Seoul, South Korea.

While Jake was teaching, I went to Seoul for a day to try [and fail, as it turned out] to figure out a visa to China. After not having any luck with that, I looked around a little – although not much, since I was still just generally lacking energy.

That name just brings to mind things I don’t really want associated with something I might drink.

The National Palace Museum, where I also had lunch – some cheesy pumpkin thing, which tasted better than the combination might sound. But since I heard from several foreigners that it’s difficult to find pumpkin there, and since dairy isn’t a big thing there because a high number of Asians are lactose intolerant, I’m pretty sure it wasn’t a traditional dish.

A replica of an area for placenta jars back in the good ol’ days of the empire.
The museum also had some seals from Emperor Gojong from the late 19th to early 20th century. One of them read, “Early rise.” Eh, not my style. The second one: “When the country is run well, people live long in harmony.” Okay, yeah, I can get behind that. The third one: “You can eat, drink, be healthy and live long.” Now you’re talkin’!

Nap time!

Bucheon, South Korea.

After an overnight trip including a layover in Doha, Qatar [shoutout to Clarissa!], I landed in Seoul, rented a cell phone, and, with many calls to Jake to confirm I was going the right way, navigated public transportation to Bucheon, a suburb/extension of Seoul.

View from Bucheon station.

Note the castle.

Bucheon’s entertainment district.

Someone thought frightening pictures of Angelina Jolie would be a good advertising tactic.

Korean barbecue with Jake’s co-teachers. The meat is laid out on a grill in front of you, and you cook it yourself. Then you put it on a lettuce or other kind of leaf, add some of the side dishes or sauces, wrap up the leaf, and stick the whole thing in your mouth. It’s delicious.

Soju with some of the co-teachers. Soju, South Korea’s national liquor, doesn’t have as strong of a taste as, say, vodka – but that’s what makes it so dangerous. I heard enough stories of bad hangovers from various foreigners that I knew to keep it in check.

The others ordered dessert for me after the barbecue: ice slush water with cold noodles, a piece of watermelon, some meat, and a few other things. Not bad, but I was so full from the meal that I couldn’t eat much.
After dinner, we went to the home of one of the teachers for coffee. I thought maybe she would ask who actually wanted coffee, so I could respectfully decline, but no, a steaming cup was placed in front of me. At that point, I didn’t want to say, “No, take it back!” so I drank the thing. It took me until I was 24 and in South Korea, but I finally had a full cup of coffee. And, just as I suspected, it was not enjoyable.

I just took this picture because I thought the phallic old cartoon man was funny. Then I went to Jeju Island and saw him as a statue everywhere – he protects the island, or something like that.

Miller time!

Another shot of the entertainment district.

Boobi Boobi and almost Duran Duran.

Amorous interlude.

Damnit, Cambodia, I'm falling in love with you, too.

Doha, Qatar: reliving my childhood.

TCBY and A&W, Doha airport? What are you, 1990s Eau Claire or something?

Taken on my layover between Cairo and Seoul. That's right, I'm finally officially done with Egypt [although I'll probably keep thinking of more things I wanted to write about and have to awkwardly slip them in somewhere - although, fair warning, I *am* planning on a post comparing Egypt and South Korea, so you devastated Egypt fans have that to look forward to!]. On to Asia!

Arabic.

Arabic is a great language. The most important facet of it is, of course, that it's fun to be able to read and write a new script. It's nice to go through pages of notes in a new script and go, "Wow! I did that!"


Although it has a lot of exceptions, there's also a lot about it that makes sense; many words that share a theme also share three consonants. For example, a lot of words that have to do with writing include the consonants k-t-b.

book: kitaab
desk: maktab
library: maktaba
write: niktab [or something like that - I only ever heard it spoken]

At ILI, my language school, I learned both modern standard Arabic [MSA] - the Arabic spoken on, say, Al Jazeera but not many other places - and Egyptian colloquial Arabic [ECA]. Each country/region has its own dialect, and it can be pretty hard for them to understand each other. If you'd like to learn Arabic, I recommend learning only one at a time - MSA or ECA [or whatever dialect of the country you're in]. It was difficult to learn two different words for the same thing and keep track of which was which. In fact, after a while, I stopped caring about MSA and mostly just focused on ECA - when/if I go back, I will only take ECA.

Take MSA if you need Arabic for your studies, if you want to read the Quran, if you want to work for Al Jazeera, etc.

Take the local dialect if you're more interested in talking to people on the streets and getting to know the locals, not getting swindled at the market*, etc.

Take both at the same time only if you have a strong need for both. Otherwise, I'd recommend focusing on one before even thinking about the other one.

