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!

orientalist architecture

My farewell post is coming soon, I promise. But first: some photos of one of my favorite neighborhoods in Cairo. Islamic Cairo has many beautiful mosques, which I find so innately peaceful. You take off your shoes, women make sure their hair is covered, find a spare bit of carpet and enjoy the quiet. I like the beautiful vaulted ceilings and striped arches and the minarets you can usually visit if you provide a little baksheesh (tip/bribe).

It's the way I had always pictured the Middle East.

At Al-Azhar Mosque, one of the most famous in the Middle East. It also has a school attached, Al-Azhar University, which is one of the oldest universities in the world.

A view of the Citadel and Mohammed Ali Mosque from an Al-Azhar minaret. Everything in the middle is part of Islamic Cairo.

The Al-Ghoury Mosque, school and tomb in Islamic Cairo. It's very centrally located near Khan al-Khalili, and is one of my favorites since it's really beautiful inside.

Stained glass windows in the Al-Ghoury Mosque.

Me in the mosque. Note the gorgeous arches...sigh.

Climbing a minaret! This is where the muezzin come to sound the call to prayer.

This is in the Mouayyid Mosque down by Bab Zuweila. To those who have never been in a mosque, the indented area on the left is called a mihrab, and it indicates the direction of Mecca (i.e., the direction in which one should pray). The stairs on the right is where the Imam will go on Fridays to deliver the sermon.

Bab Zuweila, one of the oldest gates that was an entrance to Old Cairo. These minarets you can climb normally with a legitimate ticket, but really, where's the fun in that?

when jesus was in egypt-land

Today I finally went to see Coptic Cairo, the oldest part of modern Cairo that contains the Coptic Museum, a number of churches, and the Ben Ezra Synagogue (entrance pictured above), which is the oldest in Egypt. Coptic Christians make up about 10 percent of Egypt's population of 80 million, but most of the Copts live in Middle Egypt. Anyway, the Coptic language is like a combination of Greek and ancient Egyptian, I think, and they are famous for their textiles and the monasteries, several of which are still in use today in places like Fayoum and Wadi Natroun.

First I went to the Coptic Museum, where they have recreated parts of monasteries and things like that. They also have complete garments that priests used to wear, as well as religious books from the 13th and 14th centuries. The oldest that they have, which is also actually one of the oldest books in existence, is a 1,600 year old (as in, from the year 400-ish) Book of Psalms in the Coptic language. I went in some of the churches, including the St. Sergius Church, which is where Jesus and family was said to have hidden out when they were passing through Egypt, and is probably the best-known church in the country. I also went into the Ben Ezra Synagogue, which was really cool. When repairs were being done on the building in the 18th (or maybe it was early 19th?) century, that's when they found the Cairo Geniza, which helped show a lot about the life of the Jews in Cairo and Egypt, including when the community was led by Rambam, a scholar also known as Maimonides (Rabbi Moses Ben Maimon = RMBM = Rambam). There were not supposed to be any photos allowed, but I gave the guard a little baksheesh (bribe/"tip") and he let me take some photos, sans flash of course. The synagogue is not in use anymore, but given that so few monuments remain to Egypt's Jews, it's nice to know that this one at least is being taken care of.

Also interesting, is that this is the first time in Cairo I have seen so many signs in Spanish as opposed to just French. Most guards, when addressing me, spoke to me in Spanish instead of Arabic (what I usually get) or English. I think it must be because lots of groups come from Spain and Latin America to see all the churches.

A plaque outside one of the churches...you can see what the Coptic language looks like on top, above the Arabic.

The outside of the Church of St. George, which people can't enter (but is one of the oldest in Cairo).

The inside of the synagogue. If you look, you can see the ten commandments above the ark, as well as the Stars of David. There was also a place to donate money for cemetary upkeep, one Torah on display, and menorahs that said "Zion" in the middle.

The outside of the Hanging Church, so called because it was built suspended over water (though it has been rebuilt since then I think).

The Hanging Church from the inside.

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.

just like raiders of the lost ark

In part of my quest to go explore something new in Cairo each weekend, I have recently become very closely acquainted with my Lonely Planet Egypt. In perusing, N and I discovered that in addition to Cairo, there are things we both want to see in Alexandria as well. We have both been to Alex before (N multiple time, me just in September ), but had not seen the catacombs of Kom al-Shuqqafa, which we both wanted to see. So on Saturday, the two of us caught the 9 am train from Cairo to Alex, and our Egyptian friend S3 (who is also N's roommate) picked us up at the train station. She is from Alex and goes home some weekends, so it's always nice to have a knowledgable friend on hand to show you around. After a quick lunch, we went to the catacombs (no cameras inside so I only have pictures of the outside, check below!), which were really cool. Apparently they were discovered by accident in 1900 when a donkey feel through the ceiling, and our tour guide then proceeded to give us a full history of "things discovered in Egypt when a horse or donkey fell through a ceiling." FYI, this happens more than you think. I guess if you really want to find some ancient Pharonic treasures, bring along a horse and hope they take care of the hard part for you.

