Egyptians Celebrate Like No One Else

I went to two celebrations this weekend that illustrate the fact that Egyptians have a completely different idea of celebrating than anyone else.

First, my friend Erin's birthday is this coming Tuesday, so we celebrated it this weekend. Now, an Egyptian birthday is a bit different from they way anyone else might celbrate it. We began the same way that anyone else might, with a dinner out. Ours was a little upscale, this one was at the Four Seasons. Fantastic dinner, really expensive. After that we headed over to a club called After 8, which is just a small little night club in Cairo. You have to reserve a table to stay there, but really you can bring as many people as you want. The place is ALWAYS packed. One of the girls came only to the club and brought a cake with her. She sercretly gave it to the waiters there (we've done this before) and they brought it out around 1 in the morning. They also supplied 2 sparklers per person and some sort of firework to set off when the cake arrived. Then they play a Happy Birthday song, which is played everywhere for birthdays here. I'm not sure where it comes from but its about 3 minutes long and its like regular house/techno music. Its fun to dance to :) Lots of fire, lots of music, lots of dancing. Basically, that's Egypt.

I also went to a wedding this weekend. The director of the school's middle son was married to a pretty foreign girl (not sure where from, maybe Scotland..more on that in a minute). Now, Egyptian weddings aren't really weddings persay. There isn't really a ceremony, just a reception. We were told that the wedding started at eight, but we should show up between eight-thirty and nine because it wouldn't begin on time. Nothing on Egypt begins on time...which is very annoying to someone like me who likes to be on time for things. So we arrive there around 8:30, and lo and behold, the reception hall isn't even set up yet!! We were there for about a half hour until it was finished being set up. Then we sat inside, but the events didn't begin for ANOTHER twenty minutes or so. They said they needed to wait for as many people as possible to show up before they began. Then, finally, we all went out into the hallway. We were in the Nile Hilton on the second floor. Half of us stayed at the top of the stairs, and everyone else went to the bottom. There were two camera men as well, one at the top, one at the bottom. The two of them followed them around all night, projecting things on a screen in the reception area. The groom waiting at the bottom of the stairs as the bride slowly descended with her father. A man playing bagpipes accompanied them - which is why I thought she may be Scottish. On the landing in the middle, the groom and his father walked up and waited. There was a brief conversation (I wonder what they talked about!) and then the couple walked down the stairs with the two fathers walking behind them. They walked to a larger area of the ground floor where everyone followed and about a dozen men with tambra drums (hand drums) and a few other instruments played. Then there was a mini dance party where the bridal party danced to the music. There was a procession around the stairs after the dancing and then the bride, groom and the music brigade walked back up the stairs. At the top they continued to play while they waited to get in. Everyone else was let in before the bride and groom, and then they were announced in. After the introduction, there was dancing. And more dancing...and more... Finally, around midnight, they brought food to the tables. There were several traditional Egyptian dishes but I don't know what any of them are called. There wasn't a lot of food on the table though (as it was a family style type of set up), so we weren't sure if we should eat a lot of a little. Maybe an hour after appetizer dishes were put out, they brought out the wedding cakes (I say cakes because instead of one multi-tiered cake, there were several single layer cakes on many different level platters) and showed the bride and groom cutting the cake. Then, they proceeded into a separate unseen room and showed the bride and groom cutting a huge leg of meat as well. There was a HUGE buffet of food and deserts. Also, Egyptians don't drink with their meals - and I'm not referring to alcohol, I'm referring to anything. While there were bottles of water on each table, we only got other drinks inbetween food. One round of juice (which was odd) and one round of soda. There was no alcohol at this wedding whatsoever, which is normal for Egypt.
All in all, it was a interesting night - just very confusing foodwise.