Where I hear to what lengths other parents have gone to entertain their children during school holidays, I sometimes feel a little guilty that I don’t try a little harder myself. Not having a car limits us, but I *could* make arrangements if I really wanted to. So that’s what I did this last week of their school holiday. A friend and I arranged for a van from her husband’s company and we took all of our children ice skating at a mall in another part of Cairo called Nasr City.
It’s not that far to Nasr City but once we got on the road I was immediately reminded why I don’t do such things more often – it took us a little more than an hour to get to the mall with all the (scary) traffic on the roads. The mall itself looked fairly nice – and oddly enough was decorated for Christmas. There was even a large Christmas tree right in the middle of the ice rink (which itself was in the middle of the mall) I didn’t have any time to look around however – the van needed to be back and available for employee transport by 4pm. Once we finally arrived, the children had an hour to skate before we had to jump back in the van and drive the hour back home.
But what a fun hour it was. The children had an absolute blast. They started out hanging on the rail around the rink and by the end were playing ice tag. Our time passed much, much too quickly. In an ideal world, it wouldn’t take so long to get back there. But since it does, I think next time I’ll arrange our transport a bit differently so we have the option to stay a bit longer if we wish. Skate, lunch, skate some more.
Any maybe next time I won’t have twisted my ankle the week before and will be able to join them!
I’ll bet ice skating for the kids WAS a real treat. The differences in the places we all live . . . here in our little podunk town we have the choice of either an indoor or outdoor skating rink for the kiddies. Your kids probably appreciated the experience more!
Happy New Year!
by Mama Pea December 30th, 2009 at 9:55 amI think you’re very brave driving in that traffic! It was dangerous crossing the road in some places. The ice skating sounds like fun though.
by Shelley Munro December 30th, 2009 at 2:04 pmShelley – fortunately the van came with a driver because I’m NOT that brave!! Riding in that traffic is bad enough. Cairo traffic is the only time in my life I’ve ever been car sick
by Jenyfer December 30th, 2009 at 2:19 pmIt sounds like the drive was worth, though! So glad you had a good time!
by anny cook December 30th, 2009 at 5:34 pmAnny – had a great time – only wish we’d had longer!
by Jenyfer January 2nd, 2010 at 6:25 am