all things go, all things go

Well everyone, this is it: the farewell post. I wanted to take this time to write some things that I love -- and am going to miss -- about Egypt, and the Middle East in general. Here they are, in no particular order.

1. Street food. Many people complain about the food in Egypt, but I don't agree. True, it's far from gourmet; if that's what you wanted, you'd be better off in Morocco or Lebanon. But for cheap, delicious, and occasionally greasy local street food on the go, you can't beat Egypt. My favorites: tall glass of mango or guava juice, or banana with milk (sounds weird, but it is so good!), or as'hab, a juice made of sugar cane; fuul, aka stewed fava beans with tahina and salad and sometimes hot peppers, especially from Mah'roos, aka Biblical fuul, aka the fuul place in Garden City; koshari, the classic Egyptian vegetarian peasant dish made from rice, noodles, chick peas, fried onions, lentils, spicy red sauce and some of that garlicky/vinegary stuff on top; fiteer, a kind of fried dough eaten with honey as a dessert or with veggies and cheese or meat as a meal; and of course fatta, which is rice, fried pieces of bread, chicken schwarma, and taamayya (garlic sauce) on top. So good. All of it. Now I just have to find a decent Egyptian restaurant in New York.

2. The call to prayer. When it comes to speaking Arabic in Cairo, Egyptian Ameyya has been much more useful to me than the classic fus'ha I learned at Northwestern. But there is something so beautiful about classical Arabic: when it's written, I love the calligraphy, the flowing script, whether its the inticate designs on Islamic buildings or sprawled across a store front or on the cover of a book. And I love the sound of it, the allahu akbar echoing around me five times a day, marking time and filling the streets and alleys. Hear it at 4 am? Stayed out too late. Hear it at 9 am? Woke up too early. Hear it at 6 pm? Time to start wrapping up work and head home. Though I am not going to be joining anyone at a mosque to pray, I really like hearing the call to prayer sound around me; it reminds me that this city, my home, is filled with people coming together to share something special every day.

3. Chilling. I don't think I can emphasize the relaxed, chilled out nature of this country. Egyptians have a flexible concept of time, and are often late; I respond well to this. Everything is late: buses, scheduled performances, parties, people. I don't think I could live in a country where everyone places such a high premium on time. Everyone is very relaxed about everything; one of my favorite Egyptian words is malesh, meaning: it's OK, no worries. Bus is late? Malesh. Air conditioner broken? Malesh. I seem to be locked out of my house? Malesh! And one of the things I have learned to do here is stop worrying about time so much. I am not usually in a rush, and it's been pretty great. It makes some people anxious, and I will admit that I have moments of wishing things could run more efficiently. But it's worth it for the laid-back atmosphere all around the country. I have chilled all over Egypt: by the Red Sea, by the Mediterrean Sea, in Upper Egypt, on the Nile, in several types of desert, in Siwa, in tents, in Mosques, with Bedouins, and more. In Basata, I took off my watch for four days, and it was heaven. The most popular set-up I see in Egypt is incredibly conducive to chilling: mats and rugs and oversized pillows on the floor, a long, low table, some shishas and trays of tea, all shoes left by the entrance. You can lay out, you can lay back, you can nap or read a book or play a game of tawla/shataranj, you can forget that you were ever supposed to be doing anything else. And if you're late to whatever you were supposed to be doing next? Malesh.

4. Cairo, in all its faded glory. (Get ready, this is a long one!) In the days before Nasser took over, Cairo was a international city. There were gilded buildings and chic pastry shops, and a dignified sort of feeling to the city. Now, many of the streets have been renamed and the facades are cracked and all that grandeur has begun to crumble. Going to have a beer on the rooftop of the Odean, or passing by Groppi's in downtown, or sitting in of the Farouk-era, Victorian-style chairs in my apartment: these are reminders and relics of a more glamorous time. It's true that Cairo is not a beautiful city. But it's intriguing and interesting, and never boring.

I love the Nile, especially at night. During the day you can see the garbage washing up along the shore if you look too closely, but at night it whispers past, just a few buildings away from my Zamalek apartment. In Upper Egypt, down in Aswan, you can take a small boat back and forth across the Nile, where it's wide and quiet and sparkling blue. For three days on the Nile cruise, you can gaze off the side and see quiet fishing villages on either side, and animals, and it's beautiful. But my favorite thing of all is to get on a felluca with a group of friends, whether it's three people or twenty, and just sail and talk and chill. Some of the best conversations I've had in Egypt have been contemplative ones on the Nile. I love, whether sailing or walking along the corniche or on someone's balcony, to watch the Nile at night, gently reflecting the neon lights of the billboards and hotels, silently and eternally flowing north to the Mediterranean.

I love the minarets of mosques piercing the skyline, I love walking in the streets because there are no sidewalks (or because the sidewalks are not passable), I love the way things are built on other things so that in the same city there can be a building from medieval times across the square from an Ottoman one, I love the noise and chaos and energy of the city. They say New York is the city that never sleeps; in Madrid, they said "Ellos que dicen que Nueva York es la ciudad que nunque duerma no conocen los madrilenos" (those who say New York is the city that never sleeps don't know people from Madrid), and now I can safely say that Cairo is truly a city that functions on its own inner clock and rhythm. Everything is open past midnight, everything delivers, it is not unusual to find traffic even when it's 3 am, and the streets are crowded no matter the hour. When I first got here I considered it is the most overwhelming place I have ever lived, and now that assault on the senses is both familiar and welcome; I would not have it any other way.

