Back to School

Hey folks,

Sorry it’s been so long. It seems whenever I sit down to write, I don’t have the energy or the time or the computer or something. Since these are the same excuses, I’ll chalk it up to energy, which if it were present, would let me work something out for the other two.

Okay, so what’s up? Here’s the news from here.

Weather is nice (I know it’s not so nice where most of you are, I hope it’s okay for the rest of you). This is much more what I expected (highs 22-27) and sunny. This is much better than the dust storm which we had last week (did I tell you about that? I don’t remember. It meant you couldn’t see much in the distance, and everything inside and out was covered with a layer of dust.

Okay, so I did start school last week, Monday to be exact. Sunday was placement testing, actually, then classes on Monday. There are 2 courses, Egyptian Colloquial Arabic (the language spoken on the streets, in the houses, on the non-formal media of Egypt) and Modern Standard Arabic, which is the universal written Arabic language, and is found in anything written, including newspapers, and anything formal, like news, government speeches, etc. I’ve been put in level 6 for ECA and level 4 for MSA. The MSA is what I studied at university, but ECA is what I’ve used since I got here, so ECA feels more comfortable since I’m so out of practice in the other, and also I didn’t take a lot of the grammar rules of MSA. Oh well, we’ll just do our best.

Actually, I think it will be good for the month anyways. I’ll reassess after a bit to see if I want to take another level next month. It will definitely improve my speaking and my vocabulary. And it’s a good reminder of what it’s like to be back in school (lectures and participation and homework) – all that good stuff that I haven’t done in just under 11 months but will be fully immersed into in 7.5 months. We have about 7 people in our ECA and 10 in MSA so they’re pretty standard.

It’s a funny little world, this institute. It only teaches Arabic, so all the people there are foreigners, and they come from all over the world, in all different levels. I don’t think you appreciate how multicultural Canada is until you come to a place like this. There are some parts of Cairo that are multicultural (e.g. Maadi) but mostly, when you see someone not-Egyptian, they stand out quite a bit, and it doesn’t happen all that frequently. So back to the institute, it’s like this weird little multicultural bubble swimming in a sea of Egyptians. It’s a lot like University in Canada (aside from the studying) in the ages, the attitudes and mostly the multiculturalism, again b/c (I get the feeling that) even University here doesn’t have the same diversity. BTW I like it, it’s a different feeling of acceptance, no one looks weird ‘cause everyone looks different.

So my schedule is Mon-Thurs, 9-2pm, (9-11: ECA; 11:30-2: MSA). After that it’s standard – homework and evening plans. I’m gonna see about continuing at the Hospital one day a week to work with a couple of the mentally handicapped people but it might tough, it might be busy with homework, gym, church and some social life (wow that makes me sound amazing self-centered. My only other excuse is I’m not a fan of the 1.5hr commute).

Okay so I really wanna post on job creation, the type of jobs you’ll find here and the economic situation of Egypt, but I’ve going to a church where one of my friends’ bands is playing tonight and I’ve never been there and I don’t really know how to get there and it’s far away, so I need to leave lots of time to make my way there (best compound run-on sentence ever!).

Another time.