tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-55715552009-06-08T15:08:48.655+03:00MuleIn Egypt from June 11, 2003 to June 12, 2005, in Syria for two months, then in DC for grad school.Khalidnoreply@blogger.comBlogger105125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5571555.post-1118657803074186112005-06-13T13:14:00.000+03:002005-06-13T13:16:43.080+03:00I'm now safely settled in Damascus, and will take an Arabic course in July. As promised, I won't be blogging, but here's a quote from a US Army spokesman which I thought merited posting, for its razor-sharp insightfulness:"Increasingly, it is the Iraqis who are bearing the burden of this war, even more than Americans."اللهKhalidnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5571555.post-1118230957701149232005-06-08T14:32:00.000+03:002005-06-08T14:42:37.706+03:00Mom, Dad, and Amelia are now on their way back to the US, and I'm getting ready to leave for Syria, providing with me a convenient excuse to stop blogging (since I'll be in a repressive Axis of Evil wannabee country, not enjoying the freedom of Mubarak's Egypt).Yet another article on the CIA's inability to find enough Arabic translators:http://www.nytimes.com/2005/06/08/politics/08intel.html?hp&Khalidnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5571555.post-1116776637618539732005-05-22T18:37:00.000+03:002005-05-22T19:39:46.620+03:00Amelia, Mom, and Dad are getting into Egypt on Wednesday; the itinerary on which I wasted much time that would have been better spent on the final paper for Literature class I just turned in calls for Wednesday and Thursday in Cairo, Friday and Saturday in the White Desert, Sunday and Monday in Cairo, an overnight sleeper train to Aswan, a four-night cruise from Aswan to Luxor, then a train back Khalidnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5571555.post-1116397592960782232005-05-18T09:10:00.000+03:002005-05-18T09:26:32.966+03:00Finally, a post not about Vinny. I realized I never put anything up about Turkey, which my parents leave for today. On the 25th, they'll leave Istanbul for two weeks in Egypt. Coming from Cairo, Istanbul seemed very European, and not even remotely related to the stinky, overcrowded metropolis on the Nile. Traffic gridlock was as bad, though, or even worse at times since there's not a modern Khalidnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5571555.post-1115743879267621102005-05-10T19:45:00.000+03:002005-05-10T19:51:19.276+03:00Here's Vinny's post, replete with unedited grammaticular mistakes (a strong first sentence though). I would however, like to note a few things first: the five-alarm fire in the Khan (half a block from where the bombing was) ended up destroying 120 shops, thanksfully with no lives lost. The response was slow, though--the fire started, with unknown causes, at 7:00am Saturday morning, Khalidnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5571555.post-1115286005406069302005-05-05T12:35:00.000+03:002005-05-05T12:40:05.413+03:00Vinny's now in Cairo. I'll hold off writing about his experience, since he'll be posting himself on my blog in a couple days.Today I went by the Syrian Embassy to apply for a visa--I had heard rumors that the visa request only cost LE 250 ($45) for Americans, whereas it's $100 in the States, but discovered to my dismay that it's actually LE 660 ($115) here in Cairo. The worst thing is there's Khalidnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5571555.post-1114512409922604342005-04-26T12:28:00.000+02:002005-04-26T12:46:49.923+02:00Vinny's going to be coming to Cairo from May 3rd to May 8th, right after our spring break ends (which is really late, because there's an Islamic holiday on April 21st this year, Sinai Liberation Day on April 25th, some other holiday on April 28th, and then Shem El-Nessim on May 2nd, in a weird convergence of the Islamic, Coptic, and Western calendars combining to push spring break back a month).Khalidnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5571555.post-1113897595136842302005-04-19T09:58:00.000+02:002005-04-19T09:59:55.136+02:00From the original NYTimes story on the Oklahoma City bombing ten years ago today:------------------------------------------------------------Some experts focused on the possibility that the attack had been the work of Islamic militants, like those who bombed the World Trade Center in February 1993.But if so, it was unclear why they would have struck in Oklahoma City. Some Middle Eastern groups Khalidnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5571555.post-1113384148457616832005-04-13T11:11:00.000+02:002005-04-13T11:22:28.460+02:00Yesterday witnessed the surprise return of Muhammad from Shubra, an old "friend" who still thinks I'm Norwegian (I generally say American these days, except in Gamaliya), and was actually one of the main factors encouraging the whole Norwegian identity, thanks to all the English he tried to use when we first met. He's mostly dropped that now, speaking entirely in Arabic but throwing in the Khalidnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5571555.post-1112951470232060092005-04-08T10:58:00.000+02:002005-04-08T11:11:10.233+02:00It's still unclear what happened exactly. Al-Jazeera is saying that there are three dead, one French tourist, one American, and one Egyptian suicide bomber, while people yesterday were saying that the bomb was thrown by a man on a fizba (the little mopeds not too common in Cairo at large but all over the place in Hussein and Gamaliya since regular cars have trouble navigating the narrow streets)Khalidnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5571555.post-1112899212061320462005-04-07T20:38:00.000+02:002005-04-07T20:40:12.060+02:00Just to let you know, we're all fine. The explosion was in the Khan, in a street that I go through every few days on my way home, though usually I take the other route through the square.Khalidnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5571555.post-1112866079800393012005-04-07T11:19:00.000+02:002005-04-07T11:27:59.800+02:00Opposition leader Ayman Nour's headquarters in Baab ash-Shariya, about a fifteen-minute walk from my house, are now surrounded by pro-Mubarak signs, no doubt spontaneously put up by the masses. They say slogans like "Yes to the leader Mubarak", "Yes to the