Inside the catacombs, there was this huge hole through the center of the ceiling that they used to lower the bodies through, plus all these side passageways with tons of tombs. There was also this area that apparently used to be the tomb for a private (and wealthy) Roman family, and it included this stone archway and entrance. The whole thing looked like a booby-trapped scene from Indiana Jones, so you kind of got the impression that when you tried to enter you might be bowled over by a large stone ball, or that some wooden spears would suddenly come flying out of the sides. We decided to brave it anyway, and it was fine. Which was both a relief and slightly disappointing at the same time.

Also, the last time we went we saw the outside of the Bibliotheca Alexandrina, but it was already closed (because it was Ramadan), so this time we were able to go inside. They had a really cool exhibit called "Impressions of Alexandria" that featured maps, drawings and photos of Alexandria going back hundreds of years, and N and I also took the time to select a book and sit down and read for 15 minutes, so we could say we read books at the library of Alexandria (OK, it's not the fabled great library anymore, but it's still pretty cool). I read from Macbeth (I've always loved that play, at least partially due to the witches), and the complete works of T.S. Eliot (not for Cats! It's because his poem "The Hollow Men" is one my favorites), and N read from a collection of English literature from Ceylon (this is the old name for Sri Lanka, where N's family is from).

After all that, we went back to S3's house for lunch/dinner, which included some deliciously prepared seafood, which we don't get all that often in Cairo. In Alexandrian fashion, the fish were served whole on the bone, and N and I didn't really have any idea how to go about eating it. But S3 and her mom helped us, and I think we were at least pretty entertaining trying to figure it out -- so at least the ridiculous foreigners can be the dinner theater. Her family is great, and I enjoy spending time there when in Alex. We also went for a sunset stroll by the sea -- S3's family lives about a block away from the beach, and I think if I lived that close I would never get any work done at all.

N, me and S3 outside the tombs of Kom al-Shuqqafa

My arm being devoured by the stone lion, S3 freaking out in the background

Not inside one of the catacombs, but a separate tomb. Still, a cool drawing I think.

Inside the library...look at all those books! It goes so far down. A reader's paradise...

Me, jumping for joy to be near a beach

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

what should i do with my extra hour?

The great Cairo Museum Exploration continued this weekend when I went to the Museum of Islamic Ceramics on Saturday. Like most of the other museums I have been to here (besides the Egyptian Museum), it was empty. A2 and I were the only people there, and while you might think it would be creepy, I find it pretty cool to have a museum full of priceless antiquities all to yourself. There was no ticket booth or anything, but when we walked in the attendant came over and asked if we were tourists. We said we live in Cairo (fingers were crossed for the Egyptian ticket price instead of the foreigner one!), and were asked for proof. I used my EgyCare health insurance card, and we were ultimately given foreign student price (it's usually good for a 50 percent discount, and is second cheapest after actually being Egyptian). Great success!

Anyway, the museum is housed in a former mosque, and the mihrab is still in front and there are cool arches and stuff, plus some really beautiful stained glass windows and great Arabic calligraphy on the walls. My inner Orientalist was pleased. The museum mostly has dishes, tiles, pots, jugs, etc. from all over the Middle East and surrounding area -- Egypt, Syria, Turkey, Persia, Andalusia (Spain in pre-Ottoman times was called Al-Andaluz, though Andalusia now refers to the southern region of Spain). Some went as far back as the 9th and 10th centuries. There were also some more modern ones that were modeled on those artifacts, and those were nice also. It's amazing how many are in such great condition, and really beautiful with vibrant colors and intricate details. I really like a lot of the Islamic pottery because I think they don't look ancient; a lot of those jugs were more than 500 years old, but they look you could just pick one up and pour yourself a glass of water right right here in 2009. Cool stuff.

Also, I recently realized that we're still not back on Daylight Savings Time, when the rest of the world appears to be. I know America already switched "sprang forward," like a month ago, and figured we in Egypt were just biding our time. But apparently not. I have heard they might not have it this year, something to do with when Ramadan falls. Can they do this? Can an entire country just opt out of Daylight Savings Time? And if so, isn't there some weird cosmic imbalance because I get an extra hour this year (from when we "fell back" in September) that I apparently don't have to give back? And if that's true, I feel like I should be grateful, and should come up with something really amazing and awe-inspiring to do with that extra hour. Thoughts?

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.