Ishtaaaaaa.

Since Sunday, I've had a serious change of heart.

Monday was our service learning project at the knitting workshop in Muquttam, and I must say, for everything went wrong in its conception and all the negativity that surrounded it, I had a great time, and it went really well. We got there pretty early, and got right down to business with taking pictures and cataloging products and doing interviews, and everyone was impressed with how efficiently we worked. We got all the information gathered before noon, and were able to spend a little bit of time trying to communicate in any way we could, with our broken Arabic, with one of the women who was extremely friendly and enjoyed our company very much named Fadwa. I think the most rewarding part was how happy she was when we said we'd come back and bring her copies of the pictures we took with her. It was nice to see how nice the environment they're working in is because when I first thought of knitting factory [which is how it was originally presented], I thought of a massive industrial factory with lines of sewing machines and women just sewing away all day. Very Dickens-esque. It was just the contrary. There were maybe 10 or 15 stations, very bright with plenty of windows, and all the women seemed really happy. We came back to the hotel after to organize all the pictures and information to give to Sai to get the website up and running, and all that's left is to wait for everything to be complete.


We had a few hours between service and, later that evening, we had our first dialogue with the Egyptian Fulbrighters. That was really great. It was a little awk at first, when we all just kind of mingled together without really saying much, but once we introduced ourselves and got the ball rolling, everything was fine. Prof. Sullivan and a few other people talked for a bit about the organization and past dialogues, and that was as it always is when we have to listen to a preface, and then we broke up into four groups. There were maybe 20 people in my room, and we were all pretty quiet at first. Cynthia was our mediator and was pretty proficient at letting us go on our own and discuss the things we wanted to talk about rather than interjecting into every story and making irrelevant points. The first half was nice, despite one of the Egyptian men interrupting other students to give us a history lesson. The conversations lost their momentum when he would stop us to make a point, and then give us a 5-minute back-story. I guess it paid off a little bit, but it just generally slowed things down. The second half was different because Cynthia and the historian left, so we got less history, but a more talkative moderator.

I think, overall, the dialogue was one of my favorite things we've done so far here because we finally got to sit down and have a real conversation with our Egyptian counterparts. As much as we receive positivity with regards to America just walking the streets of Cairo and various other cities we've been to, it's hard to tell whether it is a genuine sentiment or not. Solely the prospect of hearing what these students [who, unlike the ones in the souks who yell out to us how much they love Uncle Sam, weren't trying to sell anything] honestly thought about American people and our government and generally the way our country works was exciting. Living inside the United States and being pampered by all the luxuries it provides, we are blind to the way the rest of the world views us, so hearing it first-hand from people our own age makes it all the more real and believable. Unfortunately, it was easy to tell they were reluctant to say negative things about our government, let alone theirs, but they opened up about American people.

A lot of the things they said are things that I myself hate about our culture: the fact that the media controls and dominates everything, how celebrity gossip is prevalent over important news, how marriage has become a commodity, how "reality" has lost its meaning with the proliferation of "reality television", how originality is lost on younger generations, and how education is losing importance. All of these are things that we, being among the highly-educated Americans, can see and criticize about our society and we all agreed on these problems, for the most part. One of the things that I most enjoy about being here is that I don't have to listen to constant babble about which celebrity is pregnant or having plastic surgery or getting married. That garbage that is bringing our nation down little by little is unheard of here and it's SO nice to be away from that.

We covered many of the basic topics - religion, politics, culture differences - at the beginning and then went into a little more depth toward the end. Somehow we got onto the topic of my being a music major, and they were pretty fascinated, since it seems like majors in the arts are seen as less [I'm trying not to say important, but it seems like the only appropriate word] important than studies in things like engineering and politics. The fact that all I study is music was intriguing to them. We got onto the topic of cultural things to do around Cairo, since a lot of us haven't really been OUT out for some nightlife yet. One of the guys, Karim, told us about Cairo Jazz Club in Mohandiseen, and how that night was Jazz Night, and there were all kinds of various events at the place. A few of us were very interested, so at the end, we exchanged information and decided to meet and go together.

We met them outside the hotel, and two guys drove three girls, and two other girls and I went with Karim in a cab. We got there before the band started, so we grabbed seats on the bar and just got to know each other outside the parameters of the dialogue. Turns out that it wasn't especially a "jazz" night, per say, but more of a Frank Sinatra tribute night. There were posters of Old Blue Eyes all over the walls and the band played most of the standards that he's known for. I loved it. It was probably the most fun I've had in Egypt. We got up and danced and stayed out pretty late for having 9am class the next day. It was nice to go out with people other than our NU mob and have a good time without being on a schedule. The boys drove us back to the hotel, and our cab got to Flamenco before the car, so we waited with Karim until the other two picked him up, and then crashed into bed. I went to bed singing I've Got You Under My Skin and New York, New York. It was one of the best nights I've had in a long time.

This is turning into a novel. I should probably start updating more often.