You're open until WHEN?!

As the holy moth of Ramadan draws to a close, I thought I might should make a few comments on what I’ve observed in my time here. But first, a disclaimer- I say all this with the utmost respect for, and no limit of ignorance about Islam. Whatever mistakes I make, and I’m sure they’re in here, please do correct me.

Assuming that the new moon is sighted tonight, (which it will be, but out of tradition, you aren’t allowed to say it will be until it actually is), Ramadan, the holy month of fasting, ends tonight. And let me tell you- Ramadan is a weird practice. It’s absolutely beautiful, but very weird. The way it goes is you aren’t allowed to eat or drink from sunup to sundown each day for a month. Additionally, Muslims are required to abstain from smoking, drinking, or any kind of sexual action or thought. This means that most places are closed from 2pm-8pm, when people are either hungry past the point of functioning, or breaking fast. Philosophically, there are several interesting points about all this.

The first is that there is, depending on whether you ask an Islamic scholar or a Muslim scholar (the first I mean to be someone who studies Islam from an analytical, secular standpoint, and the second from a religious), no real reason for the fasting. In theory, it is to commemorate the Night of Power- the night that Mohammed the Prophet received his revelation. But consider this: all the different schools have a different date, and it’s not specified in the Qur’an (or the Hadith, I think), so there’s no significance to Ramadan as a month in and of itself other than that somehow, mysteriously, it was tagged with this fasting gig. Go figure, right?

A second interesting theological standpoint is that the demons (ie Satan) are chained during this time, and cannot incite bad, forbidden, or unclean behavior in the people, making it a very pure, holy time. I don’t know enough about this to really say too much, but curiously enough, during Ramadan, it is also more acceptable for a single man and a single woman to go unchaperoned. All over the city, on bridges, in squares, you see men and women in their early twenties all mooney-eyed holding hands or sitting just a little closer than would normally be considered permissible. It’s odd. I really don’t have a reason for this, but it would be interesting if it were linked to the idea of the chained demons; that is to say, during Ramadan with all its purity and holiness these young people can be trusted to behave, whereas otherwise it would be forbidden.

Reason number three isn’t even particularly theological: many Muslims will tell you that the reason for the fasting is to experience the suffering of the poor. Then, at the end of the month, there is Zakat al-Iftar (I think- someone check my spelling), which is a charitable contribution to the poor. Similarly other holidays highlight the ideas of generosity and good morals.  For example, when sheep are sacrificed in the streets in November, practice dictates that a third of the meat should go to the family, a third to the neighbors, and a third to the poor. I’m told the whole city turns a particularly vivid shade of red. (Ewww. Or is it ewe?)  But nonetheless, generosity is a central theme in Ramadan, and in Islam in general.

I was sitting on the bus on the way home next to a young woman who was reading the Qur’an (the holy book) as we rode. I asked her, when she set it down, if the reading of the Qur’an was something particularly popular during Ramadan, or if I would see it with the same frequency during the rest of the year. This started up a conversation as to the nature of Ramadan, and I asked her casually if she was excited to be able to eat during the say again.  “No, no!” She said vehemently (although, fortunately for me, without offense- may people seem to be happy to end the fasting), “I am sad to see it go. Ramadan is such a beautiful time.”

And so it is, whether it be for devout theological reasons, or simply the empathy and communion that is formed by going hungry with the poor, or as a time to break fast each day with family and friends, it is an absolutely beautiful occasion. Now if we could just do that and keep the stores open during normal business hours…

Anything but the Khalijis!

Matt is a goofball. He does goofy things, makes goofy comments, and asks goofy questions. So imagine my surprise when he asked what turned out, in retrospect, to be a very interesting question. Specifically he asked whether Egypt is in Africa or the Middle East. If you tweak that just a bit, it becomes what is a surprisingly controversial topic in Egypt.

Ask the question: “Who are the Egyptians? Are they Arabs? Pharonic descendants? North Africans?” You’re liable to get some interesting answers.  I spoke with a particularly well-versed poli sci student, a native Egyptian, and she gave me something to think on. “Yes,” she said “I believe I am an Arab.” Her response was simple enough until she went on to add “But that is not a common opinion among Egyptians my age.”

I was baffled. Ya’ani- Egypt is the most populous of the Arab States. It is the seat of the Arab League. It is (or until recently, has been, depending on who you ask and whether or not there is a tape recorder in the room) the political leader of the Arab World. So how is it that most students do not  consider themselves to be Arabs?

