I decided to let nature take its course; luckily the house didn’t burn down.
After the cooking excitement I was pleasantly surprised to find how delicious the fish was. It wasn’t BBQ ribs but it was still pretty good. Tomorrow should be an exciting day; we will be moving fingerling and selling fry.

Night Life

2008-06-09T14:41:00.000-07:00

Day 18 June 8 – Night Life

Today I did the whole operation of cutting off the catfish’s head, remove the gonads, and remove the pituitary glad myself. It was not pretty, there was blood everywhere, but everything else went fine. Then I gave the heads of the catfish to the dogs and cats; the rest of the body will be tomorrow’s lunch.

Then I got to play with the biggest catfish I have ever seen. They lowered the water of the concrete tank so we could have a chance of catching it. I would guess the thing weighed about 17 pounds and three feet long. The worker held up 4 fingers which I took to mean he was four years old. With a little training I was able to hold the fish still for a picture.

For the first time Dr. Ishmail, Mohamed, and I went into the city of Ca-Fra- Shay. Dr. Ishmail had to go for a meeting so Mohamed and I took a little tour. Before we separated we stopped for Pizza. I got a delicious seafood pizza with shrimp and calamari. We sat outside and were worried that it was about to start raining at any moment but all we got was a few drops.

So I noticed a few cultural differences while watching the people in the city. First, guys holding hands. I saw many teens and adults either holding hands or hooking arms. Now if you were to do this back home you would get some strange looks. Another thing that would get some strange looks is the way men kiss cheeks.

I think there is a major difference between the way American drive and the way Egyptians drive. Americans are just always in a hurry. Here in Egypt it is perfectly fine to walk in the road, in front of cars. It is fine to pull out in front of someone so they have to brake hard to keep from hitting you. If you come close to hitting someone you just kinda wave and nobody minds. In the US if you pull out and make somebody slow down you will probably get the finger.

Pillars

2008-06-09T14:34:00.001-07:00

Day 17 June 7 – Pillars

During lunch I asked Mohamed about the five pillars of Islam. They are like the five requirements to get on god’s good side.
Alms for the poor. I think this is the source of Baksheesh. It is required for each Muslim to give poor people money. Mohamed said that people should give 2.5 percent of their yearly salary to the poor
Pray five times a day. I have seen this performed without fail. They take this very seriously, everybody prays, every time. Young kids are allowed to go to the mosque to learn how to pray correctly. Once the children turn ten years old their parents must force them to pray.
Pilgrimage to Mecca. Every Muslim who can afford and manage it must take a pilgrimage to the site of Mecca. Mecca is the site of a religious event, sorry I can’t remember what is was. I think it had something to do with Abraham and the building of a church? To fulfill the requirement the person much go during a certain time of the year, there is a special festival. The site of Mecca is in Mecca, Saudi Arabia.
Admit in the Oneness of Allah. Muslims often repeat "There is none worthy of worship except God, and Muhammad is the messenger of God." This pillar of Islam is admitting that Allah is the only god and Mohammed is his prophet. (Shia don’t meet this requirement because they don’t recognize Mohammed as the prophet, this is like a group of Christians not recognizing Jesus.)
Fast during the month of Ramadan. Each Muslim must not eat while the sun is up during Ramadan. “Those who are sick, elderly, or on a journey, and women who are menstruating, pregnant or nursing, are permitted to break the fast and make up an equal number of days later in the year if they are healthy and able.” (Islam101.com)

I also found that after a pond is emptied and the fish are removed they do something special in the pond. While the pond is empty they bring in a tractor to clean out the ditch. Then compost is dumped into the bottom of the pond. Then when the pond is filled with water the compost will jumpstart the growth of algae. They also allow the water to remain stagnant for about a week to allow mosquitoes to lay their eggs in the pond. The mosquito eggs and algae work as free natural food for the fish in the pond.

This is a translation of the call to prayer they announce over loud speakers five times a day.

God is Great.
God is Great.
God is Great.
God is Great.
I testify that there is none worthy of worship except God.
I testify that there is none worthy of worship except God.
I testify that Muhammad is the messenger of God.
I testify that Muhammad is the messenger of God.
Come to prayer!
Come to prayer!
Come to success!
Come to success!
God is Great!
God is Great!
There is none worthy of worship except God.

Egyptians just distrust Jews on principal.
In Saudi Arabia gas is 70 cents a gallon

Home Alone

2008-06-09T14:31:00.001-07:00

Day 16 June 6 – Home Alone

Well normally somebody comes and knocks on my door at 8AM to tell me breakfast is ready, I don’t have an alarm. Well today nobody did and I was in bed until 11:20, oops. I totally forgot that both Dr. Ishmail and Dr. Mohamed were going to be gone today. Well I took a tour of the farm by myself, checked on my baby fry in the jar and looked around the farm. On the way I came across some donkey and cow herders who stopped so their stock could drink from the ponds. I stopped and looked at the baby donkey and the guy came up and said Salam. So I responded “Salam, Hi” he said something which of course I didn’t understand so I said “sorry I don’t understand.” Now I assumed by answering in a foreign language and looking confused the guy would stop talking; I was wrong, very wrong. The guy just kept talking, whenever he would stop I would repeat “Sorry I don’t speak Arabic”, “Sorry, I only speak English”, or “I don’t understand”. He just kept talking, I felt weird just walking away while he was talking to me so I just kind of stood there nodding along. Well eventually he ran out of steam and I wandered off….
The workers at the catfish farm invited me over for catfish dinner at 8PM. While this seems like a simple message to pass along, the language barrier is like a burning river of napalm. Using hand signals and pointing is not a good way to pass that barrier…
Well I showed up at 8 and found everyone in a small room. The room had two beds, a propane tank, satellite tv, 100 spiders, and a rug. We all sat on the rug and had a good meal of catfish with rice and tomatoes. Everyone was very nice and I even had a translator, a good time was had by all. As we finished eating and prepared for tea, the sun went under the horizon. I guess that was the signal for the mosquito D-Day, it was like somebody flipped a switch and the bugs were everywhere. I was killing them non-stop, I couldn’t stop long enough to drink my tea. Well at that very moment I was ready to go back home and avoid the carnage. Well before I could get a ride back everyone had to pray, a very interesting procedure that takes about 7 minutes. A game of pool later I went to sleep.

