Last night in Maadi was great! It was one of the many neighborhoods I visited while looking at apartments and I was reminded of how beautiful it was. However, it definitely had the overwhelming "American" vibe that many of my companions seemed to admire yet I found it slightly revolting. The idea of a Fuddruckers in the middle of Cairo (well, the Southeast of Cairo) was really frustrating. This is clearly the other half of the globalization coin that so many textbooks discuss: Westernized products and fads overwhelm local culture and create a bastardized version of both societies. Many Americans seem to consider Maadi their little "haven" but I found it fake. I'm sure if I get homesick it'll be nice to know there's a nearby location where burgers and fries are considered "authentic" but at the moment it makes my skin crawl. The taxi to Maadi was disturbingly long. The taxi driver didn't appear to speak any English and my companions and I were chatting away in the backseat while letting him do his taxi-thang. At one point it became clear we had passed the same building twice. No, no, no, you will not be charging to me to drive in a circle. I very loudly stated that we should call one of our Egyptian friends and have him re-explain our destination since the taxi driver could not seem to find the square we were headed to. Miraculously we ended up there within a few minutes. I have yet to decide if this is a coincidence or the taxi driver understood more than he let on and realized we weren't going to be complacent passengers while being ripped off. Though I should note that "ripped off" in Egypt means losing 5-10 EGP, approximately 2 USD. But that's not the point. I may be superfluously frugal but I hate the entire concept of being ripped off, even if the negative effects upon me are minimal.
The event in Maadi was surprisingly similar to those in the US. It was just a bunch of kids from the university hanging out, listening to music, and occasionally dancing. I was very taken aback by some of the behavior I saw from other foreigners, however. Foreign women definitely have a reputation for promiscuity and this is something that, or as I had previously thought, was a reputation many women wanted to discourage. Some women's actions at the apartment were contrary to this opinion. One woman allowed an Egyptian to place his hand down her shirt and didn't say or do anything. Women in Egypt get way more attention here than in any other country I've traveled. It would be extremely rare to walk down the street without a cat call, whistle, lewd stare, or bizarre comment in broken English (imagine: "howdy pretty girl"). Luckily, none of this escalates anything faster than words and simply ignoring it/making a determined face will suffice 99 % of the time in my experiences. Yet the moment you reciprocate the attention or, worse yet, allow them to touch you - it's all over. An Egyptian man would never act that way towards an Egyptian woman and he would especially never touch her. If a man touches you and you don't immediately recoil or react negatively you've essentially opened up the possibility of promiscuous actions. It's sort of a complex relationship but it isn't the "secret to Egypt" - it's commonly known to almost every foreigner traveling to the Egypt. So when I see a women acting in such ways that only perpetuate the negative stereotypes towards us it really makes me angry. Beyond that, it was a really enjoyable evening and it was fun meeting people who are also students at my school. Most of them were on the AUC rugby team and I plan to have some "school spirit" and go to some of the games this semester. After hanging out with some friends we went to a cafe and I was able to fulfill my longtime craving for serious chocolate decadence with a very fudgy chocolate cake and a latte. The latte was great; Egyptian coffee standards are relatively high and I enjoy how strongly they brew the espressos and coffee. The cake was disappointing by my standards but pretty good for cafe fair. I was just happy to have something that tasted of chocolate. The Egyptian guys my friends and I were hanging out with were appalled by the idea that I'd just walk home from wherever they dropped off the other girls (they lived at the AUC dorms in Zamalek and I live in an apartment about 10 minutes walking away). I tried to explain that my route was all along a major, well-lit road and that I carried pepper spray (which I showed them) and they laughed. I guess I should have expected it since my pepperspray is "breast cancer awareness"-themed so it's...pink. Not the most intimidating color but who needs intimidation when you have burning imitation capsicum in your eyes and sinuses? They told me that Egyptians use pepper spray "for breakfast" and they mimed spraying the little canister into their mouths. So much for intimidation factor. I don't feel any less safe, though. My little "breath spray" can spray up to 15 feed and fits on my keychain. I even had a thorough "now this is the switch you turn to activate the spray, point it away from you, then click this, make sure it's pointed away from you" mini-safety lesson from Graham so I'm feeling relatively confident in my ability to use it if I need to. We'll see who's laughing when your eyes are on fire.
