The Wandering Jew

Wisconsin Sucks

2008-10-28T18:20:00.002-06:00

It has gotten so cold here in the past couple days. In fact, it snowed yesterday. I was mortified. However, based on principle, we are refusing to turn on our heat until after Halloween. So I sleep in layers, and right now I am wearing gloves while I type. Which would be hard enough without the puppy who has never seen gloves before and thinks they are a new toy for him to attack. Writing this paper tonight is going to be virtually impossible.

Mildridiots, Volume 5

2008-10-20T13:55:00.005-06:00

To be honest, I could do a hundred more Mildridiots, all devoted to awful things Morgan does. Every day when she comes into work, she asks me things like, "Did you prep roast beef?" and, "Did you slice tomatoes?" She apparently thinks she's my boss. I always respond with, "Yes, that's my job," extra sarcastically.

She also scolded a customer last Saturday. The customers always place their order at the counter, sit down while we make it, and then we call them up to grab their plates and pay. But she has decided to turn everything on its head and make them pay when they order, which causes a ton of confusion, since some of these people have been doing it the normal way for the past 30 years. So a customer came in, placed his order, and then walked to a table and sat down, like he's done for years and years. When the sandwich was done, she called him up, and said, "Okay, now you have to pay. You should have paid earlier, but you just walked away from me. I was like, 'What the hell?' " Yes, she did say all of that to a customer. A customer who knows how this place operates much better than she does.

Anyway, let's meet some new people:

Paranoid ATM User
The first customer on Sunday, this guy called in his order and came in to pay with a credit card. I apologized and told him that we don't accept cards, but we do have an ATM. He looked like I had crushed his soul. I've never seen anyone that devastated about using an ATM. After thinking it over for a solid minute of awkward silence, he decided to withdraw the money. Upon entering his card and his information, the ATM told him that he would incur a $1.75 surcharge. At this, he went from crushed to irate.

"What is this? Are you trying to fleece me?!" he demanded. "No, we don't take the surcharge for ourselves," I assured him, but my words fell on unforgiving ears. The damage was done. I received not a single cent tip for his large order. Jackass. He also tried to tell me that we used to take credit cards, and when I told him that we never have, he told me I was wrong. He was exactly the kind of person I wanted to see first thing in the morning after waking up to a shit waterfall outside my room.

Courtney
Since I introduced you to Morgan, I figured I should also tell you about some of the other coworkers. Courtney is in her early-to-mid-twenties, with many piercings, crazy-colored hair, and is currently going back to college for the third time in her life. She moved out of her parents' house when she was a teenager, and has been working for $6.50 ever since. She enjoys drinking, doing the occasional drugs, and not working.

She frequently calls in "sick," but then admits under further questioning that she is either too drunk to come in (at 4 PM), or she hasn't slept yet because she was up all night drinking. At first, this was annoying, but now I've gotten used to just saying, "No," when I don't want to come in. And it's actually kind of nice to have so many options for extra work if I ever want some more money. Plus she's always up for a switch in schedules if I want to go somewhere for the weekend.

On Saturday she told me that her dog, Spaz, might be put down. Apparently he has bitten about 13 people, and one guy finally complained. Now, Spaz is this goofy little pug, whose bites are more like nips and honestly can't hurt anyone. So the guy who is calling Animal Services and DEMANDING that they kill this adorable pug is pretty insane. But Courtney also needs to get her dog under control. As she said herself: "He bites me and Noah [her boyfriend] all the time, and he's broken the skin twice. But we're always like, 'You're so cute!' " And then she instantly went into how ridiculous the guy was being. She's utterly incapable of seeing how some people may not find getting bit by a dog is cute.

So she's a mess.

There's Nothing Like Waking Up To Your Roommate's Shit Raining On You

2008-10-19T09:20:00.003-06:00

This weekend was nothing like I described in my last post. It was so, so much worse.

First, my cousin ended up not coming. He was going to be in town for an Ultimate Frisbee tournament, but when I called him on Friday, he said he had been demoted to the B-Team for missing two games, so he was being sent to Nebraska instead of Wisconsin (what a brutal punishment, huh?). When I talked to him, he was in the car with his two roommates, drinking, while his little brother drove them to Nebraska. And they were all listening to Fergie. So it seems like he at least was having a good weekend.

Last night, nothing notable happened at the trailer trash party. They were all rather well-behaved, and my friends and I actually stayed upstairs most of the night to watch Sarah Palin on SNL (how great was that episode compared to most others?!). Everything exciting happened after the party.

We left to get some pizza at around 12:30, and when we returned at 1:30, the party was already over. But we could hear some loud moaning coming throughout the entire house. "YES! YES! KEEP COMING!" my roommate's trashy girlfriend shouted. Upon further investigation, we realized that they were not upstairs in his bedroom - they were having sex in the basement on the nasty, mildewy couch that we found down there when we moved in!

So they finished up while I was taking Bark Antony outside. The roommate's girlfriend (they're Jessie and Steve, for future reference... hopefully they don't read this) stumbled outside and said to me - keep in mind she had just finished having sex with her boyfriend not two minutes prior - "God, you're sexy. If only I was single."

"Yep," I responded. "Magic would surely happen."

Eventually I got Antony back inside and into his crate to go to sleep, and as I climbed into bed, I heard a familiar sound 'round these parts - "GO TO FUCKING HELL, YOU BITCH!"

Yes, Jessie and Steve were having their weekly epic fight. Last week, the fight was so bad that the neighbor's called a domestic violence report to the police, and they showed up pounding on our door at 4 AM. This week, no such luck, but the fight was pretty much as intense as last week.

No one ever knows what they fight over, but it sounded like she was slapping him and he was asking what he did to deserve getting slapped and alternating between screaming, "I FUCKING LOVE YOU!" and "I'M GOING TO FUCKING KILL YOU!"

Finally, they quieted down and I drifted off to sleep, already pissed at how late I had been forced to stay up when I just wanted to get a decent amount of sleep before work in the morning.

Around 3 AM, I woke up to the sound of a veritable waterfall outside my room. My instant assumption was that someone was either puking or peeing in the hallway, so I got up to investigate.

First, let me explain that earlier in the day (seriously, around, like, noon), our roommate Jon had clogged the toilet upstairs, and then had tried to fix it, which resulted in the toilet filling to the brim with water so it could no longer be plunged without overflowing. So what did he do? JUST LEFT IT. Didn't try to get the water down, didn't call maintenance, NOTHING.

Well, someone must have flushed it during the night, because brown water was pouring out of the ceiling down onto our floor. I raced upstairs to see what was happening, and discovered the worst sight ever: a two-inch deep puddle on the floor of the upstairs bathroom and hallway, with hundreds of little pieces of shit floating in it.

And it had soaked through the floor and was raining down on me. An artist's rendition:

Unbelievably irate, I grabbed a piece of Tupperware from upstairs, threw it under the stream of shit water, and went back to bed. When I woke up, the shit had dried, but Steve was brushing his teeth down in our bathroom (understandably), and he was even more pissed than I was (again, understandably, since his room had been invaded by a widening lake of shit in the night).

So... I'm going to enjoy these five hours at Mildred's and just hope all the problems at home are solved and/or everyone is dead when I get back.

College!

Pictures of My Dog and The X-Files Best Moments, Episodes 9 and 10!

2008-10-16T14:53:00.010-06:00

Wow. Almost a week since my last post. I apologize. I haven't even been doing that much. Although I was supposed to finish reading Invisible Man by today for a class, so I've been frantically plowing through that for the past week when I realized that it is impossibly long. I almost made it, too - only 50 pages short! Is that an excuse enough for you?

Anyway, let's do this bullshit that no one looks forward to:

This astronaut was possessed by an... alien ghost,
I think? And it sometimes made his face into the
"face" carved into the surface of the moon.

I wasn't joking about the alien ghost.

And then in the next episode, an invisible alien
(notice how their aliens are never fully visible, to
save money?) REALLY wanted to take this guy
on his spaceship.

I assume the aliens wanted to study grunge fashion.

Also, I have a new article! It's my review of "Towelhead." Not an interesting read, really, but good movies never make for exciting reviews.

I feel like all I do on this blog anymore is plug my reviews and post lame X-Files pictures. So here's what's going on in my life this weekend: my cousin is coming to visit, so I'll try to show him a good time around Madison and I'll try to document it for your viewing pleasure. And my roommate's white trash girlfriend is hosting a party at our house for some reason. (I'm not joking about the white trash thing. Although she assured me that she doesn't want the party to "get ghetto," but all of her friends are "super preppy" because their dads own roller coasters.) I will try to remember to keep my camera on hand at all times, because something awesome has to happen when you mix 20 trailer park girls and a bunch of cheap beer.

And, to make sure I haven't totally wasted your time, here are some pictures of Bark Antony:

I thought his ears were going to stand straight
up, but for the past month only his left
ear has stood up, making him look pretty
stupid most of the time.

Antony and his BFF Apollo taking over my
favorite chair.

Sleeping with one ear up and his tongue
sticking out. How embarrassing.

In Which The Sarah Silverman Article Goes to Print, And They Fuck It Up

2008-10-10T10:34:00.003-06:00

My two latest articles for the Cardinal are a review of Beverly Hills Chihuahua and my interview with Sarah Silverman. For once, they didn't edit a single word I wrote in the interview story, but they did censor her quite a bit. They cut a couple shit jokes and a joke about Osama bin Laden, which is weird because there's enough stuff left in there to offend anyone as it is.

But what's even weirder is that they didn't promote it at ALL. You'd think if we got to interview a big name like her, we'd make a big deal about it, but they didn't even include a picture of her, let alone promote the interview on the front page to let you know that it was in there.

Our rivals, the Badger Herald, published their story a day after ours, but even though the writer - in my opinion, at least - isn't as good as I am (sorry, whoever you are), they gave him the royal treatment: pictures, promotion, and a damn good headline.

My headline when it was published was "Sarah Silverman Talks About Season Premier" or whatever. My headline that I submitted with the article was "Sarah Silverman Talks Show, Politics, and Pubes". Guess what the headline for the Badger Herald article was? "Sarah Silverman Talks Obama, Osama, and Pubes".

WHY AM I NOT ALLOWED TO HAVE A HEADLINE WITH PUBES?

HALLOWEEN MADNESS: The X-Files Best Moments, Episodes 7 and 8!

2008-10-09T21:32:00.010-06:00

Episode 7 was lame. A computer was attacking people. The only thing I liked about it is that it proved my point that Eagle Eye was nothing new.

Episode 8, however, kicked ass. It was such a great little horror movie condensed into a 43-minute episode.

Basically, some dudes were up in the Arctic, drilling for ice samples, but they happened to be doing it above a meteor crater. So alien worms got into their brains and made them kill everyone at the research lab.

The episode was really well done, especially in showing the growing paranoia of the crew sent up to investigate (headed by Mulder and Scully, obviously, but also made up of Felicity Huffman and Bania from "Seinfeld"). Definitely their best episode yet.

Here are some crazy pictures:

So first this dude had these weird black things
in his armpit, and I was like, "Shit, he's fucked."

Then they looked through a microscope
at some blood and the alien just looked like
sperm with spikes.

But then the pilot tried to kill them all, so
they obviously held him down and ripped
a worm out of the back of his brain.

This is the worm. It was really fake-looking.

And then, to close out the episode,
Felicity Huffman got naked and Scully felt her
tits. Seriously.

The X-Files Best Moments, Episode 6!

2008-10-07T21:09:00.006-06:00

I have to admit, this episode bored the shit out of me at first. Boring ghost story, blah blah blah, he's in love with this woman and is protecting her even after he's dead.

But then crazy Exorcist shit started happening, and it suddenly became the strongest episode yet.

I mean, first, Mulder and Scully were reviewing surveillance footage, when they noticed something strange:

So they enhanced the quality, and what did they discover?

A CREEPY GHOST SMIRKING AT THEM.

Shit only got weirder from here. First, the woman's bath filled with blood (noticeably coming from the two holes drilled in the sides of the tub):

Then, Mulder came into her house and discovered a floating dude, who was currently having his throat crushed by the ghost.

Ultimately it was another (sort of) happy ending, but I didn't care about the resolution, because so many crazy ghost shenanigans had gone on that I was already thrilled with the episode. Hopefully there are more like this the closer we get to Halloween.

Now That It's Cold, This Is What I'm Wearing

2008-10-06T18:22:00.002-06:00

Here's the back of it:

(Made with the help of Cafepress).

Mildridiots, Volume 4

2008-10-06T14:56:00.003-06:00

This is a very special volume of Mildridiots. You see, my roommate recently quit for another job, so our latest Mildridiot is the newest employee!

Her name is Morgan, and she is a bitch.

Let me provide some examples. First, I should preface it by saying that she lives in the apartment above the store that Nels rents out. (The only reason this restaurant hasn't gone out of business in the past 30 years is because he owns the entire building and rents out the top floors, so they pay for our lack of customers.)

On Thursday, it was Bodnar's last day, so I accompanied him for what was sure to become a sob-fest as he closed down Mildred's for the last time. (I also accompanied him for the free food, of course.) We drove his car, and as we were parking in Mildred's lone parking spot, we accidentally ran over a dead, rotting log.

The second he got out of the car, Morgan was out on her balcony, and she instantly said, "Are you going to pick that up?" while pointing at the dead log that was smashed to bits.

"Uh... what?" he asked. Keep in mind during this that Morgan had no idea whether or not we were employees. For all she knew, we could have been customers she was chewing out.

"That log there. That was a really nice thing that Nels had." What the hell? That dead log was really nice? In the six months that I have worked here, I have never once seen Nels go out back to take care of his log (sexual innuendo definitely not intended).

Naturally, my roommate got pissed that she was trying to insinuate that she knows Nels better than us, or even that she had the balls to say anything about this stupid log at all. "Oh, really? So you know Nels, like, really, really well, then?" he snapped. Frankly, she deserved such a sarcastic onslaught. She tried to respond, but he just stormed inside before she could even say anything.

So of course I was looking forward to Saturday, when I would be training her. I didn't think she'd have the cojones to mention the incident to me, but OF COURSE she did. Within the first ten minutes, she said, "I'm so glad it's you here and not your idiot roommate." Did she really just come in to train with me and in the first ten minutes call my best friend an idiot? I just brushed it off with a, "Yeah, he's really awesome," and moved on.

I also was able to more or less ignore her terrible customer service, such as saying, "Right on, dude, you've got the perfect amount of change! $4.20!" to this elderly guy who had no idea what her stupid stoner joke meant. I also ignored the fact that it took her over 10 minutes to make two Leadbedders, our most basic sandwich. I know it's her first day, but it's not like it's her first day on Earth. A baby could have figured out which side of the bread to put the mayo on faster than she did (seriously, she asked what side the mayo goes on, to which I responded, "THE INSIDE"). Although, I did make it up to the customer by sneaking a free cookie in her bag with a note attached to it that said, "Sorry about the wait!"

But I could no longer ignore her when she started telling me how to do my job. First, she wouldn't let me reuse a piece of wax paper that had touched a different slice of bread. Then, when I was showing her how to slice an onion, she virtually demanded that I throw away segments of the onion that were either too thin or too thick. Nels would have gone insane had he been there - he throws literally NOTHING away. He has an entire jar of dead seeds (which he already got his money back for, because they were dead when he bought them) that has sat on the shelf for several years. Keep in mind these are dead, completely useless seeds that he essentially got for free. And he can't bear to throw them out.

So I said, "No, we don't throw anything out here unless it is totally useless. Nels would have your head." But she decided to ARGUE with the guy training her! "Oh, come on, man. Just get rid of them."

Naturally, I yelled at her. "Okay, listen. I'm training you. Not the other way around. Don't tell me how to do my job."

That shut her up for a while, but she made a few more passive-aggressive comments about how I apparently don't know how to work here.

Joke's on her, though. The next day, she had to work 6 hours alone after my morning shift, so I under-prepped and left her stranded on her second day, alone and without any cheddar, cucumbers, or tomatoes. I plan on doing this every Sunday for the next few weeks. HA! How's that for passive-aggressive, bitch?

My White Roommates Learning Dance Moves From MTV2

2008-10-05T12:45:00.004-06:00

Last night, we discovered our On Demand system contains how-to videos from MTV2 that teach all the hottest dance moves kids are doing these days. My awkward, white, nerdy roommates decided to learn a couple.

First up, the Biz Markie. Fairly basic, and I think he nailed it pretty well. Ignore the dog fight in the background.

Next they attempt to master something called "Jookin' It," which was taught by some group from America's Best Dance Crew. This one is much more difficult, which means the result is all the more hilarious. (Important note for animal lovers: he isn't seriously that mean to his dog. He was joking. This is much more important than dogs.)

Man, I just watched the video and my commentary is retarded. Ignore it.

And now, the entire routine comes together. Watch my roommates totally serve each other.

This was a stupid post. I apologize.

An Afternoon With Sarah Silverman

2008-10-03T11:57:00.003-06:00

Actually, just a conference call.

That's right, I interviewed Sarah Silverman for the past hour for an article I am writing about the newest season of the "Sarah Silverman Program."

She was hilarious and really nice - other than the time when she called us all "fucking fat" - and made it a much more enjoyable interview than Michael Chiklis (not that he was mean or terrible or anything, he just didn't tell as many jokes about shit).

But she wasn't the star of the show. Oh, no, not by a longshot. This MORON decided that rather than doing some in-depth reporting or asking a question that would help him write his story, he would spend his one question sucking up to her. This is how he decided to play things:

Idiot: Hey, Sarah. I'm Jewish, too, so, you know, we have that special bond.

Sarah: Uh... Great!

Idiot: My question is, um, what question should a reporter ask to convince you that he should write on your show? (Ed. note: HE SERIOUSLY FUCKING ASKED THAT.)

I don't remember what Sarah said in response, because I was seething with rage that this moron was making us all look like retards.

Also, the first three questions were about her "Great Schlep" viral video, and about Obama. Seriously?! That's what you're going to all ask her about when she's here to talk about her new show? She actually said, "I feel like I should be plugging my show, not talking about this."

Oh, and some starstruck girl asked her what celebrities she has met.

I went last again (seems it'll be that way every time, because there aren't many schools that come after "Wisconsin - Madison"), and we had gone about 10 minutes over the designated time. So here is how my glorious interview went:

Moderator Jill: Alright, our last question is from Danny.

Me: Hey, Sarah.

Sarah: Hey, D--

Jenny from Comedy Central: Sarah, we're out of time!

Sarah: Is that Jenny? Hi Jenny!

Jenny: Hi Sarah! How are you?

Sarah: I'm well!

I was dumbstruck. Luckily Sarah is awesome and intervened and said she could take one last question. But that totally threw me off. Of COURSE I'm the one to get cut off. I bet the asshole from the Badger Herald (our rival newspaper) was giggling to himself. But I think we all know who asked the better question. I asked her, "Do you have any plans to release another CD or movie like Jesus Is Magic?" because, frankly, I've been dying for a Sarah Silverman stand-up CD. The Badger Herald asked, "You are very good at getting your audience to respond with awkward, uncomfortable silence. Do you try for that reaction?" Her answer: "No."

I definitely won in this interview.

HALLOWEEN MADNESS: The X-Files Best Moments, Episodes 4 and 5!

2008-09-30T20:50:00.008-06:00

Let's face it, nothing exciting happened in these two episodes. Let's just get it over with.

This stupid kid wanted to go see some aliens.

That second picture is what the aliens did to a bartender's ear. Actually, that was pretty damn awesome. I mean, look at that thing!

In the next episode, Mulder pretty much fell in love with some Neanderthal woman living in the New Jersey woods. This was a waste of an episode except for two hilarious things. One, the police sketch of the Neanderthal:

She's got some sweet, sweet titties.

But even better than that was getting to see what Scully apparently wears on dates:
That ridiculous lacy wedding dress with shoulder pads is an AWESOME choice for a first date.

In other Halloween news, I have decided what I am going to be this year. Green Man from "It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia"! I ordered the suit today (don't even ask how much I spent on this ridiculous purchase).

Don't know who I'm talking about? Enjoy this clip from last week's episode, in which Green Man made a glorious reappearance (also take note of Kaitlin Olson's brilliant performance). Unfortunately the FX website doesn't allow me to embed the video here for your enjoyment. Laaaame.

The costume is part of a group, believe it or not. No one is going to understand our theme without it being explained, but whatever. My roommate Bodnar will be going as Dexter, and my roommate Jon will be going as Don Draper. Our theme is obviously "Our Favorite Characters From Minor Cable Networks".

I Am Sick of "Eagle Eye"

2008-09-27T13:12:00.002-06:00

Here's my article from my interviews with DJ Caruso and Michael Chiklis.

I also had to go see the movie yesterday, and now I'm writing the review. WHEN WILL I BE DONE WITH THIS MOVIE?! But seriously, it wasn't terrible. Kind of a stupid plot, but still very entertaining.

Oh, and I'm interviewing Sarah Silverman on Thursday. These are my current thoughts: OMGOMGOMGOMGOMGOMGOMGOMG.

MOVIE REVIEW: "This Movie Sucks"

2008-09-25T21:04:00.002-06:00

Once again, the subject line was my original title for my movie review this week.

I was forced to go see "My Best Friend's Girl," which was incredibly terrible. Way too bad to even laugh at, let alone with.

So my review can be found at The Daily Cardinal's website. The headline in the online version makes no sense - they made a typo and it should read "Dane Cook Can't Score With blah blah blah" instead of whatever nonsense sentence it currently reads. Just so you don't think I'm retarded.

This was actually my second article in today's paper. The first was from my interview with Chiklis. Unfortunately for you, it's not online yet for some reason. When you click on it, all there is is an error message.

HALLOWEEN MADNESS: The X-Files Best Moments, Episode 3!

2008-09-24T22:33:00.004-06:00

Finally we get a fairly creepy episode!

This third episode started with some dude walking down the street with a scary pair of eyes glaring at him from a sewer grate.

Seriously, it was much creepier to see than it sounds.

After that, it was all sort of downhill, which is surprising, considering the villain this week could squeeze into tight spaces, was over 100 years old, hibernated for 30 years at a time in a nest made out of human bile, and murdered people by ripping their livers out.

But, I don't know, once you got to see the guy and he was revealed to be just some dude wearing yellow contacts, it wasn't that scary. Look how pathetic he looks:

But the eyes in the beginning? Totally eerie.

Tomorrow I'll post my two articles from the Daily Cardinal. That's right: two! One is the story I did from the interviews with DJ Caruso and Michael Chiklis about Eagle Eye, and the other is a review I did of My Best Friend's Girl, which was a despicable movie and therefore a really fun review to write.

HALLOWEEN MADNESS: The Return of the Halloween Superstore

2008-09-24T14:06:00.006-06:00

Earlier today, Bodnar and I took a trip to our local Petsmart (I'm still confused - is it Pet's Mart or Pet Smart?) to get our respective puppies some more food and also to engrave a kickass dog tag for little Bark Antony (his name is written BARCVS ANTONIVS, so if he's lost there's no way anyone is going to call me and try to tell me they found my dog). But before we even got to the Petsmart, what did we see had sprung up next door the way it does every year like that house the Order of the Phoenix hides out in?

A HALLOWEEN SUPERSTORE.

I'm sure you all are familiar with these magnificent oases, which vary in size from a truck in some dude's driveway to this one, which had filled a whole fucking warehouse.

Just LOOK AT THIS:

So beautiful. So filled with overpriced plastic severed hands.

I obviously couldn't let this momentous occasion go by without a purchase. At first, I almost bought these:

But that was more based on their name. I mean, based solely off of their appearance, you would never guess what they were, seeing as they appear to be neither ultimate nor boobs.

Eventually I decided on two things. One is something that I have wanted for well over a decade, ever since I first saw A Nightmare on Elm Street. And the other just seemed too hilarious to not buy, and I'm sure I'll get some good use out of it in the future.

BEHOLD!

Madison Hippies Accuse Me Of Being A Sex Offender

2008-09-23T17:27:00.002-06:00

The subject basically says it all. Two hippies just showed up at my door and asked me if I am or if I live with a sex offender who was previously listed at this address. They are prowling the streets with a list of sex offenders in the area. I don't know what they would have done if I was the guy they were looking for. Are they just trying to intimidate these guys into leaving their neighborhood? It's not like I'm going off in support of sex offenders, but come on ladies, let's tone down the crazy a little bit.

Mildridiots, Volume 3

2008-09-22T16:44:00.003-06:00

Only 45 minutes into my shift, and we've already got two more Mildridiots! One was a regular that I forgot about on the first volume in this series, and the other is a brand new jackass.

New York Bastard
I've never seen this guy before, but there was something about him that just screamed "New York City". Maybe it was his classic "NEW YORK CITY" shirt, or maybe not. But he marched up to the counter and announced, "I NEED A BLYSTONE," which is one of our more popular sandwiches. So I made that and called him up to the counter to come get it, at which point he looked at our beer selection (a rather impressive array of Wisconsin microbrews, if I may say so), and sneered, much like a cartoon villain. "Is this all the beer you have?" Obviously it is, but I just said, "Yep," and then quickly added a quiet, "Sorry," after receiving a lengthy glare from him. I'm not sure what I did that needed an apology, but the way he was looking at me made me feel like the lowest scum on Earth. "Oh, come on. I know you have a Maibock back in that fridge," he said, completely serious and more than a little pissed off. "Uh... no. I can promise you we have no hidden beers." Eventually, he settled on a Berghoff, but he was NOT HAPPY about it.