5. The people. I don't even know how to put into words exactly how awesomely amazing the people I have met here are. They are from all over the world, they speak a dozen different languages, they are fun and silly and fascinating. They shared their cultures and opened their homes; they have opened my mind, as I can only hope I have opened theirs. Some I saw every day, some only once a month, but I always felt welcomed and supported. They are my Cairo family, they are such a big part of what made my year so great, and I will miss them more than I can say.

Cairo is not a perfect place, and neither is Egypt. But I'd rather think about the things I love instead of dwelling on the negative. So with that, I will say goodbye to you. I hope you enjoyed reading about my life in Egypt this year as much as I enjoyed writing. Thanks!

zen by the red sea

In what seemed like an official start to summer, I spent this past weekend at Basata, a relaxing, chilled-out, eco-friendly camp between Nuweiba and Taba on the Red Sea. We could see the lights on Aqaba (Jordan) and Eilat (Israel) at night, and the mountains of Saudi Arabia across the sea during the day. In fact, all our phones automatically went on the Saudi Arabia network; given my desire to actually visit that country (minimal), that's probably the closest I will come to going there.

Basata is a cool idea -- basically, there are all these huts on the beach (literally, on the beach, with the Red Sea like 5 feet away), all of which have no electricity or running water. They have "beds" (mats) with carpets/rugs/more mats, a few low tables, a few pillows, etc. Ours was a double-decker with a small loft area, the whole hut sleeping a total of eight people (though we were 10, which was fine as two people opted to drag their mats outside and sleep on the porch). At either end of the camp is a bathroom hut with showers and toilets etc., and there's also one big communal hut. This one features a bakery (freshly baked good every day...yum!), kitchen and cooking area, as well as huge spaces to chill on oversized cushions and the floor, long tables and etc. Oh! And a library, a "take one, leave one" kind of situation. English books are quite expensive, so my friends and I usually trade around what we have, plus I get a new one each month to review for the magazine I write for. Anyway, they had a lot in German, but I did read Tar Baby by Toni Morrison (I love Toni Morrison -- Song of Solomon is one of my favorite books of all time) and American Wife by Curtis Sittenfeld, a fictionalization/reimagining of the life of Laura Bush. Both were excellent.

For food, you are on your own for breakfast and lunch. You can take raw ingredients and make your own, or eat some prepared stuff (i.e. from the bakery, or some corn flakes or whatever). For lunch they usually had out mini-pizzas. And then for dinner you could sign up for prepared food (everything vegetarian!) or make your own. In both cases, you just write down what you took and then pay for everything at the end. We were there three nights and four days, so we did some of our cooking the last night, but ate their food the first two (and it was so amazing). Also, in a very un-Egyptian manner, they recycled! Very exciting stuff.

There was also some beautiful snorkling right off the beach with some great stuff -- saw loads of fish, crabs, sea urchins, etc. And also some lionfish, which apparently are poisonous, so we did not get too close. All in all, an excellent and extremely relaxing vacation. Could not ask for a better start to the summer.

Below, please enjoy some photos of the sea and beach to make you jealous.

in which i get a visitor!

Big news of the week: I have a visitor! Marcy, who has spent the year teaching English in Madrid (another city I love), is visiting me in Cairo for five days before returning to America. It has been a welcome chance for me to revisit some tourist sites in Cairo, like the pyramids and Egyptian Museum, as well as Cairo staples like a felluca ride on the Nile and some shopping at Khan el-Khalili. She has done some exploring on her own, like in Coptic Cairo and in Zamalek, so I have just posted some photos (below!) of the things we did together. Enjoy!

In other news, last week I went with N to see an installment of the Refugee Film Festival. They had been asking for volunteers for the festival, but with my work hours it didn't work out. However, on the day we went we managed to see two films (with dinner in between). I much preferred the second one, which was about mistreatment of Sudanese refugees in Cairo, a problem that many Egyptians don't know anything about. I have friends who teach and/or work with refugees so I have heard about the issue before, but I still found the documentary to be really interesting.

Illicit inside-the-pyramid shot! That's Marcy on the left, rando tourist on the right, and the sarcophagus in the back. This was inside the middle pyramid.

It looks like they are re-painting the Egyptian museum. It seems pink-er than usual...

Green area in the Khan at night

More green area in the Khan at night.

my stylish swine flu mask

This was a weekend of weird (and fun) cultural experiences. On Thursday night I went to a stand-up comedy event at the Sawy Center. I have heard about comedians performing before in Cairo (there are several well-known comedians, especially Egyptians, thanks to popular specials like Axis of Evil and Arabs Gone Wild), but I always skip them because I was pretty sure they would be in Arabic. My friend L heard about this one and said it was supposed to be in English, so I decided to give it a shot. It turns out that it was an evening hosted by well-known Egyptian-American comic Ronnie Khalil, and featuring some amateur and established Egyptian comics...in English and Arabic. First there were four performances in Arabic, an "interlude" by Khalil (in English, making fun of the Obama speech), and then four performances in English, including a much longer set from Khalil.

