Pondering

Well I only have about 5 days left here and I figured a new blog entry was in need. So much to say….

Okay, I’ll start with something that happened to me today. I was walking back to the Medina (the dorms) in broad daylight while wearing jeans, a t-shirt, and a long sleeved sweater over my t-shirt. I was minding my own business when all of a sudden a man in his late thirties or forties wearing a jalabiyya approached me and said, “Izayyik, ya kouskous?” Which basically translates to, “How are you doing, you cunt?” Now I’ve actually had worse things yelled at me in the street here before in English, such as sexually explicit acts, but the difference is that this time it was in Arabic. I like to give the men the benefit of the doubt when they say profanities to me in English; I assume that they just don’t know what they’re saying or the level of disrespect it shows me. But this time I was just really infuriated that this middle-aged man, who should have known better, and who would NEVER even whisper a word like that around any of his female relatives (curse words are extremely disrespectful here; Egyptian boys have a totally different way of speaking amongst themselves and would never say some of the things that they say to other boys in private when a girl that they respect is present. In fact, the only reason that I knew what this word meant was because we actually spent one of our Egyptian colloquial classes learning the different curse words and what was appropriate to say to females and not) said it so blatantly to me, probably because he was under the impression that I wouldn’t understand him. I was particularly annoyed because I try so hard to be respectful of the culture here; like I said, I was wearing a long-sleeved sweater and jeans in 90 degree weather in order to be appropriately dressed! Anyway, I totally stopped moving after he said that to me, and debated whether I should say something back. What I really wanted to do was to go off on a feminist rant. But (1) I didn’t have the vocabulary for that and (2) I don’t think it would have done any good. It probably would have just antagonized him. So I didn’t do anything. Which is the part that really sucks. Sometimes I just want to…..I don’t even know what I want to do. MAKE THEM UNDERSTAND. KNOCK THEIR HEADS AGAINST THE WALL. TEACH THEM ABOUT RESPECTING OTHERS. Arrrrrrrrrrrrg.

Another thing that I wanted to mention here was a recent discussion that I had about most Egyptians views on Jews. We’ve talked about it several times in my Political Islam and the Society class, and it came up again the other day when I was watching a movie with one of my Egyptian friends. We were watching “Hassan wa Murkus,” which is a movie about an Egyptian Christian and an Egyptian Muslim who fall in love. The movie ended really optimistically with both the families joining hands and walking together in the midst of a huge protest between the Christians and the Egyptians, so I couldn’t help but feel proud of the Egyptian cinema for at least making a statement about unity. But then I thought back to the movie about Israel I saw here a few months back, so I asked Eman Khader, basically the most Westernized of our Egyptian dormmates, if she thought a movie like that could be made about Jews, and we both promptly responded, “No, not now.” The thing is, most Egyptians don’t separate between Jews and Israelis. They see anyone who is Jewish as a contributor to the Nakba (the catastrophe of 1948 when Palestinians were forced to flee Israel), and the continued killing of the Palestinian women and children that they see shown on the news each day. It doesn’t help that there are no Jews here to show them an alternative on which to judge the religion (there are approximately 6 Jews in all of Alexandria). The education system also just perpetuates these generalizations/ stereotypes. In all the public schools, students are required to take a class in religion, but by religion I mean their particular religion. This means that the minority of Christians are sent off to be in a class by themselves to learn about Christianity, while the Muslims learn about Islam. And no one learns about Judaism (or any other religion for that matter, since the other religions aren’t even acknowledged as true religions). My politics class basically decided that this is an extremely counter-productive system. First of all, by dividing the Muslims and Christians into different classes, it teaches the Christians from a young age that they are a minority and further divides Egyptian society. Secondly, the children never learn about cultures different from their own. Or more importantly, they don’t learn the fact that it’s a mistake to judge an entire society or culture based on what they see in one particular instance, or in a particular group of people. I guess I can just draw this back to my experience this afternoon with the man on the street. He most likely saw me as “the typical foreigner without any morals.” It just drives me nuts that there’s no nuance. People on the street see you, and instantly jump to conclusions about your upbringing, background, morals, etc. There’s just so much “black and white” here.

On a different note, I would also like to mention the fact that many Egyptians criticize Western women for their obsession with beauty and the need to always follow what is “in fashion.” Well, I actually see the same thing here, just in a different way. Just like there’s a societal pressure in the West to wear what’s in fashion, there’s a societal pressure here to wear what is thought to be Islamic clothing (whether or not it’s truly commanded by Islam is up for debate). I am absolutely certain that all of the women who claim to wear the hijab for religious reasons are influenced at least somewhat by the societal pressures and expectation to wear one as well. These women aren’t living in a vacuum. There’s no way of separating them from the societal pressures of veiling.

