laundry day

Today was actually meant to be "get up and leave the dorms and go shopping day" but it didn't quite work out like that.
I put my first load of laundry into the washer around 11 am. Then I watched tv and didn't do anything for a while, until I switched it into a dryer and put the second load in, then ordered lunch. By the time lunch arrived, it was almost time to switch laundry out again, but I ran into a friend downstairs, and talking to friends is always more interesting than laundry.
And that was pretty much my whole day. I sat in the courtyard with a bunch of friends coming and going, talking for a really long time, and it was really really great. I don't like thinking about me leaving and everyone else leaving Cairo, and then me coming back, and most everyone else not coming back. I know I'll make new friends, but gosh darn it, I like these friends.
During one short trip upstairs to take my last load of laundry out of the dryer, I found that the third floor dryer, which I have avoided since my first week here, still really sucks. So, I had to lug a bag of wet clothes to another floor to find an open dryer. The sixth floor was taken, so I went down to the fifth. I was halfway through the door, when I heard a shout behind me. "Cloze double-you see. Man cloze double-you see!"
I turned around to see an angry waving security lady behind me. At first I thought she meant "clothes" and I was thinking, "Yes, I have my clothes," but then I realized she meant "close." So I reached out to close the door, and protect all the innocent fifth floor girls from the scary scary man in the w.c., but she intercepted me, and pretty much forced me back to the stairwell door, wet clothes bag in hand. Then I ran away. (The fifth floor dryer, by the way, was open and empty. It would have taken about thirty seconds to put my clothes in, turn it on, and leave. But no.)
Luckily, the fourth floor dryer was free as well. If it hadn't been, I would have been a good deal more pissed off than I already was.
Speaking of man on the floor, I had another crazy experience this morning. I had just headed out with my first load of laundry, when a cleaning lady looked at me up and down, and said gently "man on the floor." And I immediately turned around, went back to my room, and changed out of my shorts and tank top into something more appropriate. I didn't even think about trying to get past her, or about why I was suddenly wearing a cardigan that covered my arms to the wrists, a higher cut shirt, and a long skirt. When I walked back out and past the same cleaning lady, she nodded approvingly. What has Egypt done to me?
So, it was a frustrating laundry day, but a good hang out with friends day. It ended on a kind of sad note, though, because the first of my really good friends in Cairo is leaving tonight, and we all had to say goodbye to him. And I have nothing more to say on the subject.
Also, I'm just going to leave this here. You're welcome.

post-sinai snooze-fest

Sorry, there won't be a catch-up blog from Sinai posted to tonight. I am uploading pictures to yesterday's blog, but my computer is being epically slow, and I don't want to fight with it any more.
I did pretty well at school today, despite being sore and tired. Climbing the three flights of stairs to get to work hurt like nobody's business. Tomorrow should be better, unless of course, it's worse. I find it works that way. It will get better eventually, though.
For the first time, I actually didn't wake up when the bus got to campus this morning. It wasn't until the doors opened that I had any idea we were there. I like to think that someone would have woken me up, but I'm not really sure about that. Sadly, nothing else really interesting happened today, except for discussing The Duchess of Malfi in Dramatic Lit, and turning in a pretty fail outline to my Egyptian Lit professor.
When I got home, I started work on my midterm for my linguistics class right away, and got half of it done pretty quickly. Of course, then I took a break, which led to me not finishing the second half of the midterm until 11:00. Oops.
In the meantime, though, I did get all my laundry done. I went down to the first floor to use the machines there. That turned out to be good in someways (both machines worked, I got to take the elevator upstairs without seeming like a total wimp, since I was carrying laundry) and bad in others. Well, other. I got shut into the bathroom twice by a security lady, thanks to a 'man on the floor'. Wonderful, right? Gotta protect me from the trauma of having electricians see my laundry.
On the positive side, no one stole my laundry detergent when I forgot it on the washer. Twice.
Okay, the slowness of my computer is driving me insane. That's it for tonight. Catch-up blogs tomorrow, and don't forget to check yesterday's post for the new pictures!
Oh, and read my friend Geoff's new blog about Cairo, he sums the entire experience up pretty well. You can find it here.
Something to listen to: Ben Folds singing Losing Lisa.

