It has been ten days since I graduated from college and left Princeton's Orange Bubble for Cairo. I've been putting off starting my blog given the chaos of moving to a new (and pretty chaotic) city and starting classes. As background, I'm here for the next year as a fellow in the CASA program (the Center for Arabic Study Abroad), which is administered by a shadowy combination of the American University in Cairo, the University of Texas, and the U.S. government's money. The idea, as far as I can tell, is to be reasonably fluent by next May in both Modern Standard Arabic and in Egyptian dialect, 3amiyya [n.b. the 3 is an 'ayn, that back-of-the-throat letter that we Anglophones have a lot of trouble with]. They say we'll be able to read a whole novel in weekend... we'll see about that.
I meant to write my first post about an encounter I had in Princeton, in fact. Returning to campus in a taxi, I began chatting with the driver and discovered that he was Egyptian. Though he had left in the early 1980s after being imprisoned for political protests in college, Saleh eagerly scribbled down the numbers of his two brothers for me in Cairo, insisted that I meet the one who is a high-ranking official at the police academy here. It was a serendipitous meeting and of course I plan to contact the brothers soon.
Today I decided I could no longer postpone my blogging because political tensions are rapidly escalating. Yesterday, the Supreme Constitutional Court ruled that (a) Parliament would be dissolved because the elections were invalid, and (b) Ahmed Shafiq's candidacy for president was valid despite his prominent role in the fallen regime. Friday, today, which is usually the big day for protests anyway because people are not at work, Tahrir Square is (according to security updates and the news, not personal experience) filling up with protesters. I don't know any more than those of you following the New York Times and Twitter, though, about the scale of what will go down today or over the next couple of days. Tomorrow and Sunday are the days of the presidential runoff election between Shafiq and Morsi, the Muslim Brotherhood candidate. For most liberals and for young revolutionaries, neither of these is a viable option. In my middle-class neighborhood in Dokki (don't worry mom and dad, it's not close to Tahrir), Shafiq has a pretty strong presence. His campaign headquarters is just a 8-minute walk or so from my apartment, and what we've taken to calling the "Shafiq-mobile" has been a prominent presence in the nearby streets over the last few days. By that I mean a minivan plastered in posters, with a very loud megaphone. It drives around blaring the message: "Bismillah al-rahman al-rahim. Ahmed Shafiq. Raqm 1. Ramz al-sullam." (Number one, sign of the ladder, etc.) We also had an overexcited taxi driver yesterday who was essentially unrolling Shafiq posters while driving, or rapidly weaving, through traffic.
Although the elections are on everyone's lips, life marches on as usual while we wait to see what happens in the next few days. Although our classes are technically supposed to be at the Tahrir campus of AUC, that isn't too feasible at the moment, so we're in the university's dorms in upscale Zamalek for the summer. Since class starts at 8:30 every morning and cabs get pricy on our modest stipends, my roommates and I have been waking up at what still feels like the crack of dawn to catch a microbus to the bridge that we can then cross into Zamalek. Although various sources have repeatedly warned us against microbuses, including a taxi driver who lectured to us at CASA, who said they take drugs while driving, it has been working out pretty well the last few days. Anyway, a ride only costs 50 piasters, or 8 cents. So many different levels of society exist here: one can pay 2 dollars for a single boutique cupcake in Zamalek (yes, I did this) or 75 cents for 2 filling sandwiches and bottled water at the ful and ta3meyya (falafel) place around the corner (I also did this). I'll write more about my neighborhood and apartment building later sometime, but suffice it to say that it is nice without being fancy. I live next-door to a McDonald's on a well-lit square/traffic circle that has trees and grass. There are tons of places to eat or consume juice cheaply on the large nearby streets of Tahrir and Dokki.
Class is pretty exhausting, but going well so far. I definitely feel that I'll be learning a lot quickly. Generally by the time class ends at 1pm, all I want to do is nap directly in front of the fan, although even that doesn't really alleviate the dripping neck sweat that is an inevitable product of summer in Cairo. Homework, which I didn't really imagine I'd be doing a week after graduating from college, comes in copious amounts. They're breaking us in. In terms of class, we have 3ameyya for two hours every morning, then MSA for two hours, and then the homework cycle begins anew. For this reason, I haven't had much time for sightseeing since I returned to Egypt. Still, I did take a trip last Saturday to the pyramid at Saqqara, which predates the Giza pyramids and was constructed relatively soon after Upper and Lower Egypt were united. There are also several other smaller mastabas (tombs) at the site. We went to the Mastaba of Ti, in which extensive hieroglyphics and friezes have been preserved. Afterward, we stopped briefly at Memphis, capital of Egypt during the Old Kingdom.