Fly swatters are wonderful

Suni vs Shia

2008-06-09T14:21:00.000-07:00

Day 15 June 5 – Suni vs Shia

Well I guess I’ll go in chronological order..

I got up at 8am this morning to go and see the big event for the day, moving eggs and fry. It was very much like what I had already done at Desert Springs Tilapia. Lower the water the brood stock are in, catch them in net, separate males and females, and then catch the fry and eggs.
Then we moved the eggs into what looked like a large lemonade jar. The jar is tilted and a water line was put into the jar. This causes the eggs to continually be circulated by the water. The inflowing water continually overflows, but the unhatched eggs do not overflow. The point of putting the eggs in this jar is to separate the hatched eggs and the unhatched eggs. This works because the little fish swim out of the jar while the eggs stay inside.
Then while sitting around watching CNN I asked what the difference between Suni and Shia was. Mohamed told me that Suni are a type of Muslims, a branch, that are more strict than normal Muslims. He said that Shia are also a branch of Muslims but he thought (passionately) that they were wrong. He said Shia do not think The Prophet Mohammad was supposed to be the one god talked to, they think Ali (pronounced ally) should be in that position. Shia do not think Mohammad is the prophet which Is a major point of conflict between them and normal Muslims. Shia think god accidentally sent the message to Mohammed because he was sleeping in Ali’s bed (I think). In Iraq Saddam kept the Shia majority in check with an iron grip, with him gone they are trying to take power. The Shia would then implement their extremely strict version of Islamic law.
I am always amazed when I realize how similar all of the major world religions are. This is the way I see it, and keep in mind I’m no religious expert, feel free to correct me. Jews believe in the Old Testament, Christians Believe in the Old Testament and the New Testament, Muslims believe in the Old Testament, New Testament, and the Koran. The Koran just tells them that Mohammad was the last prophet. The only other differences I can see is the majority of Muslims make their religion a much larger part of their lives and a few other things. For example the women cover their hair and necks, and dress conservatively. Some people see this as oppression of women, which from an outsiders perspective is understandable. Think of it this way, Jewish men wear their little head cover (sorry I forgot the name is it Yamaka?), Muslim women just wear something else to show their devotion. You wouldn’t say Jewish men are oppressed because they wear theirs, why would you saw Muslim women are? (I have never seen anyone forced to wear one, or punished for not wearing one.) Suni and Shia would be much more likely to force women to wear veils than normal Muslims.

Relax Relapse

2008-06-05T09:24:00.000-07:00

Day 14 June 4 – Relax Relapse

Today I woke up the glorious news that Obama won the Democratic nomination….Hooah! :) Today was much like yesterday, no big operation for the day. As I played solitaire and Dr. Ishmail played Snood (great time wasting game) he asked me if I could send him a certain type of tiny worm from the us.
The way it works now at the farm is they have to buy baby shrimp, called brine shrimp to feed the tiny fry. These are expensive and Dr. Ishmail is always trying to cut costs. To get around this he wants to grow these little worms on the side of the ponds so each day he can just feed the fry (baby fish) with these worms. The worms would be much cheaper to grow than it is to buy the brine shrimp.
Using these worms is a common practice in the US (so says Dr. Ishmail) but Egyptian laws are hampering him. It is much harder to get these worms because other species of the same type of worm are toxic. So the whole group of them are controlled, but not in the US. He has tried to bring them back from the US before but was thwarted, once someone sent the wrong type, another time his daughter forgot to add water to the vial. So he asked me to try and send him some Fed Ex when I get home, which I am more than happy to do. I can’t tell you how much he has taught me and how wonderful of a host he has been.
I also came to understand another aspect of fish farming in Egypt today, crappy infrastructure. I didn’t realize this for a while but the power has been out for the last 24 hours. Now you are thinking “Patrick, how could you not notice there is no power?” well that is because the power goes out so often that Dr. Ishmail bought a generator to cover when the power is out. This is vital because in the small tanks if the fish are not given new water and given oxygen, they will die in a matter of hours. Well at around 8PM the generator failed, his backup broke. Dr. Ishmail was obviously very concerned. He had to call a mechanic and electrician at 8:30 PM to come and fix it ASAP. Fortunately it was a minor problem, corrected in a matter or minutes. But it could have been catastrophic.
Dr. Ishmail’s son Mohammad was in Alexandria till the afternoon trying (successfully) to get his son accepted to an American school in Egypt. Now I always thought that America was not known for its good education system?!? Sorry Mr. Kukla, Dr. Schulter, and Mr. Sierra you teachers are the exception….well not you Mr. Sierra ;) But then again I guess they are better than Egyptian schools, and he learns English!

The farm im staying at has a tennis court, basket ball court, squash court, and a soccer field...ive decided to stay here another week :)

I am horrified at the prospect of my stand up fan dying during a power outage, It is the only thing keeping me from being drenched in sweat in bed. It also keeps the mosquitos at bay.

Relax

2008-06-05T08:56:00.000-07:00

Day 13 June 4 – Relax

Today was wonderful; woke up late, no plans, just relax. I finally updated the blog today, the only internet connection is a USB cell phone connection. While very convenient it is also slow.

In the afternoon I went across the street to the catfish farm and repeated the process of artificial spawning. Then we cut off their heads, dug in their brains and pulled out their pituitary gland. I think I could do the process myself now! I was also assigned the following task. After a few hours replace the acetone the pituitary glands are in, repeat after another 12 hours, then dry for 2 hours, then refrigerate

I learned about this a while ago but just realized I never talked about it. I don't know exactly, but about one in a thousand catfish are called jumpers. Jumpers are catfish that grow dramatically larger, faster than others their age. They grow so much faster than their brothers and sisters that they end up eating them. This is a problem because every fish that dies is money down the drain. So every few days they catch all the jumpers and move them to a new tank with the other jumpers, jumpers don't eat jumpers. They have to do this every few days because "jumping" is a social, not genetic, trigger. Think of it like a wolf Alpha male, if one is removed another will always take its place. So when the 1st group of jumpers are removed other begin to grow more quickly.

