Cairo, Egypt

Have you seen the Pyramids yet?

egyptohmy — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 17:15:55 +0000

It seems like that’s what everyone asks of me and finally I can say yes to that question. I went to the Pyramids with my friends, Madeline and Kariko, and it was one of the best days yet. It is truly one of the majestic things I’ve ever seen. Now I’m thinking how Morgan Freeman and Jack Nicholson got that awesome view in The Bucket List…Anyways, I got on a camel for the first leg of the trip and a horse after. I was surprised at how tall a camel actually is. I really love the horse though. We went slowly but in the more desert area, we went faster. It’s scary but enthralling at the same time. I want to try horse back riding now. It’s so different when you see the actual thing in front of you instead of looking at pictures. I’m amazed how the Egyptians built this huge structure with such little technology. The blocks are gigantic. We climbed the first few steps of the Pyramid but they wouldn’t let us go inside. I heard that there’s nothing inside anyways but just a small room where the king used to be buried in.

The Pyramids

Oh yeah, so school started two days ago. The first day was alright. There are 3 exchange students from AFS in my class: Leo from Germany, Silvia from Italy, and Stephan from Austria. I had Biology, Physics, Calculus, English, Psychology, Business, Arabic, and Religion. I went to Arabic and Religion class, and I felt hopeless because I couldn’t understand anything at all. I’m in 12th grade, so obviously the class would be so advance. The other 3 exchange students felt the same way too. I thought I would be stuck in that class forever, but hopefully the principal took us out and meanwhile, we would stay in his office. Same for Biology and Physics…I dread going to these classes because I already took it. I don’t see a reason why I would need to retake it. Plus, I hate science. However, I didn’t go to these classes and stayed in the principal’s office yet again. WOOT. I really like the staff here. My math and english teacher are sometimes boring, but they are pretty good teachers. The principal and counselor is really understanding too. The AFS coordinator in my school is also very helpful and active for making this a great year. We talked about World Challenge, a fund-raising campaign for students to earn enough money on their own to travel to another country. It sounds awesome. Imagine traveling to another country for maybe 2-6 weeks while already on a study aboard program. Haha, that will be one hellava adventure. So for now, I’ll be taking Calculus, English, Psychology, Business, and P.E. Maybe, they’ll put Economics, Arabic, and Religion in my schedule later on. The classes seem relatively easy, so I’m not going to worry too much.

My school

American Stereotype?

egyptohmy — Sat, 05 Sep 2009 01:02:03 +0000

Now that I’ve been here for about 2 weeks now, I’ve been asked the same question numerous times. Why do Americans not care about the rest of the world? I was talking with my uncle, Ahmed about America, and he asked this question. Why do Americans think that Egypt is only sand, desert, and pyramids? To be honest, I had no idea how to respond. I was in a way, trying to defend America, but my excuse isn’t good enough: “People are busy with their own lives.” Yes, but so are the Egyptians. He’s right about that…I’m not saying ALL Americans are, but most. He goes on to say how he knows a lot about other countries and people. We were talking about Barack Obama, and stating simple facts about him. He later proves his point by asking if I know the president of Egypt…ehhh take a guess, I don’t know. I didn’t take my time to research everything about the country. Basically, he’s saying how Americans don’t put in the extra effort to know about other people, and care for themselves.

What do you guys think?

What’s different…

egyptohmy — Tue, 01 Sep 2009 12:53:52 +0000

I didn’t notice until now, but I can’t see any clouds here. It’s just one huge canvas of the sky with no specks of clouds whatsoever. At night, I don’t see stars too. That’s probably cause I live in the city, but I really want to just be somewhere serene and see the sky covered with stars.

At dawn, they play the Azan. It is a call to prayer that is played throughout the city from loud speakers by a muezzin, a man appointed to call the prayers. It also gets dark here really fast, at like 7 pm around.

The elevators are really tiny. You can fit like 2 – 3 people in there, and you can see the walls of the buildings when it goes up. When you get out, you push the door instead of an automatic moving door.

When I shower, cold water would come out even from the hot pipe. So, I would need to light this heat pump in order to get hot water.

Sometimes, men on the streets would hook arms and walk together.

In order to buy school uniforms, you need to go to specific shops on the streets, not from the school itself.

The height of the sidewalks are really high. You literally have to push off from your knee to get up and jump to get down. It’s like a foot or more longer.

