Well, all of my posts have been relatively positive up until this point, but I haven't talked about what I'm now terming "Egypt Days." As in, "I'm just having an Egypt Day." I'm trying to find a way to refine this phrase even now...an Egypt Day is a day that this country, culture, city, EVERYTHING, just overwhelms and frustrates you to the point where you just have to sit down and have a good cry. (I'm a firm believer in having a good cry. It works wonders).
An Egypt Day is one where nothing works as planned and everyone seems to be against you. I was just telling someone the other day that it seems like Egypt lured me in with her siren song, but since I've been here, she's been trying to spit me back out! (Is this how men feel about us women? How frustrating that must be).
There are many forces at work in Cairo that, when they converge, make for a really rough day. Days when the Internet randomly stops working while you're entering grades, when every other electronic needed in the classroom or at home just randomly stop working, when all the cars seem to swerve toward you when you try to cross the street USING A CRUTCH, when you try to withdraw money from your bank only to find that you have to activate the card and no one will answer the call center, when you plug in a hair straightener and the cheap plug blows it out, never to work again, when you hobble down to the nearest ATM with a busted knee just to find that the ATM is broken, when you finally look at your paycheck online and realize it's $600 short and the accountant at school refuses to admit anything is wrong...
I found myself walking (some would indeed call it hobbling) home last night, fighting back tears and feeling very sorry for myself. Again. Then I started laughing because I know that life is good, really good, and I really don't have that much to cry about. Then I laughed even harder when I realized what a crazy person I would seem to anyone that happened to see me. And laughed even harder STILL when it happened and I passed a really pretty Egyptian woman, who seemed to look at me like I was crazy, but with a bit of compassion, too.
And then, just like that, my Egypt Day was over.
Which is another magical thing about Egypt. She'll make you cry, but not for long.
An Egypt Day is one where nothing works as planned and everyone seems to be against you. I was just telling someone the other day that it seems like Egypt lured me in with her siren song, but since I've been here, she's been trying to spit me back out! (Is this how men feel about us women? How frustrating that must be).
There are many forces at work in Cairo that, when they converge, make for a really rough day. Days when the Internet randomly stops working while you're entering grades, when every other electronic needed in the classroom or at home just randomly stop working, when all the cars seem to swerve toward you when you try to cross the street USING A CRUTCH, when you try to withdraw money from your bank only to find that you have to activate the card and no one will answer the call center, when you plug in a hair straightener and the cheap plug blows it out, never to work again, when you hobble down to the nearest ATM with a busted knee just to find that the ATM is broken, when you finally look at your paycheck online and realize it's $600 short and the accountant at school refuses to admit anything is wrong...
I found myself walking (some would indeed call it hobbling) home last night, fighting back tears and feeling very sorry for myself. Again. Then I started laughing because I know that life is good, really good, and I really don't have that much to cry about. Then I laughed even harder when I realized what a crazy person I would seem to anyone that happened to see me. And laughed even harder STILL when it happened and I passed a really pretty Egyptian woman, who seemed to look at me like I was crazy, but with a bit of compassion, too.
And then, just like that, my Egypt Day was over.
Which is another magical thing about Egypt. She'll make you cry, but not for long.
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