At sunset I took the daily tour – check of the farm with Dr. Ishmail. We checked the fish and shot at some metal fish feeders with his S&W 9mm, with the added benefit of scaring away the wild dogs that steal fish.

The catfish in my hand are the same age and have been raised in the exact same conditions.

Pictures!

2008-06-04T02:47:00.001-07:00

The Pictures are not in order..

This is injecting female catfish with the pituitary gland solution to speed up egg process.

This is the water recycling device. This will allow Dr. Ishmail to multiply the population density of fish in concrete tanks by reducing the nitrogen levels of the water.

This is Mohammad slicing up the males gonads over a bowl of eggs.

Mohammad "would you like to try this?"

Patrick "No thanks, I'll take pictures."

This is a harvest at the farm Dr. Ishmail advises at. Here you can see the fish are very muddy. This was the day after his discovery that harvesting fish from the water inlet side was so effective in cleaning the fish. He will soon implement this discovery at this farm.

This is Mustafa!

He talked to me for almost 4 hours about Egypt and Islam. Very cool guy!

Remember to click on the pictures for a better view.

Why XY?

2008-06-03T14:20:00.000-07:00

Day 12 June 2 – Why XY?

So there was nothing special going on at the farm today until 9PM so we just relaxed. At around 11AM some guy drove up shook hands and came inside with a plastic bag. We sat down at the greeting room table and drank a cup of tea; the black plastic bag sitting on the table. Now keep in mind, I don’t speak Arabic, I have no idea what the hell is going on; I just roll with it till I can figure out what they are doing. It became clear with the new guy opened the plastic bag and poured 50,000 Egyptian pounds onto the table(that is a little over 10,000 USD$). Well this surprised me, not in the least what I was expecting. It was all the money he made off the harvest a few days ago. People here only work in cash I found out, the banks don’t work the same way here Egypt. People don’t write checks or wire money, its all cash.
Over lunch I remembered something Mohamed said on the first day and asked about it. He had mentioned an YY male. I’ll be honest, I had too many fun friends in my high school freshman biology class to really learn anything. So I didn’t know what that meant but it was obvious it meant something. Like in that Phil Collins song, “It all means something and yet nothing to me.” So I asked. They explained that they are creating what are known as SuperMales.
This is how it works now. Males are XY and Females are XX genetically. After fish eggs hatch, for twelve days they don’t have sexual organs yet. Fish that have male organs are physically male and fish that are XY are genetically male. A normal male is the wild is both physically and genetically male. Their sex is already decided in their genes but the organs have not yet formed. Because physically male fish grow larger faster, farmers only want to grow and sell male fish. Because of this fact fish farmers add testosterone to the baby fish so even if they are genetically female they will grow male sex organs. While this is safe, it is expensive and only 90% effective, which causes problems with the fish reproduce at the wrong time. Also, people don’t like it that the fish they eat are given hormones.
If people could genetically change the fish so all of the children are males it would be great. If it were possible for two males, two XYs, to have children all of their kids would be male. So the way to make all babies males without using hormones is simple, figure out how two males can have sex!?!?! Well SuperMales are that solution; they are genetically males with female sex organs, guys who have babies. During those twelve days that the baby fish don’t have sexual organs, give them estrogen. That way even if the fish is genetically male they will grow female sexual organs.
Unfortunately, this is not the end of the process. I don’t really understand what the problem is but this is what I got. When you give the estrogen to a bunch of fish about half are genetically male and half are genetically female. Now Supermales are ONLY the ones that are genetically males with female sexual organs. But the only way to distinguish a Supermale from a female is to either genetically test each fish or to see if their offspring are all males. This is a pain in the ass and cots lots of money. Dr. Ishmail had made at one time 30 SuperMales, but he estimates it would take 1000 to be effective on the farm.
On a different subject, at 9PM we walked across the street with Mohamed to the catfish farm Dr. Ishmail owns. There we smashed up the Pituitary gland we collected a few days ago and mixed it with saline water. We then injected this into female fish who’s eggs were not yet ripe. We did this so that tomorrow we would be able to artificially spawn catfish again.
The rest of the day was wonderfully uneventful; I sat around and read my book. I read the entire book Uncle Chris gave me, Riding With the Blue Moth today. Amazing book, It goes for tragic, to depressing, to hopeful, to heartwarming in a few hundred pages. And it’s lots of fun if you are super awesome and have ridden your bike across the country. P.S. I’m bragging but I got 5 As and 1 B this last semester. I got my only B in Marine Biology, Ironic? I think so.

ok so i guess i didn't understand this very well. If you want a good explanation read the comments, Kev Fitz and Mr. Bong know what they are talking about.

Adviser

2008-06-03T14:15:00.000-07:00

Day 11 June 1 – 8.55 PM – Adviser

I left Mohamed’s beautiful home this morning and left with Dr. Ishmail as he went to another farm. We traveled an hour to a farm which grows not only fish but many other crops like Mangos, citrus, and peaches. Dr. Ishmail is an adviser for the aquaculture side of the farm.
Today was a harvest so Dr. Ishmail thought he should be there and keep an eye on things. It was a harvest almost exactly like the once at Ca-Fa-Shey except for one important factor. Dr. Ishmail experiments often to improve and perfect his methods. In the harvest at Ca-Fa-Shey the fish were pushed up hill towards to water inlet pipe, unlike usual where the fish are drawn from the deep end. Dr. Ishmail tried this because he was hoping that by running water past the fish during harvest would keep them cleaner. It worked wonderfully! This new method had not been implemented at this farm yet.
We then headed to Dr. Ishmail’s other house, a farm house. There he grows mangos, oranges, peaches, and apricots. He is not trying to turn a large profit from the farm, it is more of a hobby. It was an amazing place and both I and Dr. Ishmail enjoyed a relaxing afternoon.