commander of the first strike [Mubarak was the air force commander in the 1973 war against Israel]", and "Yes to Mubarak, No to every Khalidnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5571555.post-1112790366696017072005-04-06T14:25:00.000+02:002005-04-06T14:26:06.696+02:00Murfreesboro makes the front page of the Onion.Khalidnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5571555.post-1111997873723889972005-03-28T10:08:00.000+02:002005-03-28T10:17:53.723+02:00Just got back from Siwa last night, a trip that Walid and I had organized for 21 people, including 12 CASAns. We had more security problems on the way back, as the one microbus we had (a few of us went public transportation) was hounded by a police escort the whole way which slowed them down and forced them to stop only at completely empty resthouses without any other customers. When we got Khalidnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5571555.post-1111574738877579072005-03-23T12:41:00.000+02:002005-03-23T12:45:38.876+02:00I came down with some kind of throat cold yesterday and today, bad timing since we leave for Siwa in an hour. Organizing the trip was kind of a pain too, because of problems with the drivers and state security. The brother of a friend of Walid's from Fayoum was going to come with another driver to take us directly to Siwa, but then the day before yesterday the police in Fayoum confiscated the Khalidnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5571555.post-1111396510991781642005-03-21T11:07:00.000+02:002005-03-21T20:21:39.366+02:00Demonstrations in Tahrir Square yesterday and today, with very heavy security around the square and surrounding AUC. The notice we got from the embassy says it's about the latest fighting in Iraq, though there are unsubstantiated rumors going around that the Man bumped off opposition leader Ayman Nour, who was hospitalized in late February while in prison. Unless I missed something, Iraq hasn'tKhalidnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5571555.post-1110908228342563812005-03-15T19:04:00.000+02:002005-03-15T19:37:08.346+02:00Yesterday, on my way home from university I gave Walid and Yassir a call at about 9:00pm to see if they wanted me to pick up any food for dinner. There were two guests staying with us for the night (I still got a mattress to myself, partly since I have to sleep diagonally to fit on it, and the four of them shared a bed and blanket), and they requested frozen chicken, vegetables, and bread to Khalidnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5571555.post-1110788987054944182005-03-14T10:24:00.000+02:002005-03-14T10:29:47.063+02:00My blogs may be boring, but at least they're short.And here's an article about the richest family in Egypt (90th richest person/family in the world). They're Coptic Christians originally from Sohag, the poorest province in Egypt, which is about half Christian. The EconomistTechnology and development Mar 10th 2005FROM the pyramids to the Citadel, Cairo's skyline features some of the most famous Khalidnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5571555.post-1110620964383031262005-03-12T11:32:00.000+02:002005-03-12T11:49:24.386+02:00I just got back from a two-day trip to Ismailia, the middle of the three cities along the Suez Canal, which is not by either the Med (Port Said) or the Red (Suez), but by Crocodile Lake. It was the most picturesque of the three, with a lot of open green spaces and older European villas. In grad school news, I'll most likely be going to Georgetown next year to do a Master's in Arab Studies. I Khalidnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5571555.post-1110021014768254762005-03-05T12:57:00.000+02:002005-03-05T13:10:14.770+02:00Once again, apologies for not blogging much. There just hasn't been much going on in this part of the world.I'm putting together a trip to Siwa--several CASA students and a few random foreigners and Egyptians are going, as well as Walid and his sister Wala'. The latter's still up in the air because Walid's older brother Tamer, an engineer in Ma'adi who's about to have to leave his good job for Khalidnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5571555.post-1109087572096835962005-02-22T17:48:00.000+02:002005-02-22T17:52:52.096+02:00Free Mojtaba and Arash DayKhalidnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5571555.post-1108636848537514922005-02-17T12:22:00.000+02:002005-02-17T12:40:48.540+02:00I've started working at Al-Ahram Weekly once again, now only eight to ten hours a week. I need the money to save up for this summer and do some more travelling in Egypt: I've pretty much got a homestay arranged in Damascus from June 15 to August 15, for $120 a month rent and food. After this Hariri affair I'm worried that it'll be harder for Americans to travel to Syria, plus after the US Khalidnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5571555.post-1108294555936123942005-02-13T13:26:00.000+02:002005-02-13T13:35:55.936+02:00Just got back from a trip to Bahriyya, Farafra, Dakhla, and Kharga, the oases of the Western Desert. Too much to bite off for a three day weekend, for one thing. We spent 22 hours in the bus going from place to place, making for little time outside of the bus and various (really nice) hotels. And then the selection of sites was questionable. In Bahriyya (near the White Desert) we spent four Khalidnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5571555.post-1107080445243877602005-01-30T11:44:00.000+02:002005-01-30T12:20:45.243+02:00 Mount Sinai was a different experience this time around. When I went with John and Ryan in August, we started up at 1:00 AM to watch the sunrise. By the time we were down, there were about 20 tour buses in the parking lot, mostly bringing tourists from Sharm El-Sheikh. But on Wednesday we went up during the day to watch the sunset. It wasn't as impressive as the sunrise, but it had been so Khalidnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5571555.post-1106931437782221322005-01-28T18:54:00.000+02:002005-01-28T18:57:17.783+02:00Joanna's now safely in Turkey, trying to get her credit card and ATM card to start working, so check out her posts (link on the left).
I'll be posting about Dahab and Mount Sinai in a day or two, I just got back yesterday.Khalidnoreply@blogger.com