Goodbye Gouna!

13 December 2008 - 18 December 2008
Mam had barely left or Nina was already here, again... this time it was like a flash visit. Six days in Egypt of which she spent two in Cairo with Ahmed as her own personal guide. One day snorkeling on the boat, one karaoke birthday party, one “let’s get drunk on the beach” afternoon, one sushi dinner at Little Buddha’s and one brunch at Seventh Star later, and she was gone again... But we crammed as much fun as we could in the time that she spent here and we had some good girlie talks. These are the friendships I live for.

Pictures
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=79954&l=d604f&id=523210814

20 December 2008 - 3 January 2009
Nina had barely left or Siobhan was already here, again. Another of those easy low maintenance friends, who blends into the Gouna community as if she lives here, has a tab at the Clubhouse like any other resident and goes grocery shopping and cooks for you AND your other friends you while you out are having fun... eehm, working on the boat. Isn’t that wonderful? Again, lots of good girlie talks, lots of bubbles, campari oranges, gin & tonics and evenings with great food (Mama, the mutton soup was fantastic! The meat simmered for 48 hours and Ivan loved it - when an Italian loves your food, you can be proud!). Of course, lady SKO came diving as well, but the water and weather temperature now are not half as nice as when she was here in October, so after a few days there was a lot of coughing, a blocked nose and no possibility to equalise... As we were going down to the wreck of the Rosalie Moller, I had to wave goodbye to a very sad Siobhan at the surface who couldn’t get deeper than 2 meters without busting her ears and therefore had to abort the dive. The good part of the story is that now she will have to come back to dive on the Rosalie and so her next visit is planned for Easter... Jippie!

Christmas
What a fantastic evening. Days is advance, a whole bunch of us were involved in helping Hoda preparing the Clubhouse for Christmas. We helped decorating the restaurant, chopped 187 onions, cut 290 potatoes and peeled 315 cloves of garlic in the kitchen while other people cooked up special recipes at home. The result was a buffet serving more than 100 Gouna residents, with food from all over the world, including a whole roasted lamb, 4 stuffed turkeys, a huge and beautiful lasagna and the most amaaaaaaaaazing desserts - several of which made by Darja, Ivan and Siobhan :-) The atmosphere was great, relaxed, fun, with people from all nationalities and backgrounds yet with one thing in common: Gouna in their blood. It was a perfect way to spend Christmas: a handful of best friends around, lots of other good company, great food, lots of booze, a nice band playing jazzy songs and many compliments about my dress as some people had only every seen me with messed up hair, wrinkled t-shirts and flip-flops.

New Year’s eve
What a fantastic evening. A totally casual gathering, for those of us who didn’t feel like going to a massive party for too much money. Picture this: a wood fire in the middle of the terrace by the Clubhouse pool. And there we sat all evening, talking, drinking, laughing, warming ourselves, getting smoked... At midnight (or round about that time, who cares about a minutes more or less), we symbolically dove into the New Year - in this case the heated pool of the Clubhouse, shook hands and kissed each other for Happy New Year and then went on with the talking, drinking, laughing, warming ourselves, getting smoked... Totally unpretentious and a perfect setting. And as I sipped my so-manieth campari orange, I glided into 2009 with a warm, smokey, fuzzy and smiley feeling of happiness.

Pictures
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=79955&l=008bf&id=523210814

I'll miss Gouna and it's people! Even though is was really getting too cold to dive comfortably and the low season is kicking in, we were having a lot of fun at work the last few days...

Pictures
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=80177&l=aedf1&id=523210814

6 January 2009 - Departure day
Yesterday evening we had a little gathering at the Clubhouse (not any different from any other evening really) so I could say goodbye to some of my friends in Gouna.

Pictures
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=78293&l=38025&id=523210814

Now it’s 8 am and I have 14 hours to pack my stuff, store my scarce belongings somewhere, run my last errands, pay my Clubhouse bill and have dinner with Darja, Ivan and his parents before I jump on the bus to Cairo. From there, it’s on to Bangkok, after hopefully a quick visit to Gijs’ newborn baby. From Bangkok I fly to Phuket and then a taxi to Khao Lak, the Similans and Stefano. And then on to rest of the world... Planned return in El Gouna: in 3 months time.

Maybe I should get out of bed and start packing...

7 January 2009 - The real departure day
I am now in Cairo, at Christine’s mom’s house, where Gijs & Christine are staying since their little baby son was born 2 days ago. Rahim is as cute as a baby can be and it’s heart warming and funny at the same time to see the two proud parents rummaging about, changing nappies, feeding the baby, not getting any sleep... Gijs picked me up from the bus station at 6 am (he wasn’t asleep anyway) and in a few hours he’ll bring me to the airport to put me on the plane to Bangkok. I love it how logistically things work out so easily here in Egypt. Up until two days ago, I was still undecided about how I was going to get to Cairo and here I am, all things sorted, baby visit complimentary in the schedule.

Pictures:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=80211&l=fbaa6&id=523210814

Also amazing how in one day, I managed to pack up my entire household. Well, I am sort of becoming an expert at this, doing it for the 3rd time in just over a year... And the content of my house is less and less each time, as I leave stuff behind everywhere.

Once I managed to get out of bed yesterday, I started sorting my things: stack 1 stays in Gouna, stack 2 travels with me, stack 3 moves from my fridge to Darja’s, stack 4 is the remaining booze and goes to Ahmed, etc...etc...etc... In the meantime I did some laundry since I had about 16 bed sheets to wash as my house was like a hotel these last few weeks, for both friends from abroad as well as colleagues who needed a place to crash in El Gouna after one of the many Clubhouse evenings. And I ran my last errands, paid my bill at the Clubhouse (wow, I drank a lot of campari oranges...) and picked up my gear at the dive centre. I said goodbye to the people I met along the way, sometimes twice or thrice, since Gouna is small and you run into the same people everywhere. Dinner at Vanda & Lino’s was fantastic, it goes without saying. Honestly, anyone who likes food as I do, should find an Italian boy/girlfriend because they come with a whole family-in-law of great cooks. OK, Asian families too, but I already have that on my side of the genealogy tree.

At midnight it’s time for final goodbyes, I leave for Cairo by bus with a lot of hugs and kisses for Stefano from his family, as well as 1 kilo of parmesan and 4 kilo’s of drop and I wonder if I’ll have luggage overweight, again...

Mafish moshkela, nothing is going to spoil my mood the next few months!

2009 baci a tutti,

xYx