Alexandria

2008-06-03T14:14:00.000-07:00

Day 10 May 31 – Alexandria

Today I drove with Dr. Ishmail and son Mohamed to his home in Alexandria. Alexandria has about four million people and It stretches along the coast of the Mediterranean coast. Their home was on one of the middle stories of a building a few blocks back for the coast. We went up to meet Dr. Ishmail’s wife, four daughters, and only grandson. The grandson, Mohamed's son, is named Ishmail after his grandfather.
After a wonderful lunch and cookies, Dr. Ishmail’s son Mohamed took me to his place for some rest. After a nice nap we drove along the coastal road, the main drag in Alex, to a thousand year old castle from the Ottoman Empire. Because it was a Friday night the boardwalk was packed with people, children, and vendors. After a quick tour of the boardwalk we drove to the largest mall in Alex. The mall was just like the one in Cairo, huge and full of cool stuff. There was a famous perfume store which sells perfume that can cost thousands of dollars.
The next stop on the tour was the Library of Alexandria. I remembered that the library was famous but I couldn’t remember exactly for what. I expected to see a very old, massive library, but was surprised to see a concrete dome. They told me then that the library burned down, with most of its contents, during the Roman rule. Then I remembered it was famous in history as the most impressive library but it burned down with much of the documented history up to that point. It was famous because it was destroyed. So now the library looks like a dome with a slice taken out of it. It is on the coast, it is supposed to represent the sun rising off of the ocean horizon.
After a wonderful dinner and desert we headed home. Don’t get me wrong, I love Cairo, but Alexandria was great. It was much less hectic and I loved the ocean view.

Ca-Fa-Shey

2008-06-03T14:09:00.000-07:00

Day 9 May 30 – 11.02 PM - Ca-Fa-Shey

The plan was to see the harvest at 5AM, come back to my room at 7AM and leave to go to Ca-Fa-Shey. Well the driver showed up to take me to the harvest at around 6.50 so that didn’t work out. But I took the hour drive to Ca-Fa-Shey, a private farm owned by Dr. Ishmail. I found out later Dr. Ismail is famous in Egypt as the father of aquaculture. At the height of his production he was personally responsible for over 2 million pounds of fish production a year. He became wealthy years ago when he was the first to implement a new aquaculture technique.
The trip to Ca-Fa-Shey was a harrowing story in itself. Once again I feared for my life, three VERY near serious crash incidents. The drive was about an hour long through rural Egypt.
The first thing I saw was the beautiful garden in front of the home. A very nice home; the largest I have seen in Egypt by far. There is a full time cook, house cleaners, and a gardener. The house lies in front of a very sophisticated tilapia farm.
The hatcheries are made of cement with plastic covers. The plastic covers create a greenhouse effect dramatically raising the temperature. This allows the Tilapia to thrive in winter, normally their growth would slow and they would not spawn. While this temperature increase is great in winter it is very uncomfortable in summer. Inside it is probably 110 degrees with 70 percent humidity; instant sweat.
After the tour Dr. Ishmail’s son in law Mohamed, who is also a dentist, took me and showed me how to artificially spawn catfish. This is pretty nasty but it’s easy to do and the results are amazing. The first step is to get however many female catfish you need, then get 1/3 that number of males. Then massage/squeeze all of the females’ eggs out into a bowl. Next the males; this requires surgery. While the females survive the operation the males do not. It is important to keep the male catfish alive as long as possible, unfortunately for the fish. To keep the male catfish relatively calm during the operation, keep him upside down and his eyes and sensors covered. While holding the fish tightly, cut a three inch incision along the soft belly of the fish. Next, remove both of the gonads and place them off on the side. Holding the gonads above the bowl of eggs, stab and squeeze the gonads until you get the sperm all over the eggs. Then add water to the bowl of eggs and carefully mix it all together. You must work quickly because the sperm are only active for 30 to 60 seconds. Now just leave the eggs in warm water and you’re done.
Natural spawning means you just put some males and females together and let “the magic” happen. The reason people go to the trouble of artificially spawning fish is you get nearly double the fertilization, meaning twice the fish, and hopefully twice the money.
The reason the male fish must be alive for the operation is because later you can cut open its brain and remove the pituitary gland. If the fish was killed early in the operation the pituitary gland would decay quickly. The pituitary gland can be mixed with saline water to crate a fish hormone injection. This pituitary gland injection can be given to female fish to make their eggs ripen faster. This allows the fish to be spawned on the peoples schedule rather than the fish’s.
At 4PM we harvested one of Dr. Ishmail’s Tilapia ponds. When I came to the pond the water level was already so low you could see most of the fish. The previous Tilapia farm I worked at had plastic covers along the bottom of the ponds, these were muddy bottoms. This allowed me to observe the results of normal Tilapia spawning procedures. The male fish had half spherical holes in the bottom of the pond. In these holes the females would lay her eggs and the males would fertilize them. I assumed many of the Tilapia would be caught in these holes as the water level dropped, Dr. Ishmail told me that they would not because it is in their nature to find adequate water.
The worker dragged nets along the bottom to round all the fish up in a round pen. Then a worker got in with the fish and began to scoop them up in basket nets. The fish were then placed in a trailer pulled by a tractor. Once this was finished the fish were taken to a sorting station and graded into their appropriate sizes. I was surprised to see that no matter how small, all of the fish are sold.
I just found that Dr. Ishmail and Mohamed are leaving the farm to go to Alexandria this Friday and Saturday weekend. They asked me to come with them to Alexandria and I was thrilled to accept.

Catfish gain almost 1 pound for every pound of food they eat
Tilapia gain a pound of every 1.3 to 1.7 pounds of food they eat
Beef gain only 1 pound for every 10 pounds of food they eat.

Babies and Genetics

2008-06-03T14:03:00.000-07:00

Day 8 May 29 – Babies and Genetics

Today was pretty relaxed, started with watching the workers catch some Tilapia from the brood stock. They then removed the eggs and fry from their mouths. After separating the eggs and fry from the fish that escaped last time (bigger).
Then I went to see some geneticists working with blue Tilapia. I wont lie and say I understood what they were doing but it sounded interesting.
After this I had a few wonderful hours of internet. I sat around and read email, the news, and downloaded music.
I learned the Arabic words for water, fish, net, tea, one, sugar, family, coffee, and thanks.
Tomorrow I will be going to Dr. Ismyal Radwan’s private fish farm for about a week in cafrashake. (that is how it sounds.)