The sentiment of being an Arab, she explained, is a fairly new idea, mostly the product of one Gamal Abdel Nasser. Prior to the early 20^th century, or more specifically, the fall of the Ottoman Empire as of WWI, the Middle East had been a conglomeration of areas united by nothing more than a shared religion (which was not exclusive to the Middle East; take for example Turkey or Persia), a series of loosely related dialects, and a shared status as a former Ottoman territory. But there was, at that point, no real image of an ‘Arab,’ and even less so, an idea of Arab political solidarity. More than anything, what incited their unification was that they were the states that were not Ottoman and not Persian and not European. And so it was that Nasser found a receptive audience for his Pan-Arab politics. However, much as we would assume that ‘Arab’ is a Primordial identity, imbued with centuries of shared religious tradition and millennia of shared culture, it is (also) very much an intentionally engineered political identity to bring about solidarity, and thus political power, in the Middle East.

Understand that this is a single opinion, and one based on primarily anecdotal evidence from uncited sources, but still, it is a telling statement on the self-identification of the Egyptian youth. And it is a generational discussion, as I am told. Grandparents, those that remember Egypt as it was when it could exert regional power, when Nasser’s Pan-Arabism was in full swing, and Egypt was in the lead, are Arabs. My peers’ parents identified with the Westernizing influence of America, the wealthy, influential, successful benefactor that represented modernization and progress. Now this generation is in a position to make that determination. They know what they are not- they are still not in support of Israel. Nor are they particularly in support of America (“We love Americans, but the government? Blehh,” was how it was phrased, to be precise).  But they are also not aligned as Arabs, instead leaving that title for the Khalijiun (the Gulf-ies). 

So where does that leave them? “We are lost,” was her answer, “we are lost. “

صور من القاهرة

Vignettes from Cairo (Actually the subject line says “Pictures from Cairo.” I don’t know how to say “vignettes” in Arabic. I’ll work on that) :

So, I continue to believe that I can’t really explain what Cairo is like, but I am hoping I can explain what some parts are like with a few of the images and tidbits of information and general stories from Cairo.

The University campus is not near the dorms. In fact, it’s anywhere from fifty minutes to two hours away, depending on the traffic. So it’s a long bus ride. Personally, I’m really coming to like it because I do one of three things; either I chat with the people around me, producing invariably interesting conversations that will, one day be in Arabic, inshallah, or I read and do homework, or I zone out and stare out the window. For our purposes, this last one is the point of discussion, because one can see many an interesting thing in an hour on a bus in Cairo.

As far as the city itself, at first glance, it looks like it’s all made out of nasty old concrete with seventies-era satellite dishes and air conditioners (two things that everyone has) sprouting of every surface like barnacles on the side of a boat. But after a while it starts to be natural; the buildings, new and old, are all the same color because of the sand and dust. Since there is no rain to wash them off, the spring sandstorms color all the walls a sort of reddish beige. Once you get a feel for it, it seems almost more like the buildings have always been here, maybe just buried under a sand dune until the wind could dust away the sand, leaving the buildings like pillars of sculpted stone. 

But not everything is dusty high rises. There are other scenes. One of my favorites is an island in the Nile that we cross over each day on the way home from school. The entire thing is emerald green dotted with little grass or wood huts. It looks like something out of a documentary on agriculture in ancient Egypt. I asked about it, and apparently the island, and others like it, are protected by the government because the land is so fertile from silt that, even in the human pressure cooker that is Cairo, it’s actually more productive as a farm than it would be even as housing. And housing can be found other places. Another view very different from the high-rises and apartment complexes is the cemeteries. Most Muslims bury their dead above ground, in crypts or waist-high stone fixtures. These, and the fact that cemeteries aren’t nearly so grim in Arab culture as they are in ours, make it an ideal place for what we would politely call ‘informal housing.’ But it’s not a squatters’ camp either. In fact, they tend to be bustling residential centers, just with a different look to them. Understanding this explains a lot of the constant hum that can be heard within miles of the “Cities of the Dead,” the prodigious expanses of crypts, coffins, and communities at the foot of the Citadel of Salah Ad-Din and Al-Azhar park.

