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Oh my wonderful friends and family--I am SO SORRY that I have not updated my blog in such an incredibly long time! Just know that it is because I have been so busy and having so much fun (in combination with the irregularity of my internet access)!
So...where to even begin?? Well, my second session of Arabic classes ended this past week. I got an A in this second session, which pleases me very much as it is the standard to which I generally hold myself. I have been feeling much more comfortable in this class than in the last one, as I entered this level actually prepared for it alhamdulillah! Once again I was one of the best students in the class, one of the people who understood everything quickly and easily, which really helped me to feel better about myself and my intelligence after the last rather trying month of classes. Isn’t it funny how quickly one can forget oneself? By this I mean that I have always done well in classes, I have always excelled in my academics, and yet just one month of being in a difficult class made me feel like I was the biggest
At Ali's wedding
The next several pictures are all from the wedding of the eldest son of my new family, Ali, to his bride Samah. idiot that ever lived! It makes me kind of nervous about grad school, where I know there are going to be long periods of time when I feel like an idiot. I HAVE to learn how to keep my academic self-esteem high even when I am struggling in my classes or not receiving the kind of support I have become accustomed to from my professors. This is going to be critical in my happiness and success in a stressful academic environment like the University of Chicago.
Speaking of grad school, I graduated from college on Saturday!! I am now officially a college graduate, I officially have my Bachelor of Arts in Religion from Cornell College! Can you believe it? I have worked very hard for this over the last six years (I know, I know, it’s only supposed to take four, right?) and I have finally accomplished it! Alhamdulillah!!!
So everything has been going well for me academically--but that's not the most interesting part of my life! So let’s talk about the more interesting stuff!
I have moved again, this time from my flat in Garden City to join a very kind Egyptian family in the
Old Cairo district. My flat in Garden City was nice, but it was not really what I wanted. My roommates were young and wild and very much enjoyed disregarding the social norms which sought to regulate their lives. By this I mean that they wore very…”Western” clothing (read: revealing) and they liked to go to the clubs and drink and stay out until all hours of the night. They were very nice girls, but this what not the kind of environment in which I wanted to live. I have had my own experiences with this kind of lifestyle and I am very much ready to have that be something that exists solely in my past and not in my present. Again, I must say that they were really very nice girls and I liked them a lot! That just isn’t my kind of life anymore.
So now I live with the…well, I don’t really know what to say. The Mohameds? Because as my readers who are familiar with the culture know, people here do not have “family names” the way we do in America. Each child takes the first name of his father, his grandfather, and his greatgrandfather as
a serious of names that create a lineage rather than “family name”. So I live with a couple named Mona and Mohamed and their children Karim, Hassan, Gehad, Mariam, and Fatma. I met this family through Hassan, you may remember him as my Arabic tutor. I guess he still is my tutor, but our relationship has taken a decidedly different tone in recent weeks. When we first met, I immediately recognized something in him that I liked a lot--something about his gentle demeanor, the sweet sincerity of his voice, his kind of shy but heartfelt smile. We met several more times for tutoring and each time I felt a deeper and deeper connection developing with him. To be perfectly honest, we basically stopped speaking in Arabic during our meetings because we both just really wanted to actually talk to each other (and his English is darn near perfect) and let's face it: once you know who I am, where I come from, what and where I study, a little bit about my family, and some other random information, well then my Arabic is about used up. I mean, that isn't completely true, but I certainly am not at a level
The family!
From left to right: Gehad, Mona, unknown, Ali, Mohamed, Mariam, and Hassan, with Fatma in the middle bottom. where I can discuss the meaning of life in Arabic!
So we have been spending quite a bit of time together. I cannot describe the depth of our connection except to compare it to Mitch. As many of you know, Mitch is my friend-soul-mate--from the very first days of our meeting I knew that I was going to treasure his presence in my life until the day that I die. Six years later, and living hundreds or at time thousands of miles apart and seeing one another only rarely, I still cherish his friendship as much as I did when we saw each other every day at Concordia. We had an immediate connection the likes of which I never really expected to find with another person. And then I met Hassan...and let's just say that what I have found with him surpassing even my connection with Mitch (which I never would have even thought possible).
His family was kind enough to offer me a place to live, and of course I am properly chaperoned by his mother and his three sisters so there is nothing inappropriate about my staying here. I am very much enjoying my time with
Sisters!
Gehad and Mariam, 18 and 16 respectively. this family and inshaallah we will be spending a great deal more time together in the coming months. Which brings me to my next piece of news: I will inshaallah be staying in Egypt much longer than I was originally anticipating. I have contacted the University of Chicago about deferring my enrollment until the fall of 2011 to give me more time to work on my Arabic and to gain some invaluable cultural competency, and now that I am living with this family I have the ability to remain here indefinitely. I will inshaallah find a job to stay on top of my expenses, but it’s really my bills from the States that are what I need the money for—I can live comfortably here for like $200 a month or less! So inshaallah I will be traveling to the States in September or October for a long visit, and then returning to Cairo to live until next fall. Wish me luck!!!
I will share some much needed pictures with you now!
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AlidaBree
Alida Bree
Whose wedding was that anyway??
Sorry guys, I can't believe that I forgot to tell you whose wedding those pictures are from! Ali, the eldest brother in my new family, got married to a lovely and kind young woman named Samah a couple of weeks ago. Ali lives in Qatar, where he is an architect, and she is an electrical engineer from a smaller town a couple of hours from Cairo. So it was my first Egyptian wedding and it was just fantastic! I will blog more about it next go around, I promise! :)