Karl's curry night collage, Superbowl night in Maroc

Restaurant du Port collage, Cande's last night in Maroc

Dénouement

I truly did not try very hard to Parlay Voo Frawn-Sayz while I was in Maroc, but there is a word I remember from my days doing theater that works perfectly to end this blog:

“Dénouement”, English definition:

The final resolution or clarification of a dramatic or narrative plot.

The events following the climax of a drama or novel in which such a resolution or clarification takes place.

The outcome of a sequence of events; the end result.

[French dénouement, from Old French desnouement, an untying, from desnouer, to undo : des-, de- + nouer, to tie (from Latin nōdāre , from nōdus, knot).]

Read more: http://www.answers.com/topic/denouement#ixzz1EMHFrbk0

So, as we sally forth into “real life” there are always things that get left behind.

Eg: Innocence

Naïveté

Pieces of great aspirations and grand dreams

And the idea that we are immortal

My girlfriend Wendy Sue said,  “Hey, welcome home and thanks for, you know, freeing Egypt!” She’s hilarious.

There is a lot to be said for witnessing history, and retrospect is great for turning a remembrance of abject fear into a prettier emotion, but here is what is real and true:

I cannot pretend any more.

Myth: I thought by wearing a wedding band and having a “faux fiancée” that I would be immune to the perils of being a piece of meat in a Muslim world. Wrong, it’s nothing more complicated than white meat or dark meat on the menu and men get to choose. If they are willing to pay.

Myth: Being truthful and honest with others gets the same respect returned to you. Wrong, reciprocation is to be praised, but not expected.

Truth: Life is precious and you damn well better be enjoying it.

Truth: If it hurts, you’re doin’ it wrong.

I wish only the best to my friends Anthony and Bob with their marriage plans with their beautiful Moroccan women. Hope is eternal.

 

“If it is to be,

It is up to me.”

This is a quote from my BFF, Michelle Gallagher Ricca.

Everyone loves a "Happy Ending"

Monday, Phase 2

8PM- After luxuriating in a wonderfully fragrant bath of citrusy Verbena toiletries, we shared a fabulous gourmet Greek meal with our new BFF and war-time compatriot, Polly on the top floor of the Sofitel of Greek salads, stuffed squid, moussaka and some fabulous mushroom provencale side dish, which we all agreed won. And Ouzo, of course.

Feelings were jubilant and grateful as we recounted how very fortunate we 3 were, literally plucked to be #’s 68, 69 & 70 out of thousands. Then there was the good fortune of going to Athens instead of farther east to Bahrain. We agreed to exchange photos and keep in touch with Polly from opposite coasts and she gets credit for most of these photos on the blog on Egypt. My camera is back in Tampa with Chris, where I will be in a week. Thanks to Walker Travel, I got to fly directly back to Maroc via Gatwick from Athens, so I spent an extra night in the hotel we had already booked for him with Chris that was not planned. And I got a Boots, the Chemist fix at Duty-Free!!!!

Important lessons learned:

1.       The power of 3 way exceeds the power of 2

2.       Never cheap out on your hotel

3.       You CAN open a beer bottle with an eyelash curler

4.       The police are not always there to protect you

5.       Sometimes having a bomb in the trunk is a good thing

6.       There is no such thing as packing too light

7.       And my favorite - If you’re going to be dumb, you gotta be tough (Thank you, Mead!)

The Power of 3

Still Monday, the day of escape

Noonish - The first plane evacuated out was supposed to be filled with diplomats and their families and was going to Bahrain, but they had space for 3 of us wankers on it, we were told at this point. We probably weren’t close enough to the front of the lines to have even made it onto plane#2, but we heard them ask for a family of 3 from the front table that were processing folks in. We yelled to them that we weren’t related, but we were a threesome (which threesome? I ask you!) and they said to come on down!!!

So we were plucked out of the seething masses because obviously, they DID know who we were and sent inside to wait some more, albeit in big, overstuffed leather chairs. With the destination now known, or so we thought, I enlisted the help of Walker Travel and Jim began the search for our onward journey.

4PM - As it turned out, we got on the 2^nd plane out, which was going in the right direction to Athens. (Sorry, Walker Travel!) As soon as we had passed through the security check and entered the terminal, organization had gone straight down the tubes because we were now in the charge of the Egyptians.  On the way to board the Lotus Air charter somewhat worn but precious Airbus 220 which carried 170 of us, we saw that the crowd of people who had showed up expecting to get airlifted out had probably doubled again.

Then, what should open up for the 3M’s but 3 seats in the exit row with extra legroom! No-one was complaining (especially not us) and they fed us very well, which was a good thing because many people had spent the previous night at Cairo airport without food supplies, water or even toilet paper. Apparently, the Japanese embassy had impressed travelers the night before as one of the few countries who actually showed up with the supplies their stranded citizens needed. A cheer went up when we took off “Thank you for choosing Lotus Air” got a good laugh, and more applause when we landed in Athens a few hours later, right after sunset.

