patterns to set

After the other "newbies" (alguddad) finished their fusHa class today, we went to a tiny little foul&falafel place that Helena found. The boy working there (actually he's probably about our age) made fun of our mixed-up 'amiya/fusHa, and messed up Helena's order, but the food was good and cheap, and I think we'll be going back there more often (if only to speak better Arabic and try to prove to that guy that we are goofy because we're new, not because we're stupid). Michael, Helena, and I took our sandwiches along with us in order to see the National Museum in Alexandria before it closed at 3, and we had class at 4. None of us exactly remembered where it was, but two nice men showed us the way in the end, and our wandering helped us get a better idea of our surroundings.

The museum itself isn't exactly amazing as far as layout or presentation is concerned (and some of the English translations were a little hooky), but like everything we've seen here so far, the actual *stuff* is incredible. I can't really describe it...I'm going to go back and try to sketch some things when I'm not lugging around my laptop. And, though I don't think a photograph is necessarily what I need ( I felt like I'd seen some of the statuettes before in multimedia presentations, either here or at the Brooklyn Museum this summer), I decided today that I am not going to be embarassed about taking pictures in the future (especially since I usually want to take pictures of different things than other people...like that sign with the cherries&onion).

What made me determined to become an obnoxious photo-snapping tourist was not the beauty or the age of the art around me...it was three cute little school girls from Alexandria, all sisters, who insisted that I take a picture with them. When I asked them why they wanted me in the picture, they told me "Because you're beautiful!" I couldn't really refuse then (though don't get the wrong idea...if they'd been male they'd have gotten a completely different response), so I just smiled for the camera.

The point is that if I'm going to be the object in somebody else's photograph, I might as well take a few of my own. It's only fair play, right?

I do wish I had talked to the girls a little longer, because that would probably would have disspelled some of the awkwardness and made me feel like less of a...curiosity. In general, this kind of exchange makes me a little bit sad, because I feel like white skin, light hair and eyes are so over-glorified here(at home is another story). All of those girls (probably aged around 13, 9, and 7) were gorgeous, and today is definitely not one of my better days (those mosquitoes in our apartment--gah!). The same goes for my host sister Mona, and her sister Safa'. Safa' and her children (but mostly Mayor, who is the oldest) are always talking about how pretty I am, amongst themselves and to me. Some people have even explained it directly in terms of color. I would rather people treat me as a crazy foreigner/tourist/westerner for my skin color than automatically admire me because of it. And I'm about to dye my hair.

The first day I arrived here, Baba told Mona (she's a teacher) to bring me in to school with her so that her students would do well on their exams. Why? They'll be inspired by my beauty. "No, Baba," she told him, "They'll just be distracted." I think I prefer the calling and hissing in the streets from guys to the kind of looks I sometimes get from girls. Hopefully they don't think that they themselves are any less beautiful, and it is just a fascination with what's different, but I think there is a little more to it than that.

Going to the museum in between classes (and it was the perfect amount of time to do it...) really made me regret not studying in New York or another culturally interesting city. I would have loved to visit museums before and after class, wander around, make sketches and doodles...communicate with my surroundings. At Middlebury the environment is occasionally interesting and often forbidding, the classes and the workload are restrictive, and the location is isolating. It seems strange that I should have had to travel halfway around the world to have the student experience I always wanted to have.

That is basically the crux of why I'm so happy...or...before that, even, relieved to be here. Finally, my schooling is not getting in the way of my education! All this free time that I suddenly have doesn't mean I am bored, or dull, or dumb...it means I have time to make connections, to explore, to have good conversations with friends and strangers, to write and to learn, learn, learn. I have time, finally, to reply to emails, to read the news (!), and to discover things on my own. I even have time, amazingly, to study. The more I get acquainted with the city, the more I am able to do for myself, and the more I am able to teach myself.

It makes me angry and sad when I realize how hard I had to fight at "real"/American Middlebury to be the kind of person and the kind of student I wanted to be. I've only been here a few weeks and I feel I am quickly getting all the tools I'll need to find my own path for a thesis project...I feel I will be capable of putting together a program for myself in the fall if I can stay.

I miss my family, I miss my friends, I miss New Jersey, I miss New York (probably in the opposite order...after that experience with the Biblioteca, I really want a job in New York and to spend my summer in the New York Public Library system), and I miss the amazing professors I've had at Middlebury...but I want to come back here next fall.

...i saw the sign..

One of my new interests here is the concept of 'street graphics', which really just means I like looking at advertisements, announcements, and graffiti. I made Caitlin take a picture of this sign because the Arabic says "Not everything big is sweeter..."

