Israel, the three sea vacation: Red, Dead, Med :)

So I just got back from a fantastic vacation in Israel. It was Orthodox Easter this weekend, so everyone got Thursday, Sunday and Monday off of school! Five day weekend! For this weekend, a few of us - Erin, Lisa and Erin's boyfriend Joe - decided to take full advantage of our time off.

We got up on Thursday morning and took a bus to Taba, Egypt which is a city right on the border. It was a long bus ride - about six hours. We then had to walk to the border to cross it. The problem with this is the same thing that is the problem in all of Egypt...its complete chaos. Egyptians have no sense of lines or order, so its basically a mad rush to get to the front. We were in line for what seemed like forever to just get a stamp in the passport that says we left Egypt. Which by the way, tells people I was in Israel, and now i can't visit another Middle Eastern country (except Israel, Jordon and Egypt and maybe another one) until my passport expires and I get a new one. Just the way of the Mid East, they don't want people to go to Israel apparently. Then, we walked over to the Israel side of the border where we had to go through customs. That part was extremely smooth, and you could almost hear the collective sigh of relief that there were lines and technology keeping us together.

After crossing the border, we got in a cab and headed for Eliat which is a town on the Red Sea, right by the border. We had considered trying to catch a bus to go up to Jerusalem that night, but after the border crossing we had all just about had it. We found a really nice hostel/motel and dropped our bags off. Then we headed off to go to an Irish Pub! You cannot even begin to imagine our joy at drinking beer on the patio of the bar, with people dressed in whatever they want, no honking horns every three seconds, just enjoying the clean air. It was great. We stayed at the pub for a while and then headed back to our hostel where we all pretty much were wiped out and went to sleep.

The next morning, we headed over to the bus station for another ridiculously long bus ride, this time to Jerusalem. The bus was about five hours long this time, but we drove by the Dead Sea and some other scenic places. We also picked up a lot of people from the side of the road.


Oh a quick funny story from the trip. When we were in line for customs, there was a very tall guy that was dressed in running gear and looked like he was practically an Olympiad. We were joking that he was running around the world while we waited in line and speculated about the things he was carrying. When we took our cab to Eliat, we saw him walking to town. Then the next day, we saw him on the side of the road and picked him up in our bus! He even stayed at the same hostel as us and we saw him a couple more times, just walking along the side of the road with all of his things. It made us all laugh hysterically every time we saw him.

So once we got into Jerusalem, we knew we had to get into the Old City, which is where our hostel was and is pretty much where all the religious places are. We started walking, but gave up quickly. We got to our hostel after a while, which was also a nice place. They ended up having a tour scheduled for the next day that we signed up for, then we left to go explore the city. We headed over to the Jewish Quarter first to see the Western (Wailing) Wall.



After walking around the Jewish Quarter for a while, we headed over to the New City area for dinner. Most of the places were closed in both areas because of the Jewish Sabbath so as soon as the sun went down, we were already having problems finding open stores or restaurants. We ended up finding a bar where we could again get a good drink and some food (Its hard living in a dry country :)). Afterwards I went shopping in the touristy streets that we kept referring to as the Khan after a similar area near us. They are small streets that are pretty much alleyways filled with little shops. There were quite a few closed shops because of Sabbath, but it was interesting to see a lot of the things. There were a lot of religious things in the shops, from every religion. While I was in a shop, there was a procession down the street. I had forgotten that it was Orthodox Good Friday, and there were people heading down to the church. The shops all closed up soon after that, so I went back to bed.

The next day we got up early for our tour and already there were people lined up around the edges of the Old City. We were waiting to be picked up right by Jaffa gate, which is an entrance into Old city, and there were people lined up outside, there were people lined up by the entrance to the Khan. There were police everywhere just holding people back. The church bells had been ringing early that morning as we
got up. It was officially their Easter and people were out in full force. We all got coffee and waited for our guide. He couldn't drive up to meet us because of the police presence, so we had to walk down to meet him. It was a minibus full of people, most were older couples. The first stop was Qumran where the Dead Sea Scrolls were discovered. We couldn't go up into the caves themselves, but the views were amazing. After that, we went to Massada which is the site of King Herrod's palace and the site of a battle between the Romans and Jewish people. The castle is at the top of a mountain that we had to take a cable car up to. We walked down later, but we collectively decided that it was way too much walking. The top of the mountain is actually at sea level, which is pretty weird. The site is pretty much just ruins that you can walk around observe, but its nice to be able to walk within them. We were there for about two hours, and the sun was beating down on us. After our walk down the mountain, we were all pretty exhausted and overheated. Thankfully, the next stop was the Dead Sea!