I had an initial moment of panic when I heard that half the sets would be in Arabic, but surprised myself by understanding more than I expected. It helps that they were all speaking Egyptian ameyya, which is what I have been studying this year, and that my friend L was there to help translate the jokes I didn't get. I understood the most in the first act, and found him to be pretty funny. One of the next three I understood barely anything (though no one seemed to find her too funny, so I think it was OK), one I sort of understood, though he used a lot of slang I didn't pick up on (really, how am I supposed to know the words for "to hit on" and "PMS"), and the third I also picked up on some, others went completely over my head. But that's OK, I am still pretty proud of myself for what I did get. For the English set, the first two were so-so, the third was a radio personality from Nile FM, and he was really funny, and Khalil went last and he was hilarious (not to mention quite a hit with the ladies in attendance).

The best part of the whole comedy evening, though, was the Official Swine Flu Panic. About 10 cases of swine flu have been found in Zamalek (the Cairo neighborhood in which I reside, thank you very much). They are all AUC students, and the entire AUC dorms have been quarantined (as in, 150 people trapped in a college dorm and unable to leave), with classes canceled through June 15. Since the show was in Zamalek, the venue was passing out free face masks and politely requiring people to wear them. What really happened was that everyone took a free mask and then promptly took it off upon entering the hall. Still, enjoy this photo of L and I modeling our fancy swine flu masks:


Then on Friday, my friend A3, who teaches English to Sudanese refugees downtown, was invited by some of her students to come to a hip hop show they were having in their church. I went with her, and though we stood out by being the only non-Sudanese refugees present, it was definitely an experience. They opened the show by having "praise and worship" (in Arabic, but accompanied by electric keyboard and a great deal of singing), and after several of the hip hop groups had performed, there was a break for the pastor to get up and share "the word" (aka a sermon?), also in Arabic, but which appeared to be about Adam and Eve. I have been to church services before (with my Tanakh class in high school, to get into St. Paul's cathedral for free in London, other cathedral-related experiences as a by-product of living in Madrid, etc.), but none quite like this. Anyway, A3's students were quite good, or at least the ones we saw.

The third was later on Friday, when I went with some friends to see a ballet at the Cairo Opera House. It was the tour of the Canadian National Ballet, and it wasn't really traditional -- it was a much more modern take on dance. There were two acts, each a separate performance; although the first part was interesting, the second part was really fantastic. The music for the piece was traditional music from Southern Italy (according to the pamphlet), and was performed live on stage. Very enjoyable. Also, much like the last time we went for the opera, we were able to pay for the cheapest tickets and then were moved up to like the fifth row because there were so many empty seats. It's a shame more people in Cairo aren't coming out to support the arts, but I do appreciate the benefits of being one of the few who do so.

Anyway, I did other things this weekend, including a futile search for ice cream (seriously it's like 95 degrees and I would kill for a Ben and Jerry's right now), a friend's house-warming party, and more. Now that my time here is winding down, I am looking forward to making the most of all my remaining weekends.

sketchy bowling

I love bowling. I'm not very good at it, but I love the inherent tackiness and sketchiness of a bowling alley, everything from the questionable rental shoes to the pitchers of cheap beer. But the thing is, I often forget how much I like bowling until someone brings it up, and then I realize I really want to go. So I haven't been bowling in a really long time -- definitely not since I came to Cairo, and before then I can't even remember the last I went in Chicago.

But a friend told me about a bowling alley in Giza called Nile Bowling, and after going this weekend with four friends I am delighted to say that it was spectacularly sketchy. First, no bowling shoes necessary: you bowl in whatever footwear you have on, which in my case was a pair of flip-flops. Second was that in our lane, the bowling pins seemed to have some slight wobbling issues. Sometimes they just fell down of their own volition, even if a bowling ball was nowhere in sight, or the ball would roll into the gutter halfway down the lane and then the machine would give you credit for two pins down anyway (this actually happened to me on several occasions). Other times when you would go to bowl, the machine would just decline to acknowledge that roll, automatically reset, and randomly give the bowler extra frames. Ultimately, I bowled a 56, which might be a lifetime high for me without bumpers.

The whole point of this, though, is that after having been here so long, I expect things in Egypt to run inefficiently. That's part of the charm of Cairo, in my opinion. If we had gotten to the bowling alley and everything had worked properly, I think I actually would have been disappointed. Yes, people, it's come to that: my expectations are so low that I don't even need something to function to make me happy, I just need it to exist.

sandboarding is my new favorite sport

Well this is definitely a week late, but last weekend I was in Siwa, an oasis in the Western Desert. Siwa is almost completely isolated, and is the farthest away from everything of all the oases -- it is almost at the border with Libya -- and is about a 10-hour drive from Cairo. Because of its isolation, Siwa is known for having a culture different from the rest of Egypt. The people speak Siwi (a Berber language) in addition to Arabic, the women wear these really ornate outfits (though they are also exceptionally covered up), and Siwan crafts (like woven baskets) are very well-known. So yes, I was very excited to be going after hearing about it for so long.