7PM - We were greeted by the ambassador to Greece at the bottom of the stairs as we deplaned, shepherded through the paperwork and baggage claim detail and assisted into discounted rooms at the beautiful Sofitel hotel across the street by a very organized team of US embassy folks, one of whom said she felt like they were in a play. They were all excited when our plane (the first!) landed and she wanted to say “OK, places, everyone!”

We were interviewed as we exited baggage claim “for the embassy”, which I’m sure gave Chris the idea of giving an interview to ABC news “film at 11” when he got home to Tampa. Hopefully, it’s still on WTSP's website at:

http://search.wtsp.com/default.aspx?ct=r&q=Egypt

Tanks for the memories

Monday

Cell, but no internet. Curfew moved back to begin at 3PM. So much for our 3:15 flight on Thurs.

Polly arranged to leave before 8AM lifting of previous night’s curfew (smartest move ever) with her favorite driver and guide, Mohammed, to whom she bequeathed her excess bag full of goodies. She was told by the task force that we were allowed 1 checked and 1 carry-on each for the evac.  She had been on a 3-week trip. Was it genetic imperative that they didn’t bother to tell Chris that?

Polly was most worried about the cab ride to the airport, even before we realized that the cab was fueled by a tank of benzene in the trunk.

Besides the obvious, this left little room for suitcases and the cab was full with 5 bodies (Mohammed and the cab driver, plus the 3M’s), so her big, purple American bag had to be tied to the roof. On the bright side, gas stations had been closed for days and we happily scurried past many long lines of cars waiting for fuel that morning. Insallah.

Despite being marked as tourists, we cleverly travelled with headscarf disguises (!) 



At least they were good fun - I think I know what I'll be for Halloween

 The tension created by 8 or 10 military tank and vigilante checkpoints which funneled us down to 1 lane from 3 was offset my Mohammed’s optimistic reasoning and faith that things were getting better. It looked like a war zone most of the way along our 90 minute trip (normally 45) which included going right past Mubarek’s residence. The biggest delay was approaching the airport, although the relief was culpable that we were beyond the major trouble spots. God help us if we had waited for the curfew to lift!

9AM- pulled up to Terminal 4, out of which no commercial flights ran. Maybe 150-200 people were there waiting inside and out of the small terminal.

10:30 - American state dept employees (good little border collies that they are) arrived with bullhorns and began the process of herding us into lines and into categories- diplomatic status, US citizens and non-US nationals, telling us more about the luggage limitations and that we would each have to sign promissory notes to pay back the govt. for these flights the amount of a normal one-way ticket to our destination, which we were told was either going to be Athens, Istanbul or some city in Cypress. No animals allowed. By now there are at least 1000 of us, with more buses arriving at an alarming rate.

Polly had to jettison about 15 pounds of weight from her big American bag, but luckily our little bags could expand and still be less than 44 pounds to handle her overflow. Asian Americans near us were very, VERY popular with their luggage scales. We were standing outside in the sun at this time, still euphoric.

Then we won the lottery.

Polly

“Resilience: the ability of humans to not merely survive trauma and stress, but to bounce back and be happy and productive”

Amazingly, the smog had cleared up. We met Polly when we asked her to take a photo of us, now that you could clearly see the pyramids from the pool deck. I knew she was our kind of people, as she nursed a glass of red wine and stared at her Kindle at 11AM. It turns out that she had just gotten confirmed that her flight back to California on Monday was cancelled and she was spiraling into depression at having to wait until Wed. locked down in the hotel.  Her room shared the same balcony as ours and we formed an alliance, sharing info on the news of the US evac, the rest of our beer and asking her to dinner with us and the Brits that night, although dinner options were dwindling with only 1 restaurant open. She helped us, too by finding out on the 24^th try that the US embassy Egypt task force was saying that the US evac was “not starting today”.

What IS that smell?

Even when the 3 of us were smoking “sheesha” out of beautiful hookahs on the lanai (gotta love the outstanding photo op) and spending time with other interesting folks, the spookiness of hearing and smelling gunfire, taking cover where possible and camping out in the hotel farthest from the windows after calculating possible bullet “tajectories”, I was doing some drain circling of my own. I was going into resignation that we were stuck and I was becoming inactive. Chris, my hero, was instinctively doing just the opposite. His energy was up and he was thinking back on the words the embassy used “not starting today“, so right after midnight on a brand new day, he called the task force and was answered on the first ring by a concerned human. She registered us for the evac and told us to be at the special VIP terminal at Cairo airport that day, Monday the 31st, no later than 11AM to be ready to board military transport to undisclosed, safe European cities. You’d have loved to see the scene of Chris elatedly jumping around. We called and woke up Polly, who was happy to be woken for such great news. She signed up and we pledged to stick together for the ordeal, officially forging our status as the 3 muskateers.