Carpets for Sale in the Alleys

I arrived at the language center where I teach English early today, so I decided to use the rare bit of free time that I had to sit down and type up a post about my trip to Syria and Lebanon. Just as I was about to start, however, I heard shouts echoing through the alley outside the building. I stepped outside of the classroom and onto the balcony, and looked down into the street to see a group of four men strolling through the alley with giant carpets balanced on their shoulders. They were repeating a chant which I at first couldn't understand, but I soon realized that it was their way of getting the residents of the alley to come out to their balconies and take a look at the carpets. I don't have a precise translation of the chant, but it was something along the lines of "Carpets for sale! High quality! Cheaper than you'll find in stores!"

The sellers' strategy soon became clear as I noticed how densely populated the alley was. There were high rise apartment buildings on both sides up and down the street, each building generally consisting of six or seven floors with two apartments on each floor. Assuming that at least one or two people would be home in each apartment (the time being 5:30 or so in the afternoon), the sellers figured that they would have at least several dozen prospective buyers who would at least take a look at the carpets. When the sellers reached the middle of the alley, they stopped, unloaded the carpets off their back, and continued their calls to the residents of the alley to come out to their balconies and take a look.

As people slowly began to emerge on their balconies, the sellers then unfurled their carpets in the middle of the street! They then proceeded to try to convince a few of the residents that seemed genuinely interested, but unfortunately today was not their lucky day. From an aesthetic perspective, however, I loved the contrast between the colorful carpets and the street and the general oddity of seeing a carpet unfurled on the street (although, in fact, there are carpets rolled out on the street every Friday for the spillover from Friday prayers). Yet another unique image of Alexandria. Furthermore, when I peeled my eyes away from the sellers themselves, I stepped back to take in the sweeping views from the street to the sky: starting with the colors of the carpets, up to the colorful clothing and other laundry hanging from each floor of the high rises, and finally to the slim sliver of sky that was just visible above the buildings. A lot of times I feel like Egypt lacks color, which seems to be primarily a consequence of not washing buildings that are covered in a thick layer of dust, but the laundry hanging throughout every alley in the city, and especially this alley in particular, provides evidence to the contrary.

After rolling up their carpets once again and loading them up on their shoulders, the sellers continued their walk down the street. Certainly not an easy job, but I imagine that it has to be somewhat lucrative because at least a few of the hundreds of the alley residents that come out to view the carpets each day might decide to make a quick and easy buy.

Riding the Train to Class

After spending a wonderful week and a half in Lebanon and Syria (a post about the trip is in the works), I returned to Egypt last Saturday. As usual, we wasted no time yesterday getting right back into the swing of the things at Alexandria University. In addition to my classes, however, I also taught my first English class. A friend of mine on the program had spent a month teaching English classes at a private study program in Alexandria, and he handed the reins over to me for my last month in the city. This is my first experience teaching English as a second language, and because the students are still at a pretty basic level I'm speaking Arabic just as much as English with them. Of course I am trying to get them to speak in English as much as possible, and I feel like a broken record after repeating to them over and over that I would rather hear them make mistakes in English than speak correctly in Arabic. After talking about some general goals for the class, we worked on using the phrase "at the same time" to describe two different actions in the same sentence. I am going to be teaching for two hours each Sunday and Tuesday for the next 4 weeks, and I am looking forward not only to my first chance to teach English as a foreign language but also to the chance to improve my Arabic because of all the explanations I have to give them about English grammar or the meanings of English words.

The one drawback about the program is that the language center is located far away from the dorms, so I have to take a thirty minute train ride there and back. The train is a true Egyptian train - it works, but it certainly is a little bit rough around the edges as evidenced by the doors that do not close and the cacophony of screeches as it hurtles (or sometimes crawls) down the the tracks. On the train, there is a mix of all types of people from every different level of society: businessmen riding home in their three piece suits, mothers weighed down with huge bags of groceries, children playing around in the aisles, and beggars, too. The train also presents a significant business opportunity to a number of vendors hawking little candies or gizmos and gadgets throughout the ride. I was inspired to write this post because of the odd, but also effective, method that the vendors use to sell their goods. Most of them will walk down the aisle calling out what they have to sell and at what price, and in addition to that they will actually intentionally drop their ware into your lap and walk right past you. The first time I had this happen to me I was obviously quite confused - I didn't ask for the chew candy that the vendor had just dropped into my lap, but at the same time he just kept on walking down the aisle without even making eye contact with me. Watching the vendor continue to hand out his candy to the rest of the people on the train, I soon realized that his plan was to walk up and down the train car handing out candy to everyone, and then retrace his steps collecting the candy back from those who didn't want it or collecting money from those who did. The astuteness of this strategy became clear when I saw a number of kids imploring their parents to buy the candy that they were now holding in their hands. So as the vendor came ambling back down the car to collect his candy once again, he managed to make about five sales to parents with young children or adults enticed by the candy that they had been holding in their hand and staring at for the past few minutes.

Being a train vendor is by no means a ticket to earning a comfortable living, but I love the unique style that the vendors employ as they hawk their goods. It's much harder to say no to a piece of candy or give it back after holding it in your hand for a few minutes and imagining the sweet taste and the enjoyment you will get out of eating it.