We hadn't expected to be able to be able to go in the water so none of us had brought bathing suits. But we made do with t-shirts and shorts. No one wanted to miss out on being able to float. The mud there is suppose have healing qualities, so people were slathering it on themselves. The experience of floating was so weird. I can't even explain the feeling of curling up in a ball and bouncing around on the water. We stayed there for a while and then headed over to Jericho for lunch. Jericho is actually in Palestine territory on the West Bank, so we have to go through a lot of security to make sure no one on our bus was Israeli. After lunch we saw the Mount of Temptation, Tree of Zaccharus, Hirsham Palace and the Mount of Olives. Then they took us back to our hostel where we all kind of felt like we should take a nap. But we pushed through and made a trek to the Christian Quarter to see the Church of the Holy Sapulchre which is the church that was built over the area where Jesus was crucified and buried.



It is believed that this is where Jesus is buried, so there were tons of people there fawning over the tomb. Especially since it was Easter weekend.
The next day we went to the Holocaust Museum, which was pretty interesting. And depressing, but mostly interesting. Afterwards, we went to Bethlehem to the church that was built over the cave where Jesus was supposedly born according to Orthodox tradition.




It was crazy busy there, and again we had to go through ridiculous checkpoints because of it being in West Bank territory. When we got back to Israeli territory we took a cab straight to Tel Aviv which was gorgeous. It is right on the Mediterranean sea, and it probably one of the most beautiful cities I've ever seen. We spent the night there relaxing and the next morning headed back.

One of new favorite countries. Everyone was so friendly, and happy, and I wish I was still there right now.

But the good news is that school is almost over. 4 weeks til Pete is here, 6 weeks until I'm in Tokyo and 7 weeks until I'm back in Chicago.

Egyptians Celebrate Like No One Else

I went to two celebrations this weekend that illustrate the fact that Egyptians have a completely different idea of celebrating than anyone else.

First, my friend Erin's birthday is this coming Tuesday, so we celebrated it this weekend. Now, an Egyptian birthday is a bit different from they way anyone else might celbrate it. We began the same way that anyone else might, with a dinner out. Ours was a little upscale, this one was at the Four Seasons. Fantastic dinner, really expensive. After that we headed over to a club called After 8, which is just a small little night club in Cairo. You have to reserve a table to stay there, but really you can bring as many people as you want. The place is ALWAYS packed. One of the girls came only to the club and brought a cake with her. She sercretly gave it to the waiters there (we've done this before) and they brought it out around 1 in the morning. They also supplied 2 sparklers per person and some sort of firework to set off when the cake arrived. Then they play a Happy Birthday song, which is played everywhere for birthdays here. I'm not sure where it comes from but its about 3 minutes long and its like regular house/techno music. Its fun to dance to :) Lots of fire, lots of music, lots of dancing. Basically, that's Egypt.