And something else to listen to: Self singing Paint by Numbers.


p.s. I talked to my cuz-niece on Skype last night. We took pictures of each other:

awww

alternate universes, some with socks (and porphyrophobia)

In a thousand thousand alternate universes, I'm climbing Mt. Sinai right now. Of course, if I'm going to go quantum here, in a few thousand universes, I'm wearing socks, or didn't do my laundry today, or slept in till noon, or didn't choose to listen to wonderful music on the internet all day while I did my homework. None of those things are true, and I can say I'm pretty happy that's so. Except for the socks, it's kinda cold in here.
Okay, now I've got socks on.
I've decided that if a song can make me laugh at the beginning and cry at the end and be 1 minute and 38 seconds long, it should be posted on my blog, and possibly be my new favorite song. So here. And here.

I don't really know why it made me cry, honestly. It's sad, but it's cheerful, so I'm a little bit confused. Maybe that's why.
Today was a good weekend day to spend at home and not on vacation. I got all my laundry done in a timely fashion, except for the last bit that I left in the dryer for 45 minutes too long. Oops. Thankfully someone was sensible and put it on top for me, so I didn't feel too bad. I used the sixth floor washer and dryer today, marking the first time I have done my laundry all on one floor. The sixth floor washer has its  quirks, just like the fifth floor one does, except instead of the door not opening properly, on sixth floor, it doesn't close. I tell you, every day is an adventure here.
I got all my homework done today, and managed to catch up on my television shows too. Big Bang Theory is excellent, as usual, and so is House, but Bones leaves a little bit to be desired. Can they finally just get together already, please?
Aside from work and tv and laundry and cleaning, I really didn't have anything else to do today, which was a little disappointing. My friends were busy, so I couldn't go out, and today just wasn't the right day for me to wander around getting stared at and possibly harassed all by myself.
Here is another song for you, one that I've been waiting to post forever, because it has obvious spoilers for the Doctor Who series 5 finale, so I had to wait until Maggie finished watching the series. She'd watch it anyway, spoilers or not, and I'm strictly anti-spoiler, so that just wasn't going to work. But now she's done, so (finally) here is The Big Bang 2, by Charlie McDonnell:

Listening to this song honestly makes me miss my ukulele. Out of all the things I left at home (sunscreen and extra peanut butter included), my uke is the one I most wish I had brought with me. I was worried about packing it, and taking it on the plane, which is silly, because now I would gladly risk it on a plane, just to have it here now. That would give me lots more to do in my free time than take naps, and would have the benefit of being entertaining and productive for me, and simultaneously horrendously annoying to anyone within earshot. Win-win, right?
Anyway, I really want to learn to play Big Bang 2 when I get my uke again (hopefully at winter break), and I've actually already learned all the chords for it, that's how pathetic I am. Sad. I can wait three months, though. Since I have no other choice. Unless Geoff lets me borrow his mandolin... (Just kidding! I can't play mandolin.)

aa-oo-ii, baa-boo-bii, taa-too-tii, thaa-thoo-thii

pool hours

I finally had enough free time on campus this morning before class to check out the sports facilities and the pool on campus. I even learned how to rent a locker, even though the locker-renting lady didn't speak English. The pool is gigantic, fifty meters long with about twelve lanes. I don't have a swim cap or goggles, but that isn't going to stop me from doing laps tomorrow when I get a chance. As you can see from this schedule, the hours are very irregular, but I'm hoping to get to swim at least twice a week, since the gym here in Zamalek is a little lacking.
Classes went well today, and I even got my homework done at a reasonable time. There isn't any news on the library job front, because the work-study website isn't open to study abroad students yet, but I think it's getting fixed sometime this week.
In Arabic class we are still learning the alphabet, through the use of a book called the Alif-Baa and sometimes with the youtube video below. Feel free to sing along if the fancy strikes you. Don't worry if you can't pronounce some of the letters, because I can't either, and I'm supposed to be able to by now!

