Sunday, February 14, 2010
Resurrection
I think I might try to bring back this blog. Well, it will never quite be the same, but I want a project, and I want to learn more about my neighborhood in Paris, so I might turn this into something about that... we'll see. Won't say anything yet, but I'm going to put it here, so that I'm committed in some way to this idea.
Thursday, June 7, 2007
Sunday, May 27, 2007
sad
This really depresses me, that some chubby little 11 year old kid can kill this huge hunk of boar. that thing is terrifying, its unreal and it's dead because of some stupid kid. He'll be even chubbier after he eats all that sausage.
http://www.suntimes.com/news/nation/402926,CST-NWS-pig27.article
Tuesday, May 22, 2007
a tale of two cities
So there are many different Cairos. It's such a huge city, that the different neighborhoods have vastly different characters. On friday, we went shopping, a day Kathryn appropriately entitled a tale of two cities. We met at 2 (ish- meaning around 230) at Hussein mosque, outside of Khan al-Khalili, the old, very touristy bazaar in old cairo, where all of the vendors will "Kill my wife for you!" unless they are "already married, just want your money." But Khan al-Khalili was not our destination, instead we went to Ruba Bekya market, ie the Friday markey next to the City of the Dead. (city number one).
Ok sidenote- ruba bekya= the cry of junk collectors that roam the Cairo streets. apparently it is an ancient Italian art of trash collection ( i think in italian its veccia or something with a v that got lost in arabic) that is very prevalent in cairo today.The bekya men are a mild obsession of a lot of the people I know, probably because of the crazy calls they've developed.
Back to the Friday market. so basically it's just a big market, it wasn't what i expected. people said "you won't feel comfortable if you don't cover your hear and go with an Egyptian" but i didn't feel like that was necessarily true. Though the little place we stopped for a soda apparently we were the first westerners to have been there, which I guess is why they made the guy sleeping on the bench move so that we could sit. But basically you can buy anything there, socks, sunglasses, faucets ice creams, doorknockers, broken toys, broken everything, sheets, old magazines,live desert foxes (endangered), you know, the usual. So whatever, seeing the foxes was a bit strange, right next to cages filled with lizards piled on each other. Afterwards we wandered a bit in the city of the dead, a huge graveyard of mausoleums where a lot of poor cairenes live. It was strange seeing a school in a graveyard. I mean there are sort if like street and everything, because of the way the graveyard is organized. It always feels a bit strange, though, going to look at places where people live like that, people are living there because they can't afford to live other places, it's not like tlc look how i turned this barn into a house, but well i don't know, i guess most people didn't seem too bothered. We took a bus back downtown, mohamed taught me some arabish: deletaha= i deleted it, finidishtaha= i finished it
ok 2 hours later-ish we met back at tahrir again to go to city stars ie city #itneen. ie 2.
citystars is the fanciest mall in egypt, probably the fanciest mall everrrrrr. A steep 20 pound cab ride from downtown, it is definitely worth it to trek out there every once in a while to people-watch and windowshop at all the fancy stores (where, unlike clothing stores downtown, there is a very unegyptian lack of extra glitter, sparkles, goldspangliness on the clothes)--or go see a censored movie or eat at Egypt's Mexican restaurant. Its amazing how many people are shopping on any given night. I went to the mall around midnight one night and it was packed. So that's basically all there is to the tale. I was going to buy some clothes, but the guy at vero moda who told me he would give me his employee discount wasn't there. So I bought a book in arabic that hopefully one day I will be able to read...
Ok sidenote- ruba bekya= the cry of junk collectors that roam the Cairo streets. apparently it is an ancient Italian art of trash collection ( i think in italian its veccia or something with a v that got lost in arabic) that is very prevalent in cairo today.The bekya men are a mild obsession of a lot of the people I know, probably because of the crazy calls they've developed.
Back to the Friday market. so basically it's just a big market, it wasn't what i expected. people said "you won't feel comfortable if you don't cover your hear and go with an Egyptian" but i didn't feel like that was necessarily true. Though the little place we stopped for a soda apparently we were the first westerners to have been there, which I guess is why they made the guy sleeping on the bench move so that we could sit. But basically you can buy anything there, socks, sunglasses, faucets ice creams, doorknockers, broken toys, broken everything, sheets, old magazines,live desert foxes (endangered), you know, the usual. So whatever, seeing the foxes was a bit strange, right next to cages filled with lizards piled on each other. Afterwards we wandered a bit in the city of the dead, a huge graveyard of mausoleums where a lot of poor cairenes live. It was strange seeing a school in a graveyard. I mean there are sort if like street and everything, because of the way the graveyard is organized. It always feels a bit strange, though, going to look at places where people live like that, people are living there because they can't afford to live other places, it's not like tlc look how i turned this barn into a house, but well i don't know, i guess most people didn't seem too bothered. We took a bus back downtown, mohamed taught me some arabish: deletaha= i deleted it, finidishtaha= i finished it
ok 2 hours later-ish we met back at tahrir again to go to city stars ie city #itneen. ie 2.