I have also been making an effort to reunite with my old friends here and get to know the other students in CASA. The Arabic-learning world is very close-knit, and so practically everyone in CASA knows someone I've studied Arabic with before. Last night, for example, I attended my first houseboat party, hosted by some friends who live on just such a boat in the neighborhood of Imbaba.
Expect more updates soon (inshallah) with news of the elections.
I meant to write my first post about an encounter I had in Princeton, in fact. Returning to campus in a taxi, I began chatting with the driver and discovered that he was Egyptian. Though he had left in the early 1980s after being imprisoned for political protests in college, Saleh eagerly scribbled down the numbers of his two brothers for me in Cairo, insisted that I meet the one who is a high-ranking official at the police academy here. It was a serendipitous meeting and of course I plan to contact the brothers soon.
Today I decided I could no longer postpone my blogging because political tensions are rapidly escalating. Yesterday, the Supreme Constitutional Court ruled that (a) Parliament would be dissolved because the elections were invalid, and (b) Ahmed Shafiq's candidacy for president was valid despite his prominent role in the fallen regime. Friday, today, which is usually the big day for protests anyway because people are not at work, Tahrir Square is (according to security updates and the news, not personal experience) filling up with protesters. I don't know any more than those of you following the New York Times and Twitter, though, about the scale of what will go down today or over the next couple of days. Tomorrow and Sunday are the days of the presidential runoff election between Shafiq and Morsi, the Muslim Brotherhood candidate. For most liberals and for young revolutionaries, neither of these is a viable option. In my middle-class neighborhood in Dokki (don't worry mom and dad, it's not close to Tahrir), Shafiq has a pretty strong presence. His campaign headquarters is just a 8-minute walk or so from my apartment, and what we've taken to calling the "Shafiq-mobile" has been a prominent presence in the nearby streets over the last few days. By that I mean a minivan plastered in posters, with a very loud megaphone. It drives around blaring the message: "Bismillah al-rahman al-rahim. Ahmed Shafiq. Raqm 1. Ramz al-sullam." (Number one, sign of the ladder, etc.) We also had an overexcited taxi driver yesterday who was essentially unrolling Shafiq posters while driving, or rapidly weaving, through traffic.
Although the elections are on everyone's lips, life marches on as usual while we wait to see what happens in the next few days. Although our classes are technically supposed to be at the Tahrir campus of AUC, that isn't too feasible at the moment, so we're in the university's dorms in upscale Zamalek for the summer. Since class starts at 8:30 every morning and cabs get pricy on our modest stipends, my roommates and I have been waking up at what still feels like the crack of dawn to catch a microbus to the bridge that we can then cross into Zamalek. Although various sources have repeatedly warned us against microbuses, including a taxi driver who lectured to us at CASA, who said they take drugs while driving, it has been working out pretty well the last few days. Anyway, a ride only costs 50 piasters, or 8 cents. So many different levels of society exist here: one can pay 2 dollars for a single boutique cupcake in Zamalek (yes, I did this) or 75 cents for 2 filling sandwiches and bottled water at the ful and ta3meyya (falafel) place around the corner (I also did this). I'll write more about my neighborhood and apartment building later sometime, but suffice it to say that it is nice without being fancy. I live next-door to a McDonald's on a well-lit square/traffic circle that has trees and grass. There are tons of places to eat or consume juice cheaply on the large nearby streets of Tahrir and Dokki.
Class is pretty exhausting, but going well so far. I definitely feel that I'll be learning a lot quickly. Generally by the time class ends at 1pm, all I want to do is nap directly in front of the fan, although even that doesn't really alleviate the dripping neck sweat that is an inevitable product of summer in Cairo. Homework, which I didn't really imagine I'd be doing a week after graduating from college, comes in copious amounts. They're breaking us in. In terms of class, we have 3ameyya for two hours every morning, then MSA for two hours, and then the homework cycle begins anew. For this reason, I haven't had much time for sightseeing since I returned to Egypt. Still, I did take a trip last Saturday to the pyramid at Saqqara, which predates the Giza pyramids and was constructed relatively soon after Upper and Lower Egypt were united. There are also several other smaller mastabas (tombs) at the site. We went to the Mastaba of Ti, in which extensive hieroglyphics and friezes have been preserved. Afterward, we stopped briefly at Memphis, capital of Egypt during the Old Kingdom.
I have also been making an effort to reunite with my old friends here and get to know the other students in CASA. The Arabic-learning world is very close-knit, and so practically everyone in CASA knows someone I've studied Arabic with before. Last night, for example, I attended my first houseboat party, hosted by some friends who live on just such a boat in the neighborhood of Imbaba.
Expect more updates soon (inshallah) with news of the elections.
Looking forward to keeping up with Cairo Time!
ReplyDeleteI am SO glad I now know how to English-spell Ahlan wa Sahlan. Please do like you did with your Paris blog and post beautiful pictures!!!
ReplyDelete