As you’d guess, you can see some rather odd things running between these backgrounds. Just yesterday, we were motoring along to campus around 9am or so, so the streets were full of people heading out to work, or to the store, or what have you. And amidst this urban bustle, I glanced between two buildings only to find a woman with a flock of sheep ringing her, staring at her intently. My hand to God- apartments, taxis, policemen directing traffic, and an alley full of furry little sheep butts staring back at me. I have no explanation for this, but I can explain a significantly more common sight: cars with their wipers set up off the window. Now, coming from Colorado, the only reason I know of to do this is to prevent the wiper blades freezing to the windshield if you have a little snowmelt followed by a hard freeze. So I was originally a bit confounded at this one. I asked around, and apparently it’s how you know if your car has been cleaned. Lower class men around the neighborhood will progress up and down the street dusting off and washing off the more expensive-looking cars, and setting up the wipers to indicate the service. When their owner returns, the man makes an appearance and receives a pound or two for his troubles. If you don’t pay him, next time your car won’t get washed, and if you pay him a lot, your car will get washed well, rather than simply dusted off. Go figure.

Another common sight that had to be explained to me was the darker spot of skin that many men have in the center of their forehead. In Islam, one prays on their knees with their head bowed to the ground. So this spot, apparently, is a callus obtained over years of regular prayer. I’ve only ever seen it on men, but that may be because the more traditionally pious women have most of their forehead and hair covered by a scarf (that, as an aside, is either a demure black, or matches the outfit in a stunning display of color coordination that still has me in awe). 

Some of the most traditional women wear the niqab, the full black head-to-toe veil, which, in most Egyptian incarnations involves a slit across the eyes to see, which is usually connected by a short black thread that runs up the bridge of the nose just between they eyes to prevent the lower half of the veil from sagging and revealing more of the face (the picture at left, shamelessly jacked from BBC, doesn't have that part). Also, it tends to display some really stunning skill at eye-makeup, ironically. Personally, what caught my eye was seeing women wear them and glasses at the same time. I mean, there’s something you wouldn’t think of. We’ve all heard about the burkahs and the niqabs and whatnot, but there’s a question I never asked myself: how do you wear that and glasses. Well there you go. The glasses go outside of the veil, and the earpieces run behind the veil at the very corners of the slit. The nosepieces fit neatly on either side of the black thread connecting the top to the bottom.

My other whodathunkit-style question, prior to leaving the US, largely from a practical standpoint, was where and how do they sell underwear in Egypt. In a country where it is immodest to wear a low-necked T-shirt, how on earth do they advertise underwear? I mean, you would hardly expect them to have a mannequin scantily clad in silk and lace in the storefront window, right? Well, shocker. That’s what they do. There’s a mix; you’d see bras and panties displayed in a street bazaar too, if you looked in the right places, and there are also the same sorts of department stores that you’d see in the States that sell your standard collection without any fanfare or display. But Maddie and I were at City Stars, the colossal mall that far outshines anything I’ve ever entered before now (Exhibit a:

), and they definitely have scantily clad, dolled up mannequins in the underwear store windows. It bears mentioning that it is a decidedly westernized place in a relatively westernized city, but nonetheless, there you have it. Lace.

And on that note, I’m going to call it a night. Tomorrow I’m tagging along with a Cairene woman to pray at the mosque and break fast with her and her friends. Should be interesting! Stay tuned for more travel-related revelations from Cairo. 

"Just Go Up and Say Hi!" - A Slightly Emo Rant

I take back what I said about the organization of Egypt- that it was the most likely thing to drive me crazy during my time here. It’s not. That’s easy to deal with.  Heading into my fourth week here, I’m starting to develop the opinion that I can deal with anything this country can throw at me. I can take whatever problems come up and work them out and keep putting one foot in front of the other. At the moment, I’m less concerned about culture shock. I can deal with that. I know how to find my classes and order food and work an ATM. I can be functional here. And it’s a relief knowing that.

I can survive in this environment using English and spending time with Americans. The dorms, the university, the district where I live, they are all designed for Westerners. I could spend the whole next year here and know very little more about Egypt than what I knew when I arrived. It is only by my own determination that I will learn Arabic or to function within a genuinely foreign environment. So, the current bet on what is the most likely to drive me nuts: myself.

I know what I need to do to learn these things. When I was in Germany, I learned far more about German culture than I had expected because I had such ample access to Germans (and pseudo-German Americans that have gone native. Yeah, that’s you, Kelly.) In that situation, it’s easy to ask questions or translations, and all this lovely language immersion that they talk about actually happens. So easy answer, right? Just make friends with the Egyptians that live next door? Or the gaggle of girls in the lobby? Right, easy? Wrong. Very, very wrong.  Because if there is a gaggle of girls in the lobby breaking fast and watching an Egyptian movie and chatting Arabic, the instinct of every American is going to be to turn tail and run. (And whoever is sitting there smoothly in your apartment saying, “Oh that’s easy. I’m sure they’re all nice, welcoming people. Just go and say hi!” Enjoy your smug comfort now ‘cause you have no idea. And if anyone comments on this post “Oh, you just have to get up the courage to do it!” I will fly back there and smack you.) In no circumstance is it more apparent that you are the outsider, and it is intimidating as all hell.

