Look through the screen. . .

We think, as Americans, that by watching clips on the evening news, reading articles in the newspaper and magazines and surfing the web we receive an accurate portrayal of the world around us. Sadly, yet obviously, that is no where near the case. The media fails to document the mundane happenings of everyday life. The media doesn't show you how people around the world actually live. Instead they show clips that will keep us watching. Sensationalist clips of enraged Muslims exiting a mosque after Friday prayer, of poor rural flood victims drowning in Pakistan, or of starving African Children fill the World News Headlines. Under ideal circumstances this wouldn't be an issue. These headlines give us a glimpse into what problems in the world need solved. These headlines ideally would enlarge and facilitate our understanding of other people and cultures around the world. However in order for an understanding to be enhanced it needs to exist in the first place. Too often understanding of other cultures is derived from the stories and images presented by the sensationalist media. Few people ascertain the true cultural, social, and political impact of the sensationalist images they see. Instead these images and words turn into an understanding that leads to gross over-generalization and the creation of largely inaccurate cultural stereotypes. 

I am often times among these people that think they know something of the world because they read the New York Times and watch the news. The more I travel the more I learn that I know very little about the world around me. I'll detail some of what I've been tremendously mistaken about concerning the Middle East. 

After 9 weeks I shaved last night!

1. Middle Eastern Men all have beards. I don't quite know why I thought this one was true. Most images I see of Muslim men are of one of two things. 1. The image shows men coming out of a mosque on a Friday. The mosques that they generally show are attended by the most devout who happen to have beards. 2. They should images from rural areas where cultural norms dictate the necessity for a beard amongst older men. In a city like Cairo however 1 in 7 men might have a beard and that number gets significantly smaller for people of my age and educational background. 

2. Everything in a Muslim city shuts down five times a day for prayer. This one was way off. During Ramadan things did shut down for about an hour around sundown but the majority of people hadn't eaten all day so that's understandable. Believing this seems to be equivalent to thinking that things still shut down on Sundays in the US. It seems that a plurality if not a majority of Muslims in Cairo don't pray five times a day seven days a week. It also seems that on Friday a majority do not end up at a mosque. Nominal Muslims exist just as nominal Christians and nominal Jews do. 

3. Up-to-date technology would be hard to come by. The bus I ride to school everyday has wifi. My apartment gets wifi. If I put what looks like a flash drive in my computer I can get internet anywhere I want it. My apartment has Satellite TV and air conditioning. Some cars here run on natural gas rather than an oil based product. In some regards their lack of infrastructure has pushed them ahead of us in certain ways. Despite having some new technology they still need to master the art of trash collection, need to discover recycling, and should figure out that stick deodorant works better than Axe Body spray.

This is it for now but I feel these three things have significantly changed my perspective of the area. Dissecting the stereotypes and dispelling the myths that surround the other is a must for the world to move towards a peace and understanding. In order to develop a genuine understanding of the cultures around the world we must do more than stare at the screen but rather look through it and wonder how these people, how the other, lives, works, eats, thinks. With understanding comes respect and the ability to work together to create and maintain a lasting international peace.  

djm

When the sun goes down...

A view of Maadi, Cairo prior to sunset

Cairo comes to life as soon as the sun goes down. Those people that spent their days indoors, in the shade, away from the uncomfortable heat of the sun emerge to do all sorts of things. Sun down is prime time to shop, to sit at an outdoor cafe, to take a fallukah on the Nile, or to go for a stroll. Business's here stay open late into the night. Certain restaurants stay open until 4am, 7 days a week. Young and old alike litter the streets and the outdoor cafes often smoking sheesha (hookah) and playing dominoes or backgammon. 


James and I don't live like this every night but with only four days of school a week we're able to feed off the cities energy at least three nights a week. On our weekend days we often find ourselves cooped up in our apartment for most of the day doing school work and house keeping things. As soon as the sun starts moving down we get moving. Walking the streets at night is peaceful, being able to sit outside comfortably with a nice breeze is rewarding, and spending time with new friends on the Nile is amazing. 
Tonight I'll head to Old Islamic Cairo with some New Friends, watching the sunset over centuries old mosques, walking the streets and feeling the nice breeze  and visiting the market to see what the day produced. 


DJM

"Give us this day our daily bread"

One of the things that I miss the most about the US is the food. I love the food here for the most part but I do miss certain non-reproducable items such as Nature Valley Granola Bars, Tyson Chicken Patties, Pretzels, Bolthouse Farms Juices, and Barbecue Kettle Chips. Some of these products can be found at stores catering to the needs of ex-pats however I try not to think about that. Because of high import taxes and the underlying assumption that foreign = rich causes something like a bag of pretzels to cost $7 or $8. I love pretzels but that's a little much. 

