Sunday, February 21, 2010

Umm, I probably need to apologize now . . .

So, I both impressed and depressed myself at the same time today. Impressed because I realized I knew an Arabic word I didn't think I knew. Depressed because it's not a very polite one.

Most days I go visit a couple of friends who work at a dive shop in town. (Yes, these are the guys I ate maggoty cheese with the other day.) Another guy used to work there, but he quit a few weeks ago. Now he's working as a doorman at the building next door. His nephew took his old job at the dive shop. One of the things that the doormen have to do here in Egypt is fill the building's water tank up on the roof. They usually have to do it a couple times a day. So when I came by to visit today, my friend was up on the roof. I sat down and started chatting with his nephew.

My friend apparently didn't enjoy being left out of the conversation, so he started throwing rocks from up on the roof to get our attention. We moved to somewhere where he couldn't see us and sat down. But he scored a lucky shot and hit me right on the knee. I tried to think of something mildly insulting to say in Arabic, but could think of anything. I thought that if I didn't say anything he'd just keep throwing rocks, so I blurted out the first thing that came to mind which was, "ya khawal." "Ya" in Arabic means "hey." And "khawal" . . . well, let's just say that it's not particularly nice. I probably need to go apologize to him tomorrow . . .

Friday, February 19, 2010

Yummy!

Okay, so a question that I often get asked in my line of work is, "what's the strangest thing you've ever eaten?" It used to be deep-fried crickets, until last night that is. But now I've got a new answer . . . live maggots.

Egyptians are fond of this really old, really salty cheese called "mesh." They store it for months just to let it ferment. But apparently Egyptians aren't the only ones who are fond of it, maggots seems to have a thing for it too. I brought some of my friends falafel last night at their store. They were appreciative, so they decided to share some mesh with me. When they took the cover off the top of the cheese I thought that the cheese was stringy and was sticking to the top of the container. But no, it was maggots.

When in Rome . . . right? I couldn't decide whether to chew extra hard to make sure that they were dead, or to swallow them whole and pretend they weren't there.

Ah Egypt, how I love thee . . .

Tuesday, February 16, 2010

Mono-cultural angst!

Just a warning from the beginning. This is not going to be one of my more culturally sensitive posts. Everybody okay with that? Okay, then here we go . . .

Travel opens the mind. It makes you see that there really is another way of doing things, of thinking about the world, of living life. The longer you live outside of your culture, the more you see this. However, the people you live among often don't share this understanding. Case in point:

One thing Egyptians say all the time is w'allahi. The basic translation is "my God." They use it for emphasis. It's an abbreviation of the phrase, w'allahu azeem, which means "as God is great." They'll tack it on to the end of a sentence in order to emphasize that what they're saying really is true. At least that's the original meaning. At this point it's basically become a saying that they use all the time.

One of my friends asked me today how to say it in english. I told him that we don't really say that in english. Then he said, "oh my God" in english. I told him that yes, that's the translation, but that it has a completely different meaning for us. We say it when we're surprised or scared, but not really in everyday conversation.

So he asked me how we would convey the same meaning they do when they say w'allahi. I tried to explain that when someone keeps saying "I swear to God" when they're speaking in english, we assume they're lying. If they have to keep appealing to God or something else to convince me, then they're probably not telling the truth. My friend couldn't wrap his brain around it. He basically told me, "your culture's wrong."

It's frustrating to talk to someone who's so mono-cultural. When you can get outside of your own cultural box, and examine it dispassionately, as well as several other worldviews, it's irritating to talk to someone who can't think outside of their own box. How in the world do you talk to someone who has no concept of different cultures or worldviews, who assumes that the rest of the world is exactly like their village?

Grrr . . . .

See, I told you it wasn't going to be culturally sensitive . . .

Sunday, February 14, 2010

أخيراً

Hey guys,

The name of this post is أخيراً (pronounced "akheeran") which means "finally" in Arabic. Why? Good question, I'm glad you asked.