Today, my host family’s relatives came over….a whole group of kids bombarded. I played games with them for at least 4 hours by now. I taught them how to play slap jack and they taught me how to play this card game called Kings. At least like 2 and a half hours of Uno haha. They’re really cute and funny though. I also showed them the love of Tap Tap Revenge, and Mai, my sister is playing UnblockMe right now. One of them who’s called Nada, looks like a mini Shivonne. They also taught me how to say colors…kids make great learning tools haha.

The kids

Nada (Mini-shivonne) and Yusuf

Dahlia, Me, and Fara

Egypt Orientation

egyptohmy — Sun, 30 Aug 2009 02:07:46 +0000

Got a small bus tour of a bit of Cairo. I went to some hostel for a day…another day of boring workshops and introductions. Though I did learn that I’m going to an international american school, so I can’t wait for that. I’m going to school after Ramadan ends so probably near the end of September. We also learned how to sorta bargain with store owners and cross the streets. The streets are frickin’ crazy. No street lights or set lanes. Cars just honk and move wherever and they go pretty fast. Some Egyptians also don’t use toilet papers. Apparently, there’s this thing that washes you instead when you sit on the toilet. I was also pretty surprised to see how many little children will be hanging around on the streets. One little girl was trying to sell me lemons…

The hostel

a cute stray cat

YES/NSLI Egypt

The good part was when I met my host family at the end of the day. The first place my host family took me was the sports club called El Shams Club, which is apparently the biggest club in the middle east. It’s unbelievable. It shouldn’t even be called a club, it should be called an amusement park instead. They have really cool things like a long long slide and bumper cars, but basketball is a big thing here. And I have to say that Egyptian girls are really pretty. My mom and my sister are really nice though. They’re not really indirect as the AFS people make them out to be. They’re rather direct, so that’s a good thing. It’s 4am now, and I’m still awake. Their schedules are backward. Because it’s ramadan, they basically function at night and sleep in the morning.

My host family

The apartment building

Living room

My room

The view from my room

D.C. Orientation

egyptohmy — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 03:13:06 +0000

The first day – I reached Laguardia at 8 in the morning. My flight was suppose to be at 9:49, but supposedly the tires were broken and the only way to get new ones was from Chicago, which would take a long time. The agent put me on 2:30pm standby…as figures, I didn’t get the seat. Then, a nice lady put me on the 3:30pm flight even though I was suppose to go on the 4:30 one…and the 4:30 one was canceled anyways. So I finally reached the Hilton Hotel at 6:00pm. Can you believe that? I’m the closest one to D.C. and I arrived the latest. I found out that my roomate is Madeline, and she’s from Okinawa, Japan. There’s also two from Wisconsin, Kariko and Bria, and one from Texas, Dylan that are going to Egypt with me. Kari, Madeline, and me would be placed in Nasr City, Cairo, while Bria would be in Al Zamalek, and Dylan in Giza.

The second day – We went to the Department of State for some interview…ughh I don’t think I did so well. Later, we went to the Cultural Center of Egypt where they gave us presentations of Egypt. We walked around the neighborhood…saw a few glimpses of American University, and took group photos. (They’ll be up shortly). It was pretty interesting, but then again boring. After, we went to eat a Turkish restuarant called Levantes. I discovered hummus, and it’s the amazing sauce I ate yet. I also ate Adana Kebab, which is a lamb skewer with rice…gosh the food is delicious. Then, we went to the Islamic Center, where we all girls put on shawls. We found out the speaker wasn’t going to be there, so we left and went back to the hotel instead. This came the boring part…hours of waiting and more speaking about the country and its culture. It’s repetitive and tiring. So here I am, it’s past curfew time. The stupid hotel doesn’t have internet…well they do, but you gotta pay. Anyways, I leave tomorrow afternoon! It’ll be a 12 hour flight with a layover at Frankfurt, Germany. And it does count that I’m going to Germany even if it’s for 2 hours!

YES Egypt @ Egyptian Embassy in DC

Turkish Restaurant

Adana Kebab

In front of the Islamic Center with our hejabs

The third day – We finally left for Egypt. The plane rides are horrible. I can’t get enough sleep, and there was some annoying guy that I sat next to on the ride from Germany to Cairo. Apparently, my new shoes were dirtying his “white” pants when I crossed my legs. Mad paranoid…I felt so homesick by now, like why the hell am I doing so?

@ Germany! the plane with the annoying guy complaining about his pants.