After a week of being here, my biggest complaint is that all the chocolate is expensive and mostly melted when you go to eat it.

the gates of cairo

Today I went to the market Khan El-Khalili where I overpaid for this really neat piece of cloth artwork with the shahada on it. I also climbed the towers of Bab Zuwayla:

It got kinda scary in parts...

And here is the view:


Still havent been to the pyramids or any other really touristy areas, I think I'm going to wait until my arabic is better and the weather gets cooler.
salaam

Cell phone.

0107284558.

I think you have to dial 0112 first from the US to get to Egypt, but I am not sure because I have not tested this.

There are arabic and roman characters on the keypad and it came with a soccer game.

I think I'm going to the pyramids tomorrow insha'allah

its only just begun

Third night in Cairo.
No sign of any sort of travel sickness yet.
My sleep schedule is starting to adjust.
Cairo is still just as weird and chaotic as it was when I first arrived, but the chaos seems much more friendly than it originally did.
There are police everywhere, but I don't think they do anything aside from sitting around with their big guns and occaisionally waving. I'm convinced that the police force is just Egypt's form of wealthware. "No job? Here's a uniform, now go stand at a street corner".
The cars drive fast and don't really seem to follow any set of rules, but they will usually stop or atleast honk before they are about to hit you.
I believe that there are only two rules in Cairo that are actively enforced.
1) No taking pictures of ANYTHING. whenever there is a cool building, there is always a guard or policemen there to spring to action and shout at me in arabic when I get my camera out to take a picture of it. Terrorism plot thwarted.
2) Men and women are not to be alone. ever. I can't have girls up to in my room or even on my floor. There are guards at the men's and women's respective elevators to make sure that nobody ever forgets this.
Walking around with girls in public is an interesting experience though. All the egyptian men star at them and whisper (and sometimes shout) cat calls in arabic. One girl I was with was called a whore, but she was wearing short sleeves so she deserved it.

Aside from that, everything seems pretty lax. People are generally good natured and having conversations in half english/half arabic (well usually it is 90% english and 10% arabic, but whatever) has been fun. It is a nice place and a crazy place.

here is the view from the room:
not much, but I can tell if it is day or night at a glance!

and here are photos of me and my two roommates.

From left to right we are John, Matt and Matt (me).
We had to turn in 3 passport sized photos for something, so we went to a photography studio and got them taken. To our great delight we learned that we get a free glamor shot with frame for whatever reason. I think they turned out great.

the qahira

I have arrived.
I have many stories, but right now I am tired.
here is a picture:

some advice:
don't order vegetarian meals on planes, you will get a pile of artichokes and some stale bread while your neighbor gets spinach salad, fruit, delicious cake (and some gross looking meat).

also, never drive in cairo. ever. I've seen it happen and it is bad. But I am sure that I will have much more to say and many more photos on this subject at a later date.

Its all about the sphinxes, baby

Egyptian pounds.

On the opposite side of the 10 pound note is a (the?) sphinx with corrected nose, and on the other is an egyptian looking guy with a bow and arrow on ans a chariot. I wonder if they have nicknames for their paper money (as the title suggests) in egypt as we do over here. At any rate, I'll be spending sphinxes and chariots like mad in no time at all.

Monday is the day.

The reality of the situation is starting to hit me. The other night I was looking at pictures of downtown Cairo and my heart started pounding. It is a big city, a foreign city.

The above picture was taken on an island in the Nile where I will be living.
This is blog will catalogue my adventures in Egypt and other middle eastern countries (hopefully lebanon, but that might still be a little risky) over the next few months. I will try to include as many pictures and as few words as possible because pictures are easier than words. I will try to update several times a week, but I might not post for weeks at a time. I just don't know, but the point is that you should check back often and leave me plenty of nice comments (keep in mind that my parents might be reading this, so watch out!)

I will be in Cairo studying at the American University in Cairo from August 21st until December 25th. Stay tuned for an update on what classes I will be taking!