Update

Once again its been a while since I’ve written anything here. There are two reasons, the first, is that I don’t have internet at home, and the second is that I don’t really do anything worth mentioning since I’m in class 3-4hours a day (sometimes more) and my weekends are filled with attempting to catch up on all the backward homework... So anyway, I haven’t really done anything of much interest.

I went to the Cairo book fair a couple of weeks ago. Basically a lot of international publishing houses get together and open stores in this big fair ground. The prices are meant to be better than in the normal shops, but I think it was all much the same really. My teacher from the school was kind enough to take me (and speak on my behalf – you know that being foreign thing means you get jacked for cash left right and centre). I got a couple of books, most of what I wanted couldn’t be found unfortunately... Apparently I have to go to Yemen for them! Which is not a bad idea in and of itself... Except that the ticket from Aussie is $4000 – and that’s only to San’a! So I have some stuff to ship back, but not a lot – which is good and bad, good, the price shouldn’t be to bad, bad the cost per kilo will be ridiculously high... sigh.

The only other remotely eventful happening was going hijab shopping. There is a mall here in Cairo which is just hijabs, store upon store of hijabs. I pulled all the hard bargaining moves I know, and generally came up with decent prices – for a foreigner anyway... My friend calls it “white privilege” – apparently my ability to get a better price is based on my “whiteness”, I don’t know if I agree with her, I think it just affects the level of harassment you get really. There was one stage where me and my friend were being followed and surrounded by no less than 10 men all apparently wanting to “sell” us their hijabs – that was not the nicest part of the evening, but it was funny. So anyway, I dropped a fair bit of money there – I may even go back...

So other than hijab shopping and the book fair, nothing much is really happening. Just got back from an Arabic party – yes a party where you are only allowed to speak Arabic and you play super-cool Arabic games like “treasure hunt” and “jeopardy” and “taboo” all in Arabic! And of course there was awesome paki-food and lots of sweets and cake. I met lots of lovely girls to which was nice – I don’t really get to meet people since my class runs right through the middle of the day and afterwards all I want to do is sleep...

And with the mention of that word, I am off to sleep now. For once there are no shabab in the street causing a ruckus so I shall try to get some decent snoozing in.

Much Love and Ma’a Salama