Wow, this is getting to be somewhat of a rant. I guess it’s time to move onto something more positive… Well, I just spent two days in Marsa Matrouh which is a beach town in Egypt. And let me just say that it was absolutely GOREGOUS. I had actually been there this past summer, but that was during tourist season (April is still considered winter here). First, we went to Aguiba which was this really cool beach with a bunch of caves and tide pools to explore. Then, we relocated to another beach about fifteen minutes away, and we were the only people there! It was amazing. I have never seen water that blue or clear before, or sand that white or clean. I firmly stand by the statement that Marsa Matrouh in non-tourist season is Egypt’s best-kept secret. I have never been to the Caribbean, so I cannot say that it was better than the Caribbean, but I’m pretty sure that it is…

Alright, time to finish my Amiyya video project.

Hit and Run

The problem (or perhaps the advantage) to living in a place like Egypt and constantly being bombarded with new experiences and lessons is that I always have something that I want to blog about, but rarely have the time to do so. Let me try to remember what I wanted to say...

As far as continuation of the last blog entry, Habiba and I talked the next day, and I explained that I had just been extremely frightened for her, and that all of us responded to her in different ways but for the same reason- because we cared. She wasn't mad at me at all. In fact, she kept apologizing. Which also slightly unnerved me because I don't think that a panic attack is something that needs to be apologized for. To me, mental and physical illnesses are pretty much one in the same, and no one should ever feel guilty for suffering from either one. Anyway, at our bi-weekly meeting, the girls met separately and we spent roughly 3 hours discussing the topic. We talked about cultural relativism, and what role the program directors had in intervening in the life of their Egyptian participants (after all, our Egyptian dormmates are inextricably connected to us Americans. If something had happened to Habiba due to my inaction, I would never be able to forgive myself). We talked about emergency action plans, and our different standards of needing medical attention. And we agreed to talk to the Egyptian girls about it separately, although that hasn't happened yet.

Right after the meeting, I headed off to Cairo for my first time this semester. I had already visited the pyramids, the sphinx, etc when I was here over the summer, so the first day that we were there we explored Islamic Cairo: the Citadel, al-Azhar, Ibn Tulun Mosque (we saw a gorgeous view of Cairo from the top of the minaret that we climbed), and Khan al Khalili (huge open air market). I also met up with a friend of a fellow synagogue member who took us on a personal tour of Shar Hashamaim Synagogue and talked to us about what it is like being Jewish in Egypt. She showed us her identification card, and it was the first time that I saw "Jewish" written under the space indicated for religion (every Egyptian must have an identification card, and MUST specify their religion. And by the word "religion" I mean one of the 3 monotheistic religions: Islam, Christianity, or Judaism. Nothing else is accepted, although there are currently political movements working to accept other religions or the word "Other."), which was really interesting.

The next day, in the morning two friends and I decided that we wanted to visit the camel market about half an hour outside of Cairo. We flagged down a cab driver to take us there, and first there was some sort of misunderstanding because we told him we wanted "souq al jamal" which means "camel market" but supposedly he heard "jebel" which means "mountain," so he tried to drop us off on a random mountain (I'm pretty sure that he tried to do this to make the trip longer so that we would pay more).

Anyway, we finally made it to the camel market, and the driver waited for us while we spent about an hour there. First of all, let me say that the camel market is not a place to go for the faint-of-heart or animal lovers. Most of the camels were emaciated, they had one foot tied up like a flamingo so they couldn't run away (which managed to happen anyway), and were continuously beaten by their owners. We also saw several dead camel corpses lying out in the sun on our drive to the market itself. Luckily for me, I had only gotten about 4 hours of sleep the night before, so my emotions were somewhat numb. Watching the people's interactions was very interesting, though. We watched huge crowds of dusty old men gather around and bid over camels (one camel will set you back between $1200 and $2000), spray paint the name of the highest bidder on the side of the camel, and then record the transaction (I didn't see any actual money exchanged. I guess they do that later, or on credit...). While all of this was going on, we saw rogue camels running away from their owners, 4 or 5 camels packed into the back of jeeps to be driven home, boys from practically the age of 4 to grown men beating camels to force them into pens or the back of trucks, etc. We also spent some time talking to some of the camel vendors. Most of them were from Sudan or Cairo, and the camels were sold either to butchers or to work in the tourist industry. They were all extremely friendly (probably surprised that we spoke Arabic), and I didn't feel extremely uncomfortable for being a woman like I had expected I would. Mike befriended several of them, and had one seller convinced that he was going to buy a camel because he was "gawaan owee" (very hungry...).