I also went to a wedding this weekend. The director of the school's middle son was married to a pretty foreign girl (not sure where from, maybe Scotland..more on that in a minute). Now, Egyptian weddings aren't really weddings persay. There isn't really a ceremony, just a reception. We were told that the wedding started at eight, but we should show up between eight-thirty and nine because it wouldn't begin on time. Nothing on Egypt begins on time...which is very annoying to someone like me who likes to be on time for things. So we arrive there around 8:30, and lo and behold, the reception hall isn't even set up yet!! We were there for about a half hour until it was finished being set up. Then we sat inside, but the events didn't begin for ANOTHER twenty minutes or so. They said they needed to wait for as many people as possible to show up before they began. Then, finally, we all went out into the hallway. We were in the Nile Hilton on the second floor. Half of us stayed at the top of the stairs, and everyone else went to the bottom. There were two camera men as well, one at the top, one at the bottom. The two of them followed them around all night, projecting things on a screen in the reception area. The groom waiting at the bottom of the stairs as the bride slowly descended with her father. A man playing bagpipes accompanied them - which is why I thought she may be Scottish. On the landing in the middle, the groom and his father walked up and waited. There was a brief conversation (I wonder what they talked about!) and then the couple walked down the stairs with the two fathers walking behind them. They walked to a larger area of the ground floor where everyone followed and about a dozen men with tambra drums (hand drums) and a few other instruments played. Then there was a mini dance party where the bridal party danced to the music. There was a procession around the stairs after the dancing and then the bride, groom and the music brigade walked back up the stairs. At the top they continued to play while they waited to get in. Everyone else was let in before the bride and groom, and then they were announced in. After the introduction, there was dancing. And more dancing...and more... Finally, around midnight, they brought food to the tables. There were several traditional Egyptian dishes but I don't know what any of them are called. There wasn't a lot of food on the table though (as it was a family style type of set up), so we weren't sure if we should eat a lot of a little. Maybe an hour after appetizer dishes were put out, they brought out the wedding cakes (I say cakes because instead of one multi-tiered cake, there were several single layer cakes on many different level platters) and showed the bride and groom cutting the cake. Then, they proceeded into a separate unseen room and showed the bride and groom cutting a huge leg of meat as well. There was a HUGE buffet of food and deserts. Also, Egyptians don't drink with their meals - and I'm not referring to alcohol, I'm referring to anything. While there were bottles of water on each table, we only got other drinks inbetween food. One round of juice (which was odd) and one round of soda. There was no alcohol at this wedding whatsoever, which is normal for Egypt.
All in all, it was a interesting night - just very confusing foodwise.

Egyptian Mother's Day

This Saturday is Mother's Day in Egypt. It hasn't really been explained to me WHY its not the same day as American Mother's Day, but I do know it is on the same day every year instead of the first Sunday of the month. Egyptians, btw, do not have a father's day. I suppose in this culture, every day is Father's day.
The interesting thing about Mother's Day here is that they not only give their mother's presents, but i recieved some as well. Not that the parents of my students think I have children or anything, it just seems to be a common thing here. I got a lot of nice things, and some not so nice, but the thought was there. Its a very sweet gesture, but a very odd idea. Even when the mother's talked to me yesteday they wished me a Happy Mother's Day. I suppose the idea is that I mother them in the classrooms.
Here's what I got:
- Two plates with Egyptian drawings on them
- a nice bowl made of silver and wood
- a set of six cups
- two different perfumes
- a shirt
- a candle holder
- two candles
- a picture frame
- chocolates

I was very appreciative of these, and many of them will be coming back to the states.

Yesterday was our school Bazaar. It was a nice day off of work (kind of, we were required to be there at three) in which we just walked around to the different booths and watched our kids perform. A lot of people were there, and I spent a lot of time telling parents about how their kids are doing in class. I also received a lot of my gifts listed above here. The kids were fun, and it was nice to see them outside of their uniforms. The little booths that were set up to sell things were nice, though there were two booths with pets that were very sad. Egyptian pet store standards are significantly lower than American ones, and this booth was no exception. They had all kinds of animals, and they were all squeezed into cages. There were two very large guinea pigs in a cage meant for a hamster. They could barely move. It made my heart hurt just to see them.

I'll post pictures up soon (though some are on Facebook if you want to see)


EDIT:
I received a lot more gifts today.
- four coffee mugs
- about five assorted pictures in frames (one of which is gigantic)
- some fake flowers
- a barbie doll
- two clocks
- two sets of earrings
- two necklaces
- a set of three glasses

It was like my birthday :)

Tme moving quickly

I know that I haven’t written in a long time, but that’s mostly because nothing really exciting has been happening. We’re back in school these days, and time is flying by quickly. I can’t believe that in less than three months I’ll be leaving here! We don’t have much time left for teaching either. I wrote out an outline for the rest of my lesson plans for the year, and I was shocked to find how little time I have to teach. Not only do we only have about eight weeks left of school (the last few weeks are grading and wrapping up loose ends, no teaching after May 4th). But two of those are review weeks. So that only leaves about six weeks of teaching and that’s not much time to get the information in. Its just crazy to think about!
Besides school, I have been having fun. A few of us rented a felucca boat for an hour on the Nile. A felucca boat is pretty much a big sailboat, but a little less sophisticated than ones that most people own. It has a sail, a rudder and seats. No steering wheel or anything like that. But still lovely to ride on (especially since it comes with a driver! Ha!). The weekend we did that was beautiful and very warm, and the ride was just relaxing. Its getting windy here (sandstorm season is almost upon us), and that always helps move that boat along.
Last night we had what we all referred to as ‘second thanksgiving’ which was great. Everybody brought a dish to share, and we enjoyed a nice feast. There were about eight people all together, and about half of us brought desserts. We all ended up full though, so it worked out for the best – even if we were all sugared up for a while. Lately we’ve done a lot of hanging out on people’s roofs and playing cards. And Jenga! I’ve gotten a lot better at both of them. Its been really relaxing and I’m really going to miss everyone here. Don’t worry about me staying though, pretty much everyone is leaving after the school year ends.
Ok, I'll try to keep updating :) sorry about the long down time!

