CAIRO - When I asked the question “Ahmed, do you want to go on vacation?” Ahmed naturally said “Sure.” I didn't expect any other reply… How could anyone say no to me? I'm simply irresistible! My next question was “Any place in particular?” and he said “Why not the North Coast? We have a chalet there. We can ask Sherif to join us as well.” We did and he joined us. Good for him! So I left Cairo with Ahmed and we took what was the first vacation in a year for each of us. We met Sherif on the road because he was in Alexandria anyway. I am on vacation, so I will not be writing an article this week. Goodbye. Hold on… I've changed my mind. After all, you have driven all the way to the North Coast so it would be very inconsiderate of me to send you away. Come in and have a seat… or maybe a chaise longue and an umbrella. I will tell you this week's story because maybe next week there will be nothing to tell – I might be fired by then! We knew that mid-September is not really the high season because most people are back to Cairo to go to school, university, CityStars, etc… We were sure we might not find many things in the supermarket so we stopped in Cairo to buy whatever we needed and that of course included ice cream and chocolate. Ahmed and I are addicts, but ironically Sherif is not really into them! He's weird. By the time we got there it was late in the evening North Coast time, which is also Cairo time, which is two hours ahead of… where exactly are you now? With the exception of the mosquitoes, we were probably the only living creatures there. Although it was kind of cold, my crazy friends wanted to have a swim at night, but they were too lazy to do it. Indeed, during the three days we spent there we did not even take one dip in the sea. We were soaked in the swimming pool instead. The sea looked amazing, but swimming there is not highly recommended due to the unfriendly current. What else did we do? We sat in the sun, ate, took a couple of photos, bought more chocolate and ice cream and… basically that's it. Why am I telling you this? Because there are so many great songs about the summer and of course I wouldn't go on vacation without them. However, I forgot to take a pair of speakers with me, Ahmed didn't have a lot of music on his laptop and Sherif brought along a couple of CDs with songs I didn't like at all! Didn't I tell you that he's weird? We bought a cable to connect my phone to Ahmed's laptop but then… my battery was dead and I couldn't find the charger! We thought that someone must have broken into the chalet and stole the charger. Out of everything there why would anyone just steal a cell phone charger? We didn't have a clue. We looked for it everywhere and luckily we found it on the following day tangled under the bedspread! I guess it's time to tell you which songs I had to listen to. Of course I could never be by the pool without listening to Wham's ‘Club Tropicana'. I've always liked George Michael's singing, even in the old days when he sang commercial pop. The arrangements were also very rich with great bass lines and catchy brass sections. This particular song is all about the summer and nice vacations and of course I had to sing along to the chorus while drinking my can of tonic. ‘Club Tropicana drinks are free, fun and sunshine there's enough for everyone, all that's missing is the sea but don't worry you can suntan'. Speaking of tan, my shoulders still hurt. Don Corleone was the role played by Marlon Brando in the epic movie The Godfather, but unfortunately his husky voice in that film stopped him from singing. So let's find another ‘Don'. I guess Don Henley will do. He was the drummer of a superb band called the Eagles and it was actually his voice singing the lead vocals on the timeless ‘Hotel California'. As a solo artist he made many songs and my favourite has to be ‘The Boys of Summer'. On that number he didn't only describe the way he felt but also what the girl he loved looked like – “I can see you, your brown skin shining in the sun, you got your hair combed back and your sunglasses on baby.” He also mentioned that the radio was on and that she was wearing Wayfarers, made by Ray-ban. I like that. Let me tell you that in our case the most realistic part of the song was the one that goes “Nobody on the road, nobody on the beach, I feel it in the air the summer's out of reach, empty lake, empty streets, the sun goes down alone.” Except of course he should have said ‘empty pool' instead of ‘empty lake'. Seriously, there was hardly anyone there but us, the mosquitoes, a plumber and an electrician who work there and the cafeteria people. Funnily enough, when my friend and colleague Ihab Shaarawy saw the photos I posted from the North Coast on Facebook and realised I was there he commented “and of course no ‘Upbeat' for this week”. Sorry to disappoint you Ihab. There is no escaping ‘Upbeat'. Count Dracula lives on. After being bitten by all those mosquitoes, I guess I'm an official vampire now. I do believe in evolution because I can still sit in the sun without being fried as vampires usually do. I've just remembered that we forgot some chocolate and left it in the fridge there! Well it was Ahmed who did… why did he keep it there? He must have had bad intentions… I thought friendship is about sharing so it's not nice to hide chocolate from Sherif and me. Well, I don't care about Sherif now… I want the chocolate myself. Maybe I'll go back and get it. Do you want to come along? Send me your swimming pools and chocolate to: [email protected]