Due to the extreme cost of imported American food we eat either like Egyptians or adopt the third world diet of Rice and Beans. Egyptian food costs substantially less than anything remotely foreign. The dishes that have become staples in our diet are Ful (broad beans served alone or on a pita, bears a striking resemblance to a Taco Bell Bean burrito) and Falafel (made of Fava beans here rather than chickpeas). When served in sandwich form these include sliced cucumber, tomato, and lettuce in some kind of mayonnaise type concoction. One of these sandwiches costs about 1.5 LE or less than 30 cents. Definitely a cheap meal. Along with these two sandwiches most quick street restaurants also have French Fry Sandwiches (prepared just like the Ful and Falafel) and Egg Sandwiches. Yes they do make French Fry Sandwiches and yes they are delicious. They literally stick French Fries in a pita with salad and mayo, what a remarkable idea! 

Although delicious, sandwiches can get a bit old. We need variation. Another cheap Egyptian street dish, Koshery, fills that need for variation and fills our stomachs. Koshary is a layered mixture of rice, noodles, lentils, and chickpeas  covered with a tomato based sauce. It's served with a very spicy hot sauce and vinegar. I'm not big on the vinegar but the hot sauce is a must. The size of the Koshary usually depends on how much you wish to pay. I've found that for 5 LE or about a dollar I can stay full all night. Word on the street has it that the slaves that built the pyramids were fed Koshary to insure their continued strength and ability to work. 

As you've probably noticed I have yet to mention any meat. The simple reason behind this is that meat has become a luxury item to James and I due mostly to it's astronomical comparative cost. Eggs are relatively inexpensive, averaging slightly higher than US prices but Chicken and Beef of unknown quality can cost in upwards of $8 a pound. That's not to say that we don't ever eat meat, we do but only twice or three times a week. Most of times we usually order a great American Classic, a cheeseburger. 

For about $6 we can get one of the "world's best burgers" and a side of fries from Lucille's. These burgers might just be the best in the world. To learn more about Lucille's check out this article Click here to learn more! by western PA's own Scott Macleod of Time Magazine. By far Lucille's has been the best American style restaurant we've been to and I honestly don't think we will find one any better. I'm completely ok with that seeing as the best burger in the world is a ten minute walk from my front door

All and all we eat well and most importantly we do it cheaply by balancing eating out with cooking. Eventually I'll add some pictures of James and I's cooking adventures. Check Back

DJM

Marlboro's and BlackBerrys

Think of the college students you know. How would you describe them? How do they dress? What are their habits? Who do they hang out with? Students looking as if they just rolled out of bed, girls in Nike Shorts and white v-necks, students hanging out in distinct social groups across campus, cars too expensive to be on a college campus and an abundance of iPhone users characterized my first two years at University. 

 At the American University in Cairo a much different picture is painted. Most students don't drive to school but rather take a bus provided by the University. Of the ones that don't take the bus many have their own driver. You don't see Egyptian students in Nike Shorts or looking unkempt (unless its some kind of fashion statement) but rather you see a sharp fashion sense. The girls carry what are presumably authentic Coach purses and wear clothes sporting the names of all sorts of French designers. Guys also wear designer clothes. Armani seems to be the designer of choice amongst men. Expensive sunglasses seem to accompany most outfits. Most likely due to a limited release of the iPhone in Egypt the smart phone of choice here is the Black Berry. The vast majority of Egyptian students carry one and it seems to be a major status symbol for them. The table tops in most of my classes are littered with the little devices that seem out of place in the greater context of my experience here. Outside of the classroom large social groups, much like the ones that characterize American Universities form but the connections don't seem as distinct to an outsider. Presumably the groups of especially Freshman students attended the same lower schools in the region and are thus connected through them or by some other weaker connection. 

The most surprising characteristic of the students, (and many of the faculty) is the amount that they smoke. Between classes, walking into classes, walking out of classes, people are lighting up. It's hard to walk around campus and not hear your lungs screaming after breathing in second hand, unfiltered, chemical laden tobacco. smoke. It may be hard to find a University in a America with a higher concentration of 18-25 year olds who habitually light up. Social pressure seems to be at work here. During the first week of classes it became obvious that many people had lit up or were lighting up for the first time. A good number of young students appeared uncomfortable holding the cancer stick and many couldn't even light the thing themselves. It seems sad that something so obviously harmful provides the area of greatest visible contrast from walking an American University. 

DM

The Commute from Hell

The following story is from August 28th or the first day that James and I made the trek to the American University. The events were recorded in my journal and transcribed here. I included the price of each type of transportation to give some perspective on how cheap it can be to get around here. The exchange rate is 5.7 LE = $1. Enjoy

7:50 - This had been the earliest either James or I had woken up since being here. We didn’t actually go to sleep until about 3 or 3:30. 

8:00 – David, one of the guys we are staying with, drove us and his younger brother Mark, our friend and interpreter for the day, to a bus station of sorts. 

8:15 – (2.5 LE/person) We find the micro bus heading towards Ramses (an area of downtown Cairo). (For those of you who have visited Kenya, a microbus is the exact same thing as a matatu. If you haven’t visited Kenya I’ll do my best to describe the experience. A microbus is like a van that picks people up on the side of the rode, usually without stopping completely. It is a very cheap way of going from place to place but maybe not the safest. The drivers are crazy, the passengers are crazy, and you have to be plenty brave to exit one while it’s still moving. Microbus travel is utilized by a large chunk of Cairo's population everyday.)