The Egyptians I’ve rubbed elbows with here are very kind people. I have not had a single bad experience with anyone. Not one. However, this is also an exceptionally intimidating group. This is not a culture where people sit quietly discussing issues where one might be able to slide in a smooth “I’m sorry, I couldn’t help overhearing…” No, this is a culture where people gather in large groups and talk to people they’ve known for years, joking easily in Arabic, and incomprehensibly, both in linguistic terms, and (my terrified brain assumes) in terms of subject matter. Also, there is a very notable air of money in this place. Nothing is more intimidating than being the least sharply dressed person in a group. I’m naked without my Gucci handbag. So yes, I should integrate myself among Egyptian friends. But when you can approach a group of raucously laughing Egyptian women, lounging gracefully in their silken hijabs and Prada sunglasses and air of long-familiar comfort and integrate yourself into a conversation held in a dialect in which you can barely count, then you can tell me that I just ‘need to go up and join them.”

Aaand you can tell I feel antagonized by this point. So who, you might ask, is telling you to “just go up and say hi?” That would be me. Hi. Yeah, yours truly. I want so badly to make this work, to squeeze every drop of knowledge and experience from this adventure, that you can be I’m after myself around every corner to step up and do what it takes to learn. Every time I settle down to read a book or to check my e-mail, or do anything, really, that is not working towards that end, I feel like I’m slacking on making progress. And I am- when I spend the weekend lazing around the dorm, I’m really not learning anything. However, nagging myself that I shouldn’t be reading on the bus on the way home hen I could be eavesdropping on conversations, I shouldn’t be doing these things that give me comfort and make me feel at home when I could be doing all these things that would expand my cultural horizons, is going to drive me slowly mad. So that’s why I amend my belief that some aspect of Egypt is most likely to be my most difficult thing to overcome. It’s going to be striking that balance of pushing myself and being comfortable, and not driving myself to muttering angrily at my other personalities that also reside in my psyche in the process that will be the trick.

Well, I’m going to go eavesdrop on conversations. But before I do, let me solemnly swear that I plan on doing EVERYTHING possible in the future to try and make study abroad students visiting CU more at home. I shall never let another foreigner go un-smiled-at. 

I never really know how to answer the question: "What's Cairo like?"

It’s been almost a complete week here in Cairo, amazingly enough. I would have expected that, after moving cities every second day for the last month around Europe, a week in one place would seem like a lifetime, but apparently there is enough here to keep me busy.  But, surely enough I’ve been here a week tomorrow, and so far so good.

They shuffled us along from the plane to the dorms, got us situated, and started the orientation fair, and so far, everything has worked out rather well for me. Given that two weeks ago I didn’t have any classes and only just had a home, looking at the class schedule sitting on my dorm room desk is pretty gratifying. And as an extra bonus, I have a CELL PHONE!! For someone who just finished the homeless vagabond way of life, that is one seriously exciting development. I still have yet to buy a hair dryer, a water heater and/or coffee pot, and laundry detergent (they have washers AND dryers here! Talk about the lap of luxury.)  But it’ll get done when it gets done.

That “It’ll get done” business is, as expected, a fairly common line of thinking here.  It’s what everyone says- things just tend not to work as planned here. This really goes for everything: the new campus isn’t complete, so kids can’t move into the dorms (they are putting them in hotels for now), the buses are late, the toilets either don’t flush or constantly run, cars break down in the middle of the road constantly, The sign-ups for activities are unclear and nothing is ever announced, just about all important memos were spread by word of mouth (it’ll be interesting to see how many kids show up to class an hour early today- daylight savings time kicked in last night, but only a few people know it),  and the only way you know what’s going on is just to follow the crowd and hope someone has some idea of where we’re going, and in Egypt, never, never stand in line. Just mob the counter or you’ll never get anything done. This fact that things simply don’t function efficiently, I can tell you now, will be the biggest problem for me culture shock-wise.