THE FARM HAS CELL PHONE INTERNET AND CHANGES BY THE MEG SO I WILL UPLOAD PICS LATER.

Tell Americans

2008-06-03T13:38:00.000-07:00

Day 7 May 28 – 1.46 AM – Tell Americans…

I began my day at 8:30 when I went to the World Fish Center and meet with the Director of Hatcheries. We spent the day moving cat fish fry from an approx. 1000ft^3 tank into a larger concrete tank. The usual way to do this would be to lower the water lever to about 8 inches then catch them all with a net, out them in buckets, and carry them to the new tank. Instead they siphoned the water from the raised tank (on bricks) to the lower buckets. They believed this would put less trauma on the fry. They used a bucket with holes inside of another bucket. The inner bucket had a net to keep the fry inside, so the water would overflow but the fry would stay inside.
Because I cannot get the internet to work in my room I went to a study room in the World Fish Center. As I was on the web a man came in by the name of Mustafa. He was a translator and English teacher. We talk about everything from Iraq to Islam. He gave me a very interesting and through explanation of mosque procedure and customs.
Mustafa told me that the procedure for praying is as follows.
A caller climbs the tower of the mosque and uses a speaker system to call all Muslims to prayer. This occurs five times a day before dawn, noon, around 2:30, at sunset, and late at night. Before the Muslims enter the mosque they must be very clean.
Mustafa stressed that before you go into the presence of god (pray) you must be as clean and pure as you can. This is because god is perfectly clean and beautiful so people in his presence you must also be clean. The procedure for cleaning your body includes washing yours hands three times and cleaning under your finger nails. Then you wash from your hands up to your elbows three times. Cleaning your face, inside the ear, and behind the ear three times each is the next step. Splashing water on your hair is next. Shoes are not worn in the mosque at any time and feet must also be washed three times. After the legs are washed three times, perfume should be applied. Males who enter the mosque must wash their genitals with clean water. Women who are menstruating can not enter a mosque or take part in any religious activities because they are considered unclean. Once this process in complete you are clean enough to enter the mosque and the presence of god.
Inside the Mosque there is no representation of Allah or any of the prophets. I thought this was amazing that Jesus and Moses are Muslim prophets; this means the Christian representation of Jesus is an affront to Islam. The reason images or representation of God and prophets are forbidden is because artists would never be able to get the picture perfect.
The only thing inside the mosque of importance is the Priest (I cannot remember what they are called in Islam) and a marker pointing the direction Mecca. All prayer is physically directed toward the holy shrine of Mecca. This is the source of the saying “Mt. Everest is the Mecca of mountain climbing. Mecca is the most important, most powerful place in all of Islam. All Muslims are supposed to take a pilgrimage, a hadge (spelling?), to Mecca at one time in their lives’.
The process of actually praying is very important but would take pages to explain, so I will save it for one of my 5 required essays.

Excerpt or conversation (as well as I can remember it)
How do you feel about the U.S. military?
I know some people from the Pentagon through my work as a translator and am friendly towards them. But, how would you feel if strangers came into your home with guns, to your city, and told you what to do? They say they are here to protect us, but from what?

How do Muslims feel about Atheists?
Allah tells us through the prophet Mohammed, Allah’s peace be upon him, that we should not deal with atheists and ask them not to interact with us.

Would Muslims get along better with Christians or Atheists?
Christians

What does Salam mean?
It is what you say when you see somebody, it tells them you are a friend and you come in peace. It is a religious term, saying Salam is like saying “friend, may the peace of Allah be upon you.

“Terrorists are killers, they are not Muslims. You cannot be a Muslim and believe in terror and attacking innocent people. All Muslims hate terrorist; Islam promotes peace, hard work, brotherhood. Tell your family this, tell America this; we are peaceful people. All we want is to praise Allah and live in peace. Goodbye, Salam ” -Mustafa

The Tour de Fish

2008-05-28T03:08:00.000-07:00

Day 6 May 27 – 11.45 PM – The Tour de Fish

Today I got the grand tour of the Central Lab for Aquaculture Research. I sat around in Dr. Said’s office for about an hour before we did anything. His office is like a PH.D. party room; tea, coffee, and conversation. He then set me up with someone to give me an in-depth tour of the C.L.A.R. hatchery and ponds.
The indoor hatchery is in four parts, each in their own room. First there is the large hatchery. It has all the equipment for hatching eggs, artificial spawning, and fry tanks. The second room has a fresh water tank (couldn’t understand the reason), and a few other tanks for fingerlings. The third room has seven or eight small fish tanks which each contain two coy. The last room is a hallway in which the workers live, they have a mattress on the floor and a mosquito net.
Then I took a tour of the about thirty ponds which contain Tilapia, Catfish, and Cod(I think it was cod). The pods contained very dirty water; the water is sand and stone filtered from a Nile canal. Many of the ponds were divided into sections by nets; some of the fish nets were actually used mosquito nets.
I was then invited to tag along with an Arab tour group of about 8 women as they toured the farm. I went with them to see a few of the actual laboratories. We got a quick tour of the algae lab and the fish disease lab.
Back home I realized I can’t cook. I’m used to precooked everything. Like sausage, normally you just stick those bad boys in a pan and put it medium. It is much easier when you can read the words on the stove and the instructions on the box. Long story short, I ruined some sausage. :(

As I am writing this I realize my feet are covered with insect bites
The mosquitoes have been very unobtrusive, they leave me alone
Lots of bees and wasps on the outside walls of my house
The dirty Nile water and all around dirty conditions of the farm have caused many more instances of disease compared to Desert Tilapia – Hyder Arizona.

Who’s Right When Everybodys Wrong?

2008-05-28T02:40:00.001-07:00

Day 5 May 26 – 8.34 PM – Who’s Right When Everybodys Wrong?

So I know this is long but I'm doing this for a summer school grade.