I went to the International Language Institute [ILI] in Cairo. They're part of the International House network, and I had already had good experiences with the International House in Freiburg. I wasn't disappointed - as in Freiburg, the classes in Cairo were taught by enthusiastic, fun, interesting AND interested teachers, and I learned a lot every day. I highly recommend it for the classes alone, but they also provide nice lodging and reasonably priced food if you want it, organize group tours to some of the tourist destinations [can be a bit pricier than you could otherwise find, but you can be certain that everything's legit], and are generally nice, friendly, and helpful.


*Yasmin, the half-Egyptian half-Norwegian, wanted to buy a pack of cigarettes from a stall in the bazaar. She asked for them in English and then heard the shopkeeper tell his wife in Arabic, "Tell her the price has gone up to 25 pounds [$4.30]." She understood him AND she already knew that a pack is less than half that - ten pounds - so she said something to him in Arabic and he gave her a sheepish grin and sold them to her for ten. One of my goals with Arabic is to know enough to surprise anyone who might try the same thing on me.

The persecuted church.

Sad note. Although there have been some clashes, both violent and legal, Egypt has freedom of religion, and Christianity is legal there [most Christians there are Copts]. However, according to a missionary from the US who was there to help what they called the persecuted church and confirmed by a friend doing a human rights law internship, converting from Islam to Christianity is an offense punishable by death [vice versa is, of course, perfectly okay]. The wikipedia article on Copts, however, says that the Human Rights Watch wrote that converting to Christianity actually only causes problems for getting new identity papers.

[Maybe I should do more research on this than just hearing about it from a couple people and then checking wikipedia - does anyone know more about this?]

Some words on Egyptian women, while we're at it.

I've already talked about covering and headscarves a bit. A few more notes:

Headscarves are an important part of the outfit. Although there are some women who only wear black all the time, most ensure that their headscarves match each day's outfits. Many headscarves are sparkly, brightly patterned, etc. There are a million different ways to tie them. I picture an average Egyptian woman's headscarf closet being like an average American woman's shoe closet.

As for covering in general - the standard rule seems to be just that you can't have any skin showing. A lot of younger women wear skinny jeans, skintight shirts, shirts that would show a lot of cleavage if it weren't for the turtleneck thing underneath... Interesting that, at least for the average modern Egyptian Muslim woman, it's the skin itself that's the problem and not the shape of the body or anything.

Lest you think that being a Muslim woman in Egypt is all about covering, repressing, denying - that's not the case. Eman, one of my teachers at the language school, mentioned that she and her friends had been appalled when a guest on Oprah went on about how sexually repressed Egyptian women are. She also mentioned a number of benefits women have in Egypt - for example, their money is theirs to spend as they want. Men pretty much have to spend their money on their family. Women don't even have to use theirs to chip in for groceries. Not sure what the exact letter of the law is, but it sounds good to me!

Not that things are perfect for women there, of course - not that things are perfect for women anywhere, really.

Surrounded by dangerous Egyptian men.

Run awaaaaay!

Speaking of dangerous Egyptian men. Jessica, a girl from Minnesota who I met at the language school, is dating an Egyptian man, Shahir. Very nice guy, fun to hang out with, a fine upstanding gentleman except when he's telling inappropriate jokes, which are funny/bad enough to be acceptable, anyway.

Fast forward to the night of Jessica's birthday party at a club on a boat moored on the Nile. Before heading to the boat, I got dinner with Noura and Smita. On the way there, a guy followed us in his car and kept trying to give Noura a flower. We spent most of the time talking about creepazoid guys we'd encountered since arriving. After dinner, Noura and I were searching for ice cream when she said, "Hey, some guy is pointing at me and yelling." I told her to just ignore him - they usually get the point. But then she said, "He's still following us and pointing and yelling."

Finally I turned around to look - and it was Shahir, trying to get my attention. He ended up giving both of us a ride to ice cream and then the boat. Whattaguy.

===

Another night, Noura and I went down the street to get some shawerma from a corner take-away restaurant. We just sat on the curb outside to eat the sandwiches, and a group of teenage guys was sitting near us. They never once looked at us, but we could hear that they were starting to say a few things in English. They would speak Arabic among themselves for a while and then suddenly say, "I am Egyptian boy. I am crazy boy!" or "Please give me drugs!" But they really didn't look at us at all.

In fact, a lot of the comments are said under the breath with the eyes averted. It's almost as though they don't want you to hear them - but then again, if that were really the case, they just wouldn't say anything.

===

My last full day in Cairo, I'm pretty sure my taxi driver suggested we make a baby together. Using simple Arabic and hand gestures so I would understand, he said, "You - baby - beautiful. ... Oh, I forget, I'm married, I'm sorry."

He still made me pay for the cab, though. Maybe I should have had his baby.