One of my neighbors has been teaching me to play dominoes recently. Yes, it's more complicated and has much more strategy than I realized. I've been playing with this guy a couple of times a week for the last month or so. And I lose . . . every time. I'd told him that if I ever beat him I was going to dance naked in the street. We talk so much trash to each other. It's actually more fun to talk trash in Arabic than in English

Well, tonight I finally won. I took off my shirt, started walking towards the front door, and told my friend I'd be back in a few minutes. He thought it was hilarious. I'm glad he didn't hold me to my promise of naked dancing because there's actually a wedding taking place right now in the street I live on.

Here's to many more victories . . . I hope . . .

Friday, February 12, 2010

My new friend . . .

For those of you who may not be familiar with Egypt, let me enlighten you. We have mosquitos. Let me clarify that . . . we have LOTS of mosquitos! And the fact that I live in a not-so-nice part of town really doesn't help things much. The mosquitos in Egypt don't carry malaria or dengue-fever though, which is really nice!

Anyway, tonight I walked into my room and noticed a new roommate. There was a lizard just hanging out on the ceiling. After my initial shock, I got really excited. Anything that eats mosquitos is welcome in my bedroom. I decided to name him Edwin. It seemed like a good lizard name. I thought about Arthur or Max, but they just didn't seem to have the cultured, educated flair that Edwin does. I hope he sticks around for a few days, although forever would also work for me. Maybe he'll tell all of his friends about the abundant mosquito buffet in my flat.

Thursday, February 11, 2010

Egyptian Joke . . .

I had a friend over tonight and he taught me an Egyptian joke. So I thought I'd share it with you.

There was a young boy who lived with his father. His mother had died some years before. One day the boy said to his father, "I have to pee." His father told him, "Don't say, 'I have to pee' because it's not polite and other people might hear you. Just say, 'I have to whistle' and I'll understand what you mean." So as time went on, the boy learned to say, "I have to whistle" whenever he needed to pee.

One day the father's job took him out of town for a few days. So the father took his son to stay at his grandfather's house while he was gone. When everyone laid down to sleep the boy said to his grandfather, "I have to whistle." But his grandfather said, "You can't. Everyone's asleep and you'll wake them up. Go to sleep." So the boy went to sleep. But he woke up a little while later and told his grandfather, "I have to whistle right now." But his grandfather told him again, "No way! You can't whistle right now. Go back to sleep." So the little boy tried to sleep, but couldn't. So he woke his grandfather up again and told him, "You don't understand. I have to whistle right now!" So his grandfather said, "Okay, fine. You can whistle right here in my ear . . ."

And, that's the joke. Hope you enjoyed it . . .

Monday, February 1, 2010

Three in a row . . .



Hey guys,

I tried to post this video last night, but the internet was being finicky. Egypt won the Africa Cup last night after a close victory over Ghana (1 - 0). This was actually Egypt's third Africa Cup title in a row. My friends were much better behaved during this match than the last one. Probably because they weren't playing Algeria. Anyway, after the match ended the festivities began. No flag burning this time, though.

Last time I saw a tiny bit of the festivities, then went home. But this time I decided to head to the middle of town to see what things were like. It was crazy! People were chanting, dancing, honking horns, singing, and using aerosol cans like blowtorches. Seriously. Hair spray, bug spray, anything that would burn. I had an initial moment of fear, wondering if I would get impaled by shrapnel if one of the cans exploded. But I figured that with all of the people that were there, the odds of the shrapnel actually hitting me was pretty small.

I also learned something new last night. Steel wool will burn. Well, I think "smolders" might be a better word for it. People were lighting steel wool on fire, then spinning it around really quick. Embers would fly off the end, producing pretty much the same effect as a sparkler. I think this method is a little cheaper than buying real fireworks though.

The game ended at around 8:00 pm, and the celebration was still going strong when I went to bed at about one in the morning. It was so much fun! Let me tell you, there aren't many things that will make you feel more alive than being in the middle of several hundred Arabs dancing, chanting, and lighting things on fire.