The most interesting part of the trip, however, and a cultural experience in itself was the journey back to Cairo. It was relatively uneventful until.....we got hit by a horse. Yes, that is correct. First let me explain that in Egypt, while there are lanes painted on the ground, no one uses them. This means that there is also usually nothing separating incoming from ongoing traffic. Cars also sometimes share the road with horse and buggies. And finally, Egyptians are the most impatient people I have ever seen when it comes to driving. They weave in and out (remember, no one abides by the lanes rule) of traffic, cut each other off, stop short, and always get into accidents. I really cannot describe Egyptian "zahama" (traffic) to do it justice...you just have to see it to believe it. Anyway, what happened was we were going in one direction and a jeep going in another direction cut us off. Our taxi driver swerved a little bit to the side of the road where there was a horse and buggy, the horse's rider let go of the reins, and the horse rammed into the side of our car. I was actually asleep at this point, and I just remember waking up to a huge crash, seeing the front window totally black, and thinking that there was some kind of protest going on and that people were hitting the car.

Well, the horse did some major damage to the car, including knocking off the right side mirror, which of course made our driver extremely angry. So he got out of the car to go talk to the horse's rider and demand some sort of payment (I'm absolutely positive that neither of them had insurance, and besides, no one really resorts to legal action here- they just kind of settle things themselves). And at this point, the horse and buggy takes off! Yes, I was part of a horse and buggy "hit and run." So our driver got back in the car, and two random Egyptians who claimed to know the buggy driver got in as well to try to help us. Thus ensued a car chase in which our driver must have destroyed his car's alignment because of the high speed that we were driving on bumpy unpaved roads, through the small town, down back roads and tight alleys, stopping every so often to ask a townsperson if they had seen a horse and buggy race by.

Anyway, it turned out that in a car chase between a taxi and a horse and buggy, the horse and buggy won. Funny for us, but obviously not so funny for our driver. So next, the two random Egyptians in the car with us told us they knew the father of the buggy driver. So they took us to him, and my friends and I sat in the car while our driver spent 45 minutes arguing with the father about payment. In the process, the two random Egyptians brought us tea, and I locked my car door after the way that one of them was looking at me and creepily mouthing words to me through the window. At one point, "buggy driver's father" tried to just give our driver a new mirror instead of payment. When our driver didn't accept (who would? It wasn't just the mirror...there were wires sticking out of the side of the car), buggy driver's father just tried to kiss our driver on the cheek and hug him, like that would make him accept, yet our driver was clearly still furious. Anyway, our driver finally took some money and then gave up; he obviously knew that horse and buggy driver and his father didn't have enough money to pay for the damage anyway.

So approximately 4 hours after we set out (mind you, we only spent about an hour at the camel market), we finally got back to Cairo. And our taxi driver was infuriated when we only offered to pay double what we had originally offered (no meters in Egyptian taxis means you have to bargain for how much you're going to pay). So we just handed him the money and walked away. All I can say is that I never know what to expect here...

We spent the rest of the day exploring Coptic Cairo. We first went to Egypt's oldest synagogue, Ben Ezra synagogue, as well as the first mosque built in Egypt, the Mosque of Amr Ibn Al As. Clara, Gigi, and I also had rocks thrown at us by "shabaab" (teenage boys) outside the mosque. Talk about contradictions....Next we toured various Coptic Churches. I really enjoyed exploring Coptic Cairo, first of all just because of the history. I felt like I was back in Jerusalem again. Also, it was symbolically important for me to see the juxtaposition of churches, mosques, and synagogues. If only we could go back to that co-existence...

After exploring Coptic Cairo, we crashed a Four Seasons Hotel (well not really...we just pretended to be guests so that we could use the free bathroom, and of course the employees didn't doubt us because we looked like foreigners. At least sometimes that pays off, because the stalls actually had toilet paper! And not one, but TWO rolls. Bliss.). And then we took a half hour felucca (small boat) ride on the Nile to see the sunset. We had fun talking to our felucca owner, Abdullah, who was 62 years old and had been manning feluccas as his primary occupation for the past 50 years.

After the felucca ride, we made our way to Lucille's Restaurant to have...American food!!! I had grilled cheese and a baked potato, and let me tell you it was heavenly.

All right, that's enough for now. Of course I have more to write, but I have to head off because I bought tickets to see a show in the Library of Alexandria's Planetarium.

Perplexed Again

Okay, so this is going to be another of those slightly jumbled blog entries written right after something somewhat disturbing has happened, but once again I feel the need to vent/make sense out of things. Okay, deep breath….

The background to this story is that my roommate, Habiba, has been having problems recently with a man who is extremely intent on marrying her (a random man on the street mind you, not one connected to her in any way) following her to and from her classes, demanding her hand, asking for her phone number or her father’s number, etc. I’m not sure how long this has been going on, but she first told me about it two days ago. My immediate response to her was that she should get the police involved. Obviously this was the “American” response, because she countered that she didn’t want to make a big deal about it by getting the authorities involved, and stuff like that is “normal” here (once again with the word “normal.” I’m starting to hate that word. Who cares if it’s normal?!? That didn’t mean that I deserved to be molested or that she deserved to get stalked!!). In any case, I dropped it for the time being.

When I came home today from class she was sitting on the floor, in between praying, with a slightly dazed look on her face. The first thing that I asked her was about the man, and she replied that it happened again today, she told him to get away, etc. We both agreed that it was awful, she didn’t deserve that treatment, and that tomorrow she would get the police involved (although that’s what she promised when we talked about it yesterday…). She couldn’t concentrate at all, couldn’t find any of her things, so finally she decided to just go to sleep. This was at about 3:30 pm.

I noticed that her sleep was pretty fitful, and by 4:45 she was crying out and whimpering. I figured that she was having a nightmare or something, so I tried to wake her up. But no matter how hard I tried nudging her she WOULD NOT wake up. At first I thought she was joking with me. But after a minute, I realized that something was wrong. When she didn’t wake up after I tried splashing water on her face, I started getting really scared. So I ran to get Eman Khader, one of the Egyptians that I’m most friendly with and who seems to understand our American viewpoints the best. Eman and I tried everything: shaking her, talking to her, water, perfume, but nothing worked. We called the other Egyptians on our floor who are in the College of Medicine to help, and they tried the same things, but she just kept convulsing, and tensing her hands and feet, crying out “La! La!” (No! No!) and gasping for air.

At this point I was really scared. I have absolutely no medical training, but once again the Egyptians were reacting as if it wasn’t anything that deserved medical attention. They were talking calmly to her, rubbing her, telling her everything was all right and to just wake up. So I ran to other Americans for help because I knew that they would at least have the same sort of cultural reaction that I would- which was that this was something serious, and that she needed professional help. The first thing that Gigi said when she saw her was that it could be a seizure, which of course frightened me even more. We tried searching on the internet for signs of seizure, but one of the Egyptians quickly refuted that saying that if it were a seizure, she would have spit coming out of her mouth. At this point, there was a crowd of about 6 Egyptians and 3 Americans in addition to myself and Habiba (who was still lying on her bed) in my room.

Our next step was to call the Mushrifa (supervisor), and she and 3 other supervisors came up to the room. But they merely stood in front of Habiba (who still was writhing around on the bed, gasping, and with her eyes closed), said that there was nothing that they could do, and then promptly left!

I was feeling extremely helpless and unsure of what to do at this point, so one of the Americans suggested I call Lizz (one of our program directors). Another Egyptian asserted that that wasn't necessary. So we debated and waited for a few minutes. And then the other Americans and I really couldn't take it anymore so we called Lizz. She told us to call the Mushrifa. We said we HAD done that, and the Mushrifa didn't do anything. Then she told us to call an ambulance. So we did. But then a few of the Egyptians came over saying that Habiba had woken up (at this point I couldn't take it in the room anymore...I was standing out in the hallway with Sarafina, Gigi, and Karen), was conscious, speaking, and said that she didn't want an ambulance, so they canceled it.

Okay, what?!? I refused to believe this. So I went back in the room, and sure enough Habiba was still on the bed, in the same state, with her eyes closed. Maybe she HAD woken up and said that she didn't want an ambulance, but I really don't think that was her decision to make at this point. She obviously was not in a fully conscious state and was SERIOUSLY disturbed both emotionally and physically. While we were talking in the hall, Sarafina suggested that it actually wasn't a seizure but rather a panic attack. But we all concluded that that still deserved medical attention, particularly because of the way that she was thrashing around. So the fact that they canceled the ambulance was unfathomable to us.

Anyway, Eman Khader came running out of the room a few minutes later saying that Habiba had started the fits again. So this time the Egyptians finally agreed to remove her against her will. This was at about 6pm, over an hour after I had first tried to wake her up. They started putting her clothes on her (another cultural difference...if I were medically compromised and in the U.S. I would not care whether I were fully dressed and my hair covered before I was taken to the hospital) and practically carried her out of the room and downstairs. Then we waited for about another half hour while they waited for an ambulance to come to take her the 3 minute drive to the hospital when she just as well could have taken a taxi. Finally, at about 6:30 pm, over an hour and a half after I started trying to wake her up, they got her in an ambulance.

I can't even begin to make sense of my thoughts about this. Sometimes it's just so hard to be caught between two different cultures. On the one hand, I feel slightly guilty for reacting the way that I did. She didn't want to go to the hospital (this is if we assume that she actually was conscious when she said "No")- obviously there was a reason for that. Maybe she was embarrassed. When I talked to Lizz, she explained to me that mental health is kind of a taboo topic here. So it might be shameful for her to go to the hospital and have them find that this was "just" (I emphasize this word, because I still don't think it's something to be taken lightly) a panic attack, particularly if the source of it was "just" the fact that some man on the street wanted to marry her, and had asked her multiple times to do so. After all, that's "normal" (ooh I hate that word now) here. Obviously I don't want to cause shame on Habiba...she's a sweetheart, and I couldn't have asked for a better roommate! But I, and the other Americans, were seriously concerned about her safety. And for us, that's more important than pride.

The response of Habiba and our Egyptian friends, however, was that we were somewhat overreacting, that wasn't necessary, etc etc. While we Americans were waiting tensely out in the hall, we could hear our Egyptian friends laughing inside my room--just more evidence of different cultures' coping mechanisms. One of us Americans posed the question, "What would happen if we weren't here? I don't even want to know..." Which made me worry that I was taking the sort of Western Imperialist "looking down on other cultures" viewpoint. I mean, am I qualified to say that MY way is right? But at the same time, there's no way that I would have forgiven myself if I had just let her stay in the room, and the problem had escalated.

Another thought that kept popping into my head was, what if this had happened not to Habiba, but to one of the Americans in our program? Clearly, an ambulance would have been called within the first five minutes of any sort of concern. And, as Sarafina so bluntly put it, if one wasn't called, the rest of us would have scooped up our ailing classmate and personally carried them to the hospital.

I also couldn't help but notice that after she was finally gone in the ambulance, none of the Egyptians ate dinner with us like they usually do. Of course some of them were with Habiba in the hospital. But I couldn't help but notice their absence and hope that I won't be blamed in any way for this. In fact, the Egyptians who went with her to the hospital are back now, and I can here them joking around in the hallway again. All I can say is that this was yet another cultural experience.

Wow...okay, so I've written a lot and my thoughts are still whirling in my head. But unfortunately I need to go study for my Fusha test tomorrow and pack for Cairo. Perhaps this will make more sense to me tomorrow....

I Can't Stop

Yes, I did write two posts yesterday, and yes it is after midnight and I'm traveling tomorrow, but I still felt an urge to write a post about tonight. Because I never really expected to have a Passover Seder and to narrate the story of the Jews' exodus from Egypt, while currently sitting in an apartment in Egypt. Nor did I ever expect to attend a Seder conducted in English, Hebrew, and Arabic with Jews, Christians, and Muslims all sitting around a table together. Or to have actually visited the important places in the Passover story, such as the Red Sea and Mt. Sinai.

Sure, it wasn't exactly traditional since it's impossible to find matzah or matzah ball mix here (Alexandria has a population of approximately 6 Jews), but Sarafina, Jade, and Hima researched online and did a damn good job of making homemade matzah and matzah ball soup (albeit with flour, but we'll overlook that).

But all parts of the service were there. Hima led the seder, with help from Leah, and together they explained all of the symbols, traditions, and the story of Passover. Jeremy, being the youngest Jew present (for once not me!!!!!!!!) sang the Four Questions in Hebrew, we drank wine, sang Dayenu and Chad Gad Yah, welcomed Elijah, and searched for the Afikomen that Sameh had the honor of hiding.

There were about 30 people in Lizz's apartment, ranging from students in the Middlebury Program, the Flagship Program, two of the directors of the Middlebury Program, and even the host mother and host sister of one of the girls in our programs.

It meant a lot to me that so many people of different backgrounds came to learn and to be with friends who happened to be Jewish (but the fact that we were Jewish didn't make any difference to them). Particularly after the demonstration that I saw a few weeks ago and the movie dealing with the Israeli-Palestinian situation that we saw in theaters two days ago, I was really proud of the Egyptians who came and asked me questions about our traditions. I spent a while talking to Sameh about the similarities between Arabic and Hebrew, and he told me that he wanted to study Hebrew after he graduates. I asked him why, and he said no particular reason...just for the experience.

All that I can say is that tonight was like a microcosm of what the ideal world would be like for me. It's what I want to spend my career (and the rest of my life) working to project on the rest of the world. And I am so lucky to have been a part of what took place tonight. Thank you to everyone who made it possible.

Midnight Ramblings

Well I'm on a roll, so I thought I would update with more recent events from Egypt before I go visit Mihiri (did I mention that I'm going to ITALY??).

First of all, I am now 21. Turning 21 in a country where alcohol is forbidden by the majority religion obviously is not your typical turning 21 celebration, but I managed to celebrate in Egyptian style by going to a random restaurant that turned out to not have menus, and then deciding to move on to Aseer Mecca (basically juice paradise) where I had 5 different cups of juice: mango, banana, watermelon, pumpkin (?!?), and guava. All I can say is mmmmmmm.

