Once you drink from the Nile...

...you always come back. So the saying goes. More like you'll never leave, because you won't be able to be more than 15 feet from the bathroom for any given length of time.

I was told by co-workers that the tap water is fine to drink, its overly chlorinated, just use the Brita, yadda yadda yadda...other co-workers told me to stick to bottled, but I dismissed their overly sanitized American paranoia, and rallied the ol' iron stomach for a huge glass of it on Wednesday morning.

By Wednesday night I was miserable in every sense of the word.

I had to skip work on Thursday because I wasn't sure I would make it through the taxi ride (I have to take a taxi to work every day - more on that later..). But I thought "This is good! I'm building resistance to the local flora! I'm just gonna stick this out and will surely feel better tomorrow, and then I'll be able to eat anything I want."

On Friday morning I cried uncle and begged my incredibly nice neighbor and co-worker to run to the pharmacy for some Cipro and Gatorade. (For the public health folks worried about AB resistance - I wasn't using the antibiotics without due cause - I did have a high fever).

I spent the rest of the day in and out of sleep, the bathroom, and chugging BOTTLED water.  This morning I'm feeling a bit better - I have some more energy, and my appetite is slowly returning, so I'm going to venture to the grocery store, catch up on emails, and maybe take a co-worker up on her offer of homemade dinner with she and her boyfriend.

Then again, maybe I'll stop by the bathroom first...