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Re: [RC] [RC] Farm Names - Maryanne GabbaniIn Egypt a "farm" is anything over an acre that doesn't have an apartment building right next door...though some of the mansions out here dwarf apartment buildings. I have about 2.5 acres and I called it after a company that my late husband had owned, Al Sorat. The name comes from a sura in the Quran, a part that is very reminiscent of the Lord's Prayer. Al Sorat means "the path", referring to the path of righteousness. The sura asks Allah to lead us on the path of righteousness. So I called it Recoub Al Sorat which means "riding the path of righteousness". I had to check with some of my more literate Arabic speaking friends to be sure that I wouldn't be offending any sensibilities and was assured that it was an excellent name.The name has a few semi-planned bonuses along with the one planned one: I had bought the domain name years ago for Diaa, so it was already mine. One bonus is that it's easy for my non-Arabic speaking friends to remember because I own 11 rat terriers and used to have a kennel called Ratbusters. When you type the domain name alsorat, it is seen by most of them to be also rat...just more rats. The other semi-planned bonus was a bit of a dig at the bankers who made my life almost unlivable for about 6 years after my husband died. His company Al Sorat was the key company to all the problems they incurred after his death, so while that company may be gone, the name isn't. Banks in Egypt are stupid...or at least they were...when he was arranging loans for a factory, they gave the loans not directly to the company for the factory but to a trading company, Al Sorat, so when he died and the factory was 95% completed but not running yet, they had one hell of a time sorting out the financial responsibilities. The trading company that held the loans had just lost its main asset....my husband. When they told me, I had to laugh at them and point out that they were the ones with the problem...250 million USD in loans to a company with no material assets. Amazing. I told them to take the companies involved to pay the debts (which they did) but please leave my kids and me in peace...which eventually will be the case. So I'm happy to keep the name alive. But the place is usually just called Maryanne's Funny Farm. Maryanne Stroud Gabbani msgabbani@xxxxxxxxx Egypt Face to Face www.alsorat.com Weblogs: Living In Egypt miloflamingo.blogspot.com Cairo/Giza Daily Photo cairogizadailyphoto.blogspot.com Turn Right At The Sarcophagus haramlik.blogspot.com Photos of Egypt: http://www.flickr.com/photos/livinginegypt/ On 8/5/07, Jutta <leosch@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
-- Maryanne Stroud Gabbani msgabbani@xxxxxxxxx Egypt Face to Face www.alsorat.com Weblogs: Living In Egypt miloflamingo.blogspot.com Cairo/Giza Daily Photo cairogizadailyphoto.blogspot.com Turn Right At The Sarcophagus haramlik.blogspot.com Photos of Egypt: http://www.flickr.com/photos/livinginegypt/
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