Also, the reason that I have not updated in practically forever is that in addition to frantically scrambling to apply for summer internships, I have had a pretty annoying health concern for over a month. Thank goodness it's finally better, but I have learned several things from this experience. First of all, even if the directions to a drug are translated into English, I should read the Arabic version. Because the translators have an annoying habit of leaving out important pieces of information or using words that have different connotations when translated into English. Needless to say, that was fun. Also, I have learned that Egyptians try to comfort you by telling you that something is not a big deal, and not to worry, when you really should take concern. I think that we Americans are on the opposite end of the spectrum where we want to take all precautions and perhaps make something into a slightly bigger deal than it needs to be, but in order to ensure that it gets taken care of totally. So it was really fun for me to be in the middle of these two ways of coping and to hear advice from relatives in America telling me that it was necessary for me to do certain things that the doctor here in Egypt thought were totally uncalled for (and shared with me her opinion that Americans are germophobes). Just another cultural lesson.

I also went on a overnight biking trip in the Egyptian countryside which was both fun and, well rather difficult. I have come to the conclusion that I should have had more biking excursions as a child because, well I kind of stink at bike riding, particularly when it is on bumpy, rocky, country roads. Which meant that the actual biking part of the trip was really not fun for me. I fell off my bike several times, and each time I was hurried back onto it by Khalid because there were children from the village running behind us, and I think he was worried about some sort of confrontation/mob. But the scenery was beautiful, and the food was delicious. Best meal I've had in Egypt. I also had my first ride in a tuk tuk (sp??) which is like a motorcycle with a little cart thing attached to the back of it for passengers. The tuk tuks are probably my favorite part of the Reef (countryside). Because they are completely "pimped out" with feathers, bumper stickers (in misspelled English), huge stereos blasting music, fur, and even feathers. Oh, and it wasn't until after we sat down that I saw our driver. He was about 9 years old. No lie. Haha.

We also finally had a chance to see where the boys are living, and let me say that I am pretty jealous. There are actually statues and paintings in their main building. I'm trying not to complain, but well our living situations are just kind of the opposite. Oh, and their food was amazing. They actually had fresh juice and vegetables at breakfast. Whereas usually we have bread and jam and cheese. But of course this is Egypt and there are different standards when it comes to the sexes.

I've also seen two more demonstrations/ public masses. The first one was a parade in support of Mubarak (who is alive apparently!). I was at the tram station with Chris, and I saw the mass of young men coming. But, this time I learned my lesson. When they started coming towards me, I pulled Chris away and we hid behind the tram station. The other demonstration that I saw was about two weeks ago in the university right outside our building. It was against Israel (right after the statement about not giving up part of Jerusalem). I've been avoiding discussing politics until now, but before I leave I really want to talk to some Egyptians and see what their views are.

Okay, I really need to go to bed now. That's it for now.

Looooong Overdue

Well this post is long overdue, and I'm writing it at the expense of studying for my Amiyya test tomorrow, but I figured I should update before I leave for...ITALY in 2 days. Now to just remember where I left off....

Actually I can't remember where I left off, so here are random memories from the past month and a half. I suppose I'll start off with our trip to Dahab (an Egyptian "hippie" resort town), Sinai, and Jordan:

Basically the trip to Dahab was every road trippers' worst nightmare. We went through not one, but TWO flat tires. And we only had ONE spare tire. Which meant that we spent no less than SEVEN hours waiting in what I will call a rest stop but is nothing like the rest stops in the U.S. (picture a decrepit sort of gas station with a small front porch in the middle of the desert) while they got another one. I was not one of the smart people who brought my things with me from the bus, so I had no books or iPOD to entertain me, so I spent the time trying to sleep or playing cards. The story just gets better, though, when some members of our group decided to go on a walk in the desert and we got caught in a sand storm. Woohoo! But the amazing thing (and this speaks to the type of people in this program) was that I only heard one person complain during the entire 7 hour affair. And that person was one of the Egyptians that came with us. I also got a pretty cool video of the sandstorm, as well as a rather metaphorical picture of a rainbow appearing after the storm, about the same time that the bus pulled up. How's that for symbolism?

Driving to Dahab was amazing as well. I got to see the mountains and coast of Jordan, Israel, and Saudi Arabia all at the same time!

There's so much to say about Dahab...First of all, it's a small town, so after one day of making my rounds to the different shops, I felt like a celebrity (in an annoying way) because every shop keeper knew my name and what I was doing in Egypt, and called to me as I walked down the street. I say that this was annoying because I really have gotten to the point where I just want to blend in here. But I don't know if I'll ever get to that point. Sometimes I feel bad when I just walk by without acknowledging them, especially when they make a genuine effort to be friendly, but my policy now is to just put on my "horse blinders" and not listen to them. Which is tough.