We left Thursday night late and arrived on Friday morning, ready to explore the town. On Friday we did the tourist-y things in Siwa town, including some springs (Cleopatra's Baths, where apparently Cleopatra used to go bathe), the Temple of the Oracle of Amun, which used to be very sought after, and the fortress of Shali in the old part of Siwa, which has a great view of the whole oasis. (It's a huge oasis, with something like 30,000 people.) Friday night we slept in a hotel in Siwa, and then on Saturday we woke up and headed into the desert after lunch.

On Saturday, Sunday and Monday we were out in the desert. We went to more springs (hot, cold, salty), went dune riding in jeep 4X4s, which was awesome: the drivers speed around the desert up and down the dunes so it feels kind of like a roller coaster. So much fun! We also went sandboarding, which is like on a modified snowboard but used on a sand dune. Photos below! The camping was nice: two big tents, one for food and one for sleeping, and then a fire with a table for chilling at night. The food was really good -- Siwan food is more North African than Middle Eastern I think, i.e. cous cous and tagines instead of shwarma and falafel -- although one night definitely included a whole baby goat that had been cooked in this pit under the sand, and which I definitely did not eat. Seemed to be a popular local delicacy though.

I think my favorite part is that the desert around Siwa is very much like the kind of desert you expect to see in movies: just dune after dune stretching out as far as the eye can see. It's really beautiful, and really desolate. In the Black and White Deserts, there were rocks and formations and all kinds of things that sort of broke up the monotony, but out there was just...nothing. And it was amazing. We also took lots of evening walks and did some stargazing -- one of the best skies I've ever seen.

Temple of the Oracle in Siwa town. This oracle is the reason people in the ancient world used to seek out this oasis.

A view of the oasis from the Temple -- look at all the palm trees!

A2 and I on a donkey cart in Siwa

Siwan handicrafts

Fortress of Shali at sunset

Cold springs in the desert by the oasis

Ah, the peacefulness of the desert...

Part of the desert used to be an ocean, and those rocks are actually pieces of coral

Look at me sandboarding!

A1 and I attempting to roll down one of dunes

the future freaks me out

Firstly, a special blog shout-out to my amazing roommate Adrienne (previously referred to as A1) for getting into grad school. SAIS (school for international affairs at Johns Hopkins) is lucky to have her -- congrats!

Seeing my friends plan for their futures makes me think a lot about what's going to happen when I leave Egypt this summer. It's a challenge for sure, because I know that if I were to stay in Cairo with my journalism background I could have my pick of jobs, even in this rotten economy. In fact, I kind of already have received two informal offers, or at least had people express interest if I chose to stick around. But the problem is that if I accepted either of those jobs I would have to plan to commit to Cairo for another year or so, and I am pretty sure that's something I am not willing to do right now.

I have, as some of you know, been thinking a lot about law school. It's always been something I considered, though I pretty much put it on the back-burner in college to concentrate on journalism. Well, the journalism industry now...makes me really sad. That will be another post for another time. But suffice it to say that law school is looking better and better. Anyway, I have been thinking a lot recently about life post-Cairo (right now it's a pretty scary thought), and so that's kind of what those thoughts are looking like right now. But it's months away, so who knows!

Anyway, I realized I never really posted anything about last week either - sorry about that! I had a good weekend here. On Thursday night we went to a party at the American Embassy thrown by the U.S. Marines who work at/guard the embassy, this one a belated St. Patrick's Day party. We've gone to several of these parties before, and they're always a good time. Still no green beer, but at least we got to celebrate St. Patrick's Day a little. Otherwise, earlier in the week we went to a bar called After 8, where a man sang Irish folk songs for an hour before an Egyptian band called Wust el Balad took over. Although there was a huge bar fight at the end of the evening that night, and that felt very Irish. Overall, though, compared to festivities I have seen in Chicago, where the Chicago River is dyed green, Cairo seems pretty underrepresented when it comes to authentic Irish culture. And also actual Irish people.

Instead of a museum on Saturday, I went to the Ezbekiyya Gardens in Ataba, which contain a well-known book market. Though I currently have a good deal of reading material, I went just to browse. The offerings, though disorganized, are so much more diverse than what you would find at a regular used book store in America. In addition to your standard worn copies of American paperbacks (old copies of Stephen King, Jonathan Kellerman and other types of typical airport bookstore finds), there are Mickey Mouse comics in Arabic, ancient copies of travel guides to countries all over the world, stacks of back issues of some truly random magazines (hello, scary fashion trends in Cosmo circa 1991), and, obviously, many copies of the Qu'ran. These are all on display in about 100 stalls, so it's best to just go wander. I quite enjoyed it; as someone who has been a lifelong book lover, sometimes it's nice just to wander and browse.

paint fight

One of the great things about having friends from such diverse backgrounds means the chance to enjoy many different holidays and celebrations. On Friday, my friends and I went to the Indian Embassy to celebrate Holi, the Hindu festival of color. They were giving out packets of colored powder, which are smeared on others for maximum color effect. The powder can also be combined with water to make a paste, which is used to continue to paint your friends. We also "borrowed" boxes of water to use in a large water fight on the lawn, so that after about an hour we looked like clowns in a sprinkler. But not scary ones! There was also a bar, delicious Indian food for sale, and plenty of Bollywood dance music. (Photo above, more on Facebook.)