Camping in the White Desert

Those of you that know me personally probably know two things about me. One: I have never been actual camping. Girl scouts, yes, but never out with friends in a real forest or something. And two: I have absolutely no desire to go camping. But lo and behold, the other girls I hang around here do have a desire to camp. They also enjoy it tremendously and have done it before. When I told them I've never been, their response was to tell me that they're making me go.
The day after we got back from Spain, Wendy found a overnight camping trip in the White Desert. I wanted to see the white desert, I just wasn't sure about the camping aspect of it. But when push came to shove, I decided it was better for me to go than to not. So a group of us got picked up at 7am, not really knowing what happens next. We got into a mini-bus and asked how long it would take to get to our first stop.
"Four hours" was the driver's reply.
Everybody settled in for the long drive, a bit uncomfortably. There wasn't much room to stretch out, and the driver took the bumpiest roads possible. It was a bit hard to sleep, and four hours felt like forever. You think driving through cornfields can be boring, try driving through sand.
After the trip finally was over, we got out at a motel in the middle of a tiny town. As soon as we got there, they asked for our passports, which we all handed over. As soon as we did, we began to joke about this seemed like a horror films that begin with tourists being dropped off in the middle of nowhere. The passport situation ended up being something that involved leaving the motel, so Lisa, my roommate, went with the guys to safeguard them. When she didn't come back for almost an hour, our horror story began to feel a little more real. Fortunately, she came back with the passports and we got on the road soon enough. we took a truck that had five seats in the back of it, and accompanying us was not just the driver and our tour guide, but also a police escort. Apparently all American and British tourist - no matter how large the group- need a police escort in the desert. We found this odd, but we went on our way.
The first stop was in the Black Desert, which is filled with bits of black rock. I think they are black onyx but I'm not completely sure. Our driver had a good time off roading, which threw us around a bit in the back. Egyptians aren't so big on the whole seatbelt issue, so through out the day we were flying around our seats a bit. It only made the trip more exciting though. After getting out and taking a few pictures, we headed over to the Crystal Cavern, which wasn't nearly as impressive as we thought it was going to be. It was basically just a small crevice that sparkled a bit. We got back into the car and finally headed over to the White Desert. The White desert is pretty intriguing. It isn't the normal sand dunes - or well, it begins that way. They're really cool looking :






But the rest of the day was spend setting up camp. We didn't have to do anything, which was nice. Set up and tear down were all done by our three escorts, while we sat around. Our food was delicious and cooked all over the fire. There was chicken, rice and a goulash of some sort. We brought our own beverages, and they provided some water as well. While we ate we threw our bones to some desert foxes. They moved wicked fast and the guide warned us not to leave our shoes out because the foxes will steal them. After dinner, we all sat around the fire and some of the other camps that were nearby had their escorts come over as well. They had some drums and broke out singing a bit as well. It was a good time. The night got really cold though as soon as you got away from the fire. We had blankets as well as sleeping bags and you were still freezing. I was not sold on this part. This morning was relatively boring, packing up and spending the day driving back.

The whole experiance was good, but I still prefer my bed and indoor plumbing. Ha. Nothing has changed.

New place to view pictures.

Spain

Flickr was giving me attitude, so I switched. I'll upload some of the pictures the other girls took in spain, but these are the only ones I got before my camera died.

Spain has come and gone...

