First Week of School

---

Hello dear friends and family! I apologize again for my lack of updates. We have an Internet connection, although it is slow, but now my brand new battery in my laptop is dead. Until I can get another one mailed from Apple, I can't load pictures. Which is why you will be hearing about my adventures seeing the pyramids (I rode a camel! Quite comfortable.) and Coptic Cairo later.

In the meantime, school has started. My classes are:
Introduction to Colloquial Arabic in the Arabic script
Ancient Egypt
History I (more Egyptology)
Ancient Egyptian Literature in Translation
Acting I

School starts on Sunday, as the weekends here are Friday/Saturday. Four out of the five school days I wake up at 6:30 in the morning to catch the 7 o'clock shuttle for my 8 o'clock Arabic class, and then with the exception of Thursday, I'm on campus until I can catch the 4:30 shuttle home. It's been kind of brutal; usually I come home and take a nap. Sometimes this this nap turns into me going to bed at 6 in the evening. School has been getting less exhausting each day as problems are figured, but the first day was quite a challenge. We are on a brand new campus, which is absolutely beautiful (it looks like they're building Disneyland- The Oasis), but NO ONE knows what's going on. The school is about 75% done, so when you walk through the buildings it is apparent that is it still a construction site. Some of the rooms that are already assigned as working classrooms don't have electricity and are yet to be furnished. In one of my history classes another student and I who were there a bit early found ourselves unwrapping chairs from their plastic wrap because we got in there and there were desks, but no chairs. To get the answer to a question usually requires going to at least four buildings. Everything in this country is so inefficient- Brian, it would drive you nuts.

Here's a typical example of some of the things that are going wrong: I was hunting for my acting class twenty minutes early, because my schedule said that it was in the HUSS building, which is an absolute maze (one of my professors told me today that the architects admitted that it was one of the worst things that they had ever drawn because it doesn't make sense). After consulting a floor plan of the building and wandering around for 30 minutes, I finally found my classroom, only to discover that it was an empty office. I decided to give up at this point and just wait for the next shuttle to come. I just happened to run into another student who was in that class, and he told me that it was in another building, and although the schedule now said that it was room PO53, it had been switched to PO32, and then switched again to PO23. Madness, I tell you.

I'm really excited about my history classes. I've only gotten to take a couple of history classes at PSU, and definitely no Egyptology classes. What's really special is that we get to study this stuff in class and in books- and then go to the museum and the monuments and actually see it.

Today I finally found my acting classroom, and I think that it is going to be very unique. The teacher, who is Egyptian but actually went to PSU for a few years, is 72 and a half, and talks like Isma from "The Emperor's New Groove." She's loud and crazy, but it's obvious that she's very passionate about her job. Out of 10 students in the class, I am the only study abroad student. I think that this is great because in my other classes the students are majority Americans. If I wanted to hang out with Americans, I would have stayed in America! The Egyptians in the class are really kind, and it's really interesting to be the odd one out. Sometimes Leila, the professor, will (jokingly) go off on people in Arabic, and the rest of the class laughs while I have no idea what she said. Once she translated for me after she called Karim "homar" and smacked him on the arm. Apparently, "homar" means donkey.

On a different note, the holy month of Ramadan started on September 1st. During Ramadan, Muslims fast all day, which means no food, no water, no smoking, no swearing and no sex. At sundown the call to prayer is heard and after prayer Iftar occurs, which is the breaking of the fast. It is a huge meal that traditionally starts with the eating of a date, and many things here are open even later than usual (for example the mall is open until 2am). Just before sunrise a second meal is eaten, and then fasting begins all over again. It is almost like Christmas in the sense that schedules of everything are oriented around Ramadan. Classes, stores, offices, etc open earlier and then close at about 3 or 4 in the afternoon so that everyone can get home to eat. Then at about 8pm everything opens again. There are lights and decorations all over town, and there is a big meal every night at our hotel, usually followed by live music. At Iftar there are people in the streets handing out dates and tea for those who have not yet gotten home to break their fast. Tables are set up on the streets for any to come who do not have a family to eat with, or food to serve, so that all may eat and no one eats alone.

Okay friends and family, back to homework. I promise, pictures of the pyramids, camel-riding, Coptic Cairo and the new campus to follow later.

To quote Garrison Keiller again:
Be well, do good work, and keep in touch.

---

Comments

[Sammi]

Camels
You enjoyed riding the camel? I rode one when I went to Africa last month and it wasn't to comfty. I wouldn't ride it across the desert-but then again-you bike. I can't wait for you to come home. Enjoy it...it sounds like you are!