citystars is the fanciest mall in egypt, probably the fanciest mall everrrrrr. A steep 20 pound cab ride from downtown, it is definitely worth it to trek out there every once in a while to people-watch and windowshop at all the fancy stores (where, unlike clothing stores downtown, there is a very unegyptian lack of extra glitter, sparkles, goldspangliness on the clothes)--or go see a censored movie or eat at Egypt's Mexican restaurant. Its amazing how many people are shopping on any given night. I went to the mall around midnight one night and it was packed. So that's basically all there is to the tale. I was going to buy some clothes, but the guy at vero moda who told me he would give me his employee discount wasn't there. So I bought a book in arabic that hopefully one day I will be able to read...
Wednesday, May 9, 2007
juice
All I did today was drink juice. well, not all, but I just figured I'd make people who really like juice jealous. juice jealous. ok that wasn't necessary. Actually, today I woke up at 4 to write a paper about ceiling decorations... I'm not a huge architecture fan I decided, but I do like the decoration bits. The amazing thing is, I can visit a lot of the places we study. Like Mashatta, this 8th century Umayyad Palace in Jordan, we went there. On our way to the Amman airport, with an insane Palestinian cab driver who told us all about immigrating to Jordan and his opinions on Iraqis and "ninjas," women in nikhab, whom he refuses to pick up, because men dress as women and rob cab drivers...
Ok but that's not the point. I don't know if there is a point. Oh, Juice. After "finishing" said paper, I went to St. Andrews where I "volunteer" ie hang out with a class of realllllly cute kids for two hours and write check pluses and "supers"on their work, or try in vain to figure out how to get them to figure out the right answer instead of telling them. Like I told Essa "puuuuuppy," but instead of figuring out it's spelled with a "u," he just changed P-O-O-P-Y to P-U-O-O-P-Y. oh well.
so after that, classes blablabla. juice number one for lunch: fresh grapefruit. it was pulpy and good. mmmm. Then arabic class, after which I needed a second juice, peach. Then to arabic class number two. after that, I went to the buSSy project play. It's a bit like the vagina monologues, but written by AUC students, and with an Egyptian twist. My friend Reem was in it, she was really good. Afterwards, Kameliya and I took a cab home, then stopped at the juice stand. I got mowz bifrowla, ie. strawberry banana, that has some crazy other name like akhakhfiya or i dunno... juice here is so good. I also bought a bottle of peach juice. Usually I ONLY get aseer asb, sugar cane juice. It's so refreshing and they have these cool machines that they run the sugar cane through and mmmm. So then I came home and wrote this and now I will pass out, because i woke up at 4 to write about vine motifs and stucco decorations.
Ok but that's not the point. I don't know if there is a point. Oh, Juice. After "finishing" said paper, I went to St. Andrews where I "volunteer" ie hang out with a class of realllllly cute kids for two hours and write check pluses and "supers"on their work, or try in vain to figure out how to get them to figure out the right answer instead of telling them. Like I told Essa "puuuuuppy," but instead of figuring out it's spelled with a "u," he just changed P-O-O-P-Y to P-U-O-O-P-Y. oh well.
so after that, classes blablabla. juice number one for lunch: fresh grapefruit. it was pulpy and good. mmmm. Then arabic class, after which I needed a second juice, peach. Then to arabic class number two. after that, I went to the buSSy project play. It's a bit like the vagina monologues, but written by AUC students, and with an Egyptian twist. My friend Reem was in it, she was really good. Afterwards, Kameliya and I took a cab home, then stopped at the juice stand. I got mowz bifrowla, ie. strawberry banana, that has some crazy other name like akhakhfiya or i dunno... juice here is so good. I also bought a bottle of peach juice. Usually I ONLY get aseer asb, sugar cane juice. It's so refreshing and they have these cool machines that they run the sugar cane through and mmmm. So then I came home and wrote this and now I will pass out, because i woke up at 4 to write about vine motifs and stucco decorations.