But I have high hopes that it will be a fairly easy hurdle to overcome for this reason: it’s almost a beauty of the culture that things work like this. Every reference to things that will happen in the future is followed by the aside “inshallah,” which translates to “God willing.” And in a sense, it makes sense, ‘cause a lot of things that are planned don’t happen; nothing is certain. However, this allows a lot of room for appreciation of the present. You can sit and have a cup of coffee (‘ahooah in Arabic- good word to know) and a worthwhile discussion with your friends now instead of detailing out the plans for tomorrow. Tomorrow will either work or it won’t- that’s in God’s hands. What we can do now, what we CAN affect, is our use of what time we have now. The whole line of “it’ll get done” thinking is an effect of a paradigm that emphasizes a lot more passionate use of time and appreciation of the life that exists now. It’s a pain in the you-know-what when you need to get something done, or when you’ve been standing in the sun for an hour waiting for dinner, but in a big-picture kind of way, it’s really part of the fervor and passion in this culture that got me interested in the Middle East in the first place. So, I guess I’ll just learn to have patience. And bring a book with me everywhere. But, man, am I gonna end up the biggest procrastinator by the time I get home.

But I also have discovered the answers to some of the questions people asked me before I left. So let me see if their answers give you some idea of what Cairo looks like:

1.     1. No, for the most part there aren’t horse/carts/other livestock on the roads. This is not without exception. The traditional tourist horse and carts are around, but those don’t exactly count- the intention there is that they are antiquated. And you’d see more or less the same in Denver. But legitimate, two-wheel, working carts pulled by donkeys and the like do exist, and there are stretches of road where they are lined up on the curb selling produce and the like. It is interesting to be driving in a bus down a major highway and see cars dodging around a donkey trotting along the side of the freeway pulling a cart. I think I saw three on the way to the new AUC campus yesterday. (Campus is on the outskirts of the city, not near the dorms).

2.     2. No, I don’t really speak the language. I can pick up bits and pieces from conversations I hear and I can make myself understood with my formal Modern Standard Arabic and what little I know of the Egyptian dialect. I know enough to be ok, but not to really understand what’s going on. Most people do, however, speak more English than I do Arabic, and given that I’m white, that’s always what they start with when I walk up to the counter, etc. Replying in English is a habit I REALLY need to break.

3.     3. Yes, I have to dress modestly, meaning nothing tight, no sleeveless shirts or tank tops, no low necklines, no skirts above the knee.  And this is tempting to ignore because it’s hot. We’ve topped 90 and regularly 100 degrees each day I’ve been here, and it’s humid (but everything’s air conditioned, so it’s comfortable inside). I have been making a study of what the Egyptian students wear, and it seems like there is a really wide range of the degree of modesty with which people dress. I am collecting data, we’ll say. I aim for a productive shopping trip soon (Hey- it’s out of necessity!) To be honest, though, the degree of appropriateness of an outfit seems to have more to do with the circumstances. I’m pretty sure you cold get away with just about anything on campus; it’s out of the city and virtually everyone there I suspect will be a fairly westernized Arab or a westerner. On the other hand, we ended up walking a couple blocks from where the bus dropped us off to the dorms, later in the evening as a large group of primarily women, and we were hissed at (the local version of cat calling) and addressed (in Arabic, English, and even French) on a couple of different occasions. And in this case, I don’t think it would have mattered what we were wearing; I think anything would have elicited the same reaction, but I was quite happy in my very long skirt and very roomy shirt. Which leads me to point four.

4.     4. Yes men stare, and even grab in rarer occasions. Actually everyone stares. And yes, the women are cat-called, and as tourists, we are all pestered, and everyone does well to keep an eye on their wallets. And yes, these things are annoying. But the thing is, at no point do you ever really feel unsafe here, or at least, I haven’t. Islamic values of peace and kindness are pervasive enough to ensure even the wellbeing of the foreigners, I think. So yes, things can be uncomfortable, but I don’t ever anticipate feeling particularly endangered. (Except when crossing the streets. That makes me nervous. It’s like playing friggin frogger!)

And, being as I’m now in my third page, I’m going to forgo my commentary on traffic, and save my stories from Khan al-Khalili for my next update. Thanks, once again, for letting me perch on m digital soap box.

Cool People are Groovy

I have this theory that the majority of people in the world are pretty cool. Either this is true or I just got amazingly, inexplicably lucky with the people I have met.

