The past few days have been just as hectic as the first few. We’ve spent a lot of time on the new campus for orientation and are always out doing something. I’m having trouble registering for classes but I’m hoping that will be taken care of on Sunday.
On Monday night we went on a Nile Cruise, which was pretty cool. They had a band and some dancers and there was so much going on that you kind of forgot you were on a boat. Towards the end though we went out on the rooftop level to take pictures. Tuesday and Wednesday we spent most of our time on campus getting our ID cards and attending various lectures. On Tuesday night a group of six of us went out to a restaurant. One of my friends here is Mae, and she’s Egyptian and speaks Arabic. Thanks to her, we’ve been able to get around a lot easier and communicate with people better. She’s able to kind of tell which restaraunts are okay and which aren’t. This restaurant we went to was great. They are very laid back here, so we were able to sit there for hours without anyone trying to rush us out. We ate, played cards, and smoked hookah (of course!). I was able to get an appetizer, an entree, a desert, a juice, a soda, my portion of the hookah and the tip all for about $11.50. That’s one of the major upsides to Egypt.
On Wednesday night AUC threw an orientation party on the new campus. They played really really loud music and had traditional bands and dancers. There was free food and everything was set up really nice. We still can’t get over just how big and impressive our campus is.
Last night we took a cab out to City Stars, which is this huge mall where wealthy people from all over the region come to shop. It has 7 floors, a movie theatre and a bowling alley/arcade. It was pretty fun, except every guy in the entire place stared at us. This, apparently, is very common in Egypt and all girls are openly stared at. It was a little hard for us to get used to. Also, I was the only white person in the entire mall (even the girls I was with are all different ethnicities), so even the girls in the mall were staring at me. It was an internesting experience.
I bought an Egyptian newspaper (in english) today and literally almost every single article is about Obama. It’s very interesting to read about American politics from a Middle Eastern perspective. For those of you wondering, judging by the newspapers, the people here are happy about Obama but are still waiting for some tangible action from him that proves that he is going to be different. The mood ranges from cynical (those who think that Obama isn’t any different) to those who are cautiously optimistic. The optimistic ones are happy with Obama’s choice of George Mitchell to head up the Middle East envoy. Mitchell has roots in the Middle East and helped with the conflicts in Ireland, so the people here hope he will have a new approach to the Israeli/Palestinian conflict. I like him as well, because he doesn’t believe in requiring more concessions from the weakend/less powerful side (Palestine).
I’m trying to upload more photos to the photobucket site (http://s635.photobucket.com/albums/uu80/kayla-in-egypt). Also, let me know if you have any questions!
The comments about Obama are interesting.