Day 234 – Tomorrow, Inshallah

And so, with the arrival of Sunday 13th came hope and excitement and a keen start. We had been delayed, but today was it. By now our journey into Cairo was routine. We knew the guys at the bakery where we bought our first snack of the day, we knew where to find the taxis and how much to pay them, we even had a regular guy that we bought breakfast from at the station. As for the embassy, we’d been there so many times in such a short space of time it was all too familiar. We took a taxi from Opera Station to 26th July Street where we alighted and walked, faster than our taxi, the remaining short distance to the embassy.

As we approached the embassy all was not right. Three trucks were parked alongside the building in and around the trucks stood the pubescent stick wielding navy blue army of teenage boys so familiar to the Egyptian Police Force. Amongst them, stood the white officers with their holstered pistols and their large shiny black sunglasses completing an air of arrogance that hung around each like the cheap aftershave they wore. This was not normal; and we sp desperately craved normal. Outside of our ‘hole in the wall’ a crowd of displeased Egyptians slouched amongst the trees and along the wall, each looking sullen and resigned. Madam Hanna had said our visas would be issued ‘Inshallah,’ God bloody willing. We hung around until one o’clock.

No one could offer us any advice. And eventually a face appeared in the hole in the wall and told us “Tomorrow, Inshallah.”

With yet another day placed in the hands of God we chose to spend the afternoon in one of Cairo’s parks, we bought wine and beer, neither of which we could drink in public, and we indulged in the local bookshop and we settled down in some very nice gardens opposite to the Opera House. There, because her fingers were sore, Laura took her engagement ring off and placed it on the grass.