I have mentioned before that we use CouchSurfing.com to fuel much of our travels, and we continued to do so in Vienna. Now, CouchSurfing can control for safety to an extent, but finding interesting, friendly, generous hosts sight unseen is, I have to think, luck of the draw. Given this, I’m at a loss to explain how we keep getting lucky. First, we had the lovely and ever knowledgeable Katerina show us and another very interesting pair of CSers around Prague. In Zilina, we were graced with Dana and Dushan and his family, who reminded us what hospitality really looks like. Our luck continued with the company of Adam and a whole group of Budapestian CSers, who made us feel one of the group in no time, despite the fact that we were spectacularly late for the meeting. And most recently, we stayed with Marco and Metty, two wonderfully friendly Luxembourgians (Luxembourgers?) at their flat in Vienna. Not only did they put up with our endless antics (props to Marco, who spent an afternoon listening to Kelly and me hash out some of the finer points of English grammar,) but also showed us the finest in Vienna. The restaurants, clubs, views, attractions, and other highlights that we were shown were only eclipsed by the fantastic company and hospitality we found there.

Now, imagine after completely lucking out in Vienna, I’m further spoiled in Mainz where Karla, who has been holding my Cairo-bound luggage for the last month whilst I’ve been gallivanting across Europe, gave me use of her home, right down to her own bed for the night before I flew out of the nearby Frankfurt airport. She even got up with me at 5:30am to make me coffee and pack a lunch for my flight. So, you see, I am at a loss to explain how I have had the good fortune to encounter so many fantastic, welcoming, kind, interesting, friendly, generous people.

Our last stop was Vienna where we spent one night in a hostel, and two with Marco, our previously mentioned CS host. Due to evil and vindictive teachers, Kristina spent most of the first night and much of the next day writing a paper while Kelly and I explored the city. As the seat of the former Hapsburg Empire, (shout out to one Mr. Fred Engel, my 11^th grade European history teacher for the wealth of background knowledge, some of which I haven’t forgotten) Vienna is spectacular. The palaces and cathedrals and museums and government buildings and … and… and… They are simply stunning. There’s no other description I can think of, so lets go a-picture-is-worth-a-thousand-words style.

Cool, no? In real life, it’s breathtaking. The only more opulent, luxurious view in Vienna: Café Demel, confectioners of the Hapsburg Emperors.

Go. Trust me, the plane ticket to Vienna is worth is just for their hot chocolate. Vienna was wonderful.

 Fortunately it’s a lot easier to end a vacation with another adventure than if I were just flying back to another semester in Boulder. Currently, I’m on my flight to Egypt. Honestly, it’s a little overwhelming. I barely speak the language; I’ve never been in a situation even close to as foreign as this will be, and I am moving, sight unseen, to the other side of the world, away from all my family and friends. That part’s a little scary.

But, on the other hand, I’ve been saying for the better part of the last decade (and when you consider my frame of reference, that’s an awfully long time) that I want to travel and experience other cultures and study other languages, to meet new people and learn new histories. I know that I’m happiest when I’m full of questions (just ask Kelly), when I get to figure things out. It’s like one big riddle I get to live. How is that not amazing? So I’m slightly terrified by what I’m getting myself into, but when I think of why I’m currently in a jet cruising over Sarajevo on the way to the biggest, loudest, hottest, most chaotic experience of my life, life’s pretty much just shiny.

Budapest Has Us Under its Spell and We Just Can’t Leave!

And by “leave”, I mean “get out.”  And by “spell” I mean “its burning desire to squeeze from us every penny, Euro, Forint, and Koruna that we might have remaining in our possession." Don’t get me wrong, it’s a lovely city, and I absolutely recommend visiting. But be aware that screwing with the tourists seems to be the national pastime. With the exception of the friendly neighborhood Couch Surfing community, it seems like everyone in this city is out to swindle, manipulate, cheat, charge, or wheedle our money from us. And those that aren’t after our wallets are simply messing with our heads. Anecdotal evidence:

At the train station, we are unsure whether or not we need seat reservations to the next train, so we ask if the woman at the counter speaks English or German. She replies “no,” and indicates that she can’t help us by with a “buzz-off” waggle of her forefinger. Then she says something in Hungarian. We blink. Then she sighs the sigh of the long-suffering, unwilling, and bitter shepherd of tourists, points and says, in perfect English, “You need to go across the hall, up the stairs, and to the left for international tickets.” And so we blink at her again, and observe the five other Guest Assistance” windows, fully staffed by women staring blandly back at us, and follow her instructions, going to wait in the international line, which, by the way, snakes around most of the eastern half of the train station and is completely stationary. Word has it that neither of the guest service assistants there spoke English as well as that first teller.