This morning before I went to sleep at around 1AM I had a long, interesting conversation with Mrs. ElGhobashy. We discussed youths in Egypt, Islam, and Israel. Later, I left the ElGhobashy home and drove along the edge of the eastern desert and into the Nile delta to get to The World Fish Centre.
The discussion I had with Mrs. ElGhashy began when I asked her about the call to prayer being played over the loudspeaker outside. She was telling me how she doesn’t have to worry about her kids who were still out at 1AM because Egypt is so safe. She was saying that she knows that they won’t do anything bad because they are such devout Muslims. She told me how proud of her daughter she was because she never had to tell her (or ask her) to wear the scarf covering her hair and neck. The daughter even wore it in the U.S. when society did not require it.
I asked Mrs. ElGhobashy about many of the problems American youths face and discovered they practically don’t exist there. Being a Muslim nation Egypt does not have much alcohol so youth drinking and alcoholism are very small problems. Also, when asked about other drugs she could only name weed and heroine. Off the top of my head I can name nine different hard drugs. Mrs. ElGhobashy said she didn’t know anyone who did any of these drugs, even weed. While the overwhelming majority of the people that I know, my age, have does weed or drink regularly.
Mrs. ElGhobashy contributes the lack of these youth issues to their religion, family structure, and the way they live. Their religion forbids followers to drink alcohol, which in a family as devout as the ElGhobashy’s, is the final word. The family structure also greatly influences the children’s desire to follow the strait and narrow. The family is very close; they always know where each other are. A parent always stays up until both of their kids come home, so the kids could not get away with much. The way the family lives also contributes to the kids avoidance of destructive habits. Because all of the family members live in tight quarters the children would have a hard time hiding anything.
The heart of the conversation and the part that I found amazing was the views of an average Egyptian on Israel. Growing up in America I was always taught that Israel is the “good guy.” We hear Israel was attacked with rockets but never the other side of the story. We never hear of the thousands of Palestinians who lived there before the Allies gave away their land. It is foolish to believe that Israel is the perfect country, a nation that bears no part of the blame for the current situation. I am not choosing a side, only showing that we were never given all of the facts. We were never given the information to make a correct, informed decision on who is right and who is wrong.
The information that we take as fact, things we read in our history books comes into question when you get both sides of the story. For example when Mrs. ElGhobashy was explaining the history of Israel to me she mention when Egypt won the Yom Kippur war. She told me that even the Israelis admit, that nobody disputes, that Egypt won the Yom Kippur war. I, on the other hand, have never head anyone say that Israel lost the Yom Kippur war. Well, I do not believe two opposing sides can both win the same war. Each side blames the other for starting the war, but how is anyone to discover the truth when not everyone know the truth? When the Arabs and the Jews each have their own version of history how can they find any common ground? When both sides see the other as the source of the problem, agreeing on concessions would be difficult.
The realization that our version of historical facts are not seen as fact everywhere astounded me. While I know that there are always disagreements with regards to history, who won a war is a pretty major discrepancy. As seen in the lead up to the Iraq war we completely at the mercy of the story our news stations tell us. Those news stations are equally helpless to the information their governments provide them. When a government says "our satellites or out spies discovered these FACTS", we have no way to discover if those claims are false. If the Egyptian Government told the people that the Israeli army invaded their country first, how would an everyday Egyptian know if this was false? How would anyone if the Israeli army only attacked because Israeli ships were barred from passing through the Suez Canal? The truth is that we don’t know whose facts are correct. I have found it interesting to watch Al Jazeera, the dominant Arab news station. By watching the way Al Jazeera casts a negative light on Israel, I was able to see the way our news only shines a positive light on Israel.
After a few hours of sleep I rode with Dr. ElGhobashy to the World Fish Centre. To get there we drove for about an hour in a pickup truck. It took us about 20 minutes to get out the city. Then we drove along a highway for about 30 minutes through the outer edges of the city. This part of the trip was interesting because the highway is the border between the city and the desert. I’m talking about the kind of desert you see in movies, barren, sand dunes, as far as you can see. Then for the remainder of the trip we passed through the Nile delta, it was obvious when we entered the delta because it was much, much more green.
Dr. ElGhobasy then introduced me to the director of The Central Lab for Aquaculture Research Dr. Ahmed Said. The director then set up a quick tour of the hatchery. Mostly I just went around and meet people, I feel bad because I can’t keep anyone's name straight. Too many people with too weird names for me to remember.
They took me to my room and it is freaking awesome. Two bedrooms, AC, fridge, washing machine, shower, and satellite tv!! Only problem is I can’t get the damn WiFi internet to work.
Well everything seems great here, seems like I’m gonna get to do and see everything! Only problem I can see is they are acting like I am some important guest, which means I get the best people showing me around. But I feel bad because they focus on me so much they don’t really get to do their own work.

Random Stuff

Arabs believe that US news is run by Jews, that is why public opinion and news leans toward Israeli versions of news.

Meet King Ramesses

2008-05-24T14:51:00.000-07:00

Day 4 May 25 – 11.24 PM – Meet King Ramesses

Today I went to the Egyptian National Museum, After convincing the ticket man I was a student (to get half off ticket price) I bought my 5$ ticket. I took the subway to get there, easy just like other subways in London, Paris, or D.C. The Museum was relatively small, two stories, maybe 600 meters by 300 meters, but stuff was stacked to the ceiling. Most of the stuff was not very interesting because I don’t know much Egyptian history but there were two sections that would amaze anyone.

Here is me outside of the Egyptian Museum. Unfortunately, no pictures are allowed inside the building.

.....But rules like that have never stopped me before. If you turn off the flash taking a picture doesn't hurt anything.

First, the mummy section. You had to buy a special ticket costing 10$ but it was worth it. It is this small room, the only air conditioned room in the whole museum. But this one room had, I think, twelve mummified kings or

wives. The pictures, which I had to take “covertly,” speak for themselves. I mean how often do you see 3000 year old dlead kings?!? This is the most famous and powerful Egyptian King. THIS USED TO BE THE KING OF EGYPT, thats crazy! This was the king in the Book of Exodus, Moses lead the Jews from Egypt during his reign, some historians believe. Still has hair and everything!

