Tales of Two Cities (and beyond)

And it continues

2009-02-01T10:17:00.000-08:00

Hello all!

I am finally in Amsterdam after four different flights in three countries spanning 27 hours of travel time! Luckily everything went well, no lost baggage or missed flights this time! I am pretty tired but also happy at how smoothly things went.

It's freezing cold here but I am nice and toasty in my hotel room. I am staying here tonight and meeting my group tomorrow to get the real adventure underway.

I got a few odd looks in the airport carrying my two overstuffed backpacks (one in front and one in back) but it works ok.

My hotel is outside of the city so I don't get to do any exploring tonight. For some incomprehensible reason, the mascot of the place is a Tucan which I don't really understand...

I will try to be better about updating the blog this semester but now I am going to go shower and sleep.

Hair

2008-11-13T05:00:00.000-08:00

As a few of you know, I have been very stressed out by my midterms and generally just tired and cranky. One night a few days ago this stress came to peak as I was sitting on my bed studying for an exam. I saw my roomates scissors sitting on her desk and decided that I had to cut my bangs, right then. So I did. Unfortunatly for my hair, I am not so good at cutting straight, at all.

I finally went to the hairdesser today to see what could be done which is no easy feat when I don't speak Arabic and they don't speak English. I have a new haircut now and at least semi straight bangs. It's not the best cut I've ever had but it's also not the worst. Our conversation consisted mostly of hand gestures and smiles and then we moved on to political conversation. Obama kuwayyis (good) McCain mish kuyawwis (not good). They all really like Obama over here and very happy that he got elected.

Football!

2008-10-24T07:47:00.000-07:00

The Past Month...

2008-10-11T11:06:00.001-07:00

Hello Everyone!

Sorry about the huge lag in the posting. I have been busy/thought that people at home would not really be interested in what I have been up to as I haven’t thought it was that interesting. Then I remembered that being here is so different from being pretty much anywhere else that everyday stuff might be more interesting than it normally would.
I am going to try to update more often, once a week maybe so we’ll see how that goes…

I can’t believe it is already October. I am starting midterms at school and actually might have to do some studying! Yuck.

We just had our first break from school for Eid which is the holiday at the end of Ramadan. My roommate Heather and I went to Dahab, which is a beach town on the Gulf of Aqaba on the Sinai peninsula. I had the flue when we left but I went with one of my Egyptian friends to a pharmacy and he made them give me lots of different medicines. So I basically slept for the first two days of vacation and then we spent the next few just hanging out on the beach, eating good food and smoking sheesha. Traveling as only two people was really nice because we didn’t really have to coordinate anything and could jut go with the flow. The last couple of days we decided that we should probably actually do something with ourselves so we went snorkeling in Blue Hole. The area of Sinai where we were has world renounced snorkeling and diving. The water is beautiful and you see all types of amazing and exotic fish just under the surface.
That night we took a bus out to Mount Sinai or Moses Mountain as they call it here and hiked up it. We wanted to see the sunrise so we started the hike at about 2am. There were literally about 500 people climbing the mountain, which meant that there was a continuous trail of lights winding its way up the path. It was incredibly beautiful. We got to the top about 40 minutes before the sun rose and sat there freezing and watching it get light. As it got lighter we began to see the stark and breathtaking beauty of the mountains. The rocks are all rose colored and in fantastic patterns. I have tons of pictures but unfortunately can’t post any of them. I have never seen a sunrise like that one. IT was like a ball of fire that came up from behind the mountain. Within minutes it went from freezing to warm and then as we were climbing back down to broiling hot. Our guide up was a really cool Bedouin kid. I had heard from other people that the guides are not very nice but I really liked Mahmoud. We talked about his family and what it’s like to live out in the desert. He said he could live in the US or Russia for “an hour” but then it would be too loud and he would have to come back. HE has been a guide for three years and is only 18 but he says it is a good life. He also says that he can climb the mountain in about an hour, with out shoes and can get back down in half an hour. I have no trouble believing that because when he moves over the rocks it looks like he is gliding in a smooth dance. It incredibly impressive, as I felt like I was going to die on the way down and my legs hurt for the next three days!
The next day we took a Jeep out to the desert to see the colored and white canyons. The silence was amazing. I haven’t been somewhere that is actually quiet since I got here. There is always noise in Cairo, always. The canyons are also gorgeous. The landscape of the entire region is awe-inspiring. There is almost no vegetation and its stark and barren but still incredible looking. Once again I have pictures that will just have to wait.
Other than that I have just been exploring Cairo and getting lost less and less. I am used to the cabs and cabbies and rarely get ripped off and pay too much to get somewhere. I still hate the buses out and back from school and am unimpressed with a few of my classes but all in all I am extremely happy to be here and can’t believe how fast the time has gone!

Le School

2008-09-07T08:23:00.000-07:00

Today was the first day of school. I missed my bus this morning but still managed to make it to the campus before my first class was scheduled to end but when I finally found the classroom, there was no one there. This was indicative of most people's experience. The move to the new campus has been chaotic to say the absolute least. No one has any idea where anything is, professors included so many simply did not come to classes today.

The campus is beautiful but not, um, finished. There are not desks or chairs in many of the classrooms, no lights in the bathrooms, no ac in most places and construction on many of the buildings is ongoing. I am sure it will be lovely once the move is complete but right now it is totally disorganized and somewhat discouraging.

The students, egyptian and foreign alike, all agree that it is somewhat of a rediculous perdicament. For instance, there are TWO places to get food/drinks for over 5,000 students. There are no signs on any of the buildings and the maps are worthless because they have different names than the abreviations on the course catalgous. We get most of our information through the rumor mill which is not all that accurate. Plus, the class schedules and bus shedules are shifted because of Ramadan, which makes it even more difficult to navigate.