Later, when he was on his way out the door, I cheerily shouted after him, "Thanks! Have a great night!" at which point he stopped in his tracks, turned around and STARED at me for a good minute in the doorway. Reeeeeally awkward. He makes me feel like I'm doing everything completely wrong and hopefully he goes back to NEW YORK CITY.

Potato Salad Freak
Oh, god, this woman is obnoxious. Every Monday - when our potato salad for the week is typically made - she marches in and demands to know just what temperature the potato salad is at. And every week I assure her that it's been in the fridge for at least a few hours and is therefore quite suitable to her tastes (although it just dawned on me that she may, in fact, be the Ice Queen, which is why nothing is ever cold enough for her). Today she went through the same routine, but I was able to proudly announce that it was a slow weekend, so the potato salad from last week is still left over and since it's been in the fridge for a few days, it is most definitely cold enough. "It wasn't a slow weekend. I came in," she sulked, for some reason insulted by me thinking a weekend in which she makes an appearance in my life should ever be deemed "slow".

She also left pissed off for no good reason. And now someone else is here. Let's see if I can go three for three!

HALLOWEEN MADNESS: X-Files Best Moments, Episode 2!

2008-09-20T16:15:00.002-06:00

I had some free time on my hands at work, so I was able to pump out the second episode of the X-Files, which, let's face it, wasn't nearly as exciting or scary as the first.

This was the second grossest thing in the episode:

And the grossest?

Seth Green cameo!

Anyway, last night we made $304 at our hat party. I wore my crab hat from Japan, and it was a roaring success. Some random guy pulled me to the side and gave me a 10-minute lecture on how if I couldn't get laid wearing that hat, then none of the guys had a chance. I also heard the joke, "Do you have crabs??!!" about a thousand times. It was nice, because it reminded me why I'm so anxious to get out of college.

Also, today I bought the US History Major Cheater's T-Shirt:
And yes, my muscles are that big.

HALLOWEEN MADNESS: X-Files Pilot Best Moments!

2008-09-19T10:07:00.006-06:00

As I mentioned earlier, to celebrate that most wonderful of (mostly) American holidays, Halloween, I will be watching the X-Files (for the first time ever!) and posting the best moments from each episode. I plan on there being tons of fucked up shit to post about, so let's just get right into the pilot.

To catch you up to speed, a whole bunch of kids in Oregon were dying after going into the woods, and they were all found with two small bumps on their lower backs. Obviously aliens, right? This is just a no-brainer.

So Mulder and Scully dig up the body of one of the victims, and when the coffin is opened, what do they find?

MUMMY ALIEN MUTANT CHILD.

Seriously, what the fuck is that thing? This was such a great way to start out the series, and there's no WAY the show was not going to be picked up for more episodes after something as insane as this.

Oh, and then there was this, too:

In Which I Do My Brotherly Duty and Help My Little Sister Through Her First Night of College

2008-09-19T01:27:00.003-06:00

A Facebook message exchange between myself and my little sister, who is spending her first night in college and not having such a great time:

Sara: The only friend I've made so far is hideously deformed.

Me: How so? Genetically or just as the result of a fire? And was the fire her fault or was it someone else's? These are important questions in establishing a sense of her character.

Sara: cleft lip.
I'm a very, very horrible person.

Me: Oh, god. She sounds awful. How's the roommate?

Sara: Not here yet. She comes on Saturday. The only people I have so much as seen on my floor so far are me and Kathryn. It's this dark, scary hallway that looks like a prison and I hear the ominous jingling of keys and footsteps but I never see anyone.
WHERE AM I?

Me: With the cleft lip girl it sounds like some sort of freak prison. Like an old man shoves you in his briefcase and inside is your dorm, where these people have been trapped for centuries.

Sara: you made me "l.o.l." which I can't do because I'm pretending to sleep so that my new, deformed friend doesn't come ask to play!

Me: "Do you want to meet my pets?" and then you go into her room and there are just hundreds of slugs.

Sara: oh god! I was laughing and there were footsteps outside and they slowed so I faked snored and they kept moving. AM I GOING TO HAVE TO DO THIS FOR THE REST OF THE YEAR?!?

Me: Why is she prowling?!

Sara: I don't know! She keeps walking to the bathroom, going in, running the water a little, and walking out. Maybe she doesn't have a shower caddy and so she carries in her toothbrush, wets it, goes back to her room, puts on the toothpaste, walks back, etc., etc.
Or maybe she smells that I'm awake.

Me: I got really grossed out picturing her brushing her teeth.

Sara: She probably has to use prongs to lift the left side.

Me: I'm going to barf.

But seriously, you're probably going to hate it and feel awkward and alone for a while because that's what college does to you. It makes you feel retarded and useless. Just go with it and eventually you'll meet your future best friends. And don't forget that my phone is always with me if you want to call or text or facebook message me. But since it's like 2:30 here, I need to go to bed. Call me if cleft lip is clawing down your door.

Good night and just make the best of it until it actually becomes fun instead of just funny.

Sara: Right now I definitely feel awkward and alone, mainly because I am completely and totally alone on my floor, except for a sideshow act. I have a feeling once people actually move in, it will be a lot better. Also, once I get a fridge.

Thank you Danny. You're a much better brother than that one of Kallie's that's in a cult in Iowa.

I think I actually helped. I'm not a useless older brother after all!

On a totally unrelated note, I'm getting very excited about Halloween. I missed out on all the main holiday season (mid-October to mid-January, obviously) last year, since Cairo is where holidays and joy go to DIE, so I'm planning on being totally over-the-top this year. As in buying and wearing a whole bunch of cheesy Christmas sweaters for the month of December.

For Halloween, I'm mostly starting my celebrations by eating a ton of candy and watching a lot of scary shit. I've never seen an episode of the X-Files before (not counting one episode back when I was a kid that freaked the SHIT out of me to the point where I've forced it entirely out of my memory), so I got the first season from Netflix. To get my blog in the holiday spirit, I think I'll be posting my favorite moments from each episode that I watch. The first episode should be up tomorrow or Saturday, hopefully (we're having a party Friday night and I have to go see My Best Friend's Girl tomorrow for The Daily Cardinal - UGH - so I might be too busy to do anything until Saturday), but rest assured, my favorite moment from the episode WILL be up soon.

I don't have enough time to do a full recap of each episode, much as I would love to, but hopefully this should satisfy you enough. If my small amount of Halloween fever isn't enough for you holiday maniacs out there, check out X-Entertainment, the best website of all time for nostalgia - especially around this glorious, three-month-long holiday season.

I don't know exactly what else I'll be doing as all these wonderful holiday seasons combine into a crazy monster holiday hybrid of commercialism and memories, but one thing I know for sure is that I will be documenting the Jones Soda Holiday Pack - a family tradition. That should happen around Thanksgiving, though, so that's way in the future. Any suggestions for more holiday fun would be welcome.

(I only wrote this post this late at night to try to distract my mind from scary aliens and other things that the X-Files is making me think about. But now that I ended the post with this little tidbit, they're still all I'm thinking about and all of this was worthless. I'm such a little baby. I'm going to be up for a while.)

Mildridiots, Volume 2

2008-09-14T13:23:00.002-06:00

A guy just came in and tried to sell me pepper spray.

That is all.

IT'S INTERVIEWIN' TIME!

2008-09-13T18:28:00.004-06:00

Well, the interview with Billy Bob is over and it went off without a hitch. Know why? Because I didn't get to speak to him!

That's right, Paramount fucked us over. Late last night, they contacted my editor and informed him that since our circulation size isn't large enough, we were being demoted to interviewing Michael Chiklis. Which, let's face it, is much cooler than interviewing Billy Bob. So I was pretty thrilled about speaking to him, but also a bit panicked, since I had prepared all my questions for Billy Bob, I only got notice 12 hours before the interview, and I was notified at a party while I was drunk.

So I woke up and went into Mildred's and did a bunch of Mildred's bullshit (it was crazy busy for some reason, even though it's been pouring for the last 24 hours). At 1:35, I went out to my roommate's car in the parking lot behind Mildred's, and dialed the conference call number and entered my code. DJ Caruso, the director of Eagle Eye, was doing the first round of interviews (all the community college reporters were stuck with him), but the e-mail that gave me the code for the conference call said that it was MANDATORY (bold, capitals, and italics theirs) to stay on the line for all three interviews, because if you leave early or enter late, you'll disrupt everyone. So I sat while they all interviewed DJ Caruso, who was whatever. Then I was cut off and had to dial back in for Chiklis. So clearly it wasn't mandatory.

But I did it and sat through roll call (which consisted of the Paramount girl saying, "Who's here?" and then all of the rabid journalism students jumping all over each other to announce their name and school - my recording of the interview has me saying, "Dann-" every once in a while, only to be cut off by some crazy girl from Bryn Mawr), and then we waited in awkward silence for 15 minutes, because Chiklis was late. He makes his own schedule or else it's CLOBBERIN' TIME! (I couldn't resist.)

Finally he showed up, and right as the Paramount girl announced, "Michael Chiklis is here!" some old woman knocked on the car door. Fucking great. I opened the door to see what was going on, and she said, "I'm visiting apartment 5 and I think you're in my parking spot." Just so you know, I was parked next to two totally open parking spaces. But she needed MINE.

"Uh... I'm on a conference call right now, sorry," I tried. But she wasn't having any of my crap. "Just move your car so I can park here." What? What the hell is going on?

Totally confused - and mortified at the thought of this conversation carrying through the phone into Chiklis's ears - I tried one more plea: "I'm on the phone with Michael Chiklis. From 'The Shield'," I whispered, covering the mouthpiece with my hand.

Clearly not a fan of FX corrupt cop dramas, she just repeated, "Please move your car." At this point, I just wanted her to leave, because Chiklis was already starting to greet us, so I gave in to her demands and started the car.

"LIVIN' ON A PRAAAAYYYEEERR!" the radio BLASTED. My roommate had apparently been rocking out on the drive to Mildred's to our local classic rock station at full volume. Chiklis definitely heard that. Not only was I pumping insanely loud music to all of the journalists and people at Paramount and fucking Michael Chiklis, but I was pumping insanely loud Bon Jovi. Could this situation get any more embarrassing?

Answer: yes. But not for me.

The first question was from a student at Stanford ("Oh, I've got the dummy crowd, huh?" joked Chiklis), who clearly is Shia LaBeouf's NUMBER ONE FAN. His question? "What was it like working with Shia LaBeouf?" It's important to note that he pronounced "LaBeouf" as "LaBOOF".

Chiklis rattled off some stuff about how dedicated and nice Shia is, and then the "reporter" cut him off and said, "Yeah, he has some sweet roles, you have to admit."

"...What?" said Chiklis.

"Sweet movie roles!"

"Sweet roles? Yeah, I guess..." answered Chiklis, clearly confused.

"I mean, Indiana Jones?!" gushed the fanboy.

At this point, I was trying my hardest to stifle giggles.

After we got the future Mr. LaBOOF off the line, things went pretty smoothly. It was already established in roll call that I would get the final question, and my heart started to race as one by one the other people asked all of the hastily-prepared questions I had just written. I was left with nothing.

"And the last question is from the University of Wisconsin-Madison."

This is all I could come up with on the fly: "Uh... Hi, Michael. You were talking earlier about how hard it is to play a character like the Secretary of Defense, who has so much pressure on his shoulders. What did you do to prepare for a role like that? How did you get into the mind of such a powerful man? Did you, like, follow Donald Rumsfeld around for a day?"

Thankfully, Chiklis laughed. Luckily I was recording the interview, because I have absolutely no idea what his answer was. I was far too busy wiping gallons of sweat off my face. Next thing I knew, he was done talking and there was just awkward silence. "Uh... Thanks, that was great," I said, and he replied with, "Thanks!" END CONVERSATION. Seriously, just like that Paramount cut us all off. So I guess I had the last word with him? No one else even said thank you! It was really strange and I feel like I made a total fool of myself.

I toyed with tuning in for Billy Bob's interview, but I decided to go back into Mildred's and help out, since it was crazy busy and I was still on the clock.

Now my dilemma is I have no idea what to write about. I don't really care about this movie, and Michael Chiklis is in about 5 minutes of it. So somehow I have to find an interesting angle for this story. I have about two weeks to do this, but Jesus Christ.

Oh, and then I closed out the night by coming home and blowing the power for our entire first floor. We will be without electricity down here all weekend.

"Burn After Reading"? More Like "Laugh After Seeing"!

2008-09-12T14:18:00.002-06:00

The subject of this post was the original headline for my first article for The Daily Cardinal, one of Madison's two campus newspaper (and apparently the sixth oldest campus newspaper in the nation, which is a huge, HUGE honor). Other than changing that and adding a letter grade to the end of the article, the editors mostly kept it the same (with a few word choice changes that I wouldn't have made, but at least they kept the word "clusterfuck").

So here it is.

Tomorrow I interview Billy Bob Thornton. I have the press release for Eagle Eye, which is apparently a movie that he is in. I had no idea that anyone other than Shia is in it, based off of the previews, but now that I know Billy Bob has a role, I can almost sort of catch his lightning-fast appearance in the trailer. Out of the 55-page press release, Billy Bob garners about 1/2 a page. I have absolutely no idea what I'm going to ask him.

Mildridiots, Volume 1

2008-09-08T18:21:00.005-06:00

Mildridiots is going to be an ongoing series in which I relate stories about the lunatics that frequent the place where I work, a small sandwich shop named Mildred's.

First, some background: Mildred's has been around for some 40 years, and it has never changed. The menu has been the exact same (except for a brief crazy period a few months ago during which we introduced a new sandwich and then quickly removed it), and some locals have been coming here for 30-plus years.

There are only four employees, not counting the owner, an aging, hilarious hippie by the name of Nels Nelson (seriously). All of us employees work our shifts solo (not counting lunch during weekdays, when Nels sticks around for a few hours to make the soup of the day), and since not many people come in - it's a long, long way from the campus, where Madison's pulse is - most of my shifts consist of me reading, watching movies or TV shows on my laptop, or writing this blog post right now.

For those of you not familiar with Madison, it is for the most part populated entirely by two groups of people: college students, and aging lunatics who grew up during the Vietnam War and have totally warped their minds through the use of various recreational drugs throughout their lifetimes. And since Mildred's is so far away from campus, guess which half of Madison's population we get as customers?

So that's Mildred's. No one fascinating has come in yet today, so I'll just recap some of my all-time favorite (or least favorite, in one particular instance) customers.

Alan From Madison
This guy is definitely my all-time favorite. He hobbled in one day on his crutches ("My friends used to call me Hop-A-Long," he quipped) and ordered a beer. He then sat down and just started telling me all about his life, completely unprovoked. If he is to believed (and, really, there's no way any of this stuff was made up), this is his story:

Alan From Madison (quick history of that name: he told me he's from Michigan, and then ten minutes later when I asked his name, he said, "They call me Alan From Madison." So that was confusing) has been hunting the Dog Man for over 100 years. Who is the Dog Man? Oh, just a werewolf-type dude that's been running around killing people for about a century or so. When I humored Alan From Madison and asked, "Wow. Where does he come from?" I got a simple one-word answer that almost made me laugh out loud: "Hell." He then clarified: "Well, that's what I think. Others think he's the spirit of a dug-up Indian burial ground." So, either way, not good news.

Anyway, we talked for about half an hour, and eventually he left, but not before issuing me a stern warning: "He's been seen around Madison, so don't go out at night, and stay in well-lit areas. And if you see a seven-foot dog man, run." As if I'd walk towards someone like that.

La Croix Guy
Ugh. This guy is the WORST. He is the son of Sophia, an older woman who runs a breakfast-only shop right next door to us. Oh, and he's certifiably insane. He comes in every day and orders a berry La Croix, and then sits down and drinks it for at least three hours. Sometimes he keeps to himself, which wouldn't be that bad except for the fact that I just want him to leave so I can open up my laptop and resume whatever movie I was watching before he came in. Other times, he does crazy shit. Once, he requested that I turn the radio up. REALLY LOUD. I did it but then gradually turned it down a notch until it was back to a reasonable level. Another time, he told my friend he hated the color of his shirt, ran home, and came back in five minutes with a shirt to give him. His best moment, though, was when he crumpled up his can, grabbed a book from our bookshelf, and positioned them oh-so-carefully in the outstretched hands of the random mannequin we have by our ATM. He came back four hours later and retrieved the items.

He also has two children, for some unknown reason. One is a son who looks like he's around thirteen years old, and has to have some form of ADHD or something. He's insane. He pesters me with questions about everything whenever he's here, and La Croix Guy never lets him get any soda because, "If this is what you're like without sugar, imagine what you'll be like if I give you some." Which is by far the sanest and most reasonable thing that guy has ever said. His daughter is a toddler, who likes to grab everything at her level and throw it around the store. The son actually tries to pick up after her, but La Croix Guy sternly says, "NO. Leave it." So that's respectful of him.

He drives me crazy.

Sexy Cerebral Palsy Aide
This girl comes in every Sunday with a man named Jessie who has cerebral palsy. I thought she was his sister, but I have recently learned that she just volunteers to take him out to eat every week. Which makes her even more attractive. They do this thing that I've never seen before, where she has a keyboard printed out on a piece of paper, and he points at the letters on it to spell out words and sentences to communicate with her. It's pretty amazing.

I have sort of a crush on her, but it's kind of an awkward situation and I've never gotten up the nerve to say anything more than, "Anything else with that?" or "$5, please." I would like to use the keyboard thing as my in - say something like, "Wow, I've never seen anything like that before, that's amazing," - but every time I'm about to, I feel like I'm using Jessie or something.

So nothing will ever happen between us, and I'll just admire her from afar.

Oh, and Jessie has another girl who comes with him very, very rarely, and she's a super bitch. Doesn't use the keyboard or anything. Luckily, I know Jessie's order better than she does, so he's able to get what he wants instead of, "Just give him some turkey on wheat bread," like she said to me last time. Seeing her instead of Sexy Cerebral Palsy Aide is a terrible way to end the weekend.

That's all I can think of now. I suppose I should start closing down the store anyway, since no one has come in for the past two hours.

One Step Closer to a Pulitzer

2008-09-08T13:22:00.002-06:00

Tomorrow morning, I will be skipping class (and my court date - more on that later) to go to a screening of Burn After Reading. I'll be reviewing it for the Daily Cardinal, one of Madison's two campus newspapers. This is the first thing I've written for them, so I'm pretty excited. Plus I've been dying to see this movie, so getting to see it three days early and for free isn't a bad deal at all.

I'll put up a link to my article when it's published on Friday. I'm supposed to find all the copies of the Cardinal I can and send them to my mom. Because this is THAT important.

I'm also going to rent The Big Lebowski and The Hudsucker Proxy and watch them at work tonight. Partly to get in the mood for another surefire Coen comedy, but mostly just so I can watch movies at work and say that I'm still doing work.

Gotta Get That D-O-E

2008-09-02T15:37:00.002-06:00

My roommate Bodnar works with a guy named Jeremiah, who recently revealed to him that he actually raps under the name GOTTO. I'm not positive, but I think it has to be capitalized every time you type it.

Anyway, GOTTO/Jeremiah gave Bodnar his demo and said that if we ever want to have him do a show at one of our house parties, he'd be up for it. We like the concept, because it would certainly draw more people and we could have a cover charge, but it also makes us a bit nervous. I mean, seven nerdy white guys hosting a hardcore rap show? Is that really our scene?

Well, whether or not we host his show (which is particularly tempting based on how hilarious a blog entry it would make for), let me say that I love GOTTO. His website is here, where he has about five songs on the right side of the page for you to enjoy.

One of the best songs is available on the website - Onion Butt. I don't know if you've ever heard the term, but don't let it fool you. I know it sounds like a horribly disgusting and in no way sexy ass disease, but apparantly it refers to a butt that is so beautiful it makes you cry. I don't know, the term still grosses me out. But for those of you who love a good onion butt, GOTTO has written the ode to end all onion butt odes.

The other song I love isn't on his website, but it's called D-O-E and it is mostly him saying, "Gotta get the D-O-E/So my family can E-A-T". First of all, I love that he falls into the lazy rapper category where they just depend heavily on all of those letters that rhyme with each other. But more importantly, he misspells "dough"! Which begs the question: does he just not know how to spell "dough", or is the song really about trying to score a nice piece of venison for his family? I don't know why, but the idea of a rap song dedicated to hunting for venison really makes me laugh.

What do you think? Is GOTTO the best rapper of all time? Should we have him perform at a party?

Chimpanzee That - Monkey News

2008-08-31T13:23:00.004-06:00

For the unfortunate few of you who aren't familiar with the Ricky Gervais Show, allow me to give you a brief introduction. It has recently become one of my favorite things of all time, and I really can't remember the last time I laughed at anything this much.

The basic idea is that it is a series of podcasts by Ricky Gervais, his partner Stephen Merchant, and their "bald, round-headed mank twat" producer Karl Pilkington. Every episode is filled with Karl spouting off insane nonsense, most of it having to do with scientific discoveries and inventions he thinks are real but are definitely not. For example, in the first episode he proposes his idea to curb the expansion of the human population - in brief, his solution is that everyone dies when they are 78, and then a little baby that is living inside of them comes out and replaces them in the world. Hearing Karl try to explain why he thinks this is such a brilliant idea to Ricky and Stephen - who can barely keep it together - is worth the price of admission (which is, like, two dollars).

Anyway, you can buy the first three seasons on iTunes, and the fourth and final one will be available starting September 16th. I highly, highly recommend all of them.

Some sample clips from their original (pre-iTunes) series:

If you can't listen to the full 8 minutes (which you probably should), then the really classic Karl bit starts around the 3:15 mark.

Ax 'Em: The Worst Movie To Ever Exist Ever

2008-08-29T19:22:00.032-06:00

Back in high school, I started a website in which I would watch and review every single DVD at the local Family Video in alphabetical order. I got through all of the A's and ended on Ax 'Em, which was so unbelievably horrible that I ended the project right then and there. Some of my other reviews are pretty entertaining, and I'm sure I'll move my favorites over here in the near future, but this is by far - in my opinion - my best one, mostly because I'm filled with so much hatred for everyone involved in the production of this movie. So enjoy my extremely long teenage rant, in which I completely destroy Michael "Mfumay" Mfume's dreams.

Ax 'Em (2002)

Tagline: It Was Supposed To Be A Weekend Get-Away Until The Horror Began!

Directed by: Michael "Mfumay" Mfume

Written by: Michael "Mfumay" Mfume

Starring: Michael "Mfumay" Mfume

Whenever I write a review, I feel I'm bringing something to the internet. If I happen to review a movie that no one has done before, I feel confident knowing that if someone, somewhere, stumbles across the movie and thinks, "Am I alone in thinking this is the worst movie ever?" they may find my reviews and know they are not the only one in the universe. That being said, I feel like it's a crime to even acknowledge this movie's existence. I find it hard to believe that I will ever find a movie worse than this. I say that a lot, but this is ridiculous. Whenever I say I'm going to give you a "scene-by-scene" review, I'm lying to you. I usually cut out five or so scenes that I find boring and useless to the plot. But with this, I guarantee you will get the whole thing. Every single second of this movie has to be recorded to the annals of the internet, to spread the gospel of Ax 'Em. Bear with me, please, as we suffer through this together.

Here's how the movie starts out:

In case you cannot read that, or the pictures are not appearing, let me transcribe it for you:

On a cold winter night, in 1990, Mr. Mason, a mean and cruel Towns man, let his job for Home. After arriving home, He took a shotgun And killed his wife and Kids. Then is mean man Killed himself. When the police arrived they only Found the bodies of his wife, Daughter and younger son. His mentally Ill son Harry Was not ever found. Legend has it, he will return In 13 years to revenge his family deaths.

That's the first fucking thing you see in this movie. As we find out later, Mr. Mason and his family were white, while "mentally Ill son" is really just a euphemism for "black son". This movie's breaking down racial barriers, ya'll.

The opening scene gives away a hell of a lot about the movie, other than the plot or what the fuck is going on. What it does reveal, however, is that the movie was shot with a hand-held camera from the 1970's, and not a single microphone was used, other than the one on the camera. Keep in mind this movie was released in 2002, so being forced to use such outdated equipment is not a valid excuse. What I can gather from this scene is a bunch of black people are at a party, and about fifteen of them agree to go to someone's cabin or house for the weekend. This turns out to be an actual plot point later on, so it destroys my theory that someone just turned on a camera and filmed a Christmas party they went to. The scene is constantly fading to black in the middle of sentences and fading back in to about fifteen minutes later, so there's no way to tell what is really going on - if you can hear through all the background noise, that is. Whatever. The scene ends, and the viewers are left cringing, wondering what the fuck could go wrong next.