Budapest tourists seem to have developed multiple ways of coping. We met a German group who swore beer made it all more logical, which is why they bought a new crate of beer at each train station. The Aussies in our hostel seemed to favor temper tantrums. We’ve taken two different methods: studied avoidance (best when we can see other tourists find the pitfalls first), and playing head games right back. Kelly put on a fine display in the metro when a rotund little uniformed Hungarian woman demanded to see our tickets upon exiting, to ensure that we had not been fare-jumping. She then explained with a lot of pointing at the map and reprimanding frowns that tickets were only to be used for one line, and you can’t transfer from red to orange line on the same ticket, as we had mistakenly been told previously. So we offer her three more tickets from our book of ten to compensate for our mistake. She says, “No. No new ticket. You must pay fine.”
“What is the fine?” Kelly asks.
“6,000 Forints each.” (Notably, our hostel was 5,000 Forints a night for three beds. 6,000 Forints is a lot.)
“But we don’t have 6,000 Forints.”
“Then you pay Euro.”
“We don’t have that in Euros either,” Kelly responded truthfully.
“Credit card,” she replied, waving the form for recording a credit card number at us.
“We don’t have credit cards here,” Kelly responded, somewhat less truthfully this time.
“Fine.  Bankomat [ATM] there. You go. They [Kristina and I] wait,” she countered, growing concerned.
“I’ve already withdrawn the maximum. I can withdraw no more today,” Kelly fibbed smoothly.  “Do you have a bank transfer form?”
This seemed to have hit the end of her English capabilities, so she waylaid a passing Hungarian teen and the other ticket taker to translate as she grew progressively more flustered. Meanwhile, other passengers moseyed on past the checkpoint unhindered.
Apparently the term “bank transfer” makes less sense in Hungarian because she only grew more confused before insisting Kristina or I should make the withdrawal. “They left their wallets at the hostel,” she was assured. “Either we can do a bank transfer,” clearly the foreign phrase made her uncomfortable, “or we can give you three new tickets.”
“PASSPORTS,” she demanded flatly. I have no idea that good these would have done her, other than giving her the satisfaction of being able to demand them, but she looked quite miffed when Kelly explained slowly and clearly that they were locked safely in the hostel with our wallets. It took a while, but eventually she took three more tickets and tore them enthusiastically (“That’ll teach ‘em,” you could hear her thinking). We went on our way, and thenceforward, when confronted, Kristina and I would just start speaking only Spanish, which is much less widely known in Hungary.

Really, Budapest is a stunning city, perhaps my favorite so far. I think if you were to live here long enough to avoid these snags, it’d be wonderful, like Paris with more character and spring-fed Turkish baths. And much as I admire the intrepid capitalist’s spirit with all my heart, I don’t much mind watching the swindlers who give this beautiful city such an inhospitable façade fade into the distance. I think my wallet will be safer in Vienna.

The Land of the Industrially Pastoral

Nothing against Bratislavians (Bratislavs?) but if God wants me here, I’ll return on a diplomatic post. Otherwise, it’s just a way station on our trip between Zilina, which was fantastic, and Budapest, which looks pretty rockin’ too. (Any place where hot baths is the local past time is cool by me.)

Slovakia, as I mentioned, is a land of contrasts. So let’s look at Bratislava: It was cold. It was wet. We were cranky. Soviet architecture abounded.  And let me just say, behemoth housing complexes (we found one in Slovakia called the ‘Great Wall of China” because it extended so far), made of the kind of materials you’d expect to see separating office cubicles… it’s a different world. The hostel had wireless (which is not conducive to a let’s-go-explore-the-city mindset. What can we say, we’re addicts.) Also, the coffee and beer in the hostel were good (see above comment on wireless).

I provide as my counterpoint Zilina. I’ll grant you it doesn’t look like much from the train station (they had to tell us to get off the train, ‘cause it was the last stop. We didn’t know it wasa stop as there was no platform. The conversation involved a lot of pointing to the ground and saying “Zilina?” “Zilina.” etc. etc.) But, then neither does Denver.  At any rate, we got off the train and met our hosts, who had arranged everything down to luggage transport for us. They showed us town, ordered us beer at their favorite restaurant (and what a relief not to have to order ourselves. “Tsree pivo” was getting a little old for our only discourse with waiters.) Then they took us to his flat where his parents had prepared dinner for us. I kid you not: venison pot roast. I melted. It was so indescribably perfect, and went quite well with the cherry liquor his father kept “for special dinners.” His parents didn’t speak English, but made their meaning known, and let me tell you, watching a traditional Slovak man heckle Kelly for being a vegetarian in the face of his venison is priceless. He made her sit next to him, pointing to the seat while barking “vegetarian” with that internationally recognized twinkle in his eyes that promised an entertaining meal. It didn’t disappoint.

