I have noticed that most Egyptians ask me the same question: which one is better, America or Egypt? There is a safe answer and a risky one. The safe answer: either "both!" or "Egypt has the best people!" Or you could respond that each person loves their own country best. But offer reasons why America (or Egypt, depending on your personal opinion) is better, and the listener's ears will perk up. They all have opinions about America: Obama is great, Obama is overrated, Bush is awful, Bush was a good guy, America has good people but a bad government, etc.
But seriously: does the average American, Joe Schmoe, know half as much about Egypt as the average Egyptian, Mohammed, knows about America? Probably not. When they think of Egypt, they probably think of elementary-school lessons about Pharaonic Egypt, not what Egypt actually is. And it's difficult to define "Egypt", because Egypt is not a monolith, but this is part of our quest here. We are here to learn Arabic, we are here to learn to understand Egyptians. Sometimes I want to bang my head against the wall because I don't understand how things work here, what the inner workings of the society are, but I'm trying.
I maintain that there is no "right" way to live and that the best way to live is to keep your eyes open and see that people do different things different ways in different places and times. In a meeting with my language partner today, I was delighted to discover that he knew that America hasn't always been the way it is now: America has gone through cultural development, too. Not so long ago, America was much more "conservative", just as Egypt is "conservative" right now. Who knows how Egypt could change in the next fifty years?
Keep your eyes open, keep your ears open, keep your mind open. This is the key to Egypt, to the world.
Saturday, October 31, 2009
Wednesday, October 28, 2009
Moral Victory
Moral Victory
Today started pretty badly. I woke up before my alarm feeling like I would throw up. Fortunately I didn't, but my stomach was bloated and I thought it might pop. Diarrhea is something every American becomes acquainted with here, but it’s never fun. I couldn't risk going to class so I stayed in the Medina and tried reading Naguib Mahfouz all morning. By mid-afternoon my patience had run out and I was feeling frustrated -- but my diarrhea seemed to have abated, so I took a run. Something about exercising seems to really draw stares here. A jogger in shorts and a sleeveless shirt running laps around the inside of the Medina has apparently never happened before. I digress. The day did improve.
Soccer is the only sport that matters here. Fortunately for me, I love soccer and have been able to play and watch a lot. In the Medina there are two "fields" which we play on, and one field we do not play on. Of the "fields" we play on, one is cement and rectangular, and the other is dirt and trapezoidal. The actual field made of grass is forbidden -- except for league play. Egyptians like to stay up late, and over the summer we would start playing around midnight and finish at 3:00 a.m. That was because of the heat as well. Now that we are in the regular school year and the Medina has a few thousand more students, the fields are much more crowded and it is harder to get in a game. The games thus far have been pick-up games. The goal is to have 15-minute games with five minutes overtime in case of a tie, and but penalty shots for a tiebreaker. However that is just an idea; in reality there is no system. The fields are small, so we usually play six to a squad.
Tonight was unusual because it was the first time our team has played. You see, there is a tournament coming up in the Medina, and one of my friends asked me to recruit some Americans to form a team. So our team is half Americans and half Egyptians. One of the really great things about living in the Medina is the variety of Egyptians you become friends with. Just on this team we have Khalid, a Bedouin from Martruah; Ahmad from Mansoura; another Ahmad from Bahera; Farahat from Kafr al Sheikh and the Americans: myself, Jacob Travers from Maryland and Chris Marrs from Texas. However, Jacob was sick so Scott Cressy from Western Michigan took his spot.
Tonight was not a tournament match but we wanted to try playing together for practice. At 8:30 we descended to the fields but both were busy and had a several teams waiting to play. To get on the field takes more than waiting your turn. In Egypt, the idea of taking turns or lines has yet to catch on in a big way. Usually in this situation, who gets to play next is decided by a big shouting match between all the teams trying to play. In the shouting match anything goes for an argument, but in the end it comes down to how many people are shouting with you and the larger group takes the field. I guess it could be called democratic, in a way.
We finally got to play after a temporary loss of power for the lights in the Medina, which caused some people to leave. Luckily the power came back quickly and we won our turn to play. When Americans step on the field it draws a lot of attention. Instantly there were a hundred spectators just dying to see these Americans get trampled. Do not confuse their animosity with anti-Americanism. Although I can’t say there is none of that here, the real issue when it comes to soccer is that the U.S. National Team dealt a crushing defeat to the Egyptian National Team in the Continent Cup last July, eliminating Egypt from the tournament. Ever since then, the Egyptians have been bitter and when the U.S. team lost to Brazil in the championship match, Egyptians were ecstatic.
The game started out great. We were dominating the field. We had six shots on goal in the first few minutes, and scored one. It looked like we would crush them. But, alas things did not go our way. They called for a substitution. A normal substitution is one player, but somehow they substituted the entire team! After that it was a whole new game. We were playing against the best Egyptian players out of every player who was present (at least one hundred). We held up for a while, and then they picked us apart. We lost 4-1 to the cheers of a huge crowd. The moral victory was clear, though, we played hard with what we had, but they had to make an all-star team to ensure they wouldn't lose. Later, I got a message that they were talking about the game all over the Medina. Even though we lost, we still took the field and made a stand and that earns respect.