It also seems like a good stand-in for a lot of Alexandrians' attitude toward their city versus Cairo. When I was in Cairo, all the native Alexandrians I met said it was a much better city, more beautiful, cleaner, and the people were nicer. Less chaotic than Cairo, they said. Smaller. Sweeter. A lot of native Cairenes worried that I would be 'bored' because Alexandria was 'basically just one street.' Both of these are probably huge exaggerations, but I have to laugh at the idea of Alexandria being made up of one street. It may be smaller than Cairo, but it's still pretty huge. I wonder what the people of Cairo would have to say about Middlebury? Probably ' it's basically just one house."

...go places...

Even though Caitlin's and my exploration of the city of Alexandria has been fairly limited, we are still creating a sort of personal map of important places. Our first important place is of course our home in Mouharram Bey.

We live right along the yellow tram line and within very close walking distance of two mosques and one absolutely beautiful Orthodox Church. At the end of our street is Fathalla, the local supermarket where we do most of our grocery shopping (and where we have to avoid 'the pepsi boy', a 13 to 15 year old kid who tries to simultaneously chat us up, hit on us, practice his english, and sell us pepsi...multitasking is definitely not an american invention). There are tons of small shops and cafes and carts (fruits, meats, baked sweet potatoes) on our street and just off of it. One of the first turns as we are walking toward Fathalla leads straight into a fish market. The ground there is always wet.

The next important place--by default, not through affection--is the TAFL center at the University of Alexandria's Faculty of Liberal Arts. We started walking to and from the center recently...it's about a 25 minute walk...in order to get more acquainted with our surroundings, and also to avoid using all our change on taxis (you constantly, constantly need small change here, and for some reason Caitlin and I have a lot of trouble getting it...sometimes our plans will actually revolve around how much change we have and ways to get it when we don't). On the way we pass the Alexandria Stadium, the Ibrahim Mosque (I'm not sure if that's the full name...I'll check and correct later), a park and remnant of the old Islamic wall, the Shalalat gardens, and a very old and beautiful Coptic church with a huge cemetary. The center itself is right across the street from the infamous Alexandria Library.

Ah, the Alexandria Library. I call it infamous, because it was one of the places I was most excited about seeing when I got to Alexandria. And indeed, seeing the Alexandria Library--inside and outside--is amaxing. It's a beautiful facility, and the tour left all of us feeling very impressed. They also have some very interesting exhibits inside. Sadly, that is where the love stops. When I tried to actually study in the Alexandria Library (okay, so I was really just trying to use their internet, but still!) this is what happened: (excerpted from a very disorganized email to my brother)

First the guy at the ticket window insisted on speaking English to me, then he kept telling me to "take the ticket!" when he hadn't given me one. I just stared at him until he (grumpily) gave me my ticket. Then I tried to enter the library, at which point the guard ( a really tall guy with freckles) kindly informed me (again in English) that I couldn't enter the library with my bags. I explained that my bag had my laptop in it, and I needed it to study. Then he told me that I could register my laptop and bring it in, but I couldn't bring in my other bag. I tried to protest, but he said that purses weren't allowed in the library. When I looked at him strangely, he said that I could put my pens, wallet, and cellphone in my laptop bag but I had to put my purse in the locker room. Then I went back to the locker room to leave my purse there, and when I got there one of the employees started following me all over the place (at that point I gave up speaking in Arabic...what was the point...I was already being treated like a lost, mute, foreigner anyway) in order to help me. He 'helped' me register my laptop (which was actually necessary...I had to go in this back door, it's totally not marked as a place that library visitors would need to go), and then took me into the main entrance. After they looked through my bag, and finally told me I could go in, I was so disoriented and desperate to get away from the (very polite, very friendly, but annoying and stress-inducing!) guy that I walked straight into the glass door (I think the Biblioteca is the cleanest thing in Alexandria). Embarrassing! Then annoying guy felt like he was really necessary "Be careful, why didn't you wait for me?"

Finally I went through security and left annoying guy behind (maybe I should have given him a tip, but I don't know if this is one of the places where they're banned, and honestly I really didn't want to) and found a desk and sat down. It's a really beautiful library, lit almost completely by natural light (the ceiling is one huge, tilted, window)...but I'm not enjoying it right away like I thought I would. I keep being afraid that annoying guy will come over and ask me if I need help with something else, like plugging in my computer, or registering my sketchbook or something weird like that.

When Caitlin tried to go there the next day, they didn't even allow her to bring in her notebooks. What is the point of a library where the staff is paranoid that you will try to 'steal' a book (so you obviously can't take any of them out), and you also can't take a notebook with you in order to take notes on the books you are reading? I may still try to go back there (their internet is faster than our connection at home, and it is still a very nice place once you actually get inside), but I guess I'll have to throw another temper tantrum and get an overly nice staff person to follow me if I want to bring in anything other than my laptop.