We then see the house where we can safely assume all the murders mentioned in the error-free introduction occurred. A giant black man with an ax approaches the house, and since we're assuming a lot of things, we'll also assume this is the son whose return was foretold thirteen years ago. The kid certainly has aged in thirteen years. He went from about twelve years old to forty-five. Nonetheless, the camera switches to inside the house. All we see is an empty staircase, which we are left to stare at for about five minutes. Somewhere in the background, however, we can hear someone talking non-stop. Finally, the speaker enters the shot, and we see it is simply an elderly man, rambling incoherently to himself without taking a single breath. He sees his front door is open and manages to squeeze in a, "WHO THE HELL?!" so quickly that it takes the viewer about a minute to realize he shouted that, because he instantly reverts back to his ramblings in the same breath. He closes the door, and goes into the next room, where he loads a gun. Of course, he continues talking. As he is loading the gun, the killer stumbles up to him, and raises his ax. The old man says, "Awwww shit," before continuing to blab on, and he is killed. Or, more accurately, he is pushed into a closet, and the killer kind of taps him lightly with the ax. It's important to note that this is the only character killed with an ax, while the movie title promises at the very least two people will be slaughtered in this way.

Next up, my favorite scene: the opening credits! For some strange reason, Director/Writer/Producer/Star Michael "Mfumay" Mfume decided to put the opening credits over a step show, which - to my uninformed white eyes - appears to be just a lot of choreographed dancing without any music. I'd have no problem with this - in fact, the dances are pretty impressive, since every single person in this scene has more rhythm in their pubic hair than I will ever have in my entire body - except for two small things. One: they choose to make a five-year-old girl dance in a very provocative manner. Meaning she rubs her breasts and gyrates her hips, while her proud mother looks on and screams wildly. At least her family supports her. The second thing is after the credits are over, the scene continues on. For ten minutes. Ten minutes that have NOTHING TO DO WITH THE MOVIE. After the dancing is over, the circle breaks out a series of "yo mamma" jokes. Finally, the scene ends. We learn later that this scene wasn't cut down because Michael Mfume skipped the editing process altogether.

The only possible reason I can think of including a scene such as this in your movie is to weed out the viewers that aren't serious about watching it. When you rent Ax 'Em, you aren't watching your everyday pansy popcorn flick. You have to fucking want to watch it. Luckily, I passed through my ordeal, and I am now a man.

We return to the previously scheduled movie. A group of young people - we'll have time later to possibly learn their names, or at least the names that are audible - are discussing, again, a vacation to someone's cabin. We can assume that these are the same people from the party in the beginning, but it could just be a coincidence. Throughout their conversation, a crew member circles the group. How do I know he's a crew member? Because he's fucking carrying one of those production slates that they clack in front of the camera! The evidence is here:

However, I am impressed by the fact that they actually used those in the making of the movie. But now I'm just depressed, knowing that someone actually spent a decent amount of money on this production. I'm sure I've passed by Michael Mfume on the streets of New York or Chicago and ignored his pleas for money. The group agrees to meet at 2:00 at one of their houses, and they split up to go... I don't know, dance some more.

Next up, we meet Rock and his girlfriend. Rock looks suspiciously like Malcolm X, but that's beside the point. Rock has obviously been cheating on her, because he keeps insisting, "This is the last time." His girlfriend, however, won't have any of that shit. "You say that every weekend, Rock. Every weekend!" she insists. But Rock brings her back to his side with, "Who bought you all this shit?" pointing at her fancy jewelry and denim clothes, so they hug. Ah, young love.

The rap music that will continue throughout the duration of the movie picks up, and the first audible line is, "This here nigga's goin' straight to the top." Anyway, the group meets at someone's house at 2:00 like they were told to do. Up until this point, we've only seen smaller groups of the people who are going on this trip, and it was impossible to tell if the different groups were really different groups or just the same group of people on different days, due to the shitty quality of the tape. So now, we finally get to see the entire cast of potential victims. There are about fifteen people going along on this trip, thereby erasing any possibilities of ever getting to know each character. I mean, when your main cast of actors has to take three cars to drive anywhere, you might have to work on saying no to your friends when they ask if they can be in your movie. Anyway, the young ruffians take off on a wild adventure.

Subtle.

The kids then arrive at the cabin, sparing us from having to sit and watch the entire three-hour drive. I wouldn't put it past Michael Mfume to include a scene like that in this movie. However, there are now only two cars, and when the surviving two pull in, the occupants of the third car simply step out from behind a bush. I don't know, maybe their car broke down and they ran really fast and beat everyone there. No one questions it, so you shouldn't, either. The men immediately start making fun of each other and detailing who should bring what in. "I'M HUNGRY!" shrieks one of the banshee women, so, to punish her for speaking when not spoken to, one of the men runs up, rips her wig off, and runs away. I'm glad they find cancer so amusing. The scene ends with that.

Next up: two of my favorite characters! Aside from the old man in the beginning and a second character that will be introduced later in the movie, these two are the best. This is their one and only scene in the movie, so they make the best of it. Stumbling out of a forest, immediately establishing that they are drunk, they manage to slur some of the only audible dialogue in the movie to the point where it is no longer coherent. If you want to know how high-quality the acting is in this scene, the bigger man is the crew member that was walking around in the background a few scenes ago. However, they manage to get across the point that they saw a "big mothah fuckah musta been ten feet tall" in the forest. The smaller drunk tells the bigger drunk to go kick his goddamn ass, and then they fight over a bottle of malt liquor. "You better back up, you big six-foot-nine mothah fuckah," says the little man. "He's coming," slurs the bigger man, and the two run right out of the movie. As the scene fades, we hear Michael Mfume, loud and clear, shout, "CUT!" Classy guy, that Michael Mfume. This scene's only purpose was to establish that there is a killer loose in the forest, and that he is large, both of which we already know. But it's good to be reminded once in a while.

Back at the cabin, the kids are getting settled in. Mike, played by Michael Mfume himself, says something that I can't hear to one of the women - the largest woman in the place, who looks suspiciously like an ancient Aztec queen - that causes Mike to celebrate with Rock in a high five that will turn the world on its head. Let me try to explain it: it starts out as a normal high five, but instead of simply hitting the palms of the hands together and releasing, you must clasp your hands together and hold. You must then run your free hand through your hair, starting at your forehead and working your way up and over, all the way down to the back of your neck. While doing this, you must then hump the air as fast as possible. Then you are free to release your other hand. Both parties must be willing to partake in the hair-rubbing and pelvic thrusting, or it doesn't work. Apparently, the scene is dedicated to this one high-five, because it ends immediately after.

Mike and his girlfriend - we'll call her Nikki, because one of the characters is named Nikki, I just don't know which one - are taking a lovely stroll in the woods, when another girl - we'll call her Tonya for the same reason as Nikki - runs up and interrupts. Tonya pulls Nikki aside and tells her that she thinks her boyfriend, Rock, is cheating on her. Now, when we first met Rock, he was with another girlfriend, so it is quickly established that Rock is either a major player, or Michael Mfume just forgot what he wrote ten minutes ago. Nikki tells Tonya, "Girl, I could have told you that! Every time you got your back turned, he's sleepin' with somebody else!" They laugh it off, and Nikki also tells Tonya that Rock's second girlfriend's name is Yolanda. If you think this is the girl from earlier in the movie, you're wrong. So as far as we know, Rock has three girlfriends, all of whom know about the other two. He must have a massive penis. That's the only explanation. Naturally, the scene fades out in the middle of a sentence. This movie just doesn't want to give you closure!

And now for the first of many eating scenes. I won't mention it after this, because it'll get pretty redundant, but every time the group is eating at a table, they are eating fried chicken, mashed potatoes and drinking malt liquor. Not that they're perpetuating stereotypes or anything. I have no idea what happens during this dinner scene, and if I didn't already know Michael Mfume couldn't afford an editing machine, I would have been astonished that it was left in the final cut of the movie. There are about four copies of Ebony Magazine circulating around the table - again, not to perpetuate stereotypes - and after some guy named Sean calls Mike's girlfriend (she's the Aztec warrior queen, of course) ugly, Mike retorts by standing up and telling a five-minute joke. The punch line is simply the word "fuck". HILARIOUS! After the joke, the women get up and clear the dishes, telling the men not to worry about doing any work. The group decides to go for a late-night hike. Meanwhile, the girls continue their own conversation in the kitchen while doing the dishes. However, it's impossible to know what they are saying, because there is no audio whatsoever in this scene. They do find a gun in a drawer, but of course it's never mentioned again.

The group then moves outside around a fire. Mike is again telling a joke, but the rap music is turned up to such an atrocious volume that it's virtually impossible to make out a single word of the story. They laugh a lot, though, so the viewer just feels really left-out and lonely. And then something weird happens. The scene doesn't end, but it melds into a flashback (you can tell because it's black and white) of four kids playing. Two of the kids are black, and two are white. The white kids give the black kids something, and then they separate. Then we get to see the actual Mason murders. Mr. Mason takes a shotgun and shoots first his wife and his two kids. Although he aims straight down into their bodies, the blood seems to wait a few seconds before suddenly rebounding up onto the ceiling. The shotgun is remarkably loud, so it's incredible that no one wakes up while their siblings are being murdered in the next bed. Nonetheless, he kills all the family members, before turning the gun on himself. He sticks the barrel of the shotgun in his mouth, looks at the director off-camera, quickly removes the shotgun from his mouth and aims it at the ceiling, cues the shotgun sound effect, and then closes his eyes and lays slowly backwards. I don't know, but I think he's supposed to be dead. We see the police investigating the murders. "Investigating" means standing over the bodies and waving their guns around in the air, while constantly looking directly into the camera. If you can believe it, the flashback gets even weirder.

The black kid from before is walking by the fire pit with the old man who died in the beginning of the movie. The kid drops the thing he was given earlier, and bends to pick it up, while the old man continues on at an incredibly slow pace. When the kid stands up, he sees someone - I assume it's the mentally ill son who will return in 13 years - holding some other kid's body. The black kid holds up the object he just picked up, and then runs over to where the old man is standing. He points, but the mentally ill son and the body have disappeared. If the last two paragraphs made no sense, don't worry about it. I've spent three days agonizing over this scene, trying to unravel it's mysteries, but I've had no luck. Trust me, it's meaningless, drug-induced garbage. Don't waste your time.

Back to the real action! Tonya is standing perfectly straight in the corner of the kitchen, simply reading Ebony Magazine, which she is holding an inch from her eyes like any normal person would do. Rock runs in and asks flat-out if she wants to have sex. In short, she rejects him. Yolanda comes in, and Tonya says Yolanda can sleep with her, and Rock can sleep on the couch tonight. They leave the room, so Rock immediately gets on the phone and calls a woman named Monica, asking her to have sex. She says yes. Damn, Rock is GOOD.

Well, we don't have enough characters to keep track of, so Michael Mfume introduces three more. One of them, however, is my second favorite character in the movie. A car is driving down a road, when it suddenly stops. Three people get out - a white man, a white woman, and a black man - and they state that they are out of gas. I didn't know that once you ran out of gas, the car simply slammed on the brakes and shut off, but I'm not an auto mechanic. The white man, Brian, tells his girlfriend, Sarah, to stay by the car while he goes to find a phone. And he demands that his friend, Breakfast - yes, fucking Breakfast - comes with him. Breakfast throws a fit, but eventually gives in.

Back at the cabin, Tonya forgives Rock, and apparently Monica never shows up, because Tonya and Rock have wild sex in the bath tub. Suddenly, it's the next morning, and everyone gathers around the breakfast (the meal, not the character) table for another stereotyped meal. Everyone talks about whom they had sex with, and many people discover their significant other cheated on them. However, there can't be any fights while eating, so they just laugh it off. Everyone gets up to get ready for the day, leaving Sean at the table to finish by himself. The camera zooms ominously into his bicep, and fades out.

We go back to Brian and Breakfast, who are approaching some house. Brian wants to go in and look for a phone, and Breakfast just wants to get the hell out of there. He says, "What are you supposed to be, fuckin' Inspector Gadget?" and claims that the black man always dies first in a horror movie, so pretty much the only man safe right now out of this entire cast is Brian. They argue by kicking a fallen branch back and forth without speaking, and somehow that settles the matter. Brian goes into the house, and Breakfast runs away. "Screw these black guys," says Brian. "They don't know nothing." In a Michael Mfume movie, a line like that is like signing your own death warrant. Brian travels throughout the house, screaming every three steps, "CAN I USE YOUR PHONE?!" The house is obviously deserted, but he continues on, anyway. The screencaps I took aren't the best for this scene, because each room was color-coded for some reason, and the colors were so dark it covered up anything that was going on. However, from what I could see, the killer dials a phone, and then smacks Brian in the face with it, killing him instantly. Or, to be more accurate, he moves it in front of Brian's face, holds it there, and whispers, "Fall over." Also, I'm pretty sure the zombie dialed 1-800-KILL-YOU.

There's no way anyone could do makeup
THIS realistic. They had to have actually
killed someone with a phone for this scene.

Breakfast trips and stumbles his way through the woods, saying such lines as, "Homie don't play that goddamn game," to himself over and over. He stops, thinks about going back to save Brian, and then shouts, "Bet you won't catch my black ass!" as he runs off.

The girls at the cabin are sitting around, doing their nails, and reading Ebony Magazine, of course. They all discuss who is sleeping with whom, and what men are best in bed. I love that all of the actresses were willing to play such unashamed whores. When Tonya reveals that her sex was good, they all enjoy a celebratory high-five.

After that brief - and completely necessary - interlude, Breakfast reaches Sarah and the car. He tells her that Brian is still back at the house, and when she asks where Breakfast is going to go, he says, "I'm running back to Baltimore!" And run he does, right out of the movie. So long, Breakfast. I'm glad the giant 'tard didn't get you.

In the cabin, this guy named Tony finally gets his two minutes of fame in the movie. He goes to the bathroom, which we are forced to watch. And since they didn't use many special effects, including sounds, in the making of this movie, we can only assume he was really peeing. He pees for about a minute straight, before something outside catches his eye. He opens the window and sees the killer prowling around outside. "Fuck!" he shouts, and runs downstairs to tell Mike. Tony and Mike agree to go "fuck him up," and they run outside to do so.

Assuming everything is fine, Tonya and Rock slip outside by the fire pit to have some sweet sex. Rock wins Tonya's heart with lines like: "You phatter than a swamp possum with the mumps," and, "You so fine, I could kiss yo' daddy's ass." He seriously said those sentences to a woman, and she seriously swooned over them. Tonya says she only wants a man with money. Rock promises to buy her things, so they make love while a killer runs amok.

Everyone seems to have forgotten about the strange man, because they are suddenly all back enjoying a fine chicken dinner. They quickly realize that Tonya and Rock are gone, when a scream interrupts their meal. Everyone gets up, frantic, and runs to see what is happening. For some reason, Tony remains at the table, shakes his head, and begins to play his Gameboy. That Tony doesn't let anything phase him. They open the door, and Tonya runs in, screaming, "HELP!" Rock follows, and his arm has been cut! Everyone starts talking at once, and the door opens again, and in falls the body of Brian. They scream, and we see that when someone is killed by having a phone smashed against his face, what is left are the signs of a bear attack. The group panics and runs outside. They see the killer is doing something with their cars, so they shout, "Oh shit!" and that shot repeats itself, so we get two identical "oh shits," and they run back inside. They have him outnumbered 15 to 1, but they're still terrified. They all run past the camera, screaming - some noticeably laughing - and Tony, the goofball, stops and screams right into the lens.

Acting!

The group comes up with a few brilliant plans. First, they elect Mike to go check out the cars and see if they are tampered with. So, rather than walking normally, he dances his way on over. Way to play it cool, Mike. At first, the dance is funny, but after about a minute of it, it gets a little awkward. Especially because this is one of the only scenes in the movie without music behind it. The car sparks, so Mike opens the hood and checks it out. All he really does is open it, look inside, and then close it again, saying, "Shit, shit shit," a lot. When he closes the hood, he sees that the killer is standing behind him with a machete! Mike elbows him in the stomach, which throws the killer onto the ground, and Mike manages to escape indoors. However, they forgot to lock the door behind them, so the zombie simply opens the door and stumbles in. Everyone screams, and the scene fades to black. Yes, it fucking fades to black in the most climactic scene in the entire movie!

Here's what we can assume happens off-screen: somehow, they all escaped the killer and decided to split up and run in small, ragtag groups throughout the forest. I don't see why not. Rock remembers he has a gun in his pants. It's understandable that he didn't think to use it against the lunatic killer. Rock's group gets in a fight, and they leave Rock behind. The killer jumps up from behind Rock and, in possibly the best moment in any movie ever, Rock screams and wiggles his glasses. Now that's comedy! Suddenly, Rock is dead (or IS he?) in the grass, and the killer trades in his baseball bat for Rock's gun. Back at the cabin, one of the girls walks up to the door to leave the house, and then thinks better of it, for some reason. She turns around, and there's the killer, with his machete again! He cuts through her entire fucking skull, causing her to laugh on camera.

Wow, Sarah's still alive! Remember her? The only white girl in the movie? For some reasons, she's walking through the forest, and literally tripping every couple of steps. In a thirty-second walking scene, she trips SIX TIMES. And she's just shuffling her feet; she's not even really walking! From out of the woods behind her comes the killer, grunting like Frankenstein's monster for some reason, and you know instantly Sarah is dead. There's no way she'll survive if she can't even walk through grass that hasn't been mowed in a week. She runs off camera.

Meanwhile, Tony and the Aztec find Sarah, Brian and Breakfast's car. They get in a fight, and the Aztec woman slaps Tony across the face, prompting a series of, "Oh, you did not just slap me in these woods! You did not just slap me in these woods! I can't believe you just slapped me in these woods! What is wrong with you? I can't believe you just slapped me in these woods!" God, this script is perfect.

Sarah jumps over the camera and runs off screen. The second she disappears into the woods, the scene repeats itself. Michael Mfume, did you even try anymore when you got near the end of the movie? Meanwhile, Mike is sneaking into the house where the old man was killed in the beginning. He holds his fingers like they are a gun; either he's pretending to have one to try to trick the killer, or he was supposed to have one and they lost the gun prop while filming. Either way, he sneaks into the house, and finds the closet with the dead old man in it, revealing that it was his grandfather! You think Mike would have said something earlier, like, "Hey, guys, my grandfather lives next door. Let's go to his house to call for help."

What the hell? What's Rock doing alive? Turns out he survived the deadly blow, and he's back in the multicolored house, only it is no longer multicolored. Rock throws himself on a chair and, always the genius, tosses a bedsheet over himself to hide. Perfect! Nikki also enters the house, and she is fooled by Rock's clever, clever trick.

Two other people - it's too dark to see who they are - enter another house. Apparently this cottage was in the middle of a rather well-populated area. Why didn't they just go to one of their neighbors earlier for help? The two sneak upstairs, and when they see the killer is inside, the man pushes the woman into the killer and runs out the front door. Naturally, the woman dies. Or, at least, the zombie swings his machete five feet in front of her face and then she's laying on the floor covered in blood. Second-guessing himself, for some reason, the man turns around, runs back inside, pushes the killer out of the way, and runs back upstairs. What? Why?! You sacrificed your girlfriend and then decided to stick around? Of course, the killer takes out his gun and shoots the man in the back. Good riddance.

There's a quick shot of the camera man dropping the camera while walking through a forest (further evidence that the editing process was skipped), and then it quickly cuts to the killer entering the formerly-multicolored house. He sees Rock's clever sheet disguise and is also fooled by it. Nikki is upstairs in a closet, praying. The killer strolls around the room and then leaves. But a skeleton drops its hand on Nikki's shoulder, and she screams, giving away her position. She tries to shut the door on the killer, but he manages to give her quite a nasty cut to her arm. As in, the blade goes four entire inches through her rubber-like bones. Nikki falls back, gripping her severely damaged wrist, and the zombie taps the door, making it fall right over. He jumps at Nikki, but Rock throws off his tricky disguise, pushes the killer to the floor, and runs away with Nikki. Surely he's dead now!

Meanwhile, Mike hears some noises, so he shoots at a door, somehow managing to make the bullets make noise before he even raises his gun. The killer bursts through the door, and of course we cut to another scene immediately. There are some more running-through-the-woods shots that are far too dark to see, and hundreds of sound effects of the killer grunting and groaning like an asthmatic hag running a mile. Four of them meet up at the car, and they stand around yelling about something - I'm not sure what, but it gives the killer enough time to catch up with them. Then there are even more shots of them running through the woods. THRILLING.

They manage to find an old, abandoned warehouse (in the middle of a forest), and they seek refuge there. The killer, of course, shows up instantly, so they all back into a corner. They take a few shots at him, but nothing but yellow goo shoots out, and he continues to walk towards them. Will he never die?! He picks something up, and the Aztec shoves a pitchfork straight into his chest! Convinced that they've finally killed him, they all kick him on their way out, and Mike takes some time to gather up some random coupons from the floor of the warehouse. Classic Mike!

We see their car drive down the road, and the killer following them. I smell a sequel!

The ending credits are sure to thank God, Spike Lee, and all those who supported him, and those who did not. I'm assuming that was meant to be a little "fuck you"" to everyone who said the movie sucked, because Michael Mfume knew it would become huge and an instant classic. Now, though, the irony is just depressing.

Blog, Volume 2

2008-08-29T14:19:00.001-06:00

I think I'm going to keep this thing going. Interesting stuff happens to me, right? I guess we'll find out.

Goodbyero, Cairo.

2007-12-14T14:12:00.000-06:00

Unless something insane happens in the next two days (not a longshot with this country), this will be my last post from Cairo. Which is sort of freaking me out. Where did all the time go?

(Quick sidenote: yesterday was the two month birthday of my coke nail. It has gone beyond the tip of my finger, and is moving into uncharted territory. This makes it very hard for me to type the letter "A", or to shampoo my hair without scraping a layer of scalp off. In short: I am disgusting.)

Before I get all "boo hoo Cairo" on you, let's talk about how terrifying living in this apartment has suddenly become. For some reason, the beggars of Cairo decided we're regular moneybags, because they're all making the frightening ride up the elevator to the ninth floor, just to knock on our door and ask for five pounds.

That's not the scary part, obviously. Two nights ago, Beckett and I were asleep (in our separate rooms, pervert), when we were woken up by the doorbell ringing at 3 AM. I stayed in bed because I was tired and lazy, but I heard Beckett getting out of his room, grumbling and cursing all the way to the door. He opened it, and standing about ten feet away from the door was a small Egyptian man (Beckett described him as "Al Qaeda-looking"). His head was tilted towards the ground, but he was looking out the top of his eyes, staring at Beckett.

Beckett asked in Arabic, "What do you want?" but the guy said nothing. Just stood there, staring. Fifteen or so seconds passed, and Beckett repeated: "What?" A few more seconds of silence, and then the guy slowly said (extremely creepily, I might add, since I could hear it all the way back in my room): "Oh. Good evening." Which sounded even creepier in Arabic.

At this point, Beckett was completely freaked out, so he just shut the door. He got about ten feet away from it before he heard a series of knocks. Peeking through the peephole (a word I can't write without giggling), he saw the one man had suddenly been joined by two more. Luckily, he didn't open the door again, and just crept back to his room, grabbing a knife from the kitchen on the way. Apparently he didn't sleep until the sun came up, and I'm not so sure I would have been able to, either.

Actually, I know I wouldn't be able to, because while I was able to laugh off the story the next morning with a simple, "Weird..." it really freaked me out that night. We were supposed to change our locks or at least get a deadbolt when we moved in here, because who knows how many people have a copy of our house key? We tried the first week in our apartment, but failed and ultimately forgot. (If you know how to say "deadbolt" or "locksmith" in Arabic, it probably would have been easier for you.) Plus the windows in my room don't close all the way, and it was a particularly windy night, so the wind was making the curtains dance around like they always do when someone's about to be killed in a horror movie. But even worse, the wind was making the already-loose door shake and thump, like someone was on the other side trying to get in.

Looking back, I was being a bit of a pussy, but at the moment all I could think about was that guy saying, "Messe el-kher," in that creepy way. I spent the night on the couch in front of the TV, and didn't fall asleep until the sky was beginning to lighten.

Laying on the couch, I decided I really didn't feel like watching anything in Arabic, wrestling, or 10 Things I Hate About You for the umpteenth time (why does Egypt love that movie so?), so I just turned it to CNN. The most insane British man in the world was reporting on traveling in Japan, so I had a blast seeing all the places and landmarks I was at. It really felt like I was just there, even though that was way back in July.

It's really amazing that I can watch a news report from Tokyo and say, "I was there!" Or when a commercial for Turkish Airlines came on, showing the park between the Hagia Sophia and the Blue Mosque in Istanbul, I was able to remember the times I walked through that park myself. Or when the news report came on showing protests in Beirut after another assassination, I recognized the buildings in the background. Rather mind-blowing, really.

I can't believe there are only two hours until Saturday begins - my penultimate day in Cairo. I know it's cliche, and I know it's cliche to say it's cliche, but it feels like yesterday that I arrived in Cairo, completely confused but loving every second of this insane place. And wasn't it only last night that Beckett and I checked out of the dorms at nearly midnight, getting an apartment completely on impulse? How has it been nine weeks since I was in Beirut?

There are some things I already know I'm going to miss. Simple things, like the joys of smoking shisha and drinking tea at a small cafe down some dirty street, or just the way you can't leave your apartment without insane things happening to you (naked Saudi men, anyone?). I definitely will not miss the pollution (for the past couple days, the air outside has smelled like a charming mix of straight-up gasoline, and electrical fires) or the incessant car horn honking. But I've met some amazing people and completely changed my view of the Middle East, which I think we all need these days. We may not speak a single word in common, but a cab driver and I can still share a laugh when we see a biker collide with someone getting out of their car. His culture is 100% baffling to me (and the non-offensive Egyptian hand gesture he gives me to say "wait, please" could get you killed if you did it to someone in, say, New York), but we're basically the same.