Also, later on Friday (after a shower to wash the paint off, though in retrospect it would have been hilarious to walk around Zamalek splattered in paint for the facial expressions alone), I went to an AIESEC event called Global Village. This is the event that most AIESEC chapters will host eventually, and it's kind of AIESEC's signature thing. I am a pretty bad AIESECer -- I have not been to an event in ages -- but I thought this one sounded pretty cool.

Basically, there are booths for different countries, and each one is manned by a trainee (what I am) from that country, who is supposed to bring along things that represent their country: posters, food, music, etc. The America booth (other AIESECers represented, I just stopped by as a visitor) featured some Obama paraphenalia, peanut butter sandwiches, etc. The Morocco booth had what were possibly the best cookies ever. The girls manning the Japan booth spent the entire day in full-length kimonos.

This happened to be a good time for Global Village since Egypt is currently hosting an international AIESEC conference in Sharm this week, so they had loads of extra people from more countries to be at the booths. It was held in these gardens along the Nile, and they had a few local bands playing music also. I stopped by with a few other trainees I am friends with, we browsed the booths, enjoyed the weather, and then left together to get dinner. Many of the Egyptian AIESECers I am friends with asked why I never go to events and made me feel sufficiently guilty, so maybe I will try to go to more things this spring. Does it count as a New Year's Resolution in March?

the chicken and the mushroom

I think we all know that I am not really the outdoorsy type, years spent at Eisner notwithstanding, but I did, in fact, willingly go camping this weekend. And it was fun! This weekend is potentially a long weekend: Monday is Mohammad's birthday and an official day off, so many people also took off Sunday and made it a four-day weekend. Since I just took off to go to Amsterdam with Michelle, I chose to work today (Sunday), though I was still up for a little desert excursion.

Since Cairo is so crowded, it can be a bit of a shock sometimes to remember how startlingly empty the rest of the country can be. Our base was the Bahariyya Oasis in the Western Desert (of which the Black and White Deserts are just a small part), and on the 4-hour drive from Cairo to Bahariyya we passed...nothing. Just vast open expanses of desert as far as the eye could see, punctuated by brief spottings of camels or a few reststops. I suppose beach is still my favorite, but there is something I really love about the innate peacefulness of the desert, and this trip didn't disappoint.

We departed Cairo at 4 a.m. Friday morning packed into a minibus, drove to the Bahariyya Oasis, where we ate breakfast and repacked our bags into two 4x4 vehicles for the desert trip. There were nine of us, plus three guides. They drove the cars, made the food, tea and fire, set up the camp, and even played some awesome drum music around the campfire. We first drove through the Black Desert, which is black because of a former volcano in the area. We continued on through some really beautiful scenery, and eventually ended up in the White Desert, where we camped for the night.

The Black Desert was not necessarily my favorite, though the volcano was cool. On the other hand, the White Desert was really freaking awesome. Everything is very lunar looking, and you really feel like you are walking around on the surface of the moon. There are these strange white shapes kind of rising out of nothing, all in this white, chalky rock. It looked to me like it had been snowing on a Dr. Seuss book or something like that. And at night, the moon was so bright and reflecting off the rocks, you could see perfectly even without a flashlight.

In the morning, we stopped at a few noteworthy formations on our way back to Bahariyya. This included The Mushroom (not pictured), and The Chicken, which is the photo on the top of this post. It looks like the chicken is facing a tree. Pretty awesome.

And a sidenote: I didn't even realize it, but this weekend at Northwestern was Dance Marathon, a popular NU fundraiser that I have participated in for the last three years. Hundreds of student dancers dance for 30 hours to raise money for a chosen charity, with even more students volunteering their time to take care of the dancers, raise money with alumni, organize within the university, count all the money, set the dancing area, be in charge of music, lighting and more. It's an incredible undertaking that, I think, really brings together the student body. I missed it this year.

Former volcano in the black desert

Pretty desert photo

This is the awesome place we stopped for lunch. Note the very zen-like stream flowing through the middle.

Our campsite in the White Desert, set up by our awesome Bedouin guides. This was the chill-out area, though we also had a campfire and tents for sleeping off to the side.

Ooooh, wide-lens! Fancy! White desert at sunset. You can see another jeep out there as well.

Another view of the desert in the morning.

dam

Last night I got back from Amsterdam, which was excellent. I met Michelle there for four days -- she first went to Prague to see a friend studying abroad, and then we chose Amsterdam as something of a midpoint for us to meet up. We met in the airport Wednesday midday and took the train to our hotel. We had a great few days to explore the city, and only got lost a little (this was probably my fault... it usually is).

Some highlights included: a canal cruise to see the city (I really enjoyed the adorable canal houses), walking on many bridges (Michelle, the future civil engineer, has a thing for bridges), the Rijksmuseum (which had lots of artifacts and art, with many by Renoir, Vermeer and Rembrandt, including his famous The Night Watch), the Van Gogh Museum (including dozens of famous ones, like self-portraits, sunflowers and Starry Night), the Heineken Factory (no explanation necessary here!), the Anne Frank House, and plenty of walking and exploring. The above "iamsterdam" sign is outside the Museumplein, which is where the museums live. We thought it was cool and played in it for a while, in one of the sunnier parts of our long weekend (as you will see below, it was pretty cloudy most of the time and rained a bit on Friday).