In order to end on a happy note, I have saved the best for last: the most wonderful place in Alexandria, if not the world, is Mohammed Ahmed, a foul and falafel/fast (Egyptian) food restaurant. Their food is delicious and they have the best falafel in the city according to many (and me, though I don't really count), but they are also the most efficiently-run organization I have ever encountered in my life. Literally the second we walk in the door, someone comes to hurry us to a table. As soon as we get a table we get a menu. Almost as soon as we order, the food is served. The check is always brought promptly, we can always get change, and we always, always, always leave happy, garlicky, and full.

First few messy impressions...

Nehad Heliel, the director of our program in Alexandria, describes Egyptian culture as "a chaotic culture." My flatmate and friend Caitlin calls it 'functional chaos.' So far...and this may just be the impression of any foreigner who finds herself having to put together a new life in a new place...that seems to exactly fit my general impression first in Cairo, and then in Alexandria. Even if there is a method to the life around me, it is all so new that it seems like chaos. Even things that aren't new are less clear, either because I don't understand all of what the people around me are saying, or because people treat us like crazy westerners/foreigners and just allow us to do stupid things instead of telling us what's really going on. I don't know if the last is true, but I've suspected it a few times.

Life doesn't exactly move quickly; lateness is almost expected (from Egyptians...woe to us if we arrive late to our classes!), and conversation, friendliness, helpfulness, hospitality, and anything that could be construed as one of the above all seem to come before time commitments. But while life doesn't move quickly, or necessarily on time, it is definitely always moving. There is always, always noise coming from the streets and schools outside our apartment building, and if New York could see Alexandria's (let alone Cairo's!) cafes at night, they would quickly give up their title as the "City That Never Sleeps". On the other hand, I guess a lot of people do sleep in the middle of the day...

My point in mentioning the chaos, however, was to say that right now there is just so much going on around me that I feel that all I am trying to do is to function amid what seems--right now--like chaos. Our victories are small, like crossing the street smoothly in between cars (yes, that's how you do it here...I feel all those video-game fans must have an advantage), managing to arrive at a new destination without asking for directions (or understanding directions when we ask), and getting our grocery shopping done at the local supermarket before it closes for Friday prayers.

Sometimes the chaos is invigorating. On the way to Alexandria, my friend Baher (who was driving me there), joked that "In America, you're not allowed to talk on the phone while you're driving, right? And you have to drive inside the lanes....ah," he shook his head, "In Egypt, we're free." There certainly seem to be a lot less rules....sometimes. Other times there are more, for example the wall around our campus has different doors for all the different colleges, and we are only allowed to enter the door for our college, even though all the doors lead to the same place, and once inside you can exit through any one of them (we think....Caitlin and I once exited through 'Faculty of Education' and the guy in front of us tried to close the door behind him).

That is the tip of the Egyptian bureaucracy iceberg. Anyone who knows me knows how much trouble I have with bureacracy in general, but the beautiful thing about Egyptian bureacracy is that apparently with the right connections (or, even, perhaps, the right tone of voice?) you can easily circumvent it. And as with the doors, you can sometimes ignore it entirely. During our Orientation week, Nehad carried a stack of business cards around with her everywhere we went. These cards got us free admission, special services, and entrance to all kinds of places.

I am now convinced that the reason I was allowed to bring my notebooks *and* my laptop into the Alexandria Library (while my friends who came later were not), was because I had lost so much of my patience that morning that I actually argued with the guard (like six feet tall) about the no bags rule. Maybe it works like bargaining...? More on the Alexandria library later...

There is so much more to write about (and hopefully I will stop expressing myself in generalizations which I am sure to disprove later), but it is late. More coming soon....

Hello, hello!

First, I want to explain that 'becomingyasmeen' is not supposed to mean that I am on some sort of undercover mission, that I am taking on a new identity here and losing my old one. It's just that here my name, which is an anglicized version of the originally Persian and Arabic word, tends to get taken back to its roots. To people here, if I am not 'Jessi' (which I usually don't like to be called, because it takes away everything that's special about my name), then I must be Yasmeen, or--as a compromise-- Jassmyn. So living in Egypt is kind of like becoming Yasmeen. And being called Yasmeen doesn't mean I am losing my name, it just means being called by another version of it. I think that makes sense, because living in a foreign country requires you to make some changes that don't necessarily keep you from being yourself, but they do cause you to discover another version of that self. I expect that to happen during my time here, though it is not really the point of this blog.

The point of this blog, actually, is to maintain contact with all of you...my family and friends in the U.S....and to tell you about my life in Alexandria, and more generally Egypt and the Middle East.