And, of course, I'm going to miss all my friends out here. Emily's in Jordan, but she decided to come back tomorrow night to say goodbye to us on Sunday, which is good, because I'm dreading the thought of leaving her. At least she's in Chicago, though. What am I going to do without Allyson, who is all the way in LA?! Or Beckett, and Elizabeth, in Washington, D.C.? Weird stuff, saying goodbye to these people.

I don't know what more to say. It's been an unbelievable four months, and I think the past however-many posts speak for themselves. I'm thrilled that I came out here, and I'm excited to get back home and restart my life in the good ole USA. (The next time one of you angsty teenagers complains about living in the "worst country", just remember that at least you have drinkable water and electricity that works. Bush sucks, but you've gotta love America.)

I still haven't quite decided what to do with this blog now that I'm going home. Do I keep it running? Is my life really that interesting in the United States? There'll for sure be one or two more from home, just to update on the whole reverse-culture-shock thing that I am oh so looking forward to. But after that - who knows? I've got a couple trips in the works, specifically a road trip this summer around the United States, and hopefully in a year or two a few of us AUC kids will reunite for either the Mongol Rally or the Rickshaw Run (or maybe the Ruta Del Sol or the Africa Rally). So even if this blog dies out once life returns to that seemingly-foreign concept of "normal", I expect a vampire-like resurrection for it at some undefined point. The world's a big place, and I'm not at all satisfied with the meager amount of it I've seen so far. What's the rest of it like?

(Oh, on a related note, if you want to invite myself and two friends to stay with you during our road trip this summer, I'd be eternally grateful to you. We have no definite plans for our route [aside from going to Disney World, of course], and I don't know about their financial situations, but I'm completely poor after all these ridiculous travels, so we will be relying on a tent for lodging, rather than crazily expensive hotels. But we could pay you back for your generosity by painting you a picture or something. My specialty is abstract/cubistic renditions of genitals.)

Apparently it's the Christmas season back home, so Happy Christmas. See you in the States.

I hate AUC.

2007-12-11T09:35:00.000-06:00

Well, I should probably start by giving you an update on Operation Spiritual Warriors. I ended up dragging Emily with me the next day to see the movie and attempt to get a DVD. When Jsu saw I had returned, he yelled, "I love you, man!" I bet you're pretty jealous. They all seemed thrilled at my return, especially Rick Ojeda, who seems only half-heartedly to support this freaky religion. I kind of thought he'd slip me a note during the movie warning me to escape while I had a chance, but I guess they've brainwashed him enough to stop him from trying to save others from his fate.

Emily thought the movie was even better than how I described it to her, verifying my suspicions that it is, in fact, impossible to accurately portray with words. She practically ripped through the skin on my leg from gripping it in an attempt to stop from laughing. She particularly liked the sex scene (with the not-so-subtle song in the background, whose chorus is, "I am inside you") where Jsu clearly takes advantage of the situation and improvises a breast grab - while the woman is speaking her line! The professionalism killed me.

We then sat through another awful question and answer section. The first question was from the woman sitting next to me, who decided to challenge Megan's question from yesterday: "Last night, one of the Americans asked what you expected the audience to get from the movie, but I thought it was very spiritual and moving, and that's why I came back today." Give me a break. Then an American in the back row piped up with her awesome question: "In a spiritual movie like this, where you're attempting to pass along your religious beliefs to the audience, don't you think style distracts from subject? I mean, it's hard for me to stay involved with the spiritual storyline when I'm being distracted by demons and special effects." Suck it, Jsu! He clearly had no idea what to say to a question like that, so he just said that he wanted to make a cool movie filled with sex and violence. Classy. Between Megan's question the night before, and this girl's question, I was feeling pretty proud to be an American.

The best part of the question and answer segment came when Jsu said he thinks the movie will have "cult success". I swear, the irony almost made my forehead split in half (Spiritual Warrior reference!). FInally, people stopped asking him stupid questions about what sort of camera he used to film it all, and we were free to go. As I nervously approached him, practicing my lies ("I have a friend who is really into spirituality, so I think this DVD would really make a great Christmas present") some other loser asked Jsu where he could get a copy of the DVD. Jsu told him to sign up for the mailing list on the website, and he would be notified of the DVD release through there, probably around March. Damn! So, I left, utterly defeated, and having seen Spiritual Warriors twice in two hours. That was probably the lowest point in my entire life.

Since then, I have pretty much finished this semester. Classes are out, and I have already completed two of my four finals, as well as the paper that is due on Thursday. All I have left is a final on Saturday, and a final on Sunday, and then I'm home free. You know how impossible it is to concentrate during finals week at home, when Christmas is right around the corner, and you are sick of the material you've been studying for the past semester? Try doing that, but you're being tested on a language that's been dead for over 2000 years, and that language is the only thing keeping you from seeing your friends and family, whom you haven't seen in four months.

The word on everyone's lips these days is, "America." Even the kids who were so die-hard about Egypt when we got here can only talk about home. It's extremely easy to fall in love with Egypt if you only visit for a few weeks at a time, and then get back to normal civilization, but once you live here for any substantial amount of time, it really can make you dislike the country, which is unfortunate. I know I'll love it in retrospect from the comfort of the United States, but right now we all just want out.

Don't get me wrong, I've had the greatest four months of my life out here, but it's definitely time to go home. Cairo can feel extremely stuffy at times - a city half the size of Paris with four times the people can do that. Plus it's in the middle of the freaking desert, so it's a hassle to get anywhere other than Cairo. And once you've done all the touristy stuff (which can be done in a day or two, really), there's not much more to do than... well, drink. So I think a return to normal life will actually be a good thing.

Okay, enough bashing Cairo. Lets focus on how terrible AUC is, shall we? You see, before we go home, we have to tell AUC where we want our transcripts sent, so our grades and credits transfer. Should be a simple process, right? Not at AUC! We have to go to the Student Services office, which is run almost exactly like the DMV. You take a number, and sit and wait for your number to be called. From every student that has gone through this process, I hear the sitting and waiting takes over an hour. And this is only to get the freaking form! I could suggest a million different options - sending the form out in an e-mail, having one employee whose only job is handing out the forms, or, I don't know, putting the forms in a pile on a desk for you to just walk in and grab?! Once you have the form, you have to go to about five different offices to get various people to sign off to say that you don't have any book checked out of the library, and you've paid all your fees, etc. etc. Then you return back to the stupid Student Services office, where you take another number, and wait for another hour. Just to hand the form back in. And the final kicker? The office is only open from 9-1 on weekdays. So there's almost no way you can get in and out on the same day, unless you're very lucky. Beckett and I will be attempting to beat the system tomorrow, but I'm sure it'll end up being a two-day process.

All that's left between me and the United States: the stupid transcript process, handing in a paper, taking two ridiculously easy finals, packing, cleaning, celebrating Beckett's birthday. Tomorrow will be my last day of being a tourist for a while - Beckett still has not seen the pyramids in the four months we've been here, so Beckett, Emily, and I are heading out there to hopefully ride horses, and definitely to touch the pyramids. And then tomorrow night comes my first and worst goodbye - Emily is leaving early to travel in Jordan until she goes home. I don't know what I'm going to do without this girl I've seen every day since we became friends literally three hours after I landed in Cairo. Luckily she lives in Chicago, so I'll see her at home. But Jesus, saying goodbye is going to suck.

I promise this is my only "Cairo sucks" post. The next one (maybe my last?) will be looking back on how amazing this has all been. Because, let's face it, this whole four months has been more than surreal. Oh, and happy last night of Hanukkah.

Cairo International Cult Festival

2007-12-05T17:50:00.000-06:00

I don't know how to describe what just happened so you get the full effect, so I'll start by saying that you will never be able to understand what we went through today unless you've lived in Cairo, and also been inducted into a cult. How's that for an intriguing introduction?

Yes, it was another crazy day at the Cairo Film Festival, which has become my favorite thing ever. Remember what I said about "Cairo" being synonymous with "low quality"? Today proved that, and the unfortunate victim of this lesson was Harvey Keitel. And then later, it was us.

We showed up early to get good seats for Reservoir Dogs, which wasn't a problem because the place was deserted. Even at 11:56, there were less than twenty people in this large auditorium. I quickly got up to run out and get some popcorn, and I literally ran into Mr. Keitel. He was walking in the door, holding his son, and I was walking out at the same time, so I all but trampled him. I was way too shell-shocked to say anything, so I just quickly jumped out of his way and let him through. He look at the abysmal crowd and joked, "I knew it would be packed in here!"

He stood at the front of the auditorium with an interpreter and his son, and just did a brief introduction for the movie. And it did not go well at all. He was hilarious and classy and very, very nice, but Egypt kind of got the best of him. The microphone was not working, so various Egyptians kept running up to him with other microphones and literally shoving them in his face. None of the mics worked, and he couldn't get through any of Quentin Tarantino-related anecdotes without some moron interrupting him with a new microphone. He was way more patient than I would have been, but eventually he just said, "I can't do this. These people just want to watch the movie, so welcome to Cairo and enjoy." And then he got the hell out of the theater entirely. Thus ended my encounter with Harvey.

Within two minutes after he had left, a man came out and announced something into the broken mic, so none of us understood exactly what he had said. But the gist was that their only copy of Reservoir Dogs was "broken". You'd think at least one person would have thought, "Well, Harvey freaking Keitel flew all the way to Egypt to attend a showing of Reservoir Dogs, so maybe I'll just run up to the film booth quickly and make sure we actually have a copy of the movie on hand." But, of course, they didn't.

Incredibly, Beckett had a copy of Reservoir Dogs back at our apartment. So he volunteered to get in a cab and run to get the disc, which they agreed to, since he was totally saving their asses. So he took off running, and we all sat down to wait. Twenty minutes later, they decide that they are through waiting for him (even though they had called him and found out he was already on his way back), so they were just going to stick another movie in. I think they just assumed we all were there only to see a movie in English, not specifically Reservoir Dogs, because the guy came out front again and said, "We have English movie for you. It's okay, in English." Uh, what? One of the guys sitting next to us asked if they had any movie that Harvey has been in, since that's kind of the point, but I don't think this employee had any clue who we were talking about.

So we just sat and watched Battle for Haditha, which turned out to be really great. It's shot like a documentary, and feels incredibly real, and it shows the events of November 19th, 2005 in Haditha, Iraq, when an IED killed a Marine, and the remaining Marines proceeded to kill 24 men, women, and children. Four of the Marines are currently on trial for murder, so it's an incredibly controversial movie, but it was very well done. So I guess it was a fair trade - I got to see Harvey Keitel, and a good, new movie. But somehow I doubt Harvey will be returning for the 2008 Cairo International Film Festival.

Okay, now comes the insane part. Beckett, Elizabeth, and I convinced Allyson and Megan to come with us to see Spiritual Warriors, which they were all for, because we had visions of rubbing elbows with A-listers like Angelina Jolie and George Clooney. Yes, this was sure to be a grand affair.

We arrived half an hour before the movie started (assuming we'd be fighting for seats if we got there even a minute later), and practically got knocked over by Jsu Garcia himself on the stairs. He seemed all a-fluster, but he recognized us, and said, "Come on, I'll hook you up!" We soon found out he was only trying to sound cool and important, because we followed him up to the theater, which was free to get into anyway.

The theater was in a real Cairo Pandemonium, because - surprise! - the projector wasn't working! So while Jsu ran around like a madman trying to find his DVD copy of it, we stood outside the theater, talking. A kind old woman said to Megan, "Hello. I'm Sally," and instantly I knew that this was Academy Award nominee Sally Kirkland. Megan, of course, did not, and responded in the most condescending, whatever-you-say-crazy-old-lady voice: "Nice to meet you, Sally. I'm Megan." This embarrassment continued for Sally, because I was the only person not affiliated with the movie who knew who she really was. She actually grabbed a reporter and said, "Do you want an interview?" to which he responded, "No thanks." She finally got a couple interviews, and the only parts I could hear of it were her listing off all the hundreds of movies she's done, and repeating, "I'm Oscar nominee Sally Kirkland!" I wanted to push her out the window into the Nile to put her out of her misery. It didn't help that she was wearing a weird crystal between her eyes, which should have been a clear sign that we were getting into something insane.

We schmoozed with the "rich" and "famous" for a while, like movie producer Rick Ojeda, who made an interesting choice of a first impression: flat-out lying. "I'm the Prince of Darkness in this movie," he proudly stated. Which I discovered later was not true. He was actually just a doctor that had one line. Did he think I wouldn't notice that the Prince of Darkness looked nothing like him? Whatever, he was the nicest guy ever, and I may have fallen in love with him a bit. Hey, compared to Sally's craziness sitting next to him, he was marriage material.

Finally the movie was ready to go, so we were ushered into the smallest theater ever, which smelled like hot dog farts. The DVD menu was projected on the screen in front, and I caught the word "subtitle" misspelled as "subtitel". Why did I not recognize any of these signs and escape while I had a chance? Alas, we sat down, listened to Jsu's little introduction, and the movie started.

I really don't know how I'm going to explain this. I'll frequently be cutting in with little insights, straight from the mind of Jsu himself, so bear with me. You know the scene in Lost where they open a door in the Others' complex, and that kid is being brainwashed by really crazy images? Or the brainwashing in A Clockwork Orange? Or have you ever done acid? It was like that.

It started out normal enough. For, like, two seconds. Basically, Jsu played a struggling actor, who also on the side was a drug dealer for the mafia. (Sidenote: Jsu said at the end that the movie was based on real-life experiences. So I guess he was a drug dealer?) He runs from the cops, and decides the best solution to evade the police is to sleep in a bush. He wakes up, and he's in the garden of the strangest old man EVER. This is him:

The old man gives him some tea, deals some cards, and thus ends the semi-cohesive plot. Jsu's forehead splits in two, launching us back in time to the continent of Atlantis. Some crap goes down, the King dies, and every freaking three seconds the King's face is juxtaposed with the old man's. I can't honestly do a scene-by-scene recap of this, as much as I would love to, because I've tried to erase it from my mind. But most of the movie took place in flashbacks - Jsu's "past lives" - to stuff like Camelot, and also two kids were randomly shown being hanged 2000 years ago in Jordan. (This will become a hot issue in the "press conference" afterwards. Hang on, we're getting there.)

One of my favorite parts of the movie (but let's face it, I thoroughly enjoyed all 99 minutes of it) is that every so often scenes would be stopped, and text would appear, showing a quote from the founder of this god-awful cult they're all members of, John Roger. The quotes were all totally nonsensical, but what made it even better was that in case we couldn't read, they had someone reading it to us. We assume it was John Roger himself, because if it wasn't, they should have hired a different actor. The narrator sounded like Dick Clark post-stroke. Seriously, it sounded like half of his mouth was melting. It's hard to not laugh when you hear the narrator of a movie drooling all over himself, but it's even harder when he's saying stuff like this: "If you withhold yourself from your life, you are withholding the support of the Spirit." Or: "Spirit doesn't care because there are no emotional levels in Spirit." Or: "Spiritual Warriors have the Sword of their Heart in front of them." I could go on for days.

This madness continued for an hour and a half. Crazy stuff happened that I will never be able to explain. At one point, he became a full-on angel with wings. But then he did a swan-dive back into his body. There was a wonderful training montage with Jsu and the old man, during which they did stuff like rollerbladed at the beach (seriously) and planted flowers together (again, I'm serious). And then, out of nowhere, Jsu was standing in the middle of this neon blue ocean with all sorts of cities trapped in bubbles around him, and then he hugged a half-naked toddler and cried. An explanation for this scene was never given.

Finally, the final battle between Jsu and the Prince of Darkness (or PoD for short) took place. Just when I thought it couldn't get any better. They each grabbed swords, which turned into Lightsabers (sidenote: Jsu admitted later that Star Wars was, in fact, his inspiration for this scene), and they had a pathetic little battle, before the Prince of Darkness thought, "Wait, what am I doing? I'm the freaking devil!" and just shot a fireball at Jsu, knocking him all the way across the desert as Jsu screamed, "NOOOOOOOOOOOOO!" Suddenly, a force field appeared in the middle of the desert, separating Jsu from the PoD, and the force field had the old man's creepy face floating in it! At this moment, I completely lost it and laughed out loud. He gave some words of inspiration, Jsu realized that he was The One (sidenote: Jsu also admitted later that he got this "inspiration" from The Matrix), but the PoD again realized that he's freaking Satan, so he turned into a really terrible computer graphic of a monster. He started stabbing Jsu with his wings and throwing him all around, while the old man's face appeared on the sides of mountains, encouraging Jsu. Then I looked down for two seconds to try to hide my laughter, and somehow the PoD had been magically transformed into a cockroach! Problem solved!

It's really, really impossible to get the full effect of the movie without seeing it, but I hope I did it a little bit of justice. If you were confused by my description, I served my purpose well - we had to run out of the theater to avoid laughing in front of Jsu.

After the movie, we had our pathetic little "press conference" with Jsu, one of the producers named Fadal, and Sally. (One last sidenote: I don't know why Sally came all the way to Egypt, because she was literally in the movie for 45 seconds.) The first question that was asked was honestly this: "It was so deep and spiritual that I think we're going to have to watch it again to fully understand it. Can we watch it again?" I almost crapped my pants. After that, since we were the only Americans in the audience, the conference went into total Arabic, with Fadal answering all the questions, since he's Egyptian. Every once in a while Jsu would make him translate so we could understand what was going on, but Fadal would only translate part of the question before cutting himself off to answer it, so what we got only confused us more. The conference only lasted for about fifteen minutes, but these people had some insane questions. Two women actually started yelling about the fact that the two little Jordanian kids that had been killed 2000 years ago were not wearing historically-accurate costumes. They got in a good three-minute fight with Jsu and Fadal about it. On the list of offenses this movie committed, inaccurate costuming is near the bottom. Then someone else asked a question, and Fadal answered, and then the guy said something else to which Fadal again responded, so Jsu asked, "What the hell are you saying?" Fadal said: "He's asking about Israel and Palestine," and then they got in a big fight in Arabic. What? Why is he asking you about this right now? Then someone else asked a question, and Fadal answered, but translated the question for us: "He's asking about my village which was destroyed by conquerors." By this point, I was waiting for someone to jump out and shout, "Gotcha!" and reveal the hidden cameras.

Jsu allowed only one more question, and then just as we were about to be set free, Sally finally spoke up and said, "Wait, I have a question for the Americans." My heart sank. "What did you feel when you watched this movie? Did you feel anything in your heart and soul? Tell me about your experiences." She was met with total silence for nearly 30 seconds, before Megan - always the one ready to debate someone - responded with, "I actually just have a question. I know why you made this movie - it was an intensely personal, spiritual movie that was all about what was going on in you, and I can see you got a lot out of making it. But what did you expect us, as an audience, to get from it?" Translation: "It sucked." He responded with some bullcrap about it being a "love letter to us and to John Roger", and then we got the hell out of that place.

It kills me to have to write bad things about these people and their movie, because Rick, Fadal, Sally, and of course Jsu were incredibly nice people and I wanted oh so badly to like their movie. But... they can't be serious with this madness. Here's the worst part: I really, really need a copy of the DVD. I haven't wanted anything this badly since yesterday, when I saw the Egyptian wearing the sweater that had "SuperFab" sewn into the back of it. So... I think I'm going back to see it again tomorrow. It's the final showing, so I'm going to offer Jsu some money for the copy of the DVD, since they won't need it anymore. (Unless it's the only copy in the world, considering the only way you can see the movie is if Jsu personally comes to your city and does one of these awkward personal showings.) So if I actually have the balls to go and sit through the movie again, I could end up with a copy of the greatest movie of all time, and most likely get it signed, too. The bad news is that they'll probably be convinced that I'm very serious about the religion now, and will do their best to convert me. But I guess that would make for another interesting story.

The Closest Possible Thing To Danny Glover

2007-12-04T13:44:00.000-06:00

First of all, happy Hanukkah. You Jews at home aren't celebrating it yet, since it's not sundown in the States, but the sun went down long ago here (in Israel, as well), so I'm more than justified in saying it. Just deal with it, okay?

One of the things I love most about Cairo is the fact that any simple excursion out into the city, no matter how brief, always turns into a bewildering adventure. Tonight was a perfect example. The Cairo International Film Festival is currently going on, and while I've been hearing stories from people who peed in a urinal next to Danny Glover and others who met Jerry Seinfeld, I never really felt the urge to make a go of the festival. Not really sure why, since I love crap like this, but maybe it has something to do with the fact that any place or event with the word "Cairo" in it usually is using the city's name as a synonym for "terrible quality". I'm just sayin'.

On a whim, I decided to check out the festival's website to see what movies were playing. Imagine my surprise when I discovered that tomorrow, Reservoir Dogs would be playing, and none other than Mr. Harvey Keitel would be in attendance for a press conference after the movie! My fate was sealed; I had to go to this movie. So Beckett, Elizabeth, and I all ventured over to the Hyatt, where the festival's main theater was, to see how we could get tickets.

Unfortunately, the girl selling the tickets did not speak a word of English, other than the script she memorized earlier: "Which movie? How many ticket? Twenty pounds, please." We tried to communicate that we wanted to see Reservoir Dogs (for some reason she didn't understand, "We want to see Harvey Keitel!") for several minutes, but she wasn't having any of it. Dejected, we walked back to the elevator, but we saw a guy wearing a press ID badge, so Beckett grabbed him and asked if he spoke English. It turns out this was the best possible thing he could have done.

The guy's name is Abbas, and he is Iraqi, but engaged to an American ("Nice, eh?" he said) and he was unbelievably helpful and hilarious. He reminded me a bit of Roberto Benigni. He said he would help us get tickets, but then instantly got side-tracked by showing us all of the movies that were playing, and explaining which ones we should see. Then, mid-sentence, a pile of almonds magically appeared in his hand, and he gave each of us a nut to eat. I didn't know what the hell was going on, but I was loving it.

He exchanged some words with the now-thoroughly-annoyed ticket girl, and then suddenly stopped talking to her, and gestured for us to follow him. We started going down the escalators back to the lobby, and on the way he was telling us that he's a member of the press, but also an actor, and that he has many famous American actor friends. I was a bit skeptical, but then he said, "Oh, there's my friend!" and pointed at a guy in a nice suit who was in the glass elevator across from us and waving his arms and jumping up and down. So then we just took off running down the last few escalators, yelling, "Jsu!" which I guess was the actor's name. The man was waiting for us at the bottom, so we were introduced to Jsu Garcia. You're probably wondering who he is. I hadn't ever heard of him either, but a quick search on IMDB.com revealed that he has had tons of roles, some of them fairly large, such as starring opposite Mel Gibson in We Were Soldiers. But what really got me was that he got his start as Johnny Depp's best friend in A Nightmare on Elm Street. How can I not love the guy who uttered the line, "Up yours with a twirling lawnmower"?!

Jsu (look at me, on a first-name basis with the stars) is here because he wrote, produced, and starred in a movie called Spiritual Warriors. We thought it was just a small little production, but it definitely wasn't. It's supposed to be an incredible movie, especially since it was filmed in Syria, Egypt, and Jordan, and the budget was under $1 million. It's starring Jsu, some old dude who's been in a billion movies, Christopher Atkins, and Sally Kirkland, who we should be meeting tomorrow. Apparently Sally has been nominated for an Academy Award, and she was the first person be completely nude on-stage in a play. I think I'll break the ice with that little fact when I meet her. So anyway, he asked us if we wanted to come see it, and there was no way we were saying no to him. He offered to let us in for free, and said he'd be outside the theater waiting for us tomorrow night to let us in. Pretty amazing, right? He also gave us a bunch of flyers promoting the movie and asked us to hand them out at AUC to spread the word. He was such a cool guy, and it was an incredibly generous thing for him to do. Even though I had never heard of him by name, I've definitely seen him in movies before, and I've never met anyone like him who just exudes a movie star aura. I have to admit, I had no idea who he was, but I was totally star struck.

So he ran off, and Abbas took us back up to the theater (thereby confusing me about why we were going down to the lobby in the first place, but there's no questioning Abbas' methods), and insisted we had to see the movie that was about to show. We just did what you do in Cairo, and went along with the flow, instantly purchasing tickets. I bet the ticket girl was thrilled to see us again. Our tickets were taken by someone I'm positive was Horatio Sanz in disguise, and we were ushered into the theater. We said goodbye to Abbas outside of it, but he promised we'd see him at Jsu's movie tomorrow night. So we just grabbed three seats in the theater - which was by far the nicest theater I've ever been in - and tried to figure out what sort of movie we were about to see. We had no idea what country it came from, what the plot was remotely about, or even what the title was. Meanwhile, Beckett texted his mom to have her look up the plot details for Spiritual Warriors, and she responded with this: "Actor meets mysterious old man, old man trains actor, they fight forces of evil." Sounds awesome, huh? I can't wait.