There were some things we wanted to do but were not in season, like a nearby windmill village which is supposed to have like seven or eights windmills and other cute village-y things, but only one is open during the winter so it didn't really seem worth it to go out there. It's OK, I'll see the windmills next time -- it just gives me a good excuse to go back. We also saw tulips, but not to the extent I imagine we would have seen them during the spring.

Michelle turning the gears at the Heineken factory. This was before the beer taste-testing.

Outside of the Anne Frank House (the building on the left with the windows). They are pretty strict about no photos inside, but this is the street she looked out on every day for two years.

Canals and bridges all lit up at night. Pretty!

Michelle and I outside the Royal Palace in Dam Square.

Royal Palace (not open when the family is in residence, and it was closed to tourists when we were there)

More canal and houses, as seen from our canal cruise.

This is the Old Church as seen from our canal cruise. As you can see, it was a rather overcast day, which I think makes it look rather gothic.

I know it's a bit blurry, but here we are sitting in a giant wooden clog. It was about as awesome as you'd expect.

back in the USSR

This past week was full of excellent cultural experiences. On Monday I went with a group of about 16 friends to Peking, a Chinese restaurant in Zamalek, to celebrate the Chinese New Year (it's the Year of the Ox, which is totally my sign, so I think that means it's my lucky year or something). Then on Tuesday we went to see Aida at the Cairo Opera House. Since it wasn't sold out, we got moved to really good seats in front. For those unfamiliar with Aida, it's incredibly appropriate to see it here since it takes place in Egypt. The sets and costumes were great, and while I am not usually an opera person, I enjoyed it a great deal. It was nice to do something classy with my friends, and it's always fun to have an excuse to get all dressed up.

On Friday I went with some friends to the Cairo International Book Fair, which is spread out through a few different exhibition halls at the Cairo convention center in Heliopolis. There are displays from major publishers and bookstores from around the Arab world, and other countries like Spain, France, Italy and Greece also had booths. I wasn't about to buy a ton of Arabic books (my reading level is not that great), but I did want to pick up some children's books. That is much more appropriate. After debating between enticing titles like "Maggie And The Cat" and "There Is A Ghost In My House," I opted for "How Great Is The Summer?" which I am excited to start reading. I also got a translated version of "Little Miss Giggles," which is part of a series I am sure many of you remember fondly. I wanted the "Little Miss Sunshine" one, but they were out. Sad! I was also tempted by an Arabic copy of "The Very Hungry Caterpillar," but ultimately decided against it.

The other excellent part of the book fair was the massive used book tent, where the different stalls had stacks of magazines in every language going back decades (Cosmo in Spanish from 1998, Glamour in German from 2005, Foreign Affairs or National Geographic from pretty much any year conceivable, etc.), old comics like Batman and Superman in Arabic, huge collections of well-worn English paperback novels, etc. There is no real logic in the way things were arranged, so it was pretty much a browsing situation. I love book fairs, so this was my favorite part. Below are some photos of the book fair, including a photo of my number one find in the used book area (which I did not buy): Lonely Planet U.S.S.R., publication date 1989. I know, it's awesome.

More book fair -- some of the stalls were outside.

Me reading Harry Potter in Arabic.

Lonely Planet U.S.S.R. Note how it says "travel survival kit" in the top right. This is clearly the most awesome thing I found at the book fair.

january is boring

For some reason, Egypt has the best fruits and vegetables in the winter. You can't really find things out of season like you can in the US, so sometimes you just can't get certain produce. Metro (the market we go to) has a small but mostly reliable section, so things like onions, tomatoes, cucumbers, apples and bananas are available year-round. But ever since I got back from traveling in January, they have magical things like avocados, strawberries (we have been buying these by the kilo), mandarins/clementines, and more.

This might not sound all that exciting to you, but this comes from shopping at a supermarket where finding tortillas, refrigerated milk or basil are causes for celebration. Normally when someone cooks they make enough for multiple people, operating under the assumption that someone else will show up to help eat. Or that if you are too tired/lazy/etc. to cook you can show up at someone else's place and be fed. Or sometimes just make plans to cook together. So we all tend to buy more or less similar things, just because there is not a huge selection. Anyway, there's not a whole lot of opportunity to branch out, which is why more choices make me happy. Also, they had tortillas, which I don't think I have seen since I got here (please see earlier complaints about finding Mexican food), so that was pretty exciting also.

In other news, this past weekend, A1, A2 and I finally inaugurated (see what I did there?) our apartment with a belated housewarming party. We had a fun theme of Hollywood/Bollywood (Cairo loves a good themed party), and overall had a good time being good host/esses. It was a good excuse to have everyone over because, let's face it... January is boring.

the internets have arrived!

I am writing this post from (drumroll please....) MY APARTMENT! Where I finally have internet! Internet that is actually an account that my roommates and I purchased and own legitimately! Victory!

I have been living here for six months and this is the first time I have had internet at home. If you told me when I was graduating that I was about to go without internet at home for six months, I would have laughed...and then panicked. But truth be told, it was a lot easier to adjust to than I thought. Most evenings I am out and about anyway, and I sit in front of a computer all day so not checking my e-mail at night is just not a big deal. Plus, life here in Cairo is pretty chilled out, so I don't really have many emergency e-mails that need immediate attention. I suppose I just feel much less internet-dependent than I used to be, though I am sure that will all change now that I have a connection again.