The next stop was King Tut’s section. If my memory, and the History Channel, serve me right King Tut was a child king who died young. He was a very boring king who did not have the most impressive tomb compared to other kings. His tomb is special because it was not raided by tomb robbers because a more important King built his tomb on top of King Tut’s.

The King Tut section was amazing, gold, glass, and precious stones everywhere. Tut was buried in three coffins, each one fit in the one before it like those wood dolls. The other most coffin was made of thick, carved wood; it was about 12 long by 8 feet wide by 10 feet tall. The middle coffin was made of glass and semi precious stones held in place by gold. The innermost coffin was solid gold, surly weighing hundreds of pounds. After I left the Museum I went and wandered along the side of the Nile.

It was clear that unlike the Louvre the staff are normal police. At the Lovure the people working there seemed to really care about and know about the things they were protecting. The police at the Museum were much less enthusiastic, they were more interested in if you bought a ticket, not if you were leaning on or touching ancient objects.

Random Discoveries

Many police have AK rifles, many of them are empty

Almost no Egyptians own guns

Subways have separate mens and womens cars

Subway ticket costs 25 cents

May have to start taking that Imodium…

Atlas Shrugged is way too long

No traffic police, I have seen no police cars.

The kings were really short, like 5 foot nothin.

It’s Tougher in Egypt

2008-05-23T22:56:00.000-07:00

Day 1 May 24 – 12.10 AM – It’s Tougher in Egypt

Have not showered for three days

Normal waking hours here are 9am to 2am, with noon nap

Friday is holy day for Muslims

Got cell phone

I was talking to Mrs. ElGhobashy about differences between to the U.S. and Egypt and the main difference that she thought of was that life was easier in America. I didn’t really understand what she meant until later that day when I went got an example. I went shopping with Mr. Hussein ElGhobashy for “pattia” and a few other things. While most of the other things were pretty easy to find the “pattia” was a problem, even though is it a very common food item. From what I could figure out “pattia” is just raw bread that does not rise, like flat bread. You fold this “pattia” over ground beef and fry it. We walked all around the neighborhood asking at every food vendor if they had “pattia,” we had to ask about eight or nine different shops before we found some. Each store is about 5 foot by 11 foot open air, hole in the wall. I thought this was interesting because I’m so used to going to a huge supermarket and buying any food item I can think of. You never go to Safeway and ask for bacon, bread, or tomato soup and have them say “No, didn’t get any this week” or “no we’ve been sold out for a week.” Mrs. ElGhobashy fell and broke her hip two months ago and now has to go up five flights of stairs to get home. There is no corner drug store, no wheelchair ramps, no crosswalks, no supermarkets; I have to agree with Mrs. ElGhobashy, it’s tougher in Cairo.

Pictures!

2008-05-23T03:59:00.000-07:00

This is a picture from the front balcony of their 5th floor house. The men had all just finished praying under that tree, there is not enough room in the mosque. As everyone was dispersing a watermelon cart rolled up.

About half of the Egyptian men wear the one piece dress looking things and half wear button down shirts with khaki pants.

Click on the pictures to make them full screen, you can see everything much better that way.

Day 2 May 23 – 12:25 AM – Dull? No.

2008-05-22T23:00:00.000-07:00

( I am technically writing about yesterday,it is past midnight, but this is the best time for me to write)

Well today started out dull, I woke up a few hours before everyone else and just sat around in my room reading and sweating. Nobody else in the house in using AC and I don’t want to be only one. I may start using Chris’s patented trick of putting a wet towel over yourself when you sleep.
At around noon Dr. Hussein, wife, son, and I all drove downtown. I promise this will be my last rant about the drivers here. They are all crazy; I’m amazed there are not more car crashes. Every aspect of their driving is ridiculous, the speed, the prking, the order, seriously everything. I will try and take pictures.. A few errands later and we were back home.
I went to sleep at around 7 thinking that the action was done, not so. Around 9:30 the brother and sister knock on my door asking if I want to go the mall. I assumed they were talking about tomorrow, also not so. Well around 10 the three of us get into the car and drive to the mall. The minute I got out of the house I realized Cairo in nocturnal, the place comes alive at night. People were working, walking, and eating at 10 because the temperature was so comfortable at that time. The six story mall was beautiful, lots of restaurants, movie theaters, and classy shops. I ate at KFC, next to Pizza Hut, at least it’s not just Americans were making fat with fast food. I have no idea what I am doing tomorrow.

Oh, and I asked what Dr. Hussein thought about the Iraq War. He was opposed to it, but he argued that all wars are bad and talked about the cost in lives and health, not about American Imperialism, Oil, Bush, or the motive of this specific war.