Now, the theater was pretty enormous, and there were about six people in there. But suddenly a huge group of Egyptian students - there must have been at least 20 of them - came in, and sat down right next to me. Out of all the seats in the theater! They then spent the next half hour screaming, wrestling, running around, playing Coolio songs on their cell phones, and generally being as annoying as possible. But I wouldn't expect anything less from Egypt, so I found it all quite hilarious. Before the movie started, they were yelled at by a giant man in a suit, so then they generally quieted down. Eventually the theater filled up a little more (it was still pretty embarrassingly empty), and the lights dimmed.

What followed was the craziest hour I've experienced in quite a while. I had no idea what was going on in the movie. It was in Hungarian with English subtitles, and it was about some ugly gipsy who was framed for murder. I think. Mostly it seemed to be about creepy old imaginary ladies tormenting him in his jail cell, dead chickens, and gay sex. It was absolutely terrible. Luckily it only lasted for an hour, and then the main character killed himself in the final second of the movie, so I guess it was all worth it.

Thoroughly confused, we encountered Abbas outside the theater, who admitted that he slept through it. So why did you make us go to it, Abbas? Eh, bygones. We said goodbye to him again, but hopefully we'll see him tomorrow night. Not only is he an awesome guy, but he's the first Iraqi I've actually ever met in real life. So far, I love Iraq. I returned back to our apartment and had a sad little Hanukkah celebration, lighting the candles all by myself, in the dark since the power was out. If there had been someone else there, it would have been very romantic. Especially since it had this whole Anne Frank-esque feel to it, what with the power outage and the fact that I had drawn all the shades to hide my Jewish tendencies from curious neighbors.

So tomorrow I'll be going to only one class, and then blowing off my other three to watch movies all day! But I'll be meeting one movie star for sure, at the very least seeing another, and hopefully meeting Miss Kirkland as well. I have to say, this is shaping up to be the best Hanukkah ever.

Also, I apologize for the lack of pictures. Chances are, there won't be any more. My camera got up one day and decided it was going to make every picture have a horrible purple hue. I'm much too embarrassed to use it anymore, so I think it's time it goes into retirement.

Shave and a Haircut, Two Turkish Lira

2007-12-02T09:08:00.000-06:00

As promised, here are the pictures from my Turkish haircut experience:

Midway through the process. I considered leaving it like this, but decided to let him continue.

Half an hour later, the guy seemed like he was finally done cutting, and this is what we were left with.

Now begins the styling process. This is Phase One, which oddly took place before the shampooing. Note the older brother in the matching sweater in the background, searching men's hairstyling magazines for inspiration

My first shampooing by a dude! The water here practically came out of the faucet boiling. My face is melting.

Big Bro steps in for Phase Two of styling. He is currently adding three different kinds of hair product. To get the full effect, imagine this picture going on for thirty minutes.

I look to the future with great optimism. What will this haircut bring me?!

The final creation. Take note of the horns on either side of my forehead. Those were gone two seconds after this picture was taken.

And now, since I didn't have any on my own camera and therefore couldn't show you them earlier, Whirling Dervishes!

Only An (Asia) Minor Offense

2007-11-27T04:32:00.000-06:00

Alright, so it sucked to not be at home for Thanksgiving, but definitely not as much as I thought it would. Istanbul is, for lack of a better word, awesome. It's so beautiful, it's got a fascinating history and mix of East and West elements, and in the cold of November it feels and looks as bleak as a Dostoevsky novel. Which is exactly what I expected from Eastern Europe. In short, I loved it.

Tuesday night, Ellen and I left for the airport around midnight. We got to the airport with relative ease, considering it's Cairo, (i.e. our cab only broke down once on the way there) and we were off to Turkey. We got in around 5 AM, and were instantly amazed at how clean the airport was, as well as how many signs they had. It was so easy to find the metro! We got a little lost downtown trying to find our hostel, since the area we were in had literally a billion hostels and hotels. But we found the cleverly named Istanbul Hostel, dropped our stuff in our dorm room, and went out to explore. We were dead tired, but screw sleeping. We mostly stayed around the downtown area, near the Hagia Sophia and the Blue Mosque, which had a great little park separating them. In the park, I found a black stray dog, and of course I had to pet him. (Just so you know, all the strays in Istanbul have tags on their ears, which means the city has taken them in for various shots and de-worming. Just another reason why Cairo sucks in comparison to the rest of the world.) Naturally, since I was the first person to give him some lovin' in quite some time, he followed us around all morning. And throughout the next four days, every time I ran into him, he'd follow me for a good hour. It killed me that I couldn't bring him back to the States.

We waited outside the Blue Mosque for it to open for visitors, and while we were waiting the dog rounded up another dog friend, as well as a cat. So we just sat there outside this incredible mosque, surrounded by strays. Finally the place opened and we went in, sans animals, and admired it for a few minutes. It's huge and beautiful and old, and what more to say? Other than the fact that the combination of the gloomy skies and the bleak beauty of the mosque combined to create the Greatest Picture Ever. But I'll save that for the end of the post, where it can be fully enjoyed. Patience, my friend.

Once Emily and her boyfriend Nathaniel woke up (she had left the day earlier, and he had arrived that same day from the good old USA), they met us at the hostel, and the four of us set out to see the city. We went to the fabled "Grand Bazaar", which was neither grand nor bizarre. I mean, it was huge, but each shop sold the exact same things, at ten times the price you could get them for anywhere else in the city. So most of our time there was spent trying to find the way out.

The next day was Thanksgiving, and by this point Emily's roommate Laura had arrived in our hostel room (while we were sleeping off the previous 48 hours of being awake), and a good number of other AUC students had also arrived in the city. So Emily, Nathaniel and I organized a Thanksgiving dinner (way early, at 4 PM, just like at home, of course) for the 12 American students in Istanbul at a really good restaurant. At 4 we all piled into the restaurant, much to the dismay of the staff, and since their largest tables could only seat eight, we proceeded to push tables together. The waiters stopped us, which resulted in a bit of a fight. We tried to reason with them, saying, "Either you get our business and let us push the tables together, or we go elsewhere," while Emily yelled hilarious things like, "In America, today is a holiday!" They stood their ground, however, and we ended up wimping out and just cramming 12 people onto the 8-person table. Which actually made it more fun and more like Thanksgiving at home. We had a huge, relatively cheap meal, and it was definitely a Thanksgiving dinner to remember. Unfortunately, there wasn't any turkey or gravy or mashed potatoes, but we did have chicken kebabs, hummus, and fried eggplant. Plus instead of apple pie we went down the street and all had some amazing cake. So all in all, it was a fair trade.

Not wanting to end our little makeshift America we had created in Istanbul, Emily, Nathaniel, Laura and myself decided to spend the night escaping to the United States, just for once. So we grabbed some take-out McDonald's and brought it into the theater to watch 30 Days of Night, starring Josh Hartnett. It was a lot of fun, and the movie was actually pretty good.

Could they have maybe made Baby Jesus a little less creepy? Or at least given him a better haircut?

The next day, Laura and I woke up with nothing really planned, so we decided to go to Asia. Why not, right? We went down to the harbor, and just jumped on the ferry we thought crossed the river. Luckily, it did. Fifteen minutes and a trip across the Bosphorous later, we disembarked on Asian soil. It was pretty remarkable that for a dollar we could go from Europe to Asia. To my disappointment, no one was speaking Chinese on the Asian side.

We walked around that part of Istanbul for a couple hours, which didn't have many sights, per se, but therefore was much less touristy, which was a welcome break. Eventually, I decided enough was enough, and it was time to get a haircut. So we scoped out the barber shops, and picked the best-looking one. It was run by what looked like two brothers (they looked alike and wore the same sweater, only one was blue and one was orange) and their dad, who just sat in a chair, reading a newspaper the whole time. The younger brother seated me, and we spent the next fifteen minutes looking through hairstyling magazines, trying to explain what I wanted. We found something sort of close to a normal haircut (it was really, really slim pickings) and the guy set to work. This was my first-ever haircut from a man, as far as I can remember, and it didn't help that this particular man had a European mullet. I wished I knew how to say, "Don't make me look like you," in Turkish. While he did the cutting, the older brother kept looking through the magazines and asking me if I wanted some of the cuts, all of which were horrible. After I turned to Laura for advice about a hundred times, he figured out who was calling the shots, and eventually only showed her the pictures. My life was in her hands.

The haircut took nearly an hour, because the guy was a major perfectionist, which I was completely okay with. Once he was finished, he asked if I wanted a shampoo. I've already gotten a haircut from a man, so why shouldn't I have him wash my head? Next thing I know, he's shoving me face-first into the sink and pouring scalding water over the back of my head, which ran down my face. I screamed and writhed, but he put his hand in the middle of my back and held me down, like the sadist he was. Once he decided I had burned off enough layers of skin, he pulled me up and dried me off. Then he stepped out, and the older brother stepped in.

This guy was a pro. Apparently he is the stylist brother, because he got all his ingredients out and went to town on my head. I've never seen even a brain surgeon so careful about his work. God knows what went into my hair, but I definitely saw him use two kinds of gel and wax. He fashioned a wonderful little faux-hawk for me, and then made these two really strange curving horns out of my hair that curled across my forehead. It's hard to explain, but I'll eventually have a picture to show you what I mean. Finally he was done, and I payed them, thanked them, and left. Laura and I instantly went around the corner, took a few pictures to document the cut, and then fixed it. Unfortunately, she still has all the pictures on her camera, but once she gives them to me, I'll make a photopost or something to show the whole ordeal. We crossed back into Europe and met some friends for a really crazy night that I'd rather not write about here. So stop being so nosy.

The rest of the time wasn't spent doing anything really outrageous - we just saw most of the sights in Istanbul and enjoyed our break from the chaos of Cairo. We've really come to appreciate something as simple as fresh air, so the freezing, clean air of Turkey was an excellent treat.

Eventually we had to return to Cairo, even though none of us really wanted to. It's not that we hate Cairo, it's just that we... kind of hate it. Don't get me wrong, it's an exciting, interesting place, but it's getting a bit wearing to live there for this long. Plus we had a little taste of the Christmas season, and as much as Cairo tries to keep up with the rest of the world in that department, putting a few Christmas trees in a couple stores just ain't doing it for me. However, we have less than three weeks left here, which is rather shocking. I can't believe I'll be going home so soon. I'm extremely excited to get back, but I know once Christmas and New Years wind down and I get back into the swing of things, I'm not going to be able to think about anything other than my next big trip. Speaking of which, we were planning on going to Luxor and Aswan this weekend, but everyone's feeling a bit lukewarm about it now that they've missed so much school and have a lot of make-up work to do. Whereas I missed 14 days, and I have absolutely zero work to do. My classes here are a bit of a joke, and I think I might be in serious trouble when I get back to classes at Madison. Maybe I'll just transfer to AUC for good.

Turkey for Thanksgiving

2007-11-20T08:17:00.000-06:00

I know I just got back from England, but I think I've been in Cairo for far too long, so it's time to take off again. I leave in a few hours for Istanbul, where we will be spending our Thanksgiving. I'd actually rather be at home for the holiday, just because it's definitely one of the best holidays, and my entire family will be getting together to celebrate it without me. But I suppose I can't complain too much, what with being in freaking Istanbul and all.

I'm going to have to do my best not to think about all the fun stuff going on at home, but I know come Thursday I'll be going through some massive homesickness. I love everything about this holiday, from the delicious and insane amounts of food, to seeing all the family together, to all the stupid traditions like making fun of me for that time I accidentally swallowed one of the "I'm thankful for..." pieces of paper my mom baked into the rolls.

I've got a lot to be thankful for this year - it's been definitely the most amazing one of my life. I've always wanted to go to both Japan and Egypt most in the world, and to visit both of them within six months is incredible. I'm thankful that all my travels thus far have been completely safe and gone off without a hitch - or, if there has been a hitch, it's been nothing serious, and easy to laugh off. I'm obviously thankful for my parents, who never make me feel like crap when I have to ask for money (which has been far too often lately - sorry about that), and who support all my decisions, even seemingly-crazy ones like jetting off to Beirut during election month. Thanks for giving me all these awesome opportunities. I'm also thankful for my sisters, who are always hilarious to talk to back home, and who I can't wait to see. They're both graduating this year, so congratulations to both of them, even though that means they'll both totally be stealing my thunder when I get home.

Lets get even sappier, shall we? I'm thankful for my extended family, who I haven't seen in nearly a year since I'm always gone, but who I'm very excited to see once I get home. I'm also thankful for friends - my old ones, for not hating me for being able to do all these amazing things, and for at least faking interest in the stories of my adventures; and my new ones, for making the four months in Egypt among the best months of my whole life.

I'm also thankful for Jesus, because Thanksgiving never would have existed if he hadn't risen from the dead and defeated the Maccabees. At least, I think that's what we eat turkey to celebrate.

Have a good Thanksgiving, ya'll.

When Will You Kids Learn That There's Semen On Everything?

2007-11-19T06:06:00.000-06:00

Was that ever a good weekend, or what? Yes, I have returned from my extended weekend in England with the family, and it was everything I had hoped. Fun family times, clean air, good food and drink, and most importantly - Christmas!

On Wednesday, I got up, packed, and brought my duffel bag to class, where I had to take a midterm before I left. I thought security would have a problem with my big duffel bag coming through the metal detectors, but all they did was ask, "What in that?" and when I said, "Clothes," they just let me right in. Perfect, now I can plant all the bombs I brought to school! Anyway, I obviously aced the midterm (just like last time, all the Egyptians had to re-do their tests because none of them could grasp the incredibly difficult concept of using pencil rather than pen on Scantron tests).

I then said goodbye to Allyson, and hopped in a cab for the airport, enjoying my last thirty minutes during the drive of breathing 90% fumes and 10% oxygen. I had a bit of an Amazing Race moment - there are two totally separate airports that serve Cairo - Airport 1 is mostly domestic but with some international, and Airport 2 is mostly international but with some domestic. Confusing, right? Now, the obvious choice would be to go to Airport 2, since it's mostly international and chances are the flight to London would be leaving from there. But when the cab driver asked, "Which airport?" I went with my gut feeling and risked it all with Airport 1. I'll spare you the suspense and tell you that I was correct, which made me feel great all weekend. Especially since when I got to the airport and asked the guy at the information desk where the BMI counters were, he responded with, "Airport 2," but my gut still told me it was at Airport 1, so I walked past him and found the BMI desks on my own. But the fun of Cairo didn't stop there - you have to go through security just to get to the check-in desks, so when I tried to go through, I was forcibly shoved back through the metal detector, and one of the guards took my passport and left me standing there. I watched him talking to about three different BMI agents for nearly five minutes, with me holding up the entire line behind me. Finally, he came back, gave me my passport, and let me through. From this point on, I had a personal escort until I actually got to my gate.

Anyway, I eventually arrived in Heathrow, and set off on my series of three trains to get to the town of Eltham. But since I can't travel without having the most ridiculous things happen (usually through my own fault), I had to go to the bathroom. Terribly. The food on the plane did a number on my digestive system. So for all three trains, I'd arrive at the station telling myself, "This is where we'll find a bathroom," but every time the train was just pulling in, so I'd jump on the train and say, "Okay, at the next station." This continued for nearly two hours. On the final train, I literally thought I was going to shit my pants. I came within seconds of biting off my coke nail. That's how bad it was. I even
thought about taking the little emergency escape hammer, shattering the window, sticking my ass out, and just going out the side of the train. But I reached Eltham station, and ran down to find a bathroom. Of course, the first bathrooms I encountered had massive padlocks on them, and the second ones were locked as well. My dad had also told me there would be cabs out front of the station, but there was nothing. I was seriously panicking at this moment. I asked some dude sitting behind a window if there were any bathrooms, and I think he said no, but I wasn't really listening. So I just asked for a cab, and he typed something into his computer, and a cab magically appeared from god knows where. It was awesome. I got in the cab, rode for ten excruciating minutes to the hotel, where luckily my parents were standing outside of, about to get into the car and drive to find me. I was extremely rude and gave them half-assed hugs, told them to pay for my cab, and ran into the hotel, right past Nikki and Sara, and into the bathroom. Once my business was finished, I managed to greet the family properly, but the damage had already been done. We will never be a family ever again.

That night was most excellent. They were all exhausted and went almost immediately to sleep, and even though I thought I wasn't too tired, I passed out pretty quickly after hitting my (outrageously comfortable) bed. I spent about five minutes trying to stifle my hysterical laughs over how absolutely silent it was out there. No one was shouting, no cars were honking, and there literally was not a sound to be heard, as hard as my ears were trying to find something. After three months of non-stop noise, this was an incredible shock to my system, and I actually got a headache from the lack of noise. It was wonderful.

This is what the rental company tried to saddle five of us and our luggage with. Seriously.

The next morning, we took off in our little rental van for the town of Bath, to see a university for Sara. By this point, she had already pretty much given up on the idea of going to school in England, instead focusing on Seattle, but my dad needed to trick himself into thinking all the money he spent on this trip had a point, so we went to all the previously planned schools, no matter how much everyone begged to skip them. The drive was pretty fun, since the English countryside is remarkably beautiful when it's all frosted over in the morning, and since my dad was still trying to figure out how to drive on the wrong side of the road. Since I hadn't eaten anything since that awful BMI meal (now I know where they got the first two letters of the airline's name), we stopped for breakfast at a... Costa. Wonderful. We eat lunch at Costa about three times a week back in Cairo. But they had different kinds of sandwiches than stupid Egypt, and I ended up eating half of my mom's turkey, gravy, and cranberry sauce monstrosity, which was kind of disgusting, but that's all the Thanksgiving I'll be getting this year, so I made myself enjoy it.

We got to Bath with only a little difficulty - I told my dad to make one stupid wrong turn, and all of the sudden I was labeled as the family idiot who can't be trusted with the maps anymore - and I think all of us fell in love with the town. It was not too small, not too old, not too modern, and for me at least it was the first time I really felt like it was the beginning of the Christmas season, which everyone knows is the best time of year. The college was very nice, too. I don't really remember any of it, but who cares, right? The point is, it's Sara's number one choice in England, which is excellent.

We then did some touristy things, like seeing the church were the first king of all of England was crowned, and the nearby Roman baths. My family was amazed at all of it, but I'm going to have to be a snob and say that it can't compare to the stuff I saw in Lebanon. It all felt really touristy and fake. The baths were filled with hot water, which made it look more like it would have back when they were in use, but also made it all look even faker. Plus they had an actor in a toga shuffling in a neverending circle around the main bath, occasionally stopping to ask Minerva for blessings on "Kevin and Erin from Australia," and other such tourists. He didn't ask for any blessings for us, but I think that's because we were snickering at him the whole time.

After that, we just embraced our O'Neill side and went from pub to pub. I was ecstatic when we got nachos at one pub, and even though they were simply Doritos covered in cheese, thrown in the microwave for 15 seconds, and covered in really crappy salsa, guacamole, and sour cream, I could not stop talking about how amazing the nachos were. Apparently Cairo isn't known for its Mexican. Neither is England, but at least they make an effort. When we returned to the hotel that night, we had a conversation about the blankets in the hotel, which ended with my mom's now-famous titular line to this post.

The next morning we got out of Bath much more easily than we got in, and headed to Winchester to see the university there. On the way, we stopped at Stonehenge, which was pretty cool. It's literally on the side of a highway, and just comes up out of nowhere. You can no longer actually go up and touch it, and they kept us at a pretty far distance the whole time, but it was still really cool to see that place. Unfortunately, Egypt has ruined me forever, because once I heard it was a mere 6000 years old, I just scoffed and lost interest in it. Okay, that was a joke. It was actually amazing to see one of the only monuments in the world that comes anywhere close to the age of the pyramids. Perhaps my favorite part of the whole thing was all the made-up information they provided us with, since no one really knows a thing about who built it, why they did it, or what purpose it served. But that didn't stop them from providing us with a painted reenactment of the construction of Stonehenge, complete with honest-to-god cavemen in loin cloths. I was shocked they didn't include the dinosaurs they harnessed to haul the stones, a la the Flinstones.

The University of Winchester was lame. The town was incredibly small and boring, and the same went for the school. Plus all the buildings were made in this awful modernist style that just looked horrible next to all these old houses. Smell ya later, Winchester.

We returned to London and, of course, pub crawled. Eventually Nikki and I talked the family into going to a Japanese restaurant so I could get my sushi fix, and even though they griped about having to go there, they all admitted how amazing the food was. Next summer: Gottleib Family Japanese Road Trip!

That night, Katie and Laura planned on taking Nikki and I out with some of their friends, so Katie arranged that we would meet at 9:15 in front of the theater for the Queen musical. Insert gay joke here. But Nikki only started getting ready at 9, so out of fear that we'd be late, I sent Katie a text message apologizing in advance for being late. But then we only got there two minutes late, and Katie was nowhere to be found. So we waited. For half an hour. At that point, we kind of suspected they had already gone somewhere since I said I'd be late, but I didn't want to text her and nag her if she was just running even later than we were. So I didn't. We stood there freezing for another fifteen minutes, and I finally gave in and texted Katie, who, it turns out, was literally around the corner in a bar with everyone. She apologized a million times for a mistake that was totally my fault, but then made sure to make fun of me all night for it. Which I wasn't too upset about, because the more time she spent retelling the story of me standing and freezing while waiting for her, the less time she would spend retelling the story of when I screamed out for my mom while I was sleeping in Kyoto.

The entire night was way too much fun. It was definitely one of my favorite moments of study abroad, getting to see Katie. She kept saying, "I can't believe you're here!" throughout the night, and we both kept remarking on how crazy it is that she's from England, I'm from the United States, we met in Japan, and I'm visiting her in London while I'm going to school in Cairo. It just didn't seem real. The night was both a testament to how well we get along together and to how much traveling makes you form incredibly close friendships in such a short amount of time. I mean, we had only ever seen each other for five days out of our entire lives, but we felt like old friends. I can't even imagine what it's going to be like separating from my friends in Cairo for a while and then getting back together with them later in life. I think we all may need to live together forever like those stupid Friends.

Anyway, we went to various bars in the thankfully less touristy areas, and had a blast. All of Katie's friends were so much fun, so hopefully they'll be able to come to the States eventually. We had to meet up with Laura who was out with her "new fancy man," and since Laura is the worst at getting around EVER, it took forever to find where she was. At one point, she texted to Katie, "Just ask someone where The Big Chill is. Preferably a girl." But it's for things like that that we love Laura, so it was all okay. Of course, she did focus a little too much on her fancy man, when she had claimed she was coming to London to see Katie and I, but he was a very nice guy, so I can't fault her.

When Nikki and I returned around 3 AM, I used my cell phone to try to see my way through the dark to my bed, and since my mom is like a mental patient when she's sleeping, she saw the light and, still half-asleep, started muttering, "Why do you have a thing like that? It's hot in here. Oh, I thought you had a miner's hat. Take your miner's hat and see how how it is in here." The three of us then lay in the dark laughing for several minutes, much to Sara's annoyance.

For our last day in England, Nikki and I just wandered the city for a bit while the family went to see one final university. We then met up and got some incredible food in a pub that opened under Elizabeth I's (for those of you confused by numbers, that would be Cate Blanchett, not Helen Mirren) reign. It was all made by this feisty old woman - presumably the pub has been in her family since it opened, but we were all too intimidated to ask her - who managed to cook all the food in the two microwaves behind the bar while simultaneously yelling at all the slow helpers who worked there. It was very entertaining.

We then set off to see some strange collections. First was this museum that contained all sorts of horrible things collected by some mad scientist or something. The place was two floors, and absolutely packed with jars of freaks of nature, thousands of dissected body parts, examples of surgeries gone wrong or just disgusting surgeries gone right, and some horrible deformities. There was the enlarged skull of some poor bastard, which looked about as heavy as my entire body, and the skeleton of some "Irish Giant", who was over seven feet tall. It was so cool at first, but after seeing hundreds of twisted spines and faces ravaged by syphilis, we all left feeling pretty queasy. After that, we went to the British Library to see their collection of some rare crap, which was amazing. Unfortunately, we got there only twenty minutes before it closed, so we couldn't spend too much time admiring everything they had, which included: Shakespeare's first folio, the original handwritten drafts of Alice in Wonderland and Jane Eyre, three of the only surviving copies of the Magna Carta, original works by Mozart, Wagner and Bach, ancient Buddhist texts, Sir Thomas More's final letter to Henry VIII in which he pleads for his life, and an awesome section that had the original handwritten verses to many Beatles songs like Hard Day's Night and Michelle. On one of them, John had drawn a hilarious caricature of himself, and on the bottom of another, he had pretended to grade it like a teacher and wrote, "3/10. See me." Very cool stuff, but I don't remember any of it since we were rushed out of there so quickly.

Our last night as a family until late December, Nikki decided to blow us off and go see the Lord of the Rings musical. Which I'm sure was awesome. We just ate some awesome Italian food (the dessert was one of the best desserts of all time) and didn't do anything too exciting.

The next morning, I got up before everyone, packed, said goodbye, and left at 6 to catch the Tube to Heathrow. Of course it was a Sunday, and the Tube wouldn't open until seven. So i went back up to the room, and we tried to get me a cab to Paddington so I could take a train there, but by the time it all was being finalized, it was almost seven, so I just went back up to the room and waited. I then said goodbye for the third time in one hour, and went down to catch the first train to Heathrow. As I waited, I was speaking Spanish to this guy from Bolivia, and as I was saying goodbye to him, who do I see but my dad, running down the escalators! He brought me the printout of my flight confirmation, and I had to say goodbye for a fourth time. These people just do NOT want me to go.

