Someone says that there is some kind of curse that follows people abroad and my colleague Paola must be one of them. In the exact moment she left Alexandria the sun has begun to shine again, wind and rain are miles away (waiting for her in Rome, I guess), birds sing, deers couple and the male organizers have walked into the breakfast room wearing their best suites with a children-the-day-of-Christmas-like-smile , suddenly realizing they are living among the most charming, smart and beautiful group of ladies ever and that, since they’re actually stuck here, they can’t escape from relating with them. Although it’s Friday (which is like weekend here) everything is very nice and calm at the Bibliotheca and we are the only people working. Now, this is democracy: since the organizers couldn’t decide whether having a break following the European calendar or the Egyptian one, we ended up not having a break at all. Which was kind of cool, though, since it gave me the chance to observe the few Egyptian at work during the weekend and get some elements to figure out how life works here. First of all, it must be said that Alexandria isn’t the cleanest town ever, it looks more like the International Open-air Gathering of Garbage ( I’m waiting for the mayor of Naples to show up as the special-guest lecturer). For this reasons, it really surprises me that in the perimeter of Bibliotheca, people never stop doing cleanup no matter what. So, if you happen to be at the Bibliotheca Alexandrina on Fridays, you’d better keep in mind that, because of this cleansing fervor, it can happen to you’d be washed away by some smiling guy with a water cannon. I also believe that all this cleaning could help archeological research: I’m afraid that, if they brush a little more, they will end up digging the floor and bringing to light some super cool find, like Alexander the Great’s toilet brush or stuff like that. Anyway, the ladies are starting to get along, the workshop is really interesting and if you pass by, you can see a bunch of people who look, live and speak different but, in the deep, are much more alike than I expected.