===

A little later I was walking down the street, looking for some food, when a guy started talking to me. He pulled out his Dutch student ID card to prove that he actually goes to school there. By that point I had learned to tell men who asked that yes, I have a boyfriend, we've been together for one and a half years. His response: "That's too long! Time for a change - time to try an Egyptian man!" And then, "No, just kidding, I'm married. Well, actually, it'd be okay. I'm allowed to - but my wife isn't!"

Wow...you really know how to pick up a woman, dude.

===

Even at the airport on my way out, the guy who helped me with my luggage told me I was beautiful. This country is very good for the ego.

===

Despite what you may have heard about Egyptian men - including from me! - they really are mostly harmless. The ones who make comments pretty much never try to take it any further - I only had one weird incident, where a guy started holding out his hand as though I would actually want to hold it and then touching my arm when I didn't - and there are, of course, many upstanding young men who don't make comments at all. Shahir was horrified that someone might have thought he was creeping. As in any country, there are bad eggs and good eggs, and I was lucky enough to meet a lot of good eggs there. Thank you, respectful men of Egypt!

Egypt: the food!

[Warning: two of the pictures in this post are rotated for some reason, even though they're not rotated on my computer. I tried fixing them, but to no avail. So...do some neck exercises to see them in their full glory and enjoy!]

Food in Egypt is two fantastic things: delicious and cheap. You can get shawerma [chicken or beef cooked on a constantly rotating skewer like Döner Kebab] in a bun for 60 cents each and a pita stuffed with foul [pronounced "fool," pretty much refried beans], falafel, or French fries for a mere one pound [17 cents!] each.

Of course, that's street food, and prices can get much higher in restaurants.

Fatir, known by some as the "Egyptian pancake." Very flaky - pretty much phyllo dough. Can be savory [with cheese, etc.] or sweet [honey, powdered sugar...].

Koshary, best described as Egyptian chili. Rice, noodles, lentils, chickpeas, and fried onions on top. You add a red sauce and a mixture of garlic and vinegar to your liking and then mix it all up. Someone commented that it's an ideal meal for cold climates - which begs the question, why do Egyptians eat it?!? Probably because it's delicious - and, of course, cheap. A small portion, which is enough to satiate your averagely hungry person, is $1.20 in Abu Tarek [picture below], one of the most famous koshary restaurants, and only 50 cents in a less touristy restaurant.

Rice, chicken, and mulukhiya, a soup made of jute leaves. Well, I just found out what it's made of when I looked it up on wikipedia just now. I also found out that jute is also used to make burlap. Mmmm, burlap soup. But actually, it was pretty alright, except for the consistency, which was a bit too slimy and snotty.

But the cat liked it.

To accompany meals, I usually had hibiscus juice, hibiscus Mirinda [pretty much Fanta], or Fayrouz, an Egyptian pop that usually came in pineapple or apple flavor. AND I drank the tap water the whole time and am not dead yet.

Alexandria, Egypt.

Day trip to Alexandria [up north] with Waleed, Yasmin, and Yasmin's friend there Amr. I liked Alex a lot, but then I like pretty much all coastal/beach towns...although I have never seen beach town residents more clothed than in Alex.

There was watermelon hut after watermelon hut all along the highway up there.

Along the way, we stopped at Lion Village, a run-down safari-themed restaurant and mini-zoo.

We didn't actually see any lions, but apparently dogs were exotic enough to be in the zoo.

A decorated truck, complete with USPS Express Service decals.

The president puts up his president friends here.

Excessively long fishing pole.

Waiting patiently for any stray fish.

On the way home: unfortunately, a bad photo, but this van was hilarious - all the stuff strapped to the top almost doubled its height.

Ain Sukhna.

Day trip to a resort on the Red Sea with the Greek Society. Ain Sukhna is only an hour or two from Cairo. School was over, I had officially taken off work for the month, and there was nothing for me to do that day but relax, read a little, swim and play frisbee, and drink some beer with good company. Fantastic.

These buildig skeletons are everywhere - in Cairo and other cities and along highways all over the country. I'm not sure whether they've fallen out of use or were never finished.

Everyone brought booze with them. Oh, Greek Orthodox Egyptians. Good to have you around.

This photo and the next are from Shahir's family's vacation home not far from the resort, where a few of us went afterwards to sit around on the beach and trade bad jokes.

Not exactly Potato Lake [no offense, Potato Lake].

Bonus picture! At the Greek Society dinner I already wrote about, this delightful old man asked me to dance. He had far too much energy - actually tuckered me out after a while. At one point, he asked, "It's nice? You like?" Flirtatious little scamp. He was at the beach, too, flirting with all the girls. [photo by the Greek Society]