I knew that bare feet was like mooning someone to an Egyptian.
   *My mom was married to one in the early 1980s for a few years.
   *Ahmad - nice guy. *He did his prayers 5x a day and followed the
   dietary laws as best he could but it wasn't any different than
   someone on a salt-restricted diet or something. *He was a
   regular guy. Anyway, I learned to stop putting my feet up and
   Mom was nice enough to keep no ham in the house. She was lucky
   to get to go to Egypt for a month. *Since his family he came
   from was poor, she got to see the not-tourist side and its
   NOTHING like the images you see on TV or hear about in the news.
   *Of course this was 1984ish. *Things have likely changed over
   the past few years, at least in the major cities. She was like a
   celebrity. *Kids would flock around her and got excited to
   practice their "American "on her (as opposed to English, which
   was British). *She had a tiny bit of discrimination but not
   much. *Once or twice someone let the door close instead of hold
   it open. *One guy tried to rip her off at the marketplace. *But
   everybody else was understanding, even when she walked around
   alone. Learning Arabic was a waste of time though. *All those
   months with tapes. *Why? *The dialect in that part of Egypt was
   COMPLETELY different from the dialect taught on the "Arabic"
   tapes, which was more like the stuff out of Iran and nobody
   could understand her. *It'd be like learning Spain spanish and
   going to Puerto Rico; waste of learning. :)