Which means, fans of blog, that you can now reach me in my very own home and not just during my work hours. Contact me via e-mail and I will pass along my AIM and skype names so we can plan video chats and skype dates and whatnot. Just let me know and I will be glad to arrange a time with you.

family vacation

Until this weekend, I never knew that an entire country could lose internet connection. But that's what happened on Friday, when some undersea cable near Italy came loose or had some kind of problem, and all of Egypt found itself without any internet. People were still able to connect via iPhone or similar satellite-type thing, but all landlines weren't functioning. Seeing hordes of people panic as they run (in vain!) from one internet cafe to the next could have been funny, but when we heard that it might take five days to be repaired (actual time: about 24 hours), that panic hit me too. Anyway, it all seems to be fixed now, so no worries. I mean, it's still a bit slower than I would like but at least it's working.

In other news, my family (Dad, Mom, Michelle, Jessica) are coming to visit me/see Egypt. They were supposed to arrive in time for dinner this evening, but thanks to bad weather somewhere along the way they were rerouted through London and Amsterdam and will eventually arrive closer to 3 a.m. I am looking forward to showing them around Cairo, so it should be a fun week. Next week we will be going to Upper Egypt (Luxor, Aswan, etc.) to see all the Pharonic ruins and sites, and then to Rome for New Year's. I will try to post again this week, but if not, hope you all have a Happy Hanukkah, Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

it's beginning to look a lot like fake christmas

Holiday season is here, and we have already started celebrating here in Cairo. Last week before I left for Jordan, we celebrated Fake Christmas. A friend, M2 (M1 is my former flatmate), used to live in Cairo but now works in Abu Dhabi, and came back to Cairo to see people. To mark the occasion, she and another friend, I, decided to co-host an early Christmas party with holiday poppers, Secret Santa gifts, Christmas songs, champagne purchased at Duty Free, and a nice little tree. All hosted on a I's houseboat on the Nile, which was a great view. Hanukkah party will be this weekend, and I'm also excited for that.

View of the Nile on a cloudy day at twilight. Well, let's be realistic -- it's part dusk, part smog I would guess.

For those interested in what it's like to live as an expat abroad, here's an article written in a magazine for TCKs. A TCK, or third culture kid, is one who grows up in a culture outside their own or that of their parents, sometimes meaning in multiple countries. This article talks a bit about expat communities and culture, and Egypt is mentioned at the end. My life here is a bit different because I hang out with a younger crowd, not families, but it's still pretty interesting I think.

My other exciting news is that my roommate A2 was in an Egyptian commercial! Some of you may remember that back in August I accidentally auditioned for a commercial. Well, A2 went on another audition and booked the part. The commercial is for Etisalat, an Egyptian phone company. The ad, which is in Arabic, is below. You can catch A2 at the 15 second mark.

roman ruins and the river jordan

This past week I spent traveling in Jordan with N for our Eid vacation. Jordan is a beautiful country; we covered most of the country, from Jerash and Ajloun in the north to Wadi Rum in the south, and we saw some amazing things. I won't bore you with all the details, but here are some highlights and impressions.

My first impression of Jordanians was that they are extremely classy. In Egypt people will often get dressed up to go out; many of the more exclusive bars and clubs require reservations, and I have certainly had nights when I would need to look “shiny,” to borrow a term from my friend H. But in Jordan, everyone we saw was very trendy and dressy all the time, even in the airport and walking around in the cheaper downtown area. I felt underdressed in my dirty desert jeans. Also, Jordan seemed more conservative. In Egypt my friends and I regularly walk around in T-shirts, or skirts that come to the knee. In Jordan all the women appeared much more covered up, usually to the wrists, and many more women seemed to be wearing hijabs (were veiled).

As far as I am concerned, besides the beautiful scenery, the best part about Jordan was the famous Middle Eastern hospitality. I have experienced it to some extent in Egypt, especially during Ramadan I think. I have been welcomed into people's homes, and invited for meals and iftars. But Jordanians take it to a whole new level, in an awesome way. Everyone was so willing to share what they had, no matter what it was. Our driver from Amman to Petra stopped on the way to pick up food for his dinner and after he picked up each component he offered us some -- bread, juice, radishes. It didn't matter that he couldn't afford much, he wanted us to have some. In Petra, we met this Bedouin girl who gave us directions on our hike, then when she saw us on the way out she invited us for tea and some fruit. On the bus from Wadi Rum to Amman, there weren't a ton of free seats so we all had to split up. I ended up in the back row with a family that had four small children. Every time one of them went to eat something (a bag of chips, some orange slices, etc.), they always offered me some also... and wouldn't stop offering until I had taken just a little. Each time, it was just really nice. What a friendly country.