After dinner, dessert, and some photo sharing, we all went to bed early so as to facilitate an early morning. We got up, and, bright-eyed and bushy-tailed, set out by bus for a few towns over, where we found our trailhead and went to explore Slovakia by foot. It is absolutely stunning country, all greenery and wildflowers. Our hosts were a part of the club that marked and maintained the trails, so we were in a position to see the best that Slovakia had to offer. And we did. We climbed to the top of one hill. (By non-Colorado standards it may have been a mountain) Under us, the valley opened, revealing the town, river, and farms below. With the grass and crops, it looked more like a fine emerald-green fur coat with the other features embroidered along its length. Really, it was quite a sight. And, to my joy, balancing precariously on the opposite side of the valley was none other than the castle that had drawn us to this area in the first place.  After this view, we expected to scuttle along home and hang out there. But our guide wasn’t done showing us her home. We hiked down the valley, across the valley, and back up to the castle. And so I ceased feeling bad for abandoning my daily run.

The castle, mostly ruins, was open to the public to explore, and explore we did, monkeying around from turret to turret until we had enough castle to satiate even my love for them. And so we returned home and from there to the train station to Bratislava, which had significantly less explorable castles. As a parting thought, in my opinion, America misses out on one of the greatest highlights of civilization by not having castles. We need to start building castles. 

The Loosed Marble (post-dated first entry)

Here's a blast from the past: I just dug up the blog entry that I wrote on the plane to Germany forty-odd days ago. It is somewhat belated, but if you'll forgive me, here it is for your enjoyment:

Welcome, and thank you for joining me on my intercontinental series of adventures and misadventures. Here I hope to keep posting updates throughout so that you all can know what I’m up to and be reassured that I have no intention of being stoned or otherwise maimed on any of my travels. (It would set a terrible tone for any future business abroad, don’t you think?) 

As I write, I’m flying over the British Isles, soon to land in Frankfurt. At present, it bears mentioning that in Europe I have great tour guides, but speak none of the native languages of any of the places I am going, and I have never truly left the States (Canada doesn’t count). But it gets better when I hit Cairo. Due to what amounts to bureaucratic inefficiency and general nonsense, I arrive in Cairo in a month, and as of yet have no classes, no housing, and may well not have a program for second semester. So given everything, I think I am being pretty Zen. 

 

This is the realization I had when I found the e-mail in my inbox stating I had been waitlisted for a dorm room- I’ve made it 21 years so far with no problem I couldn’t fix, and I have no intention of starting now. Throughout the years, my fantastic friends, family, teachers, mentors, and other influences have provided me with an excellent set of experiences that can and will provide me with the tools I need to fend for myself. Once I figure out how to operate these fancy German Lufthansa seatbelts. It’s all about taking things one step at a time. 

 

And speaking of fancy and German, I have come to decide that I am a believer in this airline. I mean, in economy class, on a nine-hour flight, we get two meals, a snack, and all sorts of drinks. And, my keen observations of my fellow passengers reveal to me that alcoholic drinks appear to be complimentary, and yield an overall greater quantity of beverage than, say, a soda. In my benedryl-afflicted state (I don’t normally sleep on planes, and as I recently discovered, an antihistamine operates in my system by making me too sleepy to notice any allergies, yielding a pleasant several hours passed out face down on top of my fold-out airline tray), I decided to forego the pleasure of that particular perk, but nonetheless, I think I’m going to rather enjoy Europe. But could someone tell me what the hell I’m supposed to do with this uncommonly warm wet-wipe? Perhaps I should return to my keen observations of fellow passengers. 

 

Before I do so, however, I will make one more observation here. I have had several opportunities to be the recipient party in the saying-goodbye scenario in the last year or so, and let me just say, I vastly prefer not being on that end. Saying goodbye is hard, no matter what, but I think there is something to be said for being on the leaving end. Particularly in this case, I have been planning this trip for so long, in some incarnation or another since essentially high school, it simply feels natural to be on my way. One of my favorite toys as a child (yes, there is a point to this story. Be patient.) was a marble-run, a series of snap-together plastic tubes to guide the marble through a series of obstacles.

I would spend hours puzzling over the route that I thought would be the most interesting trip for my chosen marble, and subsequently constructing it. But the best part, hands down, is when you drop the marble and hold your breath to see how its run plays out. Well, as far as I’m concerned, my marble has been cast into the hands of gravity, and I look forward to enjoying the ride, withstanding the bumps, making sharp turns, and fixing the snags.