I'm an Uncle (Again)!

Grant Gunner Larson. Son of my older sister. Born yesterday, March 24, 2006 at 11:14 am. 8 lbs. 14 oz. Welcome to the world, kid. Thanks for the photo #1 lil sis A.

10 Little Ways I've Changed in Egypt #1

This isn't an exhaustive list. Just a first draft of the little things I'm noticing the more I think about transition back to the US:

1. I stare more at things on the street.
2. Scarves seem highly practical, and tactically stylish.
3. I'm no longer a Coca-Cola fan. It's not that I've switched sides to Pepsi. I just don't care anymore.
4. I appreciate House music (thanks Turkish ex-roomie S)
5. I'm picky about the quality of cappucinos and lattes.
6. I have a new love of macroeconomics.
7. I don't mind dirt as much as I thought I never did.
8. I highlight things in textbooks.
9. I act more warmly on first meeting with random people.
10. I love soccer.

My B-Day. My Friends.

I really didn’t want a birthday. I wasn’t grumpy or depressed, really. It’s just – I was turning 26.

26. That’s over halfway to 50, ladies and gentlemen. That’s over halfway from 20 to 30. Looking past the numbers, I find myself noticing that my classmates are increasingly younger. It’s not that that I look down on them and think they’re immature. I just find myself remembering things in history they don’t: the Challenger disaster, the Gulf War in the early 90s, the entire Clinton presidency. I’m facing the fact that each day I am more of a relic, an icon of a past age.

Okay, so maybe I was a bit depressed.

But L wasn’t having anything to do with that. “Birthdays are important in my family,” she said. And with that, she gathered the crew. A quick explanation is in order here: I don’t have one monolithic mass of friends, in fact, many don’t know each other at all. Here at AUC, I have a multiple friendship spheres: study-abroad students – hailing from everywhere, from Pakistan to California; The Arabic Language Institute program here – mostly through my ex-roomie J; and I also have a batch of grad students friends, with the odd Egyptian thrown in, just because they’re cool.

Needless to say, it was strange to have them all show up on short notice to the swanky Don Quixote restaurant here in Zamalek, a place I’d been dying to go to from the first time I walked past. The only thing Spanish about the place was the name, by the way, and the prices were astronomical. Afterwards, a few of us went to Deals for late night socializing.

By the end of the night, I realized I was profoundly touched. When my Frankfurt-Cairo plane landed last August, I didn’t know a single soul from this disparate group. Now, they’re my friends. I think sometimes I take that for granted. I won’t anymore.

Valley of the Kings of the Open Road

There’s a special guilt that comes with whizzing past four centuries of history on a motorcycle. Maybe it’s because ancient Egypt always seems enveloped in mummies’ whispers. Maybe because here in Egypt, the tales of history still sound their hollow echo between temple columns older than Jesus.

But not this weekend. This weekend smelled like speed and went by just as fast.

I traveled with my friend Dave – we’re two Americans studying at the American University of Cairo, in Egypt We’re both doing the things Americans finally do since the Twin Towers fell: seriously study this area, this people, this language. What makes the Middle East tick? We’re finding out.

But not this weekend.

It’s nine hours up the Nile to Luxor, in Egypt’s south. Here is the home of the fantastic temples of Karnak and the ancient Egyptian capital of Thebes, where pharaoh after pharaoh attempted to one-up the previous king’s monuments to his own glory.

Just across the river lay the hills containing the Valley of the Kings: home to the celebrated monarchs of old: Rameses II, King Tut, Thutmosis III. The whole gang lay buried within a stone’s throw of each other. The days only their tombs remain, the mummies either destroyed in the past or in present-day museums.

After a day in Luxor’s east bank – Luxor temple, Karnak’s Amun-Re temple – we hard-bargained a ride on a “felucca,” the triangular-sailed boats that have plied the Nile for centuries. Captain Sambol was our vessel’s master, but even the mighty captain couldn’t blow enough wind into our sails to fight the steady northward current of the Nile.

We drifted over to shore, only to be accosted by a surly man in a rowboat. Beer, he was selling. Ah, the joys of an Islamic country. After a bit of haggling, we continued to straggle up the Nile, Stella beers now firmly in-hand. The day winding down, we headed over to the west bank to bed down for the night.

The next day – the usual morning tea at the shop. But this day, something different: two motorcycles awaited us just outside – the results of a deal Dave had made with a random guy. Nothing official, mind you. “If the police ask, I’m just your friend,” he said, smiling nervously. We promised not to rat him out.

Here in Egypt, it’s not unusual for two men to ride one motorcycle – one driving and one holding on for dear life. It’s just practical. So the man was a bit confused when we insisted on one each. “No, no,” one said. “Your friend drive for awhile, then you drive. You take turns.”

Dave and I looked at each other. We both knew what each other were thinking. No way.
If we’re renting bikes, we both get our own. It’s the just way it’s done where we come from, and we were willing to plunk down the necessary cash,

After we embarrassing admitted that neither of us had ever ridden a motorcycle before, the man gave us a crash course in not crashing. He quickly realized we had more enthusiasm than ability, and worriedly cautioned us to go slow, for both our sakes and most importantly, the survival of his motorcycles. We promised to behave.