N and I landed in Amman last Saturday, a city that reminded me a lot of Jerusalem. Actually, a lot of Jordan's scenery reminded me of Israel, which is not really surprising given the amount of time I have spent in Israel and the fact that two countries share a border and thus fairly similar geography. Anyway, I think the biggest shock about Amman was that it was so quiet. It's a lovely city, spread across multiple hilltops and without any huge skyscrapers (that's what I meant about it being like Jerusalem). But everything closes so early. I don't think I have ever spent a significant amount of time in a city where everything just shut down so completely at such a ridiculous hour. All the tourist sites closed by 4 p.m., then the restaurants at around 7 p.m. One day we left our hostel at 8:30 to get dinner and everything was already closed, except for a few street falafel stands. Another night we went for dinner at 6:30 and when we left, they were putting away all the food and getting ready to close the place down. Also, all the public transportation, namely buses and minibuses, completely stopped running by 5 p.m. at the latest (though often much earlier). This meant getting up really early many mornings in order to still be able to enjoy a full day at any one site.

Petra was absolutely amazing. Our hostel screened Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (the one where the end was filmed in Petra), which was fun. We made friends with some of the other people in the hostel and then walked around with them for a bit. If you only have one day it's possible to hit the highlights and see a lot of Petra, but it's better if you have two days. On our second day, N and I chose to go see a slightly out of the way site called the "High Place of Sacrifice," which on the map looked like a short hike up but ended up being a serious trek. By the time we got to the top we were a little exhausted, but we had an amazing view of all of Petra, so it was completely worth it.

More friends were made on the way to Wadi Rum. The way to get from Petra to Wadi Rum is a 6:30 a.m. bus, and N and I hoped that we would be able to meet other people on the bus to share a tour guide with us in Wadi Rum. First on the bus we met a Korean girl traveling alone, and then as we got off we met two more Australians (N is also Australian). All wanted to share a half-day tour in Wadi Rum, and all wanted to go back to Amman that night (including us). We ended up with a tour lasting 3 1/2 hours through the desert, which was awesome, and then we began the process of getting back to Amman.

Since no buses run in the evenings (or even after noon in some cases), we figured our best shot was to try and flag down a bus or minibus on its way to Amman from Aqaba and get on from the main highway. Our Lonely Planet guide advised hitchhiking, which we considered, but there were five of us with large backpacks or duffel bags, so we eventually decided against it. The first few minibuses were a bit expensive, and several cars kept pulling over to ask us where we were going and why (this was a time when we obviously stood out as tourists, just standing on the side of Jordan's main highway looking like dirty backpackers).

Eventually a minibus came along and said they were going to Ma'an, a town in the center of Jordan on the way north where we would be able to catch a connecting bus to Amman. There weren't necessarily enough seats on the minibus, but some people shifted around and squished in so we could all have seats. In Ma'an we transferred to another bus to Amman, where we once again had to split up and squeeze in where we could (this is where I sat with the travelling family), and then finally arrived in Amman in time to go back to the hostel we had stayed in the first night. We brought the Australians with us, and all went together to have a nice dinner in the classy part of town, as opposed to the cheap local fare we had been enjoying (though the Bedouin food was really fantastic). Anyway, we really enjoyed this hostel, and met lots of cool people there over the time we were there -- some Polish art students, an Australian grandmother traveling around the world, two Spanish brothers on vacation in Jordan and Israel, and some others. It was a lot of fun to feel a part of the Jordan backpacking culture.

We also hit all the major tourist sites; we were able to cover almost the entire country in one week. We went to Petra for two days (one of the most amazing things I have seen), Wadi Rum (this desert protected area with lots of cool formations and great scenery, and you need a Bedouin tour guide to go around), Madaba (centuries-old mosaic map of the holy sites of the ancient world), Mt. Nebo (mountain from which Moses viewed Israel before dying), the castles of Karak and Shobak, Dead Sea (have now been from both Israel and Jordan), Bethany Beyond the Jordan (the site on the River Jordan where they think Jesus was baptized), Jerash (a city in the north with fantastic Roman ruins), Aljoun (another ancient castle), and Amman. We didn't make it to Aqaba or the Eastern Desert, but I guess that's just another reason to go back.

So overall it was a pretty excellent trip, as I hope you can tell by my stories. Check out the post below for some photos, and more will soon be up on Facebook.

photos from jordan

Here are some selected photos from my trip to Jordan. Check back for more details and fun travel stories in a later post. More photos will eventually be on facebook (seriously, I have like more than 300 from just this one week).

The view from Mt. Nebo, where Moses supposedly looked across as Israel (but was not allowed in) before dying. Those hazy mountains in the distance are Israel.

Al-Khazneh, or the Treasury, at Petra. You might recognize this building from Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (and if not, you should go watch it!). But seriously, Petra is one of the most amazing things I have ever seen.

Nabatean tombs caves in Petra.

More tombs and ruins in Petra.

On our second day in Petra, N and I opted for what we thought we would be a short hike to a place called the "High Place of Sacrifice." Well, it was indeed high, but after the trek we got amazing views and this stone altar. Here I contemplate stepping out into the mountains.

Our Bedouin tour guide with his 4x4 in the Wadi Rum protected area.

Wadi Rum desert. A wadi is a kind of valley, and is sometimes translated as like a dry riverbed.

Sitting on a rock bridge in Wadi Rum. They don't have these in the desert in Egypt!

Roman ruins in Jerash, in northern Jordan. This city supposedly has the best-preserved Roman ruins outside of Italy, and they were indeed pretty amazing.

Temple of Zeus in Jerash.

Here I am attempting to step on and/or kick over the ruins below, which are part of the oval forum in Jerash.

And here is N and I at the Dead Sea, which I have now visited and swum in from both sides.