Today started pretty badly. I woke up before my alarm feeling like I would throw up. Fortunately I didn't, but my stomach was bloated and I thought it might pop. Diarrhea is something every American becomes acquainted with here, but it’s never fun. I couldn't risk going to class so I stayed in the Medina and tried reading Naguib Mahfouz all morning. By mid-afternoon my patience had run out and I was feeling frustrated -- but my diarrhea seemed to have abated, so I took a run. Something about exercising seems to really draw stares here. A jogger in shorts and a sleeveless shirt running laps around the inside of the Medina has apparently never happened before. I digress. The day did improve.
Soccer is the only sport that matters here. Fortunately for me, I love soccer and have been able to play and watch a lot. In the Medina there are two "fields" which we play on, and one field we do not play on. Of the "fields" we play on, one is cement and rectangular, and the other is dirt and trapezoidal. The actual field made of grass is forbidden -- except for league play. Egyptians like to stay up late, and over the summer we would start playing around midnight and finish at 3:00 a.m. That was because of the heat as well. Now that we are in the regular school year and the Medina has a few thousand more students, the fields are much more crowded and it is harder to get in a game. The games thus far have been pick-up games. The goal is to have 15-minute games with five minutes overtime in case of a tie, and but penalty shots for a tiebreaker. However that is just an idea; in reality there is no system. The fields are small, so we usually play six to a squad.
Tonight was unusual because it was the first time our team has played. You see, there is a tournament coming up in the Medina, and one of my friends asked me to recruit some Americans to form a team. So our team is half Americans and half Egyptians. One of the really great things about living in the Medina is the variety of Egyptians you become friends with. Just on this team we have Khalid, a Bedouin from Martruah; Ahmad from Mansoura; another Ahmad from Bahera; Farahat from Kafr al Sheikh and the Americans: myself, Jacob Travers from Maryland and Chris Marrs from Texas. However, Jacob was sick so Scott Cressy from Western Michigan took his spot.
Tonight was not a tournament match but we wanted to try playing together for practice. At 8:30 we descended to the fields but both were busy and had a several teams waiting to play. To get on the field takes more than waiting your turn. In Egypt, the idea of taking turns or lines has yet to catch on in a big way. Usually in this situation, who gets to play next is decided by a big shouting match between all the teams trying to play. In the shouting match anything goes for an argument, but in the end it comes down to how many people are shouting with you and the larger group takes the field. I guess it could be called democratic, in a way.
We finally got to play after a temporary loss of power for the lights in the Medina, which caused some people to leave. Luckily the power came back quickly and we won our turn to play. When Americans step on the field it draws a lot of attention. Instantly there were a hundred spectators just dying to see these Americans get trampled. Do not confuse their animosity with anti-Americanism. Although I can’t say there is none of that here, the real issue when it comes to soccer is that the U.S. National Team dealt a crushing defeat to the Egyptian National Team in the Continent Cup last July, eliminating Egypt from the tournament. Ever since then, the Egyptians have been bitter and when the U.S. team lost to Brazil in the championship match, Egyptians were ecstatic.
The game started out great. We were dominating the field. We had six shots on goal in the first few minutes, and scored one. It looked like we would crush them. But, alas things did not go our way. They called for a substitution. A normal substitution is one player, but somehow they substituted the entire team! After that it was a whole new game. We were playing against the best Egyptian players out of every player who was present (at least one hundred). We held up for a while, and then they picked us apart. We lost 4-1 to the cheers of a huge crowd. The moral victory was clear, though, we played hard with what we had, but they had to make an all-star team to ensure they wouldn't lose. Later, I got a message that they were talking about the game all over the Medina. Even though we lost, we still took the field and made a stand and that earns respect.
Beep Beep
Welcome in Egypt!
When I was in the States, an Egyptian professor of mine told me that he was very worried about my safety in Egypt. I thought, "Terrorists? Disease?" But no, he said, "I don't know how you'll cross the street." He was so sincere and serious that I didn't laugh at him, but I didn't think anything of it until I got here and saw that it is an adventure everytime I cross the street.
I have lived in Brasil and Italy and the United States, and never have I seen such reckless driving as I've seen here. To illustrate:
Robert and I saw a man get hit by the side mirror of a car, and it sheared it right off. The man kind of made a face, like he was in pain, and the driver just drove off. Our taxi caught up to the driver and Robert yelled, "Learn how to drive!" to which the driver yelled back, "He needs to learn how to walk!"
So, yeah, that's something that I figured you could know before you got here. To practice, go to your local highway and cross it a couple of times on foot.
Monday, October 26, 2009
اهلاً بكم في برنامج فلاجشيب الإسكندرية!
Welcome to the blog of the Arabic Overseas Flagship Program in Alexandria, Egypt. The overseas portion of the Undergraduate Arabic Flagship Program, administered by American Councils, began in June 2008 with both a summer and an academic year program in Alexandria, Egypt. Hosted by The University of Alexandria, the program consists of intensive classroom instruction in both Modern Standard and Colloquial Egyptian Arabic, cultural excursions and language practice with peer tutors. This blog will contain posts by students currently in the program. We hope you will find it interesting!
-Robyn Davis
Resident Director
Flagship Program Alexandria
-Robyn Davis
Resident Director
Flagship Program Alexandria
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