I try my utmost to believe that every day is a good day. It’s a new chance. Yesterday, however, wasn’t a good day. It started off well, but by the evening, it changed drastically.

In the first half of the day, I was doing my routine. I fed the home cats, as well as the stray ones downstairs. I had breakfast on the balcony. I wrote some letters to my pen pals. I watched the first episode of Ramy TV show. By the afternoon, I started preparing lunch to find out that water was cut off. I couldn’t wash the dishes, shower or even clean my private area with water after using the toilet. I had to do it the Western way, using tissues. Yuck!

Later, I went out to buy dry food for the stray cats and dogs. I decided to take the metro, a cheap and fast transport. That time, I was totally wrong about it being fast because something unexpected was going to ruin my plan. Bear with me to know what happened next.

In the metro station, there were some auto-machines for ticket reservation where passengers could buy tickets. Instead of standing in line, I used one of those. And that was when I started cursing the day.

I added the paper in the right place and coins in their place but the paper got rejected. I got it back but I couldn’t get the coins. I explained it to the reservation clerk, who said I should have received a receipt so I could get my coins back. I checked but there was nothing. I decided to try again and added more coins. The same issue persisted.

What made me really furious was that other passengers used the machine after me, but they only put in paper, and it worked out with them. Just then, I decided I wouldn’t book a ticket or leave until I had my coins back.

After having told a station agent about the mess-up, he said he couldn’t do it himself so he called a technician. And I waited for the technician.

I kept waiting for more than an hour, observing passengers coming and going while I was standing at the same spot. That could perfectly make a scene in a movie! I complained about the long wait for the agent who said that the technician was on his way.

If you have visited Egypt before, you could know that expressions like: “on their way, in a few minutes, it won’t take long” are used figuratively.

I could have left, especially since the number of coins wasn’t a big deal but I didn’t want to give up. The blood was already boiling in my veins so I chose to wait on.

Out of pity, the agent approached me and offered me a ticket in exchange for paying the rest of money I haven’t paid. He knew I could wait forever and he saved me the waiting. I thanked him and ran to the pavement to catch the metro.

After reaching the pet supplies shop, I bought 20 kilos of dry food. Taking the metro or public transportation wasn’t a practical idea. In addition, I didn’t have enough cash so I ordered Uber. I’m not a big fan of Uber but in situations like that, I have to use it, especially that Uber is the only transport application in Egypt that offers payment with visa.

I had no idea that I was jumping out of the frying pan into the fire. The waiting period on the app was six minutes but I ended up waiting longer than that. I don’t even remember how long I kept waiting for the driver who never arrived. At that point, I lost track of time. The driver messaged me that he took a wrong path and asked me to cancel the trip.

“Hell no, it’s your fault, not mine. I’m not cancelling it”, I talked to myself. I’m unsure I’d consider myself superstitious but at that moment, I thought I might have upset nature/ God earlier and they were consequently punishing me.

The driver drove further and further from my place until he finally canceled the trip. Then, I decided to shift and order a bike, faster and cheaper. However, there was an issue. I couldn’t take all the food on the bike. I left around eight kilos at the shop and took the rest on the bike between me and the biker.

By the time I arrived home, the water was back. After feeding stray cats and dogs, I had a shower and threw myself on the bed and fell into deep sleep. Finally, yesterday came to an end without throwing more disasters my way.