There were some delays along the way and some added stops to make up for other train lines that weren't running, so we got to Heathrow about fifteen minutes late, leaving me only an hour to get to my plane before it took off. There wasn't a line at the self-check-in desks, but there was a nearly hour-long line for the desks where we check our baggage. Somehow I got incredibly lucky, because they opened a second row of desks, and an employee grabbed me and started the second line with me in front. So I checked in within about five minutes. It was amazing. Security was a breeze, too, so I made it to the gate with nearly half an hour to spare, which enabled me to watch the BBC's morning-after recap of last night's major soccer events. (For those of you not keeping up, Israel barely beat Russia, keeping England in the running. It was very exciting.)

The plane ride was semi-uneventful, except the way-too-attractive British couple next to me made me stand up about every half hour so one of them could get out to go to the bathroom. Plus we were in the second-to-last row, and there was a line for the bathrooms literally the entire five hours. So I constantly had someone standing directly next to me, and when someone would come out of the bathroom and have to squeeze by, the person would shove either their ass or genitals in my face to try to let the other person past. It was really miserable. About an hour into the flight, as well, we must have hit an air pocket, which caused an enormous jolt that actually made some people fly up to the ceiling. Just watch the crash footage from the first episode of Lost, and it was exactly like that, minus the plane splitting in half. It actually stunned the plane into a panicked silence for a couple minutes. But, apparently, we survived.

So now I'm back in Cairo for another 24 hours or so, before I take off again for Istanbul. If I had it my way, I'd be leaving now. Cairo just seems like hell compared to England, and I would really like to get back to real civilization, which I hear Istanbul has. But it's worse for poor Beckett, who came back on Friday and more or less wants to go back to Wisconsin. He said it was awful getting readjusted to Egypt. That's alright, we're only here for four weeks from today, and you bet I'm going to enjoy every minute. Because once I get home and Christmas is over, I'm going to be dying to get back to the excitement of Egypt. But that's too much to think about right now. I suppose I should go to class now, huh? (Due to sleeping through my first class and other classes being canceled, I only have one class to go to today. Which means by the time I get back from Istanbul, I will have only been to one class in two weeks. I don't know why I say I don't like AUC - it's the best school ever!)

Definitely not doing work.

2007-11-13T06:17:00.000-06:00

Greetings from the Egyptian Museum! I'm supposed to be working, but screw that. The page I'm supposed to be entering into this database is literally the most boring thing on the planet.

I don't really have anything to report. Had the most boring weekend thus far in Cairo, since Beckett's gone and I was all alone in my big, overly-fancy apartment. It didn't help that the power went out almost every night.

I leave for England in 24 hours. Finally! The rest of the family is already there, but I think we all know they won't have any fun until I show up. My dad gave me extremely detailed directions as to how to get from Heathrow to their hotel, because apparently it's really hard to get around English-speaking countries. Please, Jay. I've been to Beirut. (I'm going to be one of those people when I get home, who start every other sentence with, "When I was in Egypt...")

I also just bought my tickets for Istanbul. The schedule for these whirlwind two weeks is this: clean the apartment tonight with Emily and Allyson for Beckett's glorious return, take a midterm tomorrow morning, hop in a cab right after class and go right to the airport, fly to England, have the best time ever, return to Cairo on Sunday, go to some classes on Monday (I have to at least pretend I go to school once in a while), eat dinner with Allyson's family and possibly Beckett's family on Monday night, and then jump back on a plane on Tuesday for Istanbul. So I won't really get to rest until Sunday the 25th, and that will only be for three days at most, since we'll be leaving later that week for Luxor and Aswan. And then probably Jordan the weekend after. And then Wisconsin. All our plans are finally coming to fruition, and it's wonderful. The final five weeks are really going to fly by incredibly fast, I think, which is very bittersweet. But we'll cross that bridge when we come to it.

Anyway, I'm for sure meeting up with Laura and Katie (see my posts from Kyoto, Japan) in London probably Friday night for a smashing good time. They're already coaching me on getting rid of embarrassing Americanisms. I don't have a "cell phone", I have a "mobile"! And I certainly don't ride trains, but you bet your ass I "take" them. What a goofy country.

Very, very excited for tomorrow. Maybe I'll even study for my midterm! Probably not, though. (An indication of how easy AUC is: the last midterm for this class, I literally didn't touch my notebook until the five minutes before the test started. I got an A-. Plus I've got the professor in my pocket. We're allowed three excused absences before our grades drop, and I was planning on using my third and final absence for the day I was missing when I took off for Istanbul. But I ended up sleeping through the class last week after I stayed up all night with Beckett. So I approached the professor after class to ask her to possibly waive that absence due to circumstances beyond my control. I was nervous as hell, because she's a massive bitch during class, yelling at all the Egyptian students who come in late or talk on their phones while she's teaching or do other assorted things during class I thought only actually ever occurred within the Clueless universe. But she cut me off before I could even explain the situation, and surprised me by knowing my name. "Daniel, don't worry about it. The three-absence rule isn't concrete for you." So... I love this woman. Am I still writing in parentheses? How embarrassing.)

Maybe I'll go back to work. Or maybe I'll just go home. Whatever, I do what I want. Ya'll can't stop me!

2007-11-07T16:18:00.000-06:00

When I left for the Middle East, everyone back home was worried that something would happen to me. As Americans who haven't traveled to the area, when someone heard the words "Middle East", images of the Iraq/Afghanistan wars flashed in their heads, and they naturally assumed everywhere was like that. Of course, the majority of the area is perfectly safe, and I've never once felt in danger. The thing none of us thought about was the idea that when one of us returned home from study abroad, a loved one wouldn't be there waiting for us.

Unfortunately, Beckett's step-sister passed away two days ago. He flew home that night to be with his family, and he'll stay in Madison until next Wednesday. It killed me as his roommate and closest friend out here to see this happen to him, especially since he got the news within an hour after we finished talking about how incredibly close his family is, even though they're not all blood-related.

We're all a little shell-shocked as well here. I don't think it really entered any of our minds that someone could just be gone when we get home. In fact, we've all made little jokes about how we wish "life would just stop" at home when we go away, based on the jealousy we feel from seeing Facebook pictures show up with all our friends together, having fun without us. But we never really thought that life for anyone would really just stop.

Fortunately Beckett's family is very close, and I know they'll all get through this with each other. He had some difficulty getting out of here so last-minute, but I'm glad he did and that he could rush back home almost immediately. There's not much more you can do when something this unexpected happens - you just pick up the pieces as best you can, and go on. I told both my sisters how much they mean to me, and I'm looking forward to enjoying every minute I spend with my family in London next week, because, well, you never know what's going to happen.

Go tell your friends and family you love them. Salaam.

Whatever

2007-11-03T03:13:00.000-06:00

Wow. I haven't posted in three weeks. Will you accept my apology? Can we ever be friends again? Hopefully someone's still checking this thing (I know you'll never give up on me, Sarah Pagel). I wish I could say I've been really busy, but I haven't done that much. I suppose we've all just been enjoying each other's company here. We still have six weeks left, but we've all gotten into the mindset that we're going home soon (hence the massive pile of unwashed, moldy dishes in our sink), so we're all getting a little depressed that soon we won't be seeing each other every day. It'll be very weird.

Last weekend, Beckett, Allyson, and I hopped on a train for Alexandria, since one of our classes would be taking a field trip there the next day, and the professor said we could meet up with them in the city and go to the museum and library with the class, so we wouldn't have to pay admission ourselves. For a first-class train ticket to Alexandria (a nearly three-hour trip), it was about $6. Unbelievable, this country. We got in a really crazy fight with this guy who was furious that he and I had the same seat assignment, and even though I sat down in the seat first, he kept screaming in Arabic at Beckett to make me move. Eventually a really nice woman who spoke English switched seats to appease the dude, because he had some sort of ridiculous standard for how his train seats should be, and all the other open seats just weren't doing it for him. Even though he couldn't understand English, I spent much of the ride loudly proclaiming that my seat was the most comfortable one on the train.

In Alexandria, we didn't really do much. We got off at the wrong train station, since everyone else was getting off, and then decided to walk to the hotel, trusting in Lonely Planet's map. If you've read even one of my Japan entries, you'd know what a horrible mistake this was. What looked like a short, ten minute walk, turned into an over five-mile hike along the Mediterranean coast. Luckily, it wasn't that hot, so it was actually not to bad of a walk. Our hotel was pretty nice for being $7 a night, and it even included breakfast. Plus the place was completely empty, so Beckett and I were able to play five games of pool in the really creepy lounge without being interrupted once! I won every game, naturally. We spent the night literally going from seafood restaurant to seafood restaurant, eating a crazy amount of marine life. For what I've heard about Alexandria's seafood, I was rather disappointed. With the exception of the calamari (probably best I've ever had), the crab and fish I had were sorely lacking in flavor. Maybe it's a bad time of year.

Halloween was sort of a disappointment, as well. I decided I had only one costume option - a mummy. Really, the only place easier to choose a cliche Halloween costume is Transylvania. The one problem is that Egyptian toilet paper is absolutely the worst. Granted, I maybe should have sprung for some better-quality paper, but I don't think it would matter here. Kimberly-Clark needs to tap into this market, Dad. The paper kept ripping, and it didn't help that Beckett is in Amsterdam for the weekend, so I had to wrap myself. I eventually grabbed seven rolls of toilet paper, and hopped in the elevator to go down to my friend Alfred's apartment to ask for some help. Of course, there was some guy in the elevator, which made the entire ride really awkward, what with my body being half-covered by toilet paper and all. Alfred, his roommate James (who looks a lot like Jim from The Office, so naturally he went as Three-Hole-Punch Jim), and four girls were all getting in their costumes, and for some reason James was the one that started wrapping me, rather than any of the four girls. And he decided to wrap my thighs. Needless to say, James and I are very close now. Eventually Neve and Meg took over for the pelvic region, saving James and I from a very awkward night.

The toilet paper barely stayed on during the cab ride, and by the time we got to the AUC Halloween party, I was almost completely uncovered. Luckily, the party was even worse than my costume. We stayed for about 20 minutes (we all only went for the promised free candy, which was literally 10 pieces - thanks, AUC!), and then took off back to Alfred and James'. By that point, the only toilet paper left had all fallen down my legs to my ankles, so I looked like I was sporting some awesome leg-warmers rather than any sort of costume.

Next weekend, Beckett, Alfred, myself, and anyone else who decides to come along, will be jumping on a bus to Israel. It's about a five-hour drive to the border, at which point we have to get out and walk across the border, since the bus drivers will not cross into Israel. The hardest part will be getting through the border - we've heard stories of kids seeing both sunrise and sunset sitting at the border - but I think this is the one time during this trip it'll actually benefit me to say, "I'm Jewish!" If we're stuck crossing the border for most of our weekend and we don't see much, at least we'll have had an adventure.

And the weekend after that, I'll be in England for a Gottleib Family Road Trip! I'm dying to just fast-forward to November 14th, to see my family and breathe clean air again. Jury's still out on which one I'm more excited for.

I promise I'll stop slacking on updating this thing. Although it's actually starting to get a little difficult to type with my coke nail. Today's the three week anniversary, and it's already getting pretty long. Only 49 weeks left to go!

Only in Egypt...

2007-10-21T11:42:00.000-06:00

...do you wake up to find outside your front door there was a sand and brick cascade during the night.

And, one more picture from Lebanon. My favorite ad campaign ever. If only they had remembered to put their product somewhere on the sign as well.

Beirutiful

2007-10-17T10:36:00.000-06:00

Well, I'm back safe from Lebanon. And we didn't even get to see one lousy assassination! The trip was amazing though - probably my favorite week of study abroad thus far. It was absolute, ridiculous luxury from start to finish, and I'm struggling to find anything that went wrong all week. Let's start at the beginning, I guess.

On Tuesday, Beckett, Allyson, and I boarded a plane to Beirut. Everyone else (all freaking nine of them) would be joining us on Thursday, so for two blissful days it was just three of us. The plane ride was probably the best plane ride of my life (excluding the business class trip from Tokyo to Chicago, of course). Middle East Airlines is awesome. The flight was under one hour, but we still had very comfortable seats, private TVs, and we even got meals! It was amazing. It definitely set the tone for the rest of the week. When we landed, we passed some Lebanese celebrity (seriously, this beatiful woman had a TV camera on her, people all around her, and two massive stacks of luggage with people pushing them for her) and entered the city of Beirut. We hopped in a cab and told him where we were going, but he stopped within about three feet and got out, screaming something. Next thing we know, he's ripping open the trunk, whipping some guy's suitcase in there, and then opening our cab door and shoving this man in next to me. So... I guess we're sharing a cab, then? Turns out our cab driver was on crack or something. He kept ranting and raving in the craziest, high-pitched scream for the entire 30-minute drive. He barely spoke a word of English, but since they speak real Arabic and not the bastardized Egyptian version, Beckett was able to translate most of it. And the guy next to me turned out to be really, really nice. At one point, we drove past a couple tents with Lebanese flags all over them, and he whispered to me, "Hezbollah. Shhhh. Bad." This wouldn't be our first Hezbollah encounter.

After dropping off our newfound friend, we arrived at "Talal's New Hotel," which still has bullet holes in it from the civil war a couple decades ago. New, indeed! We had read some reviews online that said Talal has attempted to molest several girls who stayed there, but at $7 a night he could molest me all he wanted! We were a bit wary about meeting him, and at first he was pretty creepy. He instantly started snapping at us, but once we got settled in our rooms, he gave us all free waters, and from that point on he was incredibly nice. And not once did he rape anyone! The hotel was actually really nice for $7. We shared one bathroom with about 20 people, however, which isn't such good news in the Middle East. One woman I only saw going in and out of the bathroom - and I saw her seven times the first day.

We threw our stuff in our room, took a little breather, and then set out to explore Beirut, not knowing what in the least to expect. We wandered into this area near the downtown, which was incredibly creepy. It was totally destroyed in the civil war and was recently totally rebuilt, so it's impeccably clean and European. It looks exactly like a part of Disneyland. Not only that, but it was completely devoid of people. We would eventually come to see that all of Beirut was frighteningly empty, but no one had a good explanation as to why. So we stood there, in the middle of this empty European courtyard, not knowing what to do. We picked a sidestreet, and immediately came upon a massive wall of barbed wire. Okay, dead end. We picked another road, and ran into several soldiers (unlike Cairo, these guys' rifles are most definitely loaded) and a series of roadblocks. We were allowed to walk through unbothered, but it was really unsettling. The problem is that this Disneyland area is directly next to all the governmental buildings, so it's unbelievably beefed up with security. Every once in a while soldiers would come up to us and check our bags at random in the middle of the street, and there were cement blocks, barbed wire, hundreds of soldiers, and even a couple tanks, all around the area. We likened the whole experience to the movie 28 Weeks Later - it felt as if Beirut had been wiped out by a zombie attack, and we were now among the first people to resettle the city under military protection. That's how strange it was. But eventually we got used to it.

We moved down to the considerably less-creepy Mediterranean coast, and sat and had drinks on a small pier at sundown. It was awesome. But our stomachs started rumbling, so we quickly set off to find our main goal for the night - sushi. We had all been craving sushi for the past two months, since we don't really trust the raw fish in Cairo, and since I hadn't had a good piece of sushi since the Tokyo fish market, I was going through some severe withdrawal. After about half an hour of wandering due to Lonely Planet's awful, awful maps (see every single one of my Japan entries...) we found the restaurant. What followed were the greatest two hours of my life. This restaurant was listed in Paris Vogue's "100 Best Restaurants in the World", and while I don't rely on Paris Vogue for any information whatsoever, I have to agree. The sushi beat many places in Japan, the service was awesome, and, of course, I was accompanied by two of the best people. Plus their fried ice cream was fantastic.

The next morning, we hired a private car (it sounds way pricier than it really was) to drive us down to the southern parts of Lebanon. See, Lebanon is incredibly tiny, so even the furthest attractions from Beirut are at most only an hour and a half drive. The driver didn't speak much Arabic, but was fluent in French, which Beckett also happens to be, since he lived there for a year. So we got along wonderfully with the driver, Beckett translating for all of us. On the way to Tyre (pronounced "Soor" for some reason), we stopped at the city of Sidon for about an hour. We saw an old crusader castle, which was kind of cool, and then wandered around a nearby market, where we saw all sorts of crazy things like decapitated goats and puddles of blood and stuff. At the end of the market was the "soap museum", so - why not? - we went in. The place was actually kind of cool. We got to see how soap was made. I swear it was interesting! Beckett and Allyson bought some soap, since they hadn't brought any along with.

Allyson can't believe all the soap.

We then drove on to Tyre. Our driver had to get back to Beirut to get his car fixed for whatever reason, so he knocked $10 off what we originally agreed to pay, and pointed out the bus station to us. We then spent about an hour wandering around these unbelievable Roman ruins. At first, it was just a massive Roman graveyard that was pretty much in ruins. But upon further examination (and climbing over barriers and whatnot) we discovered some awesome stuff. Most of the tombs were still filled with Roman bones, which blew our minds. Some were really piled high. We also found a couple small, hidden mosaics, and some really cool carvings and writings. The place was enormous, and just when we thought we were getting to the end of it, we turned a corner, and suddenly we were standing in an enormous Roman stadium. It was completely shocking, and we were stunned into silence for a second. We climbed all over the seating and explored the corridors below the stands, and loved every second of it. It was probably one of the coolest things I've ever seen. When we were done, since we had nothing to do for the rest of the day, we walked down to the beach, which sounds so simple. We had to walk past huge military encampments with all sorts of guards and tanks and barbed wire and towers with huge guns. But we never once felt threatened - it's just not something you see every day. Once we got to the Mediterranean, we found an awesome, deserted hotel, where we sat on the beach and had a late lunch. So far, two perfect days.

But the day wasn't quite over. When we returned to the hotel, we discovered our friends Oskar, Katie, and Tim had checked in, so the six of us decided to go out for dinner. We went to this place we had read about that offered 15-course meals for $35, as well as an open bar. Seriously. When we showed up, the place was practically deserted, so our awesome waiter Sleiman knocked $5 off the price for us. As if we weren't going to stay in the first place! So for the next two-plus hours, we ate piles and piles of delicious food that never seemed like it would end, and drank normally very high-priced wine. We definitely got our money's worth, especially since I kept asking for seconds on everything, which Sleiman would always kindly oblige. He then tipped us off to the best places around town, told us who to talk to to make sure we get the best service, and tried to return some of our enormous tip. What a classy guy.

The next day, I woke up sick. Perhaps I had a little too much meat? Well, shpuking or not, I had no time to stop, so the six of us set out to explore Beirut until the other six arrived. We were actually semi-dreading doubling the amount of people with us. All we managed to do in these five hours were eat some crepes and see the campus of the American University in Beirut, which left us extremely jealous and wondering why we didn't study abroad there instead. When we arrived back at the hotel, Emily, Megan, Elizabeth, Laura, Graham, and Catherine had arrived, thereby doubling our group size for the rest of the trip. Fantastic.

The following day we hired a minibus, since 12 of us would no longer fit in a private car. The driver was really nice, but only spoke this really strange mixture of Arabic and Spanish, which meant that it took both Beckett and I to translate every other word to figure out what he was saying. We couldn't figure out where he was from that he would speak this crazy blend of languages, since he didn't understand, "Where are you from?" in either Spanish or Arabic. The plan was to go wine-tasting, but when we arrived at the vineyards, we learned that nothing was open since it was the last day of Ramadan. So we continued on to the second part of our day, the ruins at Baalbek. These ruins are listed as among the best Roman ruins in the world, but not many people ever come to Lebanon to see them, so we were really excited. And they were incredible. It was several massive temple complexes, with thousands of giant pieces of carved statues, inscriptions, and paintings all scattered around the ground. One of the temples, the temple dedicated to Bacchus, was still almost completely standing, and it was breathtaking in its massiveness. There was only one problem: Baalbek is in the homeland of Hezbollah. And since it was the last day of Ramadan, things were a bit wild. First, we heard the call to prayer broadcast around the city. Okay, nothing new here. Then the call to prayer turned into some guy screaming in Arabic, which Beckett was able to understand a few words here and there to get the gist - most of what he was saying was stuff about America. And he wasn't screaming because he loves us. Then the gunfire started. They weren't shooting at anyone in particular, just up in the air to celebrate, but still. Our driver warned us that almost everyone in the city is Hezbollah, so we should keep our eyes down and say we were from Canada, but we were not expecting this. For the next hour as we explored the temple, it sounded like outside the complex was a war zone. The sound of AK-47s firing into the air was really nerve-wracking, and once the noise started getting much louder and nearer, we decided it was time to move along. But the temple was really amazing. On our way out, we passed two kids running around playing with what looked like real handguns but were probably just filled with BBs. Although, really, I wouldn't be surprised if they weren't.

On the way back, our driver found a vineyard that was open, so we did a little bit of wine-tasting. 12 college kids know nothing of wine-tasting, so we mostly just got some sips of free wine and then wandered around the building. It was up in the hills, which were absolutely beautiful and reminded me a lot of Tuscany. For the first time in literally two months, we weren't surrounded by noise. No honking horns, no screaming, no Amr Diab blasting from every radio and stereo. It was absolute silence, and I enjoyed every second of it. When we returned, we went back to the sushi restaurant, since it was Catherine's birthday and that's what she wanted (I may have influenced her decision a bit by stressing how great the fried ice cream was). Both our waitress from the other night and the owner of the restaurant remembered Beckett, Allyson, and myself, which made us feel pathetic and wealthy at the same time.

The next day, we decided not to hire a private anything and try out the bus station right down the street. It was actually shockingly easy. All we did was walk up to the bus station, and suddenly we had 30 people around us, trying to pull us onto their buses. So we walked up to the first bus, said, "Jaina Grotto?" and he said, "Yes! Yes!" while the other bus drivers also yelled, "Yes! Yes!" They really, really wanted us Americans to get on. So we played the drivers off of each other until we got a ride for 1000 pounds - 67 American cents. The Jaina Grotto, by the way, is the most popular attraction Lebanon. It's this massive cave with some incredibly impressive stalagmites and stalagtites. It was really cool, but compared to the ruins we had been seeing the past few days, it was kind of bland. The whole place was pretty entertaining, though. With the price of our tickets, a ride on the gondolas up the hill was included, so we jumped in the carriages, expecting a long, beautifully scenic ride through the Lebanese hillside. Instead the entire ride took about three minutes. The entire ride was about 100 feet long. It saved us from maybe a five minute walk. Naturally, we milked every second of our pathetic little ride.

Our penultimate day was spent in the town of Byblos, the oldest consistently-inhabited city in the world. We explored some more ruins, which couldn't compare with those at Baalbek and Tyre, but were still pretty cool. Since the city has constantly been lived in, there were Roman ruins on top of ancient Egyptian ruins, which were all in the shadow of a massive Crusader castle. The park was enormous, but we all got pretty antsy within an hour, since we could see a really nice beach and we had all brought our bathing suits. On our way out, we noticed every single kid in the city running around with these sticks of wood. We were making fun of them, but then we found the store where they were sold. Beckett and I started having a sword fight with the sticks, and suddenly the fun of the sticks was revealed to us. So we instantly bought two. For the next three days, we were inseperable from our sticks. We tapped them on walls as we walked, had swordfights with them, turned off light switches with them, and even snuck them on board the plane on the way home. Believe, me a long piece of wood with some leather wrapped around one end with a thumbtack stuck in it is much more entertaining than it sounds.

The rest of the day was spent at the beach. It was part of this country club/hotel, who didn't mind us using their beach chairs. Since it was a country club, the place was filled with really beautiful people, all of them filthy rich. They all had trophy children, but the funniest part was that they all had a Filipino nanny. Every single one. So we were surrounded by beautiful Lebanese people, beautiful children, and Asian nannies. But everyone was really interested in us, especially a woman from Ohio who had married a Lebanese man and now lived there. She couldn't believe American college students would take a vacation to Lebanon. The place also served some amazing iced tea and delicious food - right down from the salad to the calamari to the strawberry cheesecake (the best I've ever had in my life). Once again, it was ridiculously luxurious, especially considering the fact that it was a Monday evening, so we knew at that moment all our friends back home were waking up to go to class. Suckers!

Our last full day, everyone that came late wanted to see Tyre since we had been talking it up (perhaps a bit intentionally to get them to go away for a while), so Beckett, Allyson, Elizabeth and myself hopped back on a bus to Byblos. We spent the entire day at the beach. It was the greatest day ever. All we did was swam, played in the sand, ate delicious food, napped in the sun, and watched beautiful people. We stayed to watch the sun set over the Mediterranean, and then had some dessert before returning home. Beckett ordered a fruit bowl, which he took to mean a fruit salad but was in fact a giant plate stacked with four whole bananas, five whole apples, three kiwis, two mangos, and various other unsliced fruits. I couldn't decide between the strawberry cheesecake and the banana split, so I just got both. See how hard study abroad is?!

