Getting there is half the fun(Part II)

Ok, up and at 'em!

Cairo ---->Molly ---->Hotel
Now the real adventure started. I had to get a visa, change my money over to Egyptian, and go through customs and immigration. This was all actually very easy. Anyone (American) that wants to visit Egypt, don't worry about getting a visa. Tourist visas are granted automatically to Americans in the airport upon arrival. I flew in to terminal one in Cairo, and I was supposed to meet my friend Molly in terminal three. Getting from one airport terminal to another should be simple, right? Nope. Welcome to Egypt. I had to ask three different people along the way to find the shuttle bus that would eventually take me to terminal three. Once there, I witnessed my first(but probably not last) heated argument in Arabic. They were speaking too quickly and too loudly for me to understand even a word of what they were saying, but they were very upset. I did finally make it to terminal three, and as luck would have it, Molly and another student from our program found me just as I walked through the door. From terminal three, we hailed a cab to our hotel. I don't think I'll ever forget my first cab ride in Egypt. It was an adventure, to say the least. Egyptian driving is shocking for someone who isn't prepared for it, which luckily I was by my dearest friend and his driving. In short, turn signals are rare, lanes don't matter much, speed is not a concern, and the horn is a driver's best friend. Good luck crossing the street. In addition to all of this, you often need to bargain with the cabbie for a good price. Alhamdu-lilah(Arabic for 'Thank God'), we made it to the Cairo Hyatt with no major bodily injuries.

Fil Funduq(In the hotel)
Let me start by saying that the Cairo Hyatt is definitely the nicest, fanciest, most upscale building I have ever set foot in. It was beautiful, and the service was wonderful. Molly and I shared a room, and it was lovely. We had an enormous bathroom with a nice shower, a bidet, and a phone by the toilet. Yes, a phone by the toilet. There was also toilet paper, which, as I've learned since leaving the Hyatt, was a major luxury as well. We also had a balcony with a great view of Cairo and the Nile. It was gorgeous during that first night, and also during the day.

For my first meal in Egypt, I ate a pigeon. A roasted pigeon. It was actually very good, not a lot of meat, though. It tasted something like deer meat. We spent a lot of time sleeping, which was more of a necessity than a choice.We also watched some Arabic-language MTV, which was just as classy as American MTV. Some of the shows were in English with subtitles...no wonder there's kind of a warped view of American women over here. Finally, after a lot of much-needed rest, we met up with more of our group in Cairo, and several perilous street-crossing later, we found the bus for the Middlebury program that would take us to Alexandria.

ALEXANDRIA!
A relatively long bus ride, and lots of socializing later, we made it to Alexandria where the female students were dropped off at our dorm, and the bus continued on with the men, and those students in home stays. We were all shown upstairs to our rooms by the Egyptian women that are living with us. Each female student has an Egyptian roommate. This is wonderful, for many, many reasons, linguistic and social. My roommate is wonderful. Her name is Mona, and she is always looking on the bright side of things, laughing, and making other people laugh. All of the Egyptian women here are wonderful. They always go out of their way to help us whenever they can, whether that mean helping us with Arabic, or taking us to the mall. I'll have more on all of this later.

That just about covers my journey. It was long, and certainly difficult at times, but thus far, well worth it.