Friday, April 20, 2007
approximately what my life in cairo is like
i have lots more to say, and will do so when my JP is finished-ish. For now, I found this video... These are basically the kinds of peeps i hang out with
Sunday, March 11, 2007
link didn't work?
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/01/world/middleeast/01cairo.html?ex=1330491600&en=c45627804669ee3d&ei=5124&partner=permalink&exprod=permalink
so for some reason that didn't work before. Saturday I went on a camel ride at the pyramids. I love camels, especially their feet. yalla yalla ya gamal. That is what I had to say to it, to make it go. but it still didn't go.
So I feel like I'm failing at giving any sort of multiple perspectives on being here. I guess it's harder to write about certain things, I'm not so sure about all of this internet opentotheworld ness.
Anyways, what else. Friday, I went with my friends Kathryn, Maddie and Ona to Ismailiya, a smaller city (well ok any city will be smaller than cairo) on the Suez canal. It was a really nice trip, getting out of Cairo for the day, and seeing another part of Egypt where we were the only foreigners around. We arrived right smackin the middle of noon prayers, so had a funny journey from bus station,where we were the complete focus of attention, with numerous young boys yelling numerous lewd things to downtown, where there was no one at all anywhere. We did find a restaurant that was open though, and had some beetza, v. egyptian, i know.
By the way a note on Cab drivers in Ismailiya, they are sooo nice. No marriage proposals, no attempts to overcharge foreigners, in fact TWO out of the three cabs we had while we were there didn't want to let us pay at all. Which was... not quite how things are here.
So Ismailiya is where the Suez Canal authority is located. It was laid out by the british, and if full of large fancy houses related to the administration of the canal. We went to the Ismailiya museum, which is completely unrelated to the canal. My favorite things were the tiny heart shaped amulets (like real heart-shaped), and the mosaic which told the story of Phedra and Hippolyte- I guess she tried to send him a love letter, and he wasn't having it, so she tried to have him killed... a little fuzzy on my mythology, but there were frolicking centaurs so i liked it. Oh I also liked the spones and pines (spoons and pins... tehee).
Ismailiya was a really good place to develop a happier, more wholesome image of egyptian families. There were families sitting in the park, kids playing soccer (and field hockey... ?), picknicking on the beach (of lake timsah). Basically the things that are hard to see in the city, unless you go to the suburbs, which I don't. there's a lot more I have to say about kids, and pollution and taxis and everything, but I'm going to go get some free food instead.
so for some reason that didn't work before. Saturday I went on a camel ride at the pyramids. I love camels, especially their feet. yalla yalla ya gamal. That is what I had to say to it, to make it go. but it still didn't go.
So I feel like I'm failing at giving any sort of multiple perspectives on being here. I guess it's harder to write about certain things, I'm not so sure about all of this internet opentotheworld ness.
Anyways, what else. Friday, I went with my friends Kathryn, Maddie and Ona to Ismailiya, a smaller city (well ok any city will be smaller than cairo) on the Suez canal. It was a really nice trip, getting out of Cairo for the day, and seeing another part of Egypt where we were the only foreigners around. We arrived right smackin the middle of noon prayers, so had a funny journey from bus station,where we were the complete focus of attention, with numerous young boys yelling numerous lewd things to downtown, where there was no one at all anywhere. We did find a restaurant that was open though, and had some beetza, v. egyptian, i know.
By the way a note on Cab drivers in Ismailiya, they are sooo nice. No marriage proposals, no attempts to overcharge foreigners, in fact TWO out of the three cabs we had while we were there didn't want to let us pay at all. Which was... not quite how things are here.
So Ismailiya is where the Suez Canal authority is located. It was laid out by the british, and if full of large fancy houses related to the administration of the canal. We went to the Ismailiya museum, which is completely unrelated to the canal. My favorite things were the tiny heart shaped amulets (like real heart-shaped), and the mosaic which told the story of Phedra and Hippolyte- I guess she tried to send him a love letter, and he wasn't having it, so she tried to have him killed... a little fuzzy on my mythology, but there were frolicking centaurs so i liked it. Oh I also liked the spones and pines (spoons and pins... tehee).
Ismailiya was a really good place to develop a happier, more wholesome image of egyptian families. There were families sitting in the park, kids playing soccer (and field hockey... ?), picknicking on the beach (of lake timsah). Basically the things that are hard to see in the city, unless you go to the suburbs, which I don't. there's a lot more I have to say about kids, and pollution and taxis and everything, but I'm going to go get some free food instead.
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