The next morning, we settled our bill with Talal (under $50 for a seven night stay, internet access, and many 2-liter bottles of water), jumped in two cabs, and headed back to the airport. It was no trouble getting out of Lebanon or back into Egypt, thereby completing our flawless trip. I didn't even get sunburned from lying on the beach all day, for the first time in my life. To tell the truth, we were kind of dreading our return to Egypt, since Lebanon was such an Eden. And the second we got back, we remembered what we had left behind. It took nearly half an hour to get out of the airport parking lot, since our taxi drivers kept getting stopped by corrupt cops (as if there's any other kind here) demanding bribes. When the taxi drivers refused to pay the ridiculously high bribes, they were denied exit with passengers, so we were tossed on the side of the road. Ah, Egypt. Good to be back.

One last thing:

Everyone in the Middle East has a coke nail. You know, where their pinky nail is half an inch or longer, the better to cut coke with. So one night, one thing led to another, and long story short, I now have to grow a coke nail for an entire year on my left-hand pinky finger. If I do, I will get $365. Five people are chipping in, and we all signed a written contract. The experiment ends October 13th, 2008. Here's where we're at right now:

Mentally Iftarded

2007-10-07T10:47:00.000-06:00

I feel like I'm doing this too much, but: I apologize for not posting anything. It's been a week since I wrote anything, and so much has happened. The other night especially inspired me to write it all down. But we'll get to that. Warning: this post is obnoxiously long.

First, as for that mysterious trip I mentioned, we have, in fact, bought plane tickets to Beirut. Ten of us will be doing Lebanon for a week. We leave on Tuesday, which (at the time of writing) is only two days away. I won't say anything other than don't worry, it's safe, and I won't be taking public transportation. Or approaching anyone who looks like he's running for a political office.

Last weekend, a big group of us attempted to find a place called the British Club. Basically, it's a semi-secret pub run by British ex-pats, and pretty much its only clientele are American students and Brits. It took forever to find the place, until we literally stumbled upon it. Walking down the street it was supposed to be on, we stopped and asked two guards in front of a completely non-descript, gated house, "British Club?" who pointed right at the building they were guarding. They let us through the gate, and after ringing the doorbell to what looked like an apartment (flat #1, naturally), we were let in. The problem is, you have to be a member, which costs 100 pounds, and then members can get two friends in for 15 pounds each. But when the owner saw 10 American kids, even though we weren't members, dollar - er, pound - signs flashed in his eyes. He waived the membership rule on the condition that we say hello to his mother, and let us in. The bottom floor was populated by, in his words, old farts, so we took over the upstairs pool table. One of the British people from downstairs came up to teach us how to play cricket on a pool table, which was a lot of fun, considering we were betting on it (only one pound each, which is kind of like betting with Monopoly money). I lost that game, but I won the second game. Of course.

The next day, Beckett and I were bored, so we called up Brian and decided to visit the Cairo Zoo. We had heard from people who went to the zoo and supposedly bribed the guards to let them hold baby lions, and who can say no to baby lions? So Beckett and I jumped in a cab. Unfortunately, we found the worst negotiator in the entire city. The following conversation took place (in Arabic):
Him: How much?
Us: 5 pounds.
Him: No, ten pounds.
Us: Okay, ten pounds.
Him: Yes, yes, ten pounds. Twenty?
Us: No! Ten pounds!
Him: Okay, okay, ten pounds. Fifteen?
Us: NO. Ten pounds or stop here.
Him: Wait, wait. Ten pounds.

What an idiot. But he eventually got us there, and we definitely only gave him ten pounds.

The zoo was as depressing as I expected. It's incredibly dirty, the animals look more depressed than usual, and large numbers of animals are crammed into tiny cages. We imagined the "bribing" would be difficult, but all we did was walk in front of the "jungle cat" building, and two guards called us over. They unlocked the back entrance and brought us in, giving us a private tour of the so-called "jungle cats". There was at least one real jungle cat, which snarled through the thin mesh wire at us, but the rest were just white, fluffy housecats. He then opened up a cage door, and before we knew it, he was placing a desert fox in our hands. The little thing was really strange, and shivering like crazy. I felt bad for it, but it was kind of cool holding what looked like a real-life Pokemon. Of course, the second the fox was back, the guard was asking for money.

We continued onto the lion cage, where the guards called us over as well. One let us into this back room, surprising us with two enormous lions in a relatively small cage, with fairly spread-apart bars. It was pretty alarming to see a full-grown male lion at least twice my size (and about ten times my weight), and even moreso when the guard put a chair directly next to the bars, within five inches of the lion's teeth, for us to sit and take pictures on. But what he did next was terrible. He grabbed a stick (once we were safely away from the bars) and started prodding the lion in the face, to provoke it into roaring and attacking the bars for our benefit. We were definitely not okay with it, and told him to stop. But we came here for the babies, so we asked him where they were, and he said he would take us to the next room, where the babies were. Once we got in the second room, though, we realized we were in a tiny space with five cage doors attached to it, each one protecting us from a full-grown female lion. Before we could protest, he whipped open a door, grabbed a lion by the mane, and dragged it out almost onto my feet. It was terrifying. The poor thing seemed abused, because it didn't even put up a fight, and just laid there. But I knelt and pet it on the head, half pitying it and half-scared-out-of-my-mind. With the lion still at his feet, he asked for 20 pounds per picture, and there was no way we could say no to a man with a lion next to him. So we paid up and left. Alas, no babies were seen. We quickly left the zoo.

In happier news, Allyson and I got internships at the Egyptian Museum. Allyson was the one to tell me about it, and I said I'd do it with her. So we went to the museum and simply asked if there was anything we could do there. This completely crazy Egyptian woman (no, seriously, she's crazy - all the employees there agree) said we would be making labels in the King Tut section. Alright, cool. She said to come back the next day and we would get to work. When we showed up the next day, the nicest Egyptian guy in the world led us through the curator's entrance so we didn't have to pay, and instead of taking us to the label-making room, he took us to this American doctor, Dr. Janis, who is currently adding pretty much every artifact ever discovered in Egypt to computer databases and needs all the help she can get. So we set up our laptops and got to work. Our first day was spent entirely on sexual sculptures. So we spent almost three hours staring at ancient, stone genitals. Of course, that part won't show up on any resumes in the future. It's kind of mindless work, but also fairly interesting being surrounded by so much history. Plus, if you're ever working with Egyptian artifacts any time in the future, you'll probably use this database, and there at the bottom of the pages for about several hundred artifacts, you'll see, "Danny Gottleib". Also, most of the books we're transcribing are in French, so all the other interns are 20-something French girls. And most of them are incredibly beautiful. Who would have thought the museum was where they were all hiding?

And now we get to the other night. But first! Three nights ago, Emily and I ran into each other in the grocery store downstairs. When we got to the elevator, this Saudi guy (I don't remember his name exactly, but it sounds kind of like Fawooz I think) got on, and started telling the same joke over and over - "You Saudi? I'm American!" and laughing really hard at it. He stopped at floor eight (I'm on floor nine), and instead of getting out, he talked to us for a couple minutes. His English is very poor, but we caught the word "embassy" a couple times and what sounded like "gays". It was clear we had no idea what he was talking about, so he invited us into his home. Of course, we said yes. Turns out he was trying to say "dates", because he fed us some dates and gave us an entire package as a present. Gross, but thanks. He then showed us all the expensive artifacts in his home, and invited us over the next night for Iftar (breaking of the fast after sundown) dinner. There was no way we could turn that down.

So two nights ago, Emily and I went down to his apartment at 6 PM and joined Fawooz, his wife, his three sons, and their female servant for a huge feast. It was actually pretty delicious, but he kept piling more and more food on my plate, and I was feeling rather sick near the end of the meal. We must have eaten for a good hour straight, without much talking because the entire family spoke about 30 words of Arabic total. But it was still really interesting.

After dinner, we hung out in the living room for a while, playing with his two youngest kids. The youngest, Abdullah, took a liking to me because I fixed his broken racecar, and then spent most of the night smashing it on the ground and bringing it back to me to fix it again.

All of the sudden, some guy was standing at the door, briefcase in hand. Abdullah ran over, grabbed him by the pinky finger, and dragged him into the living room. Upon seeing him, the wife and servant immediately left the room, and Fawooz politely asked Emily if she would join them in the kitchen. He expressly stated that I could stay, because this was his doctor. I knew this wouldn't be good. The second Emily had left, Fawooz tore his clothes off, and sat down on the couch in only his tiny, see-through underwear. The doctor, whose English wasn't too poor, explained that it was acupuncture time. Fantastic! What took place was more like electroshock therapy than acupuncture, however. The doctor stuck two needles into Fawooz's belly, attached clamps and wires to the needles, and proceeded to give him some sort of shocks that looked pretty painful. Every couple of minutes he would change the location of the needles. This whole thing lasted almost thirty minutes. Luckily, the TV was on, so I stared intently at it, pretending like I was laughing at the Arabic sitcoms I couldn't understand, but really laughing at the absurdity of what was happening. Abdullah kept tapping my knee, saying something, and pointing at his dad, but there was no way I was turning my head to see what was going on.

Unfortunately, Fawooz decided to mute the TV so he could ask me questions with the doctor translating, so I had to hold the most awkward conversation of my life, with Fawooz in his underwear and electrified needles sticking out of his stomach. Eventually, the doctor decided the torture was over, shook hands with me (I only touched his hand with the very tips of my fingers - who cares how awkward it looked), and left. And finally Fawooz put his clothes back on. Emily came back in the room, and after playing with the kids (Abdullah put a Saudi flag in the back of his shirt and ran around the room pretending it was a cape, hitting his head several times on the table), we quickly got out of there so I could tell her what happened. Before we left, Fawooz insisted that we were family now (how could we not be after what I witnessed?), and that he would give his "brother" and "sister" anything we needed, including money. He also invited us to Iftar every single night of Ramadan, and for lunch every day after Ramadan until we go home. He has my cell phone number and he knows where we live - directly above him - so I feel like I'll be asked back pretty soon. Needless to say, it was a hilarious experience.

The next day, Allyson and I set off on another stupid field trip. Actually, this one wasn't nearly as bad as the Alexandria one. At first we were apprehensive, since our teacher had said, without a trace of irony, "Most classes take you to big, impressive sights. But we're going to places where you have to use your imagination!" However, we visited a few smaller, but still impressive, pyramids, a couple ancient towns, and went into some extremely well-preserved temples dedicated to Sobek, the crocodilian god. It was actually very interesting.

Out in the middle of the desert, there's this ancient home with this ancient bath that still has fragments of painted tiles on the wall. History nerds like me find this stuff unbelievably exciting.

Last night, Allyson, Beckett and I went out for pizza with these two Egyptian guys Allyson met somehow. Since our luck with meeting nice Egyptian students actually willing to be friends with Americans has been virtually nil, I was a little skeptical about these guys. But they turned out to be awesome. I can't for the life of me remember either of their names, which isn't good because we hung out with them for about 7 hours and they want to do a lot more stuff with us in the future. But they're two best friends who make a hilarious pair: one is a huge, Russian-looking Egyptian who spends all his time bodybuilding and doing all sorts of martial arts that make him really intimidating, while the other is a tiny, goofy little guy who actually reminds me a lot of myself. After eating pizza, we went to a cafe to smoke shisha. Allyson decided to go home to sleep, so the four of us decided we wanted to play pool, so we set off in the bigger guy's $200,000 car. Seriously. Granted, it's only that much because they have to pay extremely high taxes on any cars - they're rarely under $100,000 - but that still says a lot about how wealthy these guys are. First they were nice enough to go extremely out of the way to drive Allyson home rather than having her take a cab by herself, and then we went to a pool club, where I lost five times in a row to the little guy while Beckett and the other one (I really need to find out their names) played Playstation. It was a really awesome night, and I'm so happy to have Egyptian friends that are not only actually willing to be friends with you, but who have such hilarious personalities. We can't wait to hang out with them again.

And now tonight we just had Iftar with Fawooz again. This time it was only him, and he invited us to a French restaurant downstairs. He said to bring six friends, but we only brought Beckett and Laura. We were joined by his friend, a security guard (not the lame U.S. version - the security guards here have huge machine guns), and enjoyed a really nice meal. Fawooz was hilarious as ever, and even though he didn't strip down this time, he was full of jokes that we half-understood but laughed at nonetheless, and he acted just like a grandfather to me. When he found out we were going to Lebanon in a couple days, he immediately offered to pay for us to have limo service to and from the airport, and throughout the meal he kept tapping my elbow and muttering, "Do you need money?" and practically refusing to accept a no from me. He really is one of the most generous people I've ever met. We decided that we'd let him help us out a little bit, since he obviously really wanted to do something, so we mentioned our internet problems, and he made a couple phone calls and insists someone who speaks English will be here in an hour or so to set up internet. I'm still skeptical, since it's Egypt, but if Fawooz can't do it, no one can. The meal was added to by the sheer amount of languages spoken. Beckett is practically fluent in French, and the French woman who owns the restaurant was there with us, so we used her to translate. Fawooz told some joke about wanting only French girls to serve us at the restaurant rather than Egyptian men, and to relate the joke to us, a form of international telephone was played: Fawooz in Arabic to a waiter, the waiter in French to the owner, the owner in French to Beckett, and Beckett in English to us. It was a truly enjoyable evening with Fawooz, and he insists he's going to give us two boxes of beer once Ramadan is over, because Emily told him I sleep a lot, which he apparently took to mean that I'm an alcoholic. What a guy.

I probably won't post anything until we get back from Beirut, since I leave in a good 36 hours. So have yourselves a good week, and expect an enormous post around the 16th of October, with all sorts of entertaining stories. Unless nothing interesting happens in Lebanon. And, let's face it, nothing interesting ever happens there. Salaam.

Ketchup

2007-09-25T04:54:00.001-06:00

I'm getting so bad at updating this thing. Sorry, Sara. I'll blame it on our lack of internet. The guy keeps thinking that when we call (with our friend Alfred, who translates) to say we want internet, we're actually saying we'd prefer him not to come, even though he says, "I'll be there between 8 and 10 tomorrow," and then never shows up. It's very confusing, but such is Africa.

First of all, that picture I got has been destroyed by my so-called "friends". I can't seem to take a good picture of it, but let's just say that I have beautiful feminine eyelashes, a Hitler moustache, and a speech bubble coming out of my mouth that says, "I'm a Jew. I don't like spending money, but I will LICK YOUR ANUS DRY!!"

Brian took this picture. It's his elbow.

Other than that, we haven't been doing much at all here since school started. We've got a lot of travel plans in the works, however, since we're slowly realizing that it's already the second month of our semester here, and we have a lot of stuff to see. We keep throwing names out there of places we want to see - Beirut! Syria! Jordan! Israel! Morocco! Libya! Turkey! The Sudan (Tara swears she has a friend who can get us in for 17 dollars, but that seems crazy for a multitude of reasons)! Alexandria! Luxor! - and the list keeps growing without us seeing any of them. However, a group of us are having a potluck dinner tonight at our place to discuss and fully plan our trip in two weeks to... some of these places. I don't want to name which ones, since it makes my mom nervous, so you'll hear all about it when I get back, and probably not much before we leave. But I swear it's as safe as Cairo, Mom.

I realize that Ramadan is exactly halfway completed and I haven't really written much about what it's like, so I should probably do it. I haven't seen that many examples of people getting irritable during the day from fasting, with the exception of a few actual street-side fistfights. Most businesses shorten their hours or shut down completely during the month - the majority of the restaurants are not open during the day unless their main clientele are foreigners - and it's a bit uncomfortable trying to eat in secret. I usually more or less fast during the day and then just eat when I'm back at my apartment, to avoid having to hide it. It's not that you get in trouble for eating during the day, it's just that it's completely rude to chow down or take a big swig of your water in front of someone who's starving. At night, the city goes kind of crazy. The sidewalks are crammed with tables for the huge communal iftar meals after sunset, fireworks are usually going off somewhere, and a crazy woman bangs a drum and screams below my window every night for almost half an hour starting at 3 AM. I hate her.

Apartment life in Cairo is more or less the same as back home, with a few more inconveniences. In the time it's taken me to write this, I've had to answer the door twice and tell two separate guys I did not want them to do my laundry. We're amassing business cards like our lives depend on it. The other day, I discovered an enormous colony of ants that had moved into our kitchen. There must have been at least five thousand. Beckett and I went absolutely crazy on the little guys - first we sprayed them with bug spray, then we left a trail of pepper along the path they were taking to throw off their scent, then we just stomped on them, followed by a heavy dousing of Oust, then just some good-old-fashioned flames, and finally just soap and water to clean up the billions of pathetic ant corpses. It was actually really fun. In hindsight, perhaps keeping our garbage in a flimsy cardboard box on the floor with no garbage bag was a bad idea.

Last Friday, Allyson and I went to Alexandria with a class field trip. Unfortunately, we had been up until 4 AM the morning before, and we had to get up at 6 to catch the bus. We both woke up in time, but since the entire trip consisted of 10 hours on a bus with only about 1 hour total off the bus, we slept throughout the whole thing. We did get to see Alexandria, which looks really comfortable and laid-back, the point where the Nile hits the Mediterranean, and a big hole in the ground people are claiming will turn out to be Cleopatra's tomb. When we stopped to see where the Nile meets the Mediterranean, our security guard told us we were absolutely not allowed to take a picture of the military operations out the left side of the bus. Which naturally means he was challenging us to take the highest-quality picture out the left side of the bus. The second his back was turned, I snapped a picture of the "secret military operations", which were actually just some big concrete things sitting in the sand. Awesome!

You are not allowed to look at this picture.

Allyson can't believe she just re-discovered Cleopatra's tomb.

Picture of a Picture

2007-09-22T04:30:00.000-06:00

Look what I got for free when I went to get passport pictures!

Sleepless in Sinai

2007-09-18T05:09:00.000-06:00

As you may have guessed from the title, I didn't sleep at all in Sinai. That means I was awake from 9 AM Thursday until 5 AM Sunday. For a pretty surreal weekend, losing my mind due to sleep deprivation didn't help. It all seemed like a crazy dream: there were wild packs of dogs, the sun was constantly going up and down, suddenly I was underwater... Let me start at the beginning.

The grand total of people going on the trip was 34, which is insane. We rented two minibuses, and all met at campus to get picked up. The trip was organized by this guy named Rob, which was good in the sense that it saved me from having to do any work or worry about any of the details, but was bad in the sense that everyone practically worshipped him all weekend. It got to the point where people were completely thrown off when five of us decided to go snorkeling - gasp! - without Rob! He's actually a really nice guy, and I knew that going into it, but I could tell he was going to be a bit anal about the whole thing, since he had gotten it into his head that he was responsible for all our actions all weekend. And who wouldn't want to screw with that?

Anyway, we split in half and boarded our buses. Rob hooked up his closest friends with the bigger, nicer bus, while 14 of us were on the smaller, crappier one. I actually enjoyed our bus size, because it made all 14 of us pretty great friends by the end of the ride. Mostly because we went through many near-death experiences together. Our driver was absolutely insane. He rarely slowed below warp speed, not even on sharp turns. At one point, we could actually feel the left wheels lift off the ground as we rounded a curve, and we started to drift off the road. It was pretty terrifying, and as much as we screamed at him to slow down, he didn't let his foot off the gas a bit. Even though we were going 100 miles an hour the whole way, he managed to make what should have been a six-hour bus ride into an eight-hour ride. He made sure to stop for ten minutes out of every half hour to have several cigarettes. It was pretty torturous. At one stop, we stopped near an intersection, one of the roads having a sign that said, "Foreigners not allowed past this point." Everyone started taking pictures of it, and the driver came over and yelled at us. Someone asked what was down that road, and he said Israel was about 50 meters away, and not to go down that road because there were landmines all around it. Awesome! Aside from the sheer length of the drive, it was pretty fun, and the desert was absolutely beautiful in the middle of the night. You would not believe how many stars you can see when it is literally pitch black - there weren't any lights for miles and miles.

We beat the other bus to Dahab, of course, so at the hotel we were asked to sit down and wait for our rooms to be ready. Now, we're only paying less than 8 US dollars a night for this place, so I wasn't expecting much. But, boy, what 8 dollars gets you! We were seated in their restaurant, which is directly on the beach, and instead of chairs the ground is just covered in comfortable pillows, true Arabian-style. We were given free tea, and after the excruciating bus ride, laying there next to the beach was perfect. I couldn't have been happier.

Finally, Rob & Co. arrived. Now, there weren't enough rooms at the hotel for all of us, but there were two hotels directly adjacent that would be taking the leftovers. We all immediately wanted this hotel, though, because how could it get any better? So we had worked out with the manager before bus two arrived that we would get the rooms at this hotel instead of Rob's group. Of course, Rob showed up, said, "Hell no!" and essentially kicked all of us out in favor of his bus. I loudly booed him, and he singled me out and said, "Danny, do you and two people want to be in the hotel right next door?" Oh my Rob, I got personally recognized by the man himself! Too flabbergasted to speak, I just nodded yes, feeling like the man of the hour.

Turns out he's craftier than I give him credit for. You see, there are three hotels directly in a row - The Penguin, which is the main one we were at; the Sea View, which is even nicer than the Penguin; and sandwiched in between the two is the Jasmine. The Jasmine has four rooms, all of which combined are smaller than the restaurant downstairs. The Jasmine is primarily a restaurant, of course. So Beckett, Brian and I were a little miffed. Especially because we only had two tiny beds, our toilet had someone else's unflushed crap in it (because the toilet was unable to flush) and our "shower" was just an ancient saltwater spout in the middle of the bathroom, with no curtain or anything to stop the water from going anywhere.

There was no way we were going to sleep in that room. And since it was already past 3 AM when everyone was finally going to bed, the three of us went back to the Penguin's restaurant and laid on the pillows to await the sunrise. The hotel was overrun with a pack of stray dogs, and after seeing the staff throwing rocks at them to get them to leave, I of course felt bad, so I pet one on the head, barely using even my fingertips to avoid getting all sorts of diseases. This tiny bit of attention endeared the dog to me instantly, and it collapsed right in my lap to go to sleep. Brian was horrified, claiming I was going to get AIDS and Rob knows what else, but it was too adorable to ignore, so I had to keep petting it, in spite of its open sores and horrible stench. All of the sudden, the greatest little puppy bounded up, and before I knew it, I had five dogs all around me. By this point, Brian was twenty feet away. I just sat with my pack of dogs and watched the sun rise, which was the most beautiful sunrise I had ever seen (for the next twenty-four hours, at least). The particular stretch of Red Sea Dahab is on is only a couple miles wide, so we could see straight across into Saudi Arabia as the sun rose behind the Saudi mountains. It was incredible.

For the rest of the day, we rented snorkeling gear and tried out a beach down the coast a bit. The snorkeling there was pretty terrible, but we heard about this place called Blue Hole that we could pay 25 pounds to go snorkeling at, so we jumped at it. There were five of us who climbed into this Jeep for a wild ride through the desert. We passed a huge amount of camels, most of them being led by kids. It was very strange. We got to Blue Hole in one piece, and jumped into the sea. Now, I've been snorkeling in many beautiful places - the Caribbean, Hawaii, the GreatAt 1 Barrier Reef - but I don't know if I've ever seen anything like this. There was so much activity down there, and it was completely beautiful. Too bad the sea was packed with Italians, who all seemed unable to swim, instead grabbing onto us and pushing us down in an attempt to stay above the water. But it was still fun. We finished before noon, and faced with the prospect of nothing to do until 10 PM that night when we would be leaving for Mt. Sinai, we just went back to the restaurant and lounged around literally all day. It was ridiculous thinking that as we were laying in luxury on the Red Sea, eating crab and looking at Saudi Arabia, our friends back home were sitting in class. How is what we're doing right now fair? I pondered it for a second, but then just ordered some more mango juice and continued the crossword puzzle Megan and I were working on.

At 10:30, the group boarded two buses and set off for Mt. Sinai. It's about a two-hour drive, which means we made it in three hours. And since we boarded the buses around 10:30 but didn't leave until midnight, it was already 3 AM and we were pressed for time, if we wanted to reach the peak before sunrise. So we started to climb!

Have you ever tried to climb a mountain in the middle of the night with one flashlight for 20 people? It's really hard. Most of us opted for the harder, more vertical path rather than the longer, gentler slope congested with ancient Russians and camels. Turns out our way was smarter, because Emily took the easy path and gouged her knee enough to need stitches. Which, of course, she didn't get because we were on a freaking mountain in the desert. The climb was so beautiful - there were billions of stars above, and shooting stars practically every second. There's a monastery at the bottom of the mountain that has the supposedly real Burning Bush, and at 3:45 AM, we were high enough to look straight down at all the little monastery lights right as the monks were waking up. Their bells and chants echoed all the way up to us, and it was beautiful.

The climb went on for nearly three hours, and we actually had to scramble up the last little bit, since it was already pretty light out. The top was absolutely packed with tourists, but we found a nice spot and settled in to watch the magic. It was a stunning sight, and I really don't think I'll see anything close to it in quite a long time. The pictures really don't do it justice.

After sitting at the top for an hour or two, we returned to the bottom the same way we came up, which was a thousand times easier in the daylight. Rather than going into the monastery like most people, we laid in the van and rested, since we were completely exhausted by this point. Rob had arranged it so we wouldn't leave until 8 PM Saturday night, even though Sundays are school days here, so people had 7 AM classes the next day. We talked him into moving it up to 6, which meant we would actually be leaving at 8 anyway. We lounged around again all day because everyone was completely wiped out.