Right now I feel like this was just another disorganized AUC outing which would be fine, but the thought that it is what I have to deal with for the next couple of weeks at least is not a pleasent thought.

Alexandria

2008-09-06T14:40:00.000-07:00

AUC sponsored a trip to Alexandria for the past few days. The upside was: meeting lots of new international students, seeing the sights with a guide, a decent hotel and food included. The downside was: having to travel with about 100 other people. I am definitely a small group/solo traveling type of person.

Two of my friends and I decided on the second night to try to find a bar we had heard about downtown. Because it is Ramadan, many thing are not open until after Iftar (dark) and of those that are, most do not serve alcohol. We caught a cab to downtown and then quickly realized that we no idea what to do next. I called another friend to try and get directions but the combination of loud noise and my lack of Arabic made understanding the street names impossible. We asked a waiter at a restaurant for directions and were directed around the block to a newspaper man who "know everything". The newspaper guy pointed us in the right direction. We wandered for a while without sucess, eventually ending up in a square. Out of nowhere a man approached us and asked if we were lost. We tried to ask him the name of the street and he asked where specifically we were going. We told him we were looking for Spitfire and his face lit up. He then asked if we knew Yousse. Puzzled we said no. I remembered that one my friends who had told me about the place was named Joey so I asked if maybe he meant Josef. "Yes" he exlaimed. "Youssef! I will take you to him. He is good friend." I was dubious because a common strategy of shop owners here is to offer to show a tourist where something is and the take them to their shop and try to sell them things. However, since we had no idea where we were, we took him up on his offer. Miraculously, he led us straight to the door of the bar we wanted and left without asking for any baksheesh, only a promise to get in touch with him if we needed any hashish. (We didn't).

We walked into the bar and met up with our friends. When we told them what had happened they all laughed and said the man had randomly appproached them with offers of hashish and they really did not know who he was. We still have no idea how he knew we were looking for them or where they had gone.

Flaming Butt Pee

2008-09-01T20:22:00.000-07:00

Is the horrifically graphic but accurate description many of the international students have adopted to describe our various gastrointestinal maladies.

Contemplate....

Gross, yes?

Pyramids

2008-08-29T05:51:00.000-07:00

The school here has tons of activities for us during orientation which has its advantages and disadvantages. The upside is that you get to meet tons of people, the downside is you are part of a huge group of Americans and draw a lot of attention to yourself.

One of the school sponsored trips was a desert horseback riding trip to the pyramids, which I opted to go on. I have mixed feelings about the experience.

We took school vans out to Giza where the Pyramids are. They are in a type of artificial desert with Cairo spreading out around them, the pictures I'm sure you all have seen are shot from a specific angle to make it seem like they are isolated in the middle of the desert. It was still magical and amazing to see them rise up from behind a hill as we were riding out. I got some pictures but they are a little blurry because we were there at night. I will try to go back during the day and get better pictures of them as well as the Sphyinx.

I won't be taking horses out the next time though. The horses are malnourished and are whipped to exhaustion everyday. They take multiple tours and I have my doubts about the amount they are fed. When we were at the top of the hill at a little camp, they were trying to eat the bark from the logs we were leaning against. You can see their ribs and the hips bones look like they are about to poke through their skin. One horse I was riding was so skinny, my heels couldn't connect to urge it on. After that, I just let it go as fast as it wanted to which was a very slow walk.

The area around the pyramids is abysmally poor. You ride through alleys of huts with dirty barefoot children waving at you while their mothers try to sell you things like individual packets of Keenex. Their is trash everywhere.

If you look down on the ride up or down from the Pyramids chances are you will see a camel or horse who did not make it back. When they die on the trail, they are left to rot in the desert and for the dogs to eat. When they get sick down below, they are taken behind a wall, shot and carted away in a pick up truck.

As bad as I felt for the horses, I suppose it is a way for the people there to make some type of living. I am still conflicted about the whole experience.

2008-08-26T03:50:00.000-07:00

Greetings from Cairo!!

I am here, safe and sound. Sadly the same cannot be said for one of my bags. I anxiously await its arrival and hope to see it very soon...

Cairo is huge and bustling and amazing. The driving is unlike anything I have ever experienced before. There are very few traffic signals and the ones that do exist seem to be more for decoration than anything else. The drivers weave in and out of traffic, often ignoring the lanes, they honk all the time, sometimes to say "get out of the way" and sometimes it seems just to say "hi". The drive from the airport was harrowing but I am pretty used to the traffic by now (at least when I am in a car). Crossing the street is an adventure unto itself. Pedestrians have the opposite of right of way. There are no crosswalks and so crossing the street means running when there are the least cars, sometimes stopping in the middle of the street to let a car speed past. Somewhat unbelievably, I have yet to see an accident. Another fun road fact is the double parking that occurs here. I think it is technically illegal but very common. The courteous thing to do is to leave the car and neutral with the parking break unlocked so the person you are blocking can simply push your car out of the way when you want to leave.

Other than traffic adventures I have been meeting tons of new people generally trying to stay coolish and healthy.

In the beggining

2008-08-20T08:49:00.000-07:00

Hi Everyone!

So I have followed the many suggestions I recieved and started a blog. I even set it up by myslef, an amazing feat considering my technological phobia...
Right now I am busy packing, more packing, running last minute errands and saying good bye to everyone. I am incredibly excited to begin this adventure but am also very, very nervous.
I will post more when there is more to post but for now I will just try to fit everything into two suitcases under fifty pounds!