By the time I returned to my apartment I was definitely not sleepy and I remembered the relatively large pile of laundry that's been accumulating in my room. One of my first "large" purchases was a big plastic hamper (an attractive neon green) for my laundry. For some reason, the idea of my dirty laundry sitting on the dirty floor seemed unclean. Now that it's safely enclosed in its neon home I feel secure. I have been avoiding laundry since my suitmate told my the washing machine "only worked on the hot setting." Uh... say what? I was all my clothing on cold - most of it even requires further instructions. The idea of washing it on hot was physically disturbing. She had never attempted to ask the previous flatmate why it only worked on hot or to ask the landlady so I was left to my own 4 AM devices to find a user manual. A quick search using the model number on the washing machine showed that not only was this an extremely antiquated model, it doesn't exist anywhere outside an Arabic speaking country. In fact, the only manual I could find showed only the cover page. A depressingly unspecific and poor quality pdf file. My annoying experience with women earlier tonight caused me to bristle when seeing the typical housewife (foreign looking, of course) doing the laundry on the cover. I hope Egypt isn't turning me into a feminist; I like shaving my legs. Nobody likes grasshopper legs scratching up against them. If I've even gone two or three days, the feeling of my own leg brushing up against the other is disturbing. There's no omnipresent "man" telling me to shave my legs or lose women's suffrage - it's just gross. Anyways.... I was relatively proud of my sleuthing skills and I stumbled across another user manual from the same company that was also about 30 years old. Some searching revealed that it also used the weird turn-dial that my washing machine used (all the modern washing machines on the company's website used words and symbols as opposed to the A-G classifications my sad machine uses). I read through it and I think it's going to work! I'm pretty sure I figured out which is the "cold water" button and even if that button doesn't work, I found the setting for 40 degrees C so that's at least not the 95 degrees that the supposed "only setting that works" uses. Only setting my ass. Tomorrow will show whether I was brilliant or utterly incompetent in finding a manual replacement. I may start with washing only the "less demanding" clothing at first. The worst thing that can happen is I have to buy all new clothing....oh darn. (:
The event in Maadi was surprisingly similar to those in the US. It was just a bunch of kids from the university hanging out, listening to music, and occasionally dancing. I was very taken aback by some of the behavior I saw from other foreigners, however. Foreign women definitely have a reputation for promiscuity and this is something that, or as I had previously thought, was a reputation many women wanted to discourage. Some women's actions at the apartment were contrary to this opinion. One woman allowed an Egyptian to place his hand down her shirt and didn't say or do anything. Women in Egypt get way more attention here than in any other country I've traveled. It would be extremely rare to walk down the street without a cat call, whistle, lewd stare, or bizarre comment in broken English (imagine: "howdy pretty girl"). Luckily, none of this escalates anything faster than words and simply ignoring it/making a determined face will suffice 99 % of the time in my experiences. Yet the moment you reciprocate the attention or, worse yet, allow them to touch you - it's all over. An Egyptian man would never act that way towards an Egyptian woman and he would especially never touch her. If a man touches you and you don't immediately recoil or react negatively you've essentially opened up the possibility of promiscuous actions. It's sort of a complex relationship but it isn't the "secret to Egypt" - it's commonly known to almost every foreigner traveling to the Egypt. So when I see a women acting in such ways that only perpetuate the negative stereotypes towards us it really makes me angry. Beyond that, it was a really enjoyable evening and it was fun meeting people who are also students at my school. Most of them were on the AUC rugby team and I plan to have some "school spirit" and go to some of the games this semester. After hanging out with some friends we went to a cafe and I was able to fulfill my longtime craving for serious chocolate decadence with a very fudgy chocolate cake and a latte. The latte was great; Egyptian coffee standards are relatively high and I enjoy how strongly they brew the espressos and coffee. The cake was disappointing by my standards but pretty good for cafe fair. I was just happy to have something that tasted of chocolate. The Egyptian guys my friends and I were hanging out with were appalled by the idea that I'd just walk home from wherever they dropped off the other girls (they lived at the AUC dorms in Zamalek and I live in an apartment about 10 minutes walking away). I tried to explain that my route was all along a major, well-lit road and that I carried pepper spray (which I showed them) and they laughed. I guess I should have expected it since my pepperspray is "breast cancer awareness"-themed so it's...pink. Not the most intimidating color but who needs intimidation when you have burning imitation capsicum in your eyes and sinuses? They told me that Egyptians use pepper spray "for breakfast" and they mimed spraying the little canister into their mouths. So much for intimidation factor. I don't feel any less safe, though. My little "breath spray" can spray up to 15 feed and fits on my keychain. I even had a thorough "now this is the switch you turn to activate the spray, point it away from you, then click this, make sure it's pointed away from you" mini-safety lesson from Graham so I'm feeling relatively confident in my ability to use it if I need to. We'll see who's laughing when your eyes are on fire.
By the time I returned to my apartment I was definitely not sleepy and I remembered the relatively large pile of laundry that's been accumulating in my room. One of my first "large" purchases was a big plastic hamper (an attractive neon green) for my laundry. For some reason, the idea of my dirty laundry sitting on the dirty floor seemed unclean. Now that it's safely enclosed in its neon home I feel secure. I have been avoiding laundry since my suitmate told my the washing machine "only worked on the hot setting." Uh... say what? I was all my clothing on cold - most of it even requires further instructions. The idea of washing it on hot was physically disturbing. She had never attempted to ask the previous flatmate why it only worked on hot or to ask the landlady so I was left to my own 4 AM devices to find a user manual. A quick search using the model number on the washing machine showed that not only was this an extremely antiquated model, it doesn't exist anywhere outside an Arabic speaking country. In fact, the only manual I could find showed only the cover page. A depressingly unspecific and poor quality pdf file. My annoying experience with women earlier tonight caused me to bristle when seeing the typical housewife (foreign looking, of course) doing the laundry on the cover. I hope Egypt isn't turning me into a feminist; I like shaving my legs. Nobody likes grasshopper legs scratching up against them. If I've even gone two or three days, the feeling of my own leg brushing up against the other is disturbing. There's no omnipresent "man" telling me to shave my legs or lose women's suffrage - it's just gross. Anyways.... I was relatively proud of my sleuthing skills and I stumbled across another user manual from the same company that was also about 30 years old. Some searching revealed that it also used the weird turn-dial that my washing machine used (all the modern washing machines on the company's website used words and symbols as opposed to the A-G classifications my sad machine uses). I read through it and I think it's going to work! I'm pretty sure I figured out which is the "cold water" button and even if that button doesn't work, I found the setting for 40 degrees C so that's at least not the 95 degrees that the supposed "only setting that works" uses. Only setting my ass. Tomorrow will show whether I was brilliant or utterly incompetent in finding a manual replacement. I may start with washing only the "less demanding" clothing at first. The worst thing that can happen is I have to buy all new clothing....oh darn. (: