In any event, happy St. Patrick's day to all of you, my dear readers. Not surprisingly, St. Patrick's day went by nearly unnoticed in Cairo--even my 3/4 Irish roommate neglected to wear green. This time last year I was drinking a black and tan at a bar in Green Lake. This year, I was celebrating my Egyptian host sister's 17th birthday by playing Go Fish and eating stuffed grape leaves. Ah, how times change!
A bit suddenly, another chapter in my Cairene experience has come to a close. In anticipation of the Walter Fam's immanent arrival in Egypt and my travels to Ethiopia after that, my last day of paid work finished on Tuesday. That's it. El fin. Khallas.
Now, Alissa Past used to be irrationally terrified by unstructured time. Of course, these Type A tendencies aren't surprising once you learn that, during every day of my conscious childhood, I was greeted by "The List," which struck terror into my childlike soul. No playtime, no fun, no anything, until the dreaded List of chores was finished. Even on Saturdays. "Free time" didn't get a whole lot of play in my household growing up.
In any case. My attachment to structure and schedules was so severe by the time I finished high school that I remember once, finding myself faced with a weekend devoid of any plans or even homework assignments, that I cried all the way through my afternoon classes. My professor was so distressed to see me bawling in the back row and he and his wife whisked me into their office afterwards to see what was the matter. Too embarrassed to tell them the problem, I sat there sniffling for a long time until my voice cracked and I offered up, "The problem is...(sniff)...um, I don't have any plans this weekend?" I can still remember the completely bewildered look they exchanged with one another. I ended up crashing their date night to see "El Ultimo Samurai" with them, relieving my soul-crushing weekend anxiety by listening to Tom Cruise's dubbed-over Spanish voice.
We've come a long way since then.
Still, knowing that I wouldn't have work at all for an entire week before my parents arrive on Saturday had me initially a tiny bit nervous. What would I possibly do with all that time?
That's when my inner nerd arrived just in time to save the day. Armed with pages of Arabic homework, an introductory book on the philosophies of consciousness, and a history of Iran from the Aryans to the present, I've had a delightful time curled up on my bed with my reading glasses on and the call to prayer wafting through my balcony window.
All sorts of unexpected plans came up, too, which is the lovely thing about not having commitments. Sunday I wound up watching an Egyptian movie (all in Arabic!) called "One-zero," which was excellent. Ok, so I understood a whole of five words, but that turned out to be enough to catch the main gist of the plot.
Last night, my roommate invited me to a lecture on the history of the Umayyad empire (ca. 650-750 AD). "Oo," I blurted out. "I was just reading about the Umayyads!" Busted. My roommate just rolled her eyes.
In the meantime, my other hobby has been refreshing my inbox every 3 minutes to see if any more grad school notifications had come in. I've heard back from a few now, but am still waiting to hear back from all of them. At this point, I know that I at least have the opportunity to study in either Seattle or DC, which is a good place to be in. We'll see what looks best once I know all my options.
So now, all I have left to do is get ready for the Walter fam's arrival. My sister and I have already begun our campaign to have our parents buy us a fat baby camel for Christmas. Feel free to join the petition.
I'm sure I'll have many harrowing stories as I try to navigate my parents around my adopted home...already my Egyptian host mother has taken to referring to my biological parents as my "foreign" parents. Um Hani, come on! They're actually my real ones! Until then, keep my soon-to-be bewildered family in your prayers...I'll keep you posted!
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