9:15 – Get out of the microbus and walk to the real bus station several blocks away. The area of downtown we walked through smelled strongly of urine. At this point the sun’s rays came upon us with a vengeance. It's early but we can tell it'll definitely hit 100 today.

9:45 – (2 LE/person) After waiting for half an hour we got on a bus headed from Ramses to Nasr City. James, Marc, and I were the only three people on the bus leaving the bus station. Within five blocks the bus was full. People actually jump onto the bus while it’s moving.  Bus fares are passed forward to the person lucky enough to be standing closest to the driver, change is made and sent back with a bus ticket. 

10:15 – Jump off the bus past where we wanted to leave it amidst a flurry of yells from around the bus. We had to back track about a block and cross a highway in order to get to our next bus stop.  We waited about twenty minutes for this bus to arrive and almost took a cab the rest of the way to the university but a very helpful police officer informed us the bus runs a little late and would arrive soon. 

10:37 – (1 LE/person) Got on the most crowded bus I’ve ever been on. Being the last person on at the stop I literally stood on the last step between the open door and the road with the bus traveling 60 km/h. Needless to say I held on as tight as my grasp would allow. Luckily within the next hundred or so meters half the bus decided to exit.  We rode this bus for about fifteen minutes until having to jump off while the bus was in motion. 

10:52 – (1 LE/person) Walked across the street and in circles looking for the last bus that was supposed to take us right to the university. We found it, however it did not take us straight to the university and after about six minutes the driver told us to get off because we passed the road the leads to the university and he wasn’t going that way after all. Some people on the bus yelled for us to go faster and Marc responded  “You guys are angry when you are fasting” the Muslims didn’t like that. At this point my frustration level was high. We had planned on arriving at school around 9:30 or 10 and it was almost 11. I was definitely anxious to see the University I am spending the next four months at. 

10:56 – (10 LE) We stand on the side of the road waiting for a taxi to take us to the university for ten minutes. We finally find one. It’s 11:05. The driver asks us which gate we wanted to go to and not knowing that the university even had a gate let alone multiple gates James and I responded “the closest one.”

11:13 – We get dropped off at Gate #1, the visitors gate. Well the guards told us that the school was “off” on that day and that we couldn’t go in. We tried to explain we were international students and had orientation and so they asked for acceptance letters. At this point I had a question: “Who carries around their college acceptance letter without being told to?” We didn’t but seeing as this question arose about thirty more times in the next three hours it became obvious that Egyptians hold those acceptance letters near and dear to their hearts or else Universities there have yet to find a more efficient way of doing things. Halas (enough). The guard at gate one took our ID’s to hold until we exited from gate #1. 

We spent about two hours on campus and got virtually nothing accomplished. The campus sits in the desert. It's about an hour from the old campus in Downtown Cairo. The landscape out here is much different. The campus is beautiful with fountains and architecture that flows much like middle eastern towns of old. The sun is hot out here and in three directions the sands of the desert fill the back drop. Leaving the university was almost as difficult as arriving but no need to get into that. 

Thankfully James and I now walk about five minutes to the end of our street every morning to catch the bus. It goes straight to the University and takes about forty minutes.

DJM

Welcome From Cairo

Ahlann (Welcome)! Well here it is, the blog that I promised. I've been here a month so I figured it was time to launch it! My ambition with this is to convey how ordinary everyday life works here as opposed to what I'm used to. I'm trying to view the culture through an unbias lenses which, at times can be quite difficult. I hope to give this wonderful city and it's people an accurate representation here.

Although not claiming to live the archetypal "Egyptian" life I feel that James (my close friend and roommate) and I find ourselves in a much different day to day situation then most of our American Peers. For instance, rather than deciding to live with the rest of the foreign students in the Dorms we opted to find our own apartment far away from them. We took a more anthropological approach to our time here. We moved into a building where we are the only foreigners, all-be-it in one of the largest ex-patriot sections of town but nonetheless we are surrounded by Egyptians most of our days. Outside of the University most of our time is spent with Egyptian friends. Because of this we still have yet to visit most tourist sites and avoid the posh ex-pat hangouts. Unlike most of our peers we utilize public transportation especially Cairo's Metro system. For the equivalent of $0.18 we can ride to most places in the city or at the very least cut a cab fair by four or five dollars. More on the Metro System later.

We don't simply spend time with Egyptians but try to live like them. We buy our food from local markets and bakeries. We have become regulars at El Tabei El Domyati, an Egyptian fast food type restaurant where we can get a meal for about $1. We cook lots of Egyptian cuisine with our friends which will most likely be talked about in a later post. We've even learned to dress based on where we are going. In certain parts of town it pays to not look like an American tourist. In other words we've learned to blend. We've picked up on cultural cues and are continuously learning the language and the culture. That last sentence has become our goal.

Anyways we are excited for the rest of our time here. I hope I can make these posts informative, enlightening, and maybe even thought provoking as well as to keep everyone up-to-date on the happenings of James and I in Cairo.

DJM