CAIRO: If you were trying to get to Garden City last Tuesday desperately wondering why you were stuck in traffic for hours, wonder no more.
The Embassy of the United States of America in Egypt was holding its Fourth of July reception.
It’s been some years since the Embassy held such a large Independence Day bash. Inside, what looked like quarter of the country’s movers and shakers were busy mingling and trying to look beautiful in the heat. Not that they were doing much moving – the embassy may be the largest U.S. embassy compound in the world, but it still had difficulty accommodating so many people.
Inside, a beaming Adel Imam was congratulating Ambassador Francis Ricciardone inches away from former Prime Minister Kamal Ganzouri, who was carefully trying to avoid knocking into Presidential Advisor Ossama El Baz, who courteously sidestepped Dr. Leila Tekla.
Everybody who was anybody, and a great many other people, were there.
The choral sang the Egyptian National Anthem before launching into the American one, a graceful and surprisingly courteous touch.
After that it was every person for themselves.
The embassy went to great effort to ensure that guests were carefully guided in with as little hassle as possible. Once they were inside, traditional 4th of July fare, like hotdogs, had been put aside in favor of elegant sates and canapés (many of the guests missed the hot dogs). If guests chose to ignore the finger food, they could move past stunning flower arrangements and make for an interesting historical exhibition that had been set up.
The crowd outside was too much fun, though. Although the party was officially set to finish at 9:30 p.m., at 9:15 p.m. people were still arriving and there were throngs inside who didn’t look as if they were going anywhere just yet.