Tomorrow I'm also planning to relinquish my passport (along with a passport size photo and one photocopy of my passport) to the student visa services so I can get my visa changed from a visitor's (which is good for multiple re-entries, but only three months) to a student visa, also with multiple re-entries, but which will be good for the rest of the school year. I hope the powers that be won't hold onto it too long, because I don't really like traveling without it, even inside Egypt.
I also went grocery shopping today, twice. The first time was on campus at the 24 hour Quick-Mart, to stock up on granola bars. I also checked out the jars of Nutella, because there wasn't any peanut butter, but since they looked runny and one had been opened, I didn't buy them. Instead, I bought a couple serving size packs of Nutella, just because I wanted to. And because Nutella is the most delicious thing on Earth, ever. While I was in the grocery store, I browsed the cereal shelves, and found this, which made me laugh:

it might be healthy, but it doesn't have any friends

Also, a package of turkish delight. Honestly, I don't remember ever seeing turkish delight in real life before. I kind of thought it was something that C. S. Lewis made up when he was writing The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe. Guess not.

it does exist

My second grocery store trip of the day came when it was time to do my laundry, because I was down to one Egypt-appropriate shirt, and I didn't really feel like wearing it. I found an empty washer and put my clothes in it and started it before I remembered that I didn't have any laundry soap. Oops. My first thought was to borrow some from a friend, but then I kind of felt like a huge mooch, so I ran to Metro (the closest and most Western supermarket) to buy some. I ended up with a brand called Persil, that comes in a bright pink box. When I got back, I added it to the washer and ran the wash cycle again so my clothes would actually get clean.
Then I returned to my room to Skype and do homework, and forgot all about my laundry. The washer had been done for about half an hour when I showed up to put my clothes in the dryer, but thankfully no one had needed it, so my clothes hadn't been moved. Unfortunately, I did the exact same thing when my clothes were in the dryer, and when I came to get them, they were piled on top. I didn't really mind, though, because they weren't on the floor, and it's not like I haven't done the same to other people's clothes in the past.
Overall, it was a successful laundry adventure, because nothing was still wet, I used actual soap instead of just color brightener, and nothing came out a very different color than when it went in. (I don't remember mentioning last time - I washed my only two light shirts with a previously unwashed dark pair of jeans. It didn't ruin them, but they can't really be called white any more. At least they're not pink.)
In other news, look how pretty some parts of AUC's campus are. This is a courtyard hidden in the middle of HUSS, the building where I have most of my classes, which is designed to be confusing and impossible to navigate.

huss courtyard

Actually, speaking of HUSS, I've gotten pretty used to it over the past few weeks. It's the buildings on campus that I've never set foot in before that are the trouble. With my extra time this morning, I decided to sit on a balcony on HUSS's second floor and read my book in the shade. I was closer to the science building than to HUSS, and I knew that a catwalk connected the two buildings, right next to the balcony I was headed for, so I decided to take the science-y route. This was a bad mistake. I wasn't late for anything, but I was lost in that building's depths for 45 minutes before I re-emerged from a door about 50 yards in the opposite direction from where I wanted to be. During that 45 minutes, I found the roof, three doors that wouldn't open, a confusing looking engineering class, and an Authorized Personnel Only chemical storage room with the door propped open to passers-by, which I didn't enter, although I was tempted. (I'll be going back to that room someday, mark my words.) Anyway, I survived my ordeal, as you can see, and I'll live to explore another day.
Here is another song I've been listening to quite a lot, since I finally listened to Sgt. Pepper all the way through without stopping. I don't think this is my favorite song from the album, but it is the one that sticks with me the most:

