Anniversary of the Revolution
Today Algeria celebrated the anniversary of the Revolution, which began in 1954. Not much was going on today and it's been cold and rainy for several days anyways. However, an international book fair was going on and I decided to check that out with Nazim and Dr. Elizabeth Bishop.
The book fair was pretty big and there were lots of books in Arabic and French primarily. There were a lot of books on Islam, educational materials and some very good books on Algeria. One of the publishers present was Gallimard from France and they had a very good selection of books as did Editeurs Sans Frontieres. I bought a glossary of Arabic words that appear in French, a small photo and information book on the Kabylie people of Algeria and, for work, I bought a book on Phrasal Verbs by Macmillan and some puppets. One of the puppets is a funny looking evil Zippy the Pinhead looking person and is exactly the same as one I bought at the book fair in Aden last year. These puppet dealers are making a killing at the book fairs off of me!
The rain went on all day and having forgotten my umbrella, I got a little wet. Once home, I just relaxed and then went out for dinner later. In the evening I tried Le Saigon, a Vietnamese restaurant near my place. I was expecting to eat some Pho, but I had squid curry and My Sao- a noodle dish with chicken and veggies. After that, I went out to a live music venue the Lonely Planet recommends, Le Racym’s. It’s actually a kind of fancy looking dinner-dance club. Having already eaten, I didn’t try the food, but the place was packed and it looked allright. When I arrived, the DJ was playing Rai music and the small dance floor was packed already. It didn’t take long to make friends with some regulars and they got me to cut a rug. It was fun, and I heard some songs, I hadn’t heard since partying at the “Casa” in Nouakchott, Mauritania.
After a good hour or so of that, the DJ threw on some current international dance club hits. Things like “World Hold ON…” (I think by Bob Sinclair). After that I walked home.
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