First Impressions

2008-05-22T22:45:00.000-07:00

Day 1, May 22 – 12:20 AM First Impressions

So, a little cliché, but I just had to watch Aladdin on the flight over on the little T.V. things. The flights over went extremely well, everything went moved like clockwork. I left Tucson at 1PM on Tuesday, with Sean, to drive to Sky Harbor Phoenix. At 3:30 Sean dropped me off at the gate, I had my ticket by 4PM, then I sat around until my flight at 8:15. Yea, I know, I was really early but missing my flight would really suck. I talked the ticket lady into giving me an exit row seat for the 10 hour leg from Phoenix to London, lots of leg room and I sat next to a pretty U of A girl, does it get any better than that? A three hour layover in London and a four hour flight later, I was in Cairo, Egypt! I quickly meet the Dr. Hussein and his son who drove me to their house.
So, I have talked to a few people who have recently been to Egypt and I have consistently heard then talk about being “Baksheesh”ed. No, it is not a verb but I don’t care. It is pronounced Bach (like the composer) sheesh (like “She” and “shh” put together. Baksheesh is an Arabic word, with religious meaning, which is part Alms for the poor and a Tip. It is like in Mexico when someone jumps on your hood and starts washing your windows for you without you asking. But this is much for widespread and socially accepted. Being the pasty color that I currently am, I am a Baksheesh magnet. I was about to lift my suitcase into the trunk of the car when some random guy sneaks in and does it for me. Now I’m all for asking little old ladies if you can help carry their bags but I am 19 years old and in very good shape, I can lift my own damn bag. Well the man then follows me around the car and says “Baksheesh, Tip.” In a tone that clearly says you owe me. I have a feeling this will be an issue between me and the Egyptian public. I have no intention of tipping every person who picks up my grocery bags or opens a door for me over the next two months. I guess the part that bothers me is how it is not like the US when begging is asking for money you know you didn’t earn. Baksheesh bothers me because the person is not obviously poor, and acts like I am in debt to him for the “work” he did. I have a problem when people demand tipping for things I would do for them without ever thinking about asking for payment.
The driving… If someone did some of the stuff I saw last night to me in Tucson, you would probably see me in the news under the headline “ROADRAGE.” Driving in Cairo could best be equated to a giant go-kart ring. There are no rules, no lights, no lines, and no police. We speed down dark, narrow roads with kids playing, dogs wandering, and people walking and never slowed down. As long as you don’t hit anything I guess it is OK,. On every road there are cars parked EVERYWHERE, there are also cars parked behind those cars blocking their exit. We drove for twenty minutes at 1AM, I shudder to imagine rush hour.
The home I’m staying in is small but nice; It is on the fourth or fifth floor of a building, it is right between two other tall building so I really can’t see anything. I think I stole the sons room. I’m getting ahead of myself, Dr. Hussein also introduced me to his wife (also a Dr.) and his daughter. I didn’t get a good look at the house because I arrived so late.
Mrs. Hussein treated me to dinner when I arrived, I was bread with chopped hot dogs and peppers in sauce. (It was much better than it sounds) The first cultural difference I noticed was how the wife and daughter waited on me hand and foot. The actual description would be pretty boring but take my word for it. I said in thanks, “oh you spoil me” and she looked surprised and said “your mother doesn’t do this for you?”
Well this is my first blog entry and I know it was pretty long. Most of my future posts will be shorter with pictures. I don’t know when I will be able to post this, internet could be a problem. I will write one post a day then upload them to site when possible. Any writing style help/suggestion would be appreciated, spelling and grammatical correction will not. Uncle Chris any suggestion you have would be greatly valued.

Fish farm Resume

2008-04-25T14:36:00.000-07:00

Patrick M. Fitzsimmons 8200 East Camino Herradura

Patrick5@email.arizona.edu Tucson AZ, 85750

(520) 603-3310

________________________________________

Objective

To receive approval for two summer semester of four credit independent study to expand my knowledge of environmental science, and more specifically, freshwater agriculture. I propose to work on an Egyptian Tilapia farm for nine weeks during the summer of 2008.

Education

Sabino High School Graduate 2007
University of Arizona, Tucson, Arizona

Freshmen
College Cumulative Grade Point Average: 3.769
Reserve Officer Training Corps – Army
Focus on Environmental Science

Relevant Classes Currently Enrolled In

PTYS195A001 Planetary Sciences
UNVR195A004 Careers In Environmental Science
ECOL183 002 Marine Biology
NATS101 027 Introduction to Environmental Science

Relevant Experiences

Background in Marine Biology and Fisheries Science
Have visited many fish farms around the world
Worked at Desert Springs Tilapia, Hyder, Arizona

Skills

Fish Farming Skills

Clean and prepare fish
Can correctly sex fish
Properly feed thousands of fish based on population and size
Separate fish by size and age
Retrieve eggs and babies from brood stock
Proficient with cast net
Skilled with seine Net
Can drive tractor
Proficient using digital balance
Understand importance of aeration and circulation

Computer Skills

Very fast computer learner
Expert in – Windows 98 and Xp, Word, PowerPoint, Email, and Data Backup
Proficient in – Windows Vista, Excel, MAC Operating Systems

8200 East Camino Herradura

Tucson, Arizona 85750

__________________________________________________________

Wednesday April 21^th, 2008

Dr. Katrina Mangin
Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology
University of Arizona
Tucson, AZ 85721

Dear Professor Mangin:

My name is Patrick Fitzsimmons and I am a Freshman here at the University of Arizona. I am writing to ask you to be my mentor for an independent study I would like to undertake this summer. I wish to apply the knowledge and skills I have learned here at the U of A to better myself and the world around me. This independent study would also greatly further my education by granting me the real world experience and understanding of how many of the theories and technologies I have learned about are implemented. This experience would challenge and improve my understanding of freshwater agricultural techniques which is my goal.

I propose to work on an Egyptian Tilapia farm for nine weeks over the summer of 2008. I have already received enthusiastic approval from Hussein Elghobashy and Dr. Ahmed Said, two of the men I will work with. At the farm I hope to learn not only how the fish farm works, but also the environmentally sustainable practices the farm employs. I also wish to expand my list of aquaculture skills by learning from the experienced fish farmers and environmental scientists.

I would like to receive approval for two summer semesters of four credits of independent study. Of course I will not be accepting payment for my time and work on the farm. I will compose essays explaining what I learned, the technologies used, and the theories I saw implemented. Another important part of the independent study will be to list the things that I did not understand and conduct research upon my return to better understand those aspects of fish farming in an arid climate.

While in Egypt I will represent the University of Arizona and the United States as best I can. Through hard work and my thoughtful commitment to excellence I will do justice to those who have gotten me to this point. Thank you for you time Professor Mangin, I hope to be able to work with you in the future.

Sincerely,

Patrick Fitzsimmons

Where the Farm Is

2008-04-25T13:41:00.000-07:00

So the farm I will be working at is about 40 miles north east of Cairo. Here is a map of Egypt you can see the Suez Canal, The Red Sea, The Mediterranean, and the Sinai. As you can see the farm is located at the edge of the Nile river delta. This means the water the farm uses comes directly from the Nile. Because of this fact I am probably gonna get pretty sick, oh well.

Here is a picture of the actual farm. Many of the big shiny things you see are fields being watered, the smaller ones are fish ponds. The weather for the time I am gonna be there is supposed to be mid 90s with 70-80% humidity, fun? I will probably be living in one of those little houses. FYI those long fields are almost 1000ft long.