All of the restaurants at Dahab are pretty much the same thing. You sit on the floor on padded cushions around a big table and eat/drink/smoke shisha while looking out at a beautiful view of the Red Sea. But we did have one interesting experience one night...We were all eating dinner and all of a sudden Farahat pulls something furry out from under the table and puts it on the table. We look closely, and it's a kitten. We look more closely and see that it is wet. So we look under the table. There is a cat literally in the process of giving birth. Now in America, the restaurant owner would be appalled at this, probably apologize profusely, and give us a discount or something. But this is Misr. So we just leave the cat there, and move to the next table over as if nothing had happened. "Welcome in Egypt."

I will also say that although I prefer Dahab to Sharm al Sheikh, the snorkeling in Sharm is much better. We spent a day in Ras Mohammad national park in Dahab which...was an experience. First of all, we didn't really see anything. Second of all, I really think that there should have been a warning that only strong swimmers should participate. I say this because at one point it was just me and a friend of Nihad's (one of our program directors) left, and we were trying to get back to shore, but the current was very strong. Nihad's friend was having serious difficulty, so she grabbed onto my flipper. So I swam the entire way back to shore in water with a very strong current, using only one leg, and while toting a somewhat large woman on my other leg. I'm actually not sure exactly how I did this, as I'm not a really great swimmer (just like last time...I don't know how I managed to be fine by myself in the middle of the Red Sea for 3 hours). I also don't know what it is with me and snorkeling but I guess it's always an adventure...

After Dahab we moved onto Sinai. And let me just say that the weather was the opposite of what it was when we climbed in the summer. Let me explain...we climbed Mt.Sinai in July in the middle of the afternoon. That was not a good idea (and we told our director this, but ma'alesh). This time, we climbed Mt. Sinai at 1 am during the "winter" in Egypt so it was frrrrrrrrreeeezzzziiiiinnnnnggg. Also, the path is very narrow which means that if there is a camel (which there are tons of because of the lazy people who don't want to climb it themselves) you better get out of the way. I have vivid memories of practically getting run over by camels while I was just minding my own business (also, really if you yell at me to "watch out," you should really specify a direction that I should move to, so I don't jump to the very direction in which the camel is located, which happened to me several times...). Anyway, we finally got to the top in time for the sunrise, and Khalid was a lifesaver and paid the bedouins at the top to give us blankets (not that we weren't still freezing, and I was wearing several layers). The sunrise was nice, but in my opinion, the moon setting was even more beautiful. It was lit up in pinks and purples from the sunrise.

The group of us set for Jordan had to leave right as the sun was rising because a bus was supposed to meet us at the bottom of the mountain to take us to Nuweiba to catch the ferry to Aqaba. So we hurried down (well actually down, then up again because we got lost, then down again) the mountain only to find that the bus was not there. So we lay down in the abandoned parking lot. And we slept on the asphalt. We really needed to get to Nuweiba by 11 to buy our tickets, but it turns out that even though the bus was 2 hours late it didn't matter because the ferry that was supposed to leave at 12:30 was....4 hours late (once again, welcome to Egypt). So we sat in a rather sketchy station, and then moved to a rather sketchy ferry station where I noticed some random man kept taking pictures of me (welcome to Egypt), and then to a very nice ferry (which left at 5 pm, not 4), which turned out to be sketchy as well. It turned out to be sketchy because although I tried to sleep, every time I opened my eyes during the 2 hour trip, there were at least 2 sketchy men filming me on their cameras or cell phones! Now I suppose this was partially our mistake, because we should have chosen a less central location in which to sit, a place where we (maybe) wouldn't have stuck out as much, but really! At one point I had seriously had enough (and no one else from our group had noticed) so I curled up into a ball and pulled my sweatshirt over my face. Needless to say, I was NOT in a good mood by the time we got to Aqaba. I mean it is a MAJOR invasion of privacy to film me without me knowing or without my consent. And although the men were probably just not used to seeing foreign women, once again, that does not make it okay! Anyway, finally the other guys in my group noticed at told the men to "halaas" (cut it out), but at that point we were already de-boating.

To continue this lovely saga...we then arrived in Aqaba where Jordanians were yelling at us from all directions trying to get us to take their cab and to pay ridiculous prices. We finally got the group into 2 cabs and got off to the hostel that we had picked out, when (yes, the journey gets even more exciting) we drove through our second sand storm. Most of the people in my car were asleep. I consider them lucky. Because I saw my life flash before my eyes. You could see literally nothing out of the windows, and the driver was speeding down this winding road. Occasionally we would see another car, but not until it was like 5 feet away and the headlights were blinding and our car shook as it whipped by. I remember looking at our driver at one point, only to see that he was sweating bullets. That was not comforting. Oh, and to top that off, we got lost. And the driver kept going like he knew what he was doing. Finally, Jahd made him call our hostel to get directions (not that it would do any good, since we couldn't SEE anything). Anyway, I don't really know how we eventually made it, but we did. And it was a humongous relief.

