Night Life

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.