The Pearl of the Mediterranean

Our trip up to Alexandria went swimmingly... in the Mediterranean, that is. I absolutely fell in love with the city, but I suspect that part of its charm is that is simply was not Cairo. Alexandria has a much more Mediterranean vibe about it with brightly colored boats in the harbor and a white stone castle on the shore, it almost felt like Greece, minus the fact that everyone is Egyptian. We took the 9am train from Cairo to Alexandria. It took two hours and cost 50 LE for a first-class ticket (less than $10). We checked into Le Metropole Hotel and set off to explore. Le Metropole Hotel is the very definition of "old world charm." The ceilings are 15ft high and there are huge mirrors in every hallway that are just as tall. We were greeted with juice and escorted to the elevator. The elevator has not been renovated in I'm guessing 60 years. Perhaps a repair here or there, but the general integrity of the apparatus remains very much the same as I imagine it did when it was built. This also means that it got stuck about five times during our two nights there (thankfully never with us in it), and took about five minutes to come when we needed it. The room was gorgeous and once we had settled in and explored the view from our balcony, we set off in search of our last Ramadan lunch of shame.

The last time I will ever feel guilty about eating lunch

Following the helpful narrative of the guide book, we found ourselves at The Fish Market, a touristy (yet still 10x more authentic than any tourist restaurant in the US) seafood restaurant. At this point, we had been up for about six hours with out food so we were starving. By the time we got there our eyes were about three times bigger than our stomachs. We ordered salad and bread and then went to the fish counter to select our meal. They had all different types of fish (all caught fresh that morning), lobster, prawns, muscles, and oysters. I chose a sea bass and had it grilled with tomatoes and seasoned with Egyptian spices. The bread platter was quite possibly the most amazing thing I have eaten since getting here to Egypt. It came with six different types of dipping sauces, including hummus and baba ghanoush, that were each spectacular. The pitas came fresh out of the oven and were puffed to perfection. The salad was delicious too and by the time our fish came out (mine still had it's head on eyeballs included), we were full. But we persevered and finished our meals while enjoying the view of blue skies, bright water, and colorful boats of the harbor.

The Citadel of Qaitbey

After lunch we walked the length of the shore all the way around to Fort Qaitbey (aka The Citadel of Qaitbey) at the end of the point. The Citadel was built in the 1480s at the sight of the Pharos Lighthouse, which is one of the seven wonders of the ancient world. The Citadel is even rumored to have used some of the stones from the lighthouse, which was destroyed in storm or fire or earthquake like almost all of the other wonders, in its construction. We had a really great time exploring the deserted castle and enjoying the ocean breeze from the outer walls. It's amazing how well preserved the Citadel is, although in retrospect that is why it was built.


Day two began with some serious confusion as to what time it was. During Ramadan, daylight savings time is given up and the clock is set back one hour. Thankfully, we did wake up in time for a filling complimentary breakfast at the hotel. It wasn't until after we had stocked up on carbs for the day that we realized that food would now be bountiful in the streets and it was once again alright to eat during the day! Our day was perfect, minus a minor ass-grabbing incident. We put on our swim suites and headed over to the Four Seasons Hotel. We paid for beach access and spent the whole day laying on the private beach. Whenever we would get hot we could just run right into the ocean. Swimming in the Mediterranean was wonderful. We just rode the waves and the temperature of the water was refreshing, but not cold. It was such a relief to just sit and not be hassled, or stared, or honked at. Peace and quiet.

A rather large sunburn later we stopped by the mall next to the hotel and I invested in an Egyptian cotton skirt. I have a new obsession with cotton. It's slowly taking over my wardrobe and I'm ok with that. We were feeling so good from our pampered day at the beach that when we went out for the night I decided to go bold and wear my new skirt. Bad idea. The long weekend after Ramadan brought vacationers from all over Egypt and the streets of Alexandria felt just as crowded as the ones in Cairo. Our hotel happened to be on the most popular corner in town for boys between the ages of ten and eighteen. Two particularly bold teens tried to approach us, but we just asked them to walk along. Being of that invincible age, our requests to be left alone fell on their deaf ears and one of them felt that grabbing my butt would help his case. Not at all, buddy. I was very upset because I'm really into personal space and not being groped. This guy apparently had no regard for either of my preferences. Thankfully, the restaurant was right around the corner. I kept my head down the whole time to avoid making eye contact with anyone on the street in hopes of not attracting any additional unwanted attention, but alas three American girls walking through the streets unaccompanied will most likely never go unnoticed. The Greek restaurant was discouraging by appearance, but the food was very good. We watched the sunset over the Citadel from the window and enjoyed not being on the street with the rowdy teens of the town. Emily ran back to the hotel after dinner to get me a pair of jeans and we decided to go back to the Four Seasons to enjoy their roof top bar.

It was there, at the bar in Alexandria where I met my future husband, Mohammed. He was our waiter and could poor beer better than anyone else I've ever seen, it was really a talent. Speaking of weddings, there were newly weds left and right all over the city. Our cab driver explained that you weren't allowed to get married during Ramadan. I loved seeing all of the brides. Lauren even took it upon herself to tell the guy sitting next to us at the Four Seasons that the bride in the hall was beautiful. Turns out he wasn't from the wedding, but hey, she got to use her excellent Arabic skills.