The next day was Petra. Which I cannot put into words. It's been my favorite part of this entire semester I think. We started off on a tour and rode horses through the Siq (canyon). Then we explored the Treasury, tombs, ritual offering places, djinn blocks, and a bunch of other sites that unfortunately I forgot. I just can't really comprehend how old it was, or how big, or how beautiful the colors of the rock were, or how advanced the Nebateans were for building a city that impressive! We climbed up to the High Place of Sacrifice which had an absolutely breathtaking view (and a cat at the top...once again, welcome to Misr!). There's no way that anyone could take an unimpressive picture from that site. Then, after having kibbeh for dinner (yum) we went to Cave Bar, a bar that was made out of a cave dating back to the first century CE!

The next day we headed to Amman and after deciding on a hotel (which was no small feat...all the hotel owners must know each other and are in deals with each other, and they sure try to manipulate you/guilt you into staying at their hostel) we set off for the Dead Sea. Now I can say that I've been to both the Israeli and Jordanian sides of the Dead Sea. Also, unlike last time, this time we found mud and of course "mudded" up to exfoliate ourselves/just look stupid and take pictures. (Once again I had a lovely "woman in the Middle East experience" when our cab driver tried to rub the mud on me. But we won't go there...) After about an hour floating, we went back to Amman for a deeeeeelicious dinner (there is no comparison between Jordanian and Egyptian food) and bed.

The next day we went to Lawrence of Arabia's old haunting ground (yep, we saw the remains of his house)...Wadi Rum! Another breathtaking place. The different colors of red sand were super cool, as well as the changing color of the rock depending on the time of day, but even cooler was that we found some cave drawings from ancient Nebateans!!

After Wadi Rum we headed back to Nuweiba, and stopped at the Turkish Baths because Jahd couldn't stop raving about them. That was a really nice change. We sat in a steam room, then got scrubbed down, then a massage, and tea all for super cheap.

So, as far as my impressions of Jordan (compared to Egypt):

Better food, more expensive, less crazy driving, there are actually traffic lights and cars stop for you instead of speeding up and trying to run you over when they see you, calmer, quieter, much hillier (just seeing the shepherds in the hills and bedouin villages...well I can definitely picture it as the biblical land).

Whew, that was a lot. And that doesn't even cover what has happened since I got back from Jordan. But I'll make that another post...

Booty Guards

Well the boys in our program can now put on their resumes that they have worked as "male escorts" (but (whew) not in the traditional sense...read on for more details). Khalid, one of our program directors, decided to assign 2-3 guys from our program the duty of escorting females to the gym, our language center, our dorms, etc. everyday from 3-5 pm to try to minimize incidents. But that isn't what gave me the urge to write this post. It's their title...The Egyptian girls have been calling them "bodyguards," but the way that they pronounce it is more like "booty guards." Which, I quite prefer. I think t-shirts that say "Booty Guard" are the necessary next step.

Anyway, this reminded me of one of the things here that provides me d

aily humor: mispronunciations and failed translations from Arabic to English. For example, on a menu in a high-class restaurant that I visited this summer, I had the option of ordering the scrumptious chicken and "vegetation." If vegetation doesn't get my mouth watering, I don't know what will. Also, we noticed that the alcohol menu at one of the few places that serves alcohol here was titled "Spiritual Beverages." Now, obviously they meant "Spirits," but I suppose alcohol is spiritual as well...

Here are my two all-time favorites. Khalid once read a menu that intended to advertise "Chicken and Herbs." Instead, it advertised "Chicken and Herpes." Mmmmmmm.... And finally, to understand this next one, you must understand that there is no letter "p" in the Arabic alphabet, and English words with "p" are pronounced with the Arabic equivalent of a "b" sound. As a result, they often get confused as to when to use "p" versus "b" and use the wrong one. Over the summer, I got some clothes dry-cleaned and the bag was supposed to say "Thank you for your business." Instead, it said..."Thank you for your pussiness." Sooooo great. I packed the bag, and still have it in my room in the U.S.

And finally I have a picture demonstrating these daily humors:

Look closely...the signs advertise "Baby Pant Ass" and "Baby Jacket Ass." Judging by the Arabic, they meant "assortment" and wanted to abbreviate it, with humorous results for those of us who know that "ass" means something totally different...

That's it for now. Off to dinner, possibly watch the sunset from the Citadel, and then an Egyptian folkloric dance class.