It has been a week of rest. Celebrating the overthrow of the Egyptian monarchy on Wednesday with a day off from work, and finding myself already in the weekend, I've managed to sleep away all but the dying remnants of the black lung and find myself surprisingly (but refreshingly) listless, especially on the heels of 3 intense weeks of transition, work, and study.
In 4 days, we will celebrate our one month anniversary in a country with 7,000 years of continual civilization. One month doesn't seem like very much, but then, we do already feel remarkably at home and well-settled. Perhaps it's just an illusion, but my roommate and I have all been impressed with our ability to show up, find jobs, secure housing, make friends, and improve our Arabic. For one month in, we've done well for ourselves.
I've been surprisingly fatigued this week, despite the rest--or maybe because of it. I slept until almost noon today, something I don't, and can't even manage to do, in the States. But the darkness and heat, the white noise of the ceiling fan... it can entice you into a complete coma. I woke up this morning and finished the rest of "Season of Migration to the North," a novel my friend Alexander gave to me for my birthday. The day before I finished Alice Munro's delicious collection of short stories, "Carried Away," which Justin gave me as a goodbye present. Both books were so moving, and reminded me of such dear friends, that the combination made me a bit homesick. Just enough to make me feel a bit tired inside, despite how much I have loved--and still love--my time here.
I've finally been feeding myself well enough and consistently enough to start to feel a bit soft and slothy. Enter: Bollywood Burn, the light of my life. Hemalayya perked me right back up.
So it turns out that in-house bellydancing parties are completely ordinary facets of life here. Whenever there's loud pop music wafting in through the window late at night, the women in the house start clapping and urging us on. Entertaining one another is the name of the game. A few days ago we decided to spice it up a bit, so my roommates and I busted out our other lesser known dance skills: I showed them some hula and bollywood, E. showed them traditional Korean dance and hip-hop, and K..... well, K just sort of does her own thing, but provides more entertainment with her endearing but awkward signature dance moves, which leave our host sisters howling.
Work continues to go extremely well. I've been following Obama's trip through the region, drafting talking points for an upcoming speech, helping to plan a cultural dialogue forum. Every week I've ended up submitting a few brief reports to the cabinet to read. Not bad! The internship has exceeded my expectations in every possible way.
In the meantime, I'm occasionally reminded that despite my ease and familiarity with Egyptian culture, I'm still not as savvy as I'd like to thing. Indeed, I'm still often a big, soft, white American target for all sorts of ridicule and ripping off.
Example.
I had a near miss two nights ago with potentially conniving neighbors. I was walking home from the metro stop later than usual, around 9:15 or so, just before my curfew with the family. It was a pleasantly cool night, with this nice breeze winding through the alleyways. I remember thinking htat I could really fall in love with Cairo, and maybe with this neighborhood specifically, with all its unique smells and noises and village flavor in the middle of such a sprawling, crowded city.
I was listening to my iPod and doing my deadpan "I don't see men" face and walking purposefully through the market, when two 12 year old girls rushed up to me and started talking rapid-fire. "What's your name?" "Where do you live?" etc etc, all in Arabic. I had a hard time understanding them.
Right around us, there was a group of men singing and dancing and banging on a drum, and I thought that there might be a wedding celebration going on. The girls insisted that I follow them upstairs to their apartment. A bit foolishly, I followed them--thinking all the while that it must have something to do with a special celebration. Upstairs they introduced me to the 5 or 6 family members who were sitting around in their pajamas. Lifesize pictures of Mary, Jesus, and the coptic archbishop on the wall tipped me off that they were Christians. Ok. So maybe they know my host family then, right? I relaxed a bit.
They made quick introductions, poured me 7-up, and continued firing questions at me. I told them that I had to leave, since I had to be home by 9:30, and the two girls insisted on walking me back to the start of my street. One of the girls demanded to listen to my iPod, and I got nervous that it would be the last time I ever saw it. Luckily, she gave it back. They demanded my cellphone number and insisted that I come over on Saturday. Ok, I think. Neighborhood kid friends. That's alright.
I went home and asked my 16 year old host sister if she knew the family. She didn't, and asked me why. As I relayed the story to her, she got really serious and told me that under no circumstances should I ever, ever go home with a family from her neighborhood, Christian or not. They think you have money, and they think you're loose, she said. They could have done anything to you inside that apartment, out of the sight of the neighbors on the street.
I felt pretty stupid for having gone along with these girls, savvy traveller as I usually am. I suppose it was mostly out of a sense that I "should" get to know more Egyptians and be open to meeting new people and such. Especially when I'm operating in another language, I can be a little slow to pick up on b.s.
In any case, I'm glad it worked out alright.
I had hoped to spend this weekend at a monastery just south of Cairo, called Anafora. They were booked full this weekend, though, so I found myself unexpectedly free after work on Thursday. So I crossed the Nile from work and went to a park on a large island in the middle of the river. I bought a large bowl of Kosheri (kind of like Egyptian spaghetti) for 50 cents and sat by the Nile, reading and watching the sailboats pass by as the sun was setting.
There are so many moments of frantic chaos here, and so many moments of complete calm and serenity. The trick is in trying to find them in equal proportion to one another.
For now, I think I'm doing alright.
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