Minutes later we rumbled into a crowd of tourists in the parking lot next to the fabled Colossi of Memnon. The tourists looked at us, we looked at them. We weren’t one-bit jealous of their air-conditioned behemoth tour bus. I think I smelled their awe. It was probably just my own sweat.

For the rest of the day, we did the tourist thing: Medinat Habu, Hatshepsut’s temple, Valley of the Kings. I studied Egyptology last semester. I love this stuff. But even I quickly realized the motorcycles were slightly more fun than the temples of “big rocks,” as Dave called them, tongue firmly planted in his cheek.

As the sun dropped low in the sky, we cruised aimlessly, ending up on the road to Qena – 50 kilometers north of Luxor. The open road was anything but – chickens, children, pickups. The occasional donkey cart. It didn’t matter: riding was the joy, the rest was just distraction.

It got dark. It was getting late. With a touch of sadness, we turned around and headed back to Luxor, the beams of the setting sun on our backs. We were overdue returning the bikes. “Mish qwis,” the man said, “not good.” He demanded we pay more.

No way. Not this day. We had breathed exhaust fumes, held power in our hands; the wind on our cheeks had given us the world. For that day, for those hours, we – not the dead-and-gone-pharaohs – were gods.

No, we weren’t paying more.

Our kind doesn’t take that kind of lip from anyone.

What a Difference an 'A' Makes

The Associated Press got one wrong today. One letter, that is. But what a letter:

The episode in question, Trapped in the Closet, which first aired last November, shows Scientology leaders hailing Satan, one of the show's four devilish fourth graders, as a saviour. A cartoon Cruise locks himself in a closet and won't come out.

Hey AP: His name is Stan. Get it right. He's a kid character on TV's South Park cartoon show. His name is not Satan.

South Park has always mocked Scientology, but turned up the heat recently with a hard-hitting episode that especially ripped on Scientologist and (I guess) actor Tom Cruise.

What an outrage, huh? It makes me want to torch an embassy. Do Scientologists have embassies? Or wait - should I be torching Comedy Central? Or the Associated Press?

Coming Back to Amr

I find myself clinging to what this is, what Egypt is to me: Sheesha and lemon juice with friends, sharing a handful of nuts with a taxi driver, randomly meeting a kid named Amr and going budget-shopping with him for his mother and sister.

I’m beginning to see the end, now. Months, weeks, days, winding down. But I don’t feel “done,” or like I’m ready to go in any way. My ears perk up every time I hear of a new opportunity – like a chance to roam Syria on the cheap with D, or getting paid pennies to teach English in Yemen.

But I’m also realizing that if I make the current “Cairo” period simply episode #203 in my life, I risk marginalizing it and isolating it. It will turn into something I always want to recapture – a story for the end of the bar, that “one thing I did once” – instead of just another thread in the weave of my life.

And that could endanger my future. It will make it to hard to come back here, or anywhere. I might get trapped on the Island that is America.

Egypt will always be part of me, who I am. But I refuse to celebrate it or worship it. The day I leave will not be the end of an era. It will just be another day in June.

With possibilities wide, wide open.

The Khamaseen Winds: an allegory

The Khamaseen Winds hit today, the desert's hot blanket of sand descending over the city.

It's no surprise, really. This kind of thing happens. Good days, bad days. Season after season.

But each of the last several week's early blast of hot, sandy wind is a vanguard of the truth. A harbinger for the fear that envelops the soul.

What if this is it? What if the winds bring the sand and never leaves? What if this is . . . the end?

No, you say, it cannot be. The city has huddled down before, waited out the huffing and the puffing that tears at the heart.

But what if this is different? What if the winds are here for good - ripping at loose shingles and branches. And what if it doesn't stop? Like dripping water, what if it allies with Time, and cannot be stopped?

What if the darkness of days is the darkness of life?

Taking the Foreign Service Exam...

Just as practice. Taking it is how you get into the State Department's Foreign Service - to work as a diplomat or other such nonsense. You can take it even if you don't want a job, so I'm going to throw myself at it and prove how little I know.

Shift

Familiar things are slipping away. No, that’s not right - old familiar things are slipping away, things I brought with me from the US.

It’s been slow, almost predicable, even. I used up my black spiral-bound notebook, lost my black windbreaker and stained my green t-shirt. I ripped a shirt sleeve on a sharp rock in the Western Desert. I even lost weight, and now no longer fit into half of the pants I brought here.

Back in South Dakota, in late August last year, I packed with intent. I checked what I should bring, budgeted what I wanted to pack, reviewed climate reports, and decided if x shirt would match y pants. I didn’t do all this because studying in Egypt was a grand safari – I did it because I didn’t have a lot of money and didn’t want to carry a lot on the plane.

It worked out. I’ve haven’t had to buy anything clothes-wise since I’ve been here, although I’ve wished for something a bit warmer on some chilly winter nights.

But the process of loss is speeding up. Half of my clothes are wearing out: stitches unraveling, jeans wearing holes, soles separating from shoes. My adaptor for my laptop broke. No explanation, no puffs of smoke. Just . . . gone.

I lost my favorite, world-traveling jacket yesterday. No big story – I just left it somewhere, and now it’s gone.

Khalas.