I'm back from my vacation! It was a great time had by all, and I really enjoyed the culture and thought the comparisons to Egypt were interesting. But anyway, here is a detailed account:

First of all, Wendy, Erin and I flew out of Cairo at 4:30 in the morning, which was just fun in itself. It seems like half the flights out of Cairo are at ridiculous hours, but I digress. As another example of how backwards Egypt can be, they had security before you check in for your flight, which makes absolutely no sense. As we walked though security, we had to hand over our passports so they could check to make sure we were authorized to leave. You see, if you are married to an Egyptian, you need permission from your husband to leave. So they checked us against what I assume is some sort of master list of marriage licenses. While the three of us waited, it seemed like ten men walked through with no problem what so ever. It was a bit frustrating. Besides that, there wasn't really anything exciting about our flight. We got into Madrid a bit late, and got lost on the Metro on our way to Erin's cousin's place. After a lot of confusion, we managed to get to Laura's apartment, and proceeded to sleep through most of the day after a quick dinner/lunch. Laura, by the way, has a dog named Sasha that is ridiculously cute. We spent a lot of time in Madrid playing with the dog.
The next few days we borrowed a tour book from Laura to just tour the city on our own. Erin had an interview that was impossible to get to without a lot of help from random Spaniards. But we had much more sucess with our self tours of the city. We saw, just to name a few, the Royal Palace, Prado Museum, Plaza de Toros, Temple of Debod, Plaza Mayor and a bunch more. Food wise, we did pretty well with our Tapas meals. We don't get pork products in Egypt, so we all jumped at the chance to get some ham, chirzo sausage and bacon. I think i ate more ham in the last few days than I have in the last several years. When we first got to Spain, the three of us were all about finding Sangria as well. We were disappointed to find that it is more of a summer drink, so many restaurants didn't have it. But we managed to search hard enough to get a few pitchers on our trip.
Our last night in Madrid we went out with Laura to see some Flamenco dancing and then out to her boyfriend's place for a party he was having. It was nice meeting some locals, and a lot of them knew English well enough for me to converse with them. I felt bad about not knowing any Spanish, but there wasn't much I could do about it. I also broke my camera this night by dropping it. I had to buy a disposable one the next day. I'll have to buy a new one here in Egypt.
The day after the party, Wendy, Erin and I went to Barcelona by bus. It was a long ride, and they showed two movies - 'The Italian Job' and 'National Treasure'. Unfortunately, they were dubbed over in Spanish, but I've seen them both several times so I just watched it while listening to my iPod while I dozed in and out. The hostel we stayed at was a lot nice than I had been expecting. There were lockers for everyone and free breakfast! The room we stayed in was for 20 people, so it was a bit hard to sleep sometimes. It was still very good for the price we paid (13 euros a night), so i wasn't one to complain.
Our first day in Barcelona, we bought tickets for a tour bus since we didn't have our handy book like we did in Madrid. It was a great idea, for it was one of those buses that let you get on and off whenever you wanted. We were able to spend the whole day just touring major sights, and being able to drive past some that we didn't feel like getting out for. One of our first big stops was Sagrada Familia which is Gaudi's dream church. We didn't go in, but we did hang around outside of it for a long time and then went and got hot chocolate and churros (which were delicious). It was a bit cold and rainy, we stayed inside until we were dry and warm enough to get back on the bus. After that, we went to Park Guell, which is another Gaudi artistic area, but this time its a park designed by him. We walked around for a long time and then sat at the top (its built into a hill) of the park in a cafe and had another pitcher of Sangria. The rest of the day was just riding around and then going out that night. The next day we ventured over to the Picasso museum which was really interesting. I absolutely enjoyed it there and even bought a print of my new favorite Picasso! We tried to go to the Chocolate Museum next, but unfortunately it was closed. We walked around for a long time before we had to collect our luggage and head to our overnight train back. The train was interesting because though we had been told we would get sleeper cars with beds, they had us in chairs - eight to a room. Though I slept( I apparently have a new found talent for sleeping anywhere), the other girls did not. we got back with no problems to Laura's place, where we slept some more and then did a little bit more touring before packing and heading out by ten the next morning.
Our flights were crap on the way home (and really showed us why Alitalia went bankrupt), but we did have a seven hour layover in Rome that we took full advantage of. Erin's friend of the family Jim Pratt is a Jesuit priest that lives at the vatican. He picked us up from the airport and took us to the Vatican for the time in between. It was pretty cool walking around and getting a bit of a behind the scenes tour of where he works and lives. He even opened a bottle of wine in his office and we all sat having a glass before we had to get back to the airport. One really cool thing is that my great uncle Dick is a Jesuit monk, and Jim Pratt was able to look him up in a book that he had that lists all of the Jesuits in the US. I was excited.
But now I'm back in Egypt where I have to unpack and do laundry all day. Fun! It was a great trip, and I hope to have pictures up soon!