Our final day in Alexandria had been planned another sight seeing day. Unfortunately, the Library of Alexandria and the Greco-Roman Museum were closed for the holiday weekend. Alright, Ramadan, you can have the last word. We did get to see the Catacomes and the Roman Amphitheater. The Amphitheater was very impressive and for a bribe of only 5 LE to the tourist policeman we got to go in the restricted underground passage ways, very cool. It was very hot that day though, and after spending a perfect day at the beach, nothing felt quite as good. We spent the rest of our day relaxing at various cafes and then headed back to the train station. We hopped on the train only to discover that a creepy man was sitting in my seat. Thank goodness he was though because other wise we would have gone off to a mystery location. We managed to get back onto the platform about 10 seconds before the wrong train started moving.

Coming back to Cairo was a bit discouraging. Maadi is home, and Cairo does have it's own charms about it. It was overwhelming coming back to it all after spending a weekend on the coast. Cairo is the farthest I've ever lived from the ocean, it was so nice to feel the breeze and I am not complaining about how much warmer the water was compared to New England. This was our first adventure outside of Cairo and it was an absolute success. Looking forward to what comes next.

First Day at a New School

(I wrote this post last week, please excuse it's dated content)

So our visa to the duty free shop is almost up, which means we’ve been here almost three weeks. Finally time seems to be moving a bit quicker than the eventful day by day that it’s been since we got here. Orientation got me more confused than I was before, and classes have begun. I use the term “begun” loosely because we only have three days of classes this week and the periods themselves are shorter due to Ramadan. After neglecting our laundry in order to attend an international student party (something that vaguely resembled a high school movie after prom event), we had no clean pants for the first day. However, all was not lost, and we put together our ceremonial first-day-of-school outfits and headed off to catch the bus.

I’m going to pause my narrative for just a moment and take this brief paragraph to complain about just how freaking stupid American University of Cairo is. I understand that I’m a little challenged when it comes to following directions and orienting myself on a map, but the AUC campus is a whole different kind of maze. My first class was in the BEC building. Guess what? There is no BEC on the map. Not only that, but even if there were a BEC on the map, I wouldn’t know how to get there because their strategically placed guiding maps don’t show where YOU are. A small detail that I find rather imperative.  I have become slightly better at navigating the campus, since I put everything in relation to the on-campus Cinnabon.

I applied for my classes back at the beginning of the summer, and I was so excited to find out that I was scheduled for nine communications credits, even though I can only transfer six. My other two classes were Financial Accounting 101 and Introduction to Microeconomics. Riveting stuff, right? Upon receiving my schedule, I realized that there was really no reason for me to be in Egypt, since these were all courses that were offered at American University in Washington D.C..

My first class, Media Management, is a course on how different branches of media converge. I am the only American in the class, and it added a new dynamic to learning. I don’t think I realized when I signed up to come to Egypt exactly how different the media is in this country. The professor, or “doctor” as they call them here was fascinated by my nationality. Whenever he had a fact about the United States, he would ask me if I knew if first (i.e. what is the circulation of the Washington Post or how many FM radio stations are there in NYC…etc). Of course I knew none of the answers, but my rough estimates weren’t too far off if you squinted. The majority of the media, here in Egypt is actually run by the government. This is such a strange concept to me. There are only nine radio stations in the entire country and the daily circulation of all the newspapers combined is only 3 million readers. It is also obvious that because of this, the media majors here at AUC have been given a very different education as to how to address the world of publication.

It was difficult to follow my professor at times. He would occasionally slip into Arabic, but he was always aware of me and would ask me if I understood. When I shook my head he would just tell me that it was unimportant anyways. I am really looking forward to the class, even though I am now in a new section do to scheduling conflicts. I’m hoping that my new class is just as interesting. My second class, Introduction to Photography, will no longer be on my schedule. The professor was well traveled, a University of Texas graduate who was a photographer on the staff of Time Magazine for the better part of a decade. However, he spent most of the class, plus fifteen minutes over time telling us how there was no excuse to being unprepaired and how his accomplishments were amazing and unless an immediate family member died there was no reason to miss INTRODUCTION TO PHOTOGRAPHY THE MOST IMPORTANT CLASS EVER. I should also mention that he did not have the syllabus or the homework assignment and made us all follow him to his office after class and wait ten minutes in the hallway while he had it printed and photocopied. I’m not a huge fan of pompous, hypocritical professors, nor do I have any desire really to spend $3,000 on an introduction to photography course.

Today was a bit of a discouraging day because I had to deal with my schedule for a large part of it. It’s not easy dropping five courses and adding all new ones. I attended my Mass Communication Research course in the morning. While listening to the course description, I was a bit bummed out that I’m taking it in D.C.. The other problem with the class is that it involves creating surveys and interviewing people on the street (not on campus), which is something I can’t do. I can’t speak Arabic, and very few people here speak enough English for me to actually communicate a survey with them.

After eating an interesting lunch with Emily and Adam I took up residence in the make shift guidance office for international students to add and drop classes. I dropped all of my courses. I am now enrolled in a different section of Media Management, Newspaper Writing and Editing, The Art and Architecture of Ancient Egypt, and Ancient Egyptian Literature in Translation. I’m still trying to figure out what my fifth course will be. Partially, this depends on what I want my minor to be. It was really hard enough picking a major, this minor business is miserable. I thought that I wanted a minor in business, but I’ve managed to avoid economics for so long; it seems like such a wasted effort if I just hop on board my parent’s victory wagon and take Micro. My goal is to have my fifth class picked out by Wednesday. Then I’m off to celebrate the end of Ramadan with the long weekend in the Mediterranean city of Alexandria. I’m hoping it’s a tad more colorful than Cairo. I could use a change of scenery.