lazy tuesday

Well, today was just as fun as a barrel of monkeys, after the monkeys have been in there for a while and got bored. (How fun can a barrel of monkeys be, anyway?)
I woke up this morning around 10 am, after falling asleep almost immediately after I posted my blog last night. It was nice to just wake up, not be jolted out of sleep by a cell phone alarm.
I had plenty of homework to do today, but ended up putting it off like any good college student. Don't worry, it did get done, just not while there was still daylight.
My goals for the day (besides homework), were to call housekeeping to get my room cleaned for the first time in three weeks, and to do my laundry. Originally I planned to seek out the dorm's laundry service and pay for them to do it, but we had some Arabic/English confusion, so I wound up just doing it myself.
Getting housekeeping to come to my room turned out to be easy, since my neighbors called them up, and I just took advantage and asked them to clean my room when they were done. They were kind of scarily efficient, and it took less than ten minutes to strip my bed, put on new sheets, polish all the wooden surfaces that weren't cluttered with my stuff, clean the mirror, and mop the floor. Four ladies worked at one time, and their supervisor (I guess?) stood out in the hall and made me sign papers saying that I had called housekeeping for the first time and that the room had everything that I was promised. (I didn't check 'lampshade', though, because my overhead light is still just a bare bulb. It doesn't really bother me, though.)
My floor proved to be dirtier than I had ever thought possible, with dirt tracked in from the Cairo streets, and lots of long hair. Wait, long hair? Whose long hair? My invisible roommate's? Creepy... Anyway, I was really glad to check housekeeping off my list of things to do, and I rewarded myself by watching a few episodes of the Daily Show with Jon Stewart. I am eternally grateful to Mr. Stewart and his associate Mr. Colbert for ensuring that their shows are viewable all around the world, not just in the United States. (I'm looking at you, Hulu and Netflix. Make it happen.)
I met my friend Emily for lunch, which was really nice, since we hadn't seen each other in a while. We walked a few blocks to a street food place which she had heard sold really good falafel. Both of us have kind of fallen in love with falafel since we've been here, so it was a really good choice. The way the shop was set up was a bit confusing, since we had to pay a man who then wrote our orders on a slip of paper for us to give to the cooks, but we figured it out eventually. The falafel was delicious, and I definitely plan on going back there soon.
After lunch, I decided to be productive again and do my laundry. The third floor washer was busy, so I made my way up to the fourth, then the fifth, where I finally found an empty washer. Of course, right after closing the door and starting it, I realized that this was the demon washer that had no handle to open the door again. When my laundry was done, I had to call Emily to ask for her fifth floor resident expertise to get my clothes out again. Luckily, we succeeded, and I went back down to the fourth floor to find an empty dryer. This dryer actually worked, unlike the third floor one, and my clothes were clean and dry and warm and the process only took three hours. Whoopee!
Unfortunately, there were some casualties. Since the washers are small here, and I had a lot of dirty clothes, I washed all my pants, and a few shirts that I knew I'd want to wear again soon. I don't know why, but somehow this ended up with my two lightest shirts in the wash with a new pair of jeans. All things considered, it could have been much worse, but it still makes me a little mad. Shoulda, coulda, woulda.

top and left are my newly light blue shirts.
bottom right corner is a very white pillowcase.

At some point after my laundry was completed, I realized that I was no longer in possession of my cell phone. I think I left it on a washer or dryer somewhere, and after checking with the front desk and finding out that housekeeping found a phone earlier today, I'm pretty sure it's safe. Unfortunately, housekeeping is gone for the day, and has taken my phone with them. Apparently that's how lost and found works in Cairo. It's not so much a place as a state of mind.
Eventually I got all my homework done, including reading The Libation Bearers (again), the most boring and plot-empty Greek tragedy ever written. I managed not to fall asleep, though, so I'll at least have something to talk about in class tomorrow.
Speaking of tomorrow, it is going to be busy. Not only do I have class for five hours, I also have tons of business to take care of, like buying textbooks and switching into (and out of) classes. Should be fun. I'll let you know how it went tomorrow, and I'll post another Luxor and Aswan blog too. Thanks for reading and commenting!
Oh, and edit to add: I've had this song stuck in my head for the last four days. You're welcome.