We re-boarded our buses that night, and set off (with a different driver, fortunately) back for Cairo. This time, it took nearly ten hours to get back. The driver stopped almost twice as much as the previous driver, much to our chagrin. The word for "let's go" in Arabic is "yalla", so every time he stopped for a smoke break, we'd all scream out the window, "Fucking yalla!" Even though we were exhausted and cranky and just wanted to get into our beds back home, we were still having a hilarious time. It kind of sucked being with such a large group, but I really did have a great time with these people. We got back around 4 in the morning, and I finally got back and into bed at 5 AM, just as the sun was coming up - my third sunrise in a row.

From Thursday until Sunday, it felt like one really long, really productive day. In that one day, I had witnessed two spectacular sunrises, snorkled, climbed a mountain, and sat on buses for almost 24 total hours. What a busy 60-hour day.

Ramadanny

2007-09-13T04:46:00.001-06:00

Life has definitely slowed down in Cairo. For the first three weeks, I really felt like a tourist, and I definitely didn't feel like I would be here for any long stretch of time. But now that classes are in full swing and I have this apartment, I actually feel like I live in Cairo, which, I must say, is pretty cool.

For one, I'm back to my regular school ways - go to class, come back to my apartment, take a nap while watching TV, eat ramen noodles, do homework, etc. I've stopped doing a ton of sightseeing every day, mostly because I don't have the time, and also because I've seen a large majority of Cairo already, and I need to space some of it out - I've still got three months!

The hardest part of returning home after all this will be going back to a real school. All us international kids have said the same thing: we feel like we're back in high school. I, for one, feel like I'm in high school in Laguna Beach. The teachers seem like they used to care but have given up, the students seem like they don't need an education (because, let's face it, they don't), and every single student wears at least $10,000 worth of clothing and jewelry to class. We really are surrounded by some of the wealthiest 17-year-olds in the world. And classes are ridiculously easy. On top of that, I only have class two times a week. It's actually a bit frustrating how little work I'm doing.

Everyone seems to be going through the same thing at the almost-one-month mark: namely, a bit of homesickness. Not debilitating or extremely painful homesickness, but in our conversations I find us talking less about sex and more about things like, "I wonder what so-and-so is doing right now..." or "Why are my friends so bad at responding to messages?" (that's YOU, Danny Bodnar). I think this is all just a side-effect of the afore-mentioned transition from tourist mode to resident status. It's strange.

Also, today is the first day of Ramadan. I haven't been outside yet (I need to stay within range of a comfortable bathroom... You figure out why), but I'm a bit nervous to see what it's like. For those of you who don't know, Muslims cannot eat, drink, or smoke during daylight hours for the month of Ramadan. For that reason, they get much testier during the days, and every night turns into a wild party. They also rearrange all the schedules - classes are compressed so I get out by 4 PM instead of 6 - and most businesses pretty much close all month. Which means I'll be either living out of the grocery store downstairs, or... Hardee's. I'll partake in Ramadan for at least one day during the month, which I imagine will be pretty difficult, since I'm constantly starving and you can't even drink water, but I want to see what it's like.

This weekend marks the first of many non-school weekend trips. Although it may as well be a school trip, because 23 of us are going. We've rented two minibuses, and we are leaving at 5 PM tonight for Dahab on the Red Sea. It's about a six or seven hour drive, so we'll get in around midnight. We spend the night and the next day on the beach or doing whatever we want, and then at 2 AM Saturday morning, we will start climbing Mt. Sinai. It takes about two or three hours to climb it, so we'll get to the top and wait for the sunrise. I can't believe I'm going to be watching the sun rise where Moses got his little tablets.

I'll report back (i.e. who kissed, who fell off the mountain, did I find any more commandments) on Sunday.

In Which We Lose Our Minds

2007-09-09T08:07:00.000-06:00

Things have gotten a little crazy here in Cairo. Let's start at the beginning.

Four days ago, it was the last day in which you could check out of the dorms and get most of your money back. After that, you would lose all of it, I think. Naturally, I had no plans to leave the dorms.

However, I was sitting in my room, minding my own business, while Ahmed was sleeping in his bed (he has to sleep for 20 hours to gather enough energy to sit on the computer for four hours a day until he goes back to sleep). The RA for our floor walked in, introduced himself for the third time, and said, "If you want, you can move down to room 417." I was confused, so I said, "Okay, thanks, but I think I'm fine here." Then he said, "Yes, but we need you to cooperate. Ahmed wants his brother to live in his room, so we would like you to move."

What the hell? How rude is that? The kid is here two days, I'm here two weeks, and I'm being asked to move all my stuff to another room? Does he really need to live with his brother, who is only two floors below us, and who he probably lives with at home? And why do I have to move? We have a third roommate who could be asked, as well as Ahmed's brother's roommates. I've become great friends with all the guys on my floor, I've gotten comfortable in the room I've come to think of as my temporary home, and suddenly this spoiled (seriously, the kids that go here are wealthier than you could ever dream) little brat puts me in this position? In my mind, I had two options, neither of them favorable: I could suck it up and move, giving in to that little jerk and significantly lowering the amount of fun I have in Egypt, or I could say no, but then live with a kid who would hate me, and whom I wouldn't feel comfortable leaving all my stuff behind with all day while I was in class. I was pretty furious, and you can believe that I stopped being so nice and tiptoeing around the room while he slept - I slammed the door shut and open every time I left (which I made often), and I invited people in to have loud conversations. Passive-agressive non-confrontation is the greatest.

But then Emily, Catherine Catherine, and Laura got an apartment. We were all kind of confused, since Catherine and Laura had been looking for an apartment, but Emily just moved out on the spur of the moment. So Beckett, Tara and I went over to see it, and it was pretty amazing. First we walked up these really awful stairs, that were falling apart and filled with hobos and garbage, so I was expecting the worse. And the elevators - how to describe them? They had to have been the first elevators ever. I laugh every time I ride in them. But we got up to their floor, walked in, and all yelled, "Oh my God!" at the same time.

We didn't know the place was fully furnished, nor that it was so huge. They have a fancy dining room table, two lounge chairs and two couches, a TV with free satellite TV, a coffee table, three fully-furnished bedrooms with two bathrooms, a washing machine/dryer, and even paintings on the walls, rugs on the hardwoods, and shelves with various decorative objects on them. It's incredible.

So Beckett and I started talking, and we began to consider getting an apartment in the same complex. We actually went downstairs, expressed our interest, and toured two apartments, one of which was directly below the girls. This was at 11:10 PM. We had 50 minutes to get out of the dorms, if we were going to do this. Beckett asked what I was thinking, and since the apartments were both nicer than the girls', I said, "For me, the decision is which one do we take." So with that, we said we wanted to take the one right below the girls, landlord Ahmed (get used to that name - the majority of the men I meet here will be named that) said we could come back tomorrow to sign the papers, and Beckett and I took off running to get to the dorms. Luckily, we were only two blocks away.

We ran up to our Resident Director's room and asked what we had to do to check out so we could get our money back. He simply said, "Get out in half an hour. Get packing!" so we ran downstairs and packed in literally five minutes. Roommate Ahmed seemed absolutely thrilled, even helping me to pack. We signed out and returned our keys at 11:45 PM, 15 minutes before we'd be stuck there for the semester, and then we dragged all our stuff the two blocks back to the building. In less than an hour, I had put in an offer on an apartment, checked out of the dorms, and been turned free on the streets of Cairo with all my belongings. It was kind of nuts.

We ended up spending the night in the girls' apartment, with Beckett and I sharing a bed with Emily, which kept us up (talking, pervs) until 4:30 AM. What I forgot to mention until now is that class started the next day at 8:00 AM.

When we all got up and had showered using the same towel (can you see why you get extraordinarily close with people in only a couple days while traveling?) we boarded the shuttle from the dorms to campus. Normally those who live in apartments have to pay for the shuttles, but we still had our housing IDs, so we get to ride free! Jackpot!

Classes were pretty strange. I skipped Arabic, since I was planning on dropping it, so I went to Global Politics of the 20th Century, which is taught by a classy old British woman, who may or may not be a Dame. The Egyptian students really (for the most part) slack off, since they're so freaking wealthy, so none of them had pens or paper, which pissed the Dame off, but not as much as the kids who walked in half an hour late, eliciting a perfectly snooty, "Well!" from her.

I then went to drop Arabic and add another history class. I thought I could just go to the registrar office, but of course Tomader needs to personally control every aspect of our lives, so we had to wait in line for over two hours just to add and drop classes. What was awful is that there was no way of seeing which classes were still open until you were face-to-face with Tomader. So some people waited for two hours for a "No". Luckily, the History of India was open, so I now only have class two days a week.

I got into History of India only five minutes before it started, so I raced across campus to get there in time, which I did, even though I got stuck in a long security check line. After class, Beckett and I had to get in a cab and race back to the apartment to pay Ahmed. He only accepts cash (it sounds shady, but with the exception of this he's actually really professional), so we withdrew thousands of pounds to give to him. I felt so awesome walking around with a huge roll of cash in my pocket. We signed the papers, gave him the money, and raced back to campus for the rest of our classes.

My last two classes were also pretty good. One I might drop - Social Problems of the Mideast. It sounds fascinating, but the professor is this ancient Egyptian woman who forgets what she's talking about and just rambles all class long. Plus there's an obnoxious girl who - even though the professor speaks fluent English and has lived in the United States for extensive amounts of time - feels the need to translate everything we say in English to the professor in Arabic. Everyone else in the class hates her. Oh, and there's a 20-page paper due. Yeah, I'm doing all I can to drop it. And my final one - Egypt in the Graeco-Roman Era - seems really interesting, and there are all sorts of awesome people in it. Plus we get to take five separate free trips to Alexandria.

After class, we went back to the apartment to actually move in. Our place is a bit nicer than the girls'. It's decorated like an 80-year-old woman died recently (and it kind of smells like it, too), with almost leopard-print couches, a matching ottoman/coffee table, a huge dining room table, a china cabinet complete with china, a fully-furnished kitchen with dishes and silverware, a balcony, two bedrooms and two bathrooms, a washer/dryer, beautiful views of the Nile, free satellite TV, faux crystal chandeliers, trippy paintings, two of the biggest beds I've ever seen (well, to be fair, my bed is actually two twin beds pushed together to form one enormous bed), etc. I could go on forever. In short, we loved it and didn't regret our decision in the slightest.

We had our new neighbors (the girls) over for a housewarming party, and Tara, Kyle, and Erik came over, Erik bearing gifts of cookies and 24 rolls of toilet paper. What a swell guy. The party was mostly us channel-surfing until we found Legally Blonde in English, and all of us just enjoying the fact that guys and girls could finally hang out together in a comfortable way.

Eventually we went to bed, with Tara sleeping over, since this is so much better than the dorms. I ended up absolutely freezing due to my air conditioner, but I suppose that's better than sweating uncontrollably all night.

Today, we just lazed around for most of the morning while Tara was at the gym and class (she's quickly becoming our unofficial third roommate - she even provided the groceries). When she got back, we went to the City Stars mall, which was freaking huge, to buy some stuff for our apartment. We got towels, dish soap, laundry detergent, dishwasher powder, air fresheners, tupperware, paper towels, shampoo for beckett, and some other stuff that I can't remember for only 120 pounds - less than 25 dollars. It was awesome. We also bought a rip-off game of Scrabble for about 7 bucks. We had a little scare in the cab when Beckett got a text message from his friend Brian, who is also here in Cairo - "Syria shoots down Israeli jet". The three of us kind of began to panic at the thought of the repurcussions from the Syrians shooting down a plane full of Israeli citizens for no reason, and we started debating the likeliness of a nuclear war and how soon we'd be evacuated from Egypt. We then found out later that Brian was a little dramatic, and the real story is that Syria fired at but didn't hit a military jet from Israel. Major difference. Although, I personally think the US press should be a little less biased and instead of "Syria fires missiles at Israeli jet," perhaps they should consider the headline, "Israel flies jet at Syrian missles".

Here's a short apartment tour:
This is how we pay the rent every month.

The gang watching Legally Blonde our first night in the apartment. Those tacky couches, chairs, and table all smell like a horrible barnyard. We're 98% sure they're stuffed with hay.

Beckett got the king-sized bed, I got the two twin beds, which I combined to create a superbed.

The view. For those of you who failed geography, that's the Nile.

This is painted inside my shower. There's all sorts of girly crap on my side of the apartment.

This is where we have all our formal dinner parties. And by that, I mean, "This is where we eat ramen noodles and play Scrabble."

I guarantee we never even touch this fancy china. But it's nice being able to say we have a china cabinet!

The greatest balcony ever. We plan on doing something more with it than some stupid chairs.

I swear this is real crystal. Diamonds, actually. Yeah, diamonds.

I love this. I plan on stealing it when we move out. It's this bizarre painting that came with the place. Note the signs for addition, subtraction, multiplication, division, and pi. Also the DNA in the bottom left corner, and the words "math" and "science" at the top center.

Out of Africa (Well, Cairo)

2007-09-03T11:07:00.001-06:00

Sorry about the lull in updates. Things are pretty hectic here, and the only time I'm in my room is for the five or so hours a night I sleep. But let's get this show on the road, because I have plans soon.

So. We got up to go to the Red Sea. We were told we had to be at campus at 8 AM, so that meant we would have to take the 7:30 AM shuttle. Since we're in Egypt, there were no shuttles waiting for us. So all 200 of us kids from Zamalek had to catch cabs in groups of four. It took forever to get that many cabs. The cab ride was absolutely nuts, too, because for some reason our driver was blasting the craziest Arabic music I've ever heard. So this awful woman is screeching like a banshee as we're careening through traffic. It was wild.

When we got to campus, there was mass chaos again. No one knew what to do, there weren't any buses, kids were missing, and long story short, we left about thirty minutes late. And then we stopped at a gas station for a while to wait for our security guards to arrive. So things were already not going as planned. When we arrived at the hotel, no one knew what to do, but we were quickly herded directly into an auditorium. How was your trip? Good? Okay, now sit for a three-hour orientation session. What made it even worse was the fact that it was a question and answer segment, and I think AUC students are all either insane or really funny jokers. People asked about crocodiles leaving the Nile and entering the city, what to do if they wandered and got lost in the middle of the desert, and where Tomader thinks are good places to eat. Then we sat through presentations introducing us to the Student Union and the "Friends", who are there to help us/take Tomader's verbal abuse. Finally, they let us go, but said that we couldn't go to the beach and would have to all sit in the lobby for an hour. Sweet!

Two hours later, we were given the keys to our rooms. We were grouped in threes alphabetically by our last names. The quality of the room you were given was up in the air - some people got waterfront rooms with balconies, while Beckett had to share one king-sized bed with two other guys. We got two twin beds and a cot, and our room was right by the water. So I was happy. Although they only gave us one key for the three of us, and only one beach towel. One of the jerks I was stuck with decided he was going to hang on to the key and I would have to find him if I wanted to get into the room at all, even though everyone else was leaving their keys at the front desk so all three could have equal access to it. But whatever, the less I had to see of the guy, the happier I was.

The Red Sea was great. It was warm enough to make us have to got out frequently because we were getting a bit too hot, but it was so much fun. Plus we could walk forever and never not be able to touch the ground. It was so shallow - big deal, Moses, I could part this if I wanted to. So we lounged around on the beach all day, and that night we went to a "bellydancing show" which was anything but. It was hosted by this gay little Italian man who was incredibly annoying. For some reason this Italian woman in a bellydancing costume sat on a pillow on stage and smoked shisha with him the whole time, but she did no dancing at all. Some other woman (with enormous breasts) did all the dancing, but it wasn't bellydancing as we know it. It was just a lot of swinging her arms and shaking her ass. And she barely did that, because for every song she just called random guys up on stage and made them dance with her. As the night progressed, I started to notice that she had called all the guys from the first three rows up, with the exception of me. So I began to empty my pockets and think up some cool dance moves.

Then things turned sour. This guy came out, kind of like a Whirling Dervish, only more circus-like. He was wearing a multicolored skirt and some sort of crazy getup, and he just spun in a circle for about ten minutes straight. It was actually kind of cool, until he took off the skirt, stopped spinning, and then just spun the skirt over his head like pizza dough. He did that part for another 5 or so minutes, which got really, really boring. Suddenly, the Italian announced that he would need two people to compete in a spinning competition. So of course Tara starts pointing at me, and next thing I know, I'm being dragged up by the Italian. The other guy they pulled up goes first, and he makes it for 25 seconds, which is absolutely pathetic. So then the Italian and the clearly gay (even though he claims to be married) Whirling Dervish start to put the skirt on me, but before I know it, they've torn off my shirt. So I do the spinning shirtless for some reason, and I make it for 30 seconds before I stop (I could have gone for days, but what would be the point?) Well, I was feeling quite ill, but then the Italian guy grabbed me, threw me over his shoulder, unintentionally (I think) pressed my genitals against his face, and started spinning me around more. I was so close to throwing up. And now I keep getting recognized by AUC students. I hate Egypt.

Later that night, Tara, Beckett, Kyle, Catherine Catherine (don't ask) and I decided to sleep on the beach and watch the sunrise, mostly to avoid all of our awful rooming situtations. We went down to the beach at 2 AM, but a guard wouldn't let us go on it because Tomader told him not to (seriously, he let Egyptians on the beach), even after we found cigarettes for him. But he said we could go in the pool. So Tara and I instantly jumped into the pool, which woke up all the students who had been sleeping in chairs around the pool, waiting for the beach to open so they could watch the sunrise. Plus it attracted some other guards, who kicked us out of the pool and said the beach was open. When we went to the beach, a guard tried to send us back to the pool, but we told him what had happened. He called his superior officer over, who asked, "What's happening?" The poor little guy answered (in Arabic), "The world is broken." But all was good, and a big group of us got to sleep on the beach.

Turns out it was kind of a bad idea. It gets pretty cold in the desert at night, especially when you're right on the water. And we had no blankets or towels or anything, and Tara and I were wet. But Tara managed to talk one of the guards into fetching a blanket for her (she gets free stuff all the time), so she was okay. She climbed onto my chair and I got under the blanket, but she didn't like my still-wet shorts, so she moved to Beckett's chair. Then things got crazy and she was totally naked from the waist down, because she had taken off her suit to dry, and she gave me her skirt to use as a blanket. But Beckett kept his clothes on and remained a perfect gentleman to this half-naked, attractive Iranian girl lying under the blanket with him. Even though we were kind of miserable, we had a great time together, especially in our attempts to force poor, shy Kyle to make out with Catherine Catherine, who is ridiculously hot and really likes him.

Finally the sun came up. It was really beautiful, and it was the first real sunrise I've ever sat and watched all the way through. Then we went back to our rooms to get some sleep. But my room had, like, five guys in it for some reason. I didn't question it and just went to sleep. Two hours later, I was woken up by all the guys walking around in only their boxers, and someone loudly saying, "Just let me poop!" I just rolled over and tried to go back to sleep. That wasn't possible, so I just went to the beach to catch some sleep, which I never ended up doing, since I spent the rest of the day swimming and playing ping pong. Isn't my life so difficult?!

7:00 that night, we all boarded our same buses for the trip back to Cairo. But since AUC was in charge of things, nothing could go right. Our bus was completely messed up. The air conditioning didn't work, and the exhaust and heat from the engine was directed into the back of the bus rather than the outside air. It was well over 100 degrees in that bus, and we were all choking on carbon monoxide. We literally spent the whole trip giggling and passing in and out of consciousness at random. Although on Beckett's bus, the girl next to him vomited into her hands, so I prefer mine.

The next day, we got up bright and early to go on another AUC trip to the pyramids and the Sphinx. It was really awesome seeing them, since I hadn't seen any pyramids yet and I've been wanting to see them since I was, like, five. Although we had to stick with our huge, obnoxious group of kids, and we were on AUC's schedule, which allotted us only 15 minutes at some places and bypassed some really cool-looking things. We'll definitely have to go back, and I totally have to ride a horse or a camel.

We got to go inside some tombs and a pyramid (the Titi Pyramid, nonetheless, which had us all giggling like the 20-year-olds we are), and it was incredible. Everything was at least 4000 years old, but in many places the paint was still on the walls. And the hieroglyphics were beautiful and it was all incredible for a history nerd like me. Cameras were not allowed, but I'm a huge rebel, so I snuck some quick pictures. Suckers!

Today I had to register with Tomader, which was actually kind of scary. She made the girl before me cry, but I held it together. She forced me into some classes I don't want to take, but starting Wednesday we can bypass her and just drop and add classes at the registrar office, so I'm going to do that. Although I don't suspect for one moment that my actions will escape The Tomader's notice, and I fully expect her to break down my door any second.

I feel like I'm finally getting the hang of life in Cairo, and now I'm prepared to add classes - which start Wednesday - to the mix. Although I hear classes aren't that difficult, and once I change my schedule around, I should only have classes on Mondays and Wednesdays. Two day week, baby!

Now I must go. Beckett and I are meeting Emily from Madison and her roommates for something - not quite sure what yet. Tomorrow I have absolutely nothing to do, and I plan on sleeping forever. I can't wait.

You are not allowed to take nor see this picture.

Same goes for this one. Although this one is pretty cool.

I had slaves construct these ones just for me.

Touching the Step Pyramid, which, I believe, is the oldest thing in the world.

Only in Cairo Can You Go Bowling AND Eat at TGI Friday's In One Night

2007-08-30T08:19:00.000-06:00

It is officially week two of my semester in Cairo, even though it feels like I've been here ages. It's actually pretty cool seeing how accustomed I've become to living here in only seven days. I'm starting to get really good at crossing insane streets, for one thing. Standing on the dotted line in the middle of the road as two cars fly past you on either side isn't that big a deal anymore. I can't wait to try it out back in Madison. The heat also doesn't affect me as much as it used to. When I first got here, I couldn't stand being outside for more than two minutes. But now I don't sweat as much (or I just don't mind sweating all day anymore), and when it dips down below 100, I find it's actually a comfortable temperature for me. I don't know what I'm going to do when I get back to Wisconsin in December.

We're only a week in, and already the school has split up into cliques, which is really stupid. The most notorious one is this girl Jessica, who won't even speak to anyone not in her clique. We don't like her at all. But other than a few obnoxious people, I still really like everyone here. And my main group of friends are all awesome. Since I'm awful with pictures, I only have one of Emily so far. So here she is, eating the hardest biscotti known to man:

It's been great not having any real classes other than Survival Arabic. That ended last night, though. We spent the first three hours of class learning new stuff and reviewing old stuff, and our teacher Maysa brought in these unbelievably delicious honey candies. I promise you've never had anything as amazing as those, whatever they were. They were so good that even some had ants on them, we were still wolfing them down. Then for the final two hours, all the classes went out in the streets to practice our new Arabic phrases on real people. So all of the sudden at 7 PM, all these unfortunate people just trying to run a fruit stand or something were hounded by hundreds of American students, pointing at stuff and asking, "How much is this?" "What is this?" in poor Arabic. It was very entertaining. We went through a really shifty-looking market that was actually in a warehouse, and at one point I was slapped by this enormous Santa's-bag-sized thing of some sort of meat this guy was carrying over his shoulder, and I had mystery meat juice all down my arm. It was a very disgusting place (I won't even describe the smells), but it was pretty cool. They had bags of spices and all sorts of vegetables and fish the size of cars. It was nuts. And all the people were so nice - various guys in their stalls would quiz us, pointing at vegetables and saying, "What's this? What's this?"

Our class then went to get Koshiri, an Arabic dish that shouldn't be good based on its looks, but for some reason is. I'm not sure what's in it, exactly - noodles, rice, chick peas, some black stuff, some red stuff, I don't know. But we sat in a tiny little restaurant and enjoyed it. The owner's son kept running over and asking if it was good, and when he cleared our plates, we slipped him a secret tip (baksheesh in Arabic), which he expertly slipped directly into his little pocket with a straight face, so his dad wouldn't take it and give it back to us.

We finished the night by going with Maysa to a cafe and drilling her with questions about her life and family. We got to meet her son, and the two of them invited us to their farm that is an hour's drive away from Cairo, to have a barbeque. I really hope we actually get to do this, because it sounds amazing, and I'd love to hang out with Maysa some more. She's an unbelievably giving person, one of the best teachers I've ever had in my life, and absolutely hilarious. She gave us all her cell phone number in case we need any help at all while we're here.

Two nights ago, we went to a nightclub called Latex. Seriously, we did. Nightclubs are most definitely not my thing, but neither are they Emily's, so we agreed we'd be awkward together. But it actually turned out to be pretty fun. It was basically an AUC mixer, because the majority of the place was AUC kids. The second we got there, Tara started going crazy (or crazier than usual, I guess), dancing like a lunatic, and she didn't stop for the next five hours. I'll have to get Emily's pictures of Tara, because she got some hilarious ones. Apparently when they went to the bathroom together, Tara was dancing up against the stall door as Emily was trying to go to the bathroom. Emily just said, "Magnoun," ("crazy") to the only Arabic woman in there, who laughed and high-fived her. But good times were had by all, and Emily, Kyle, and I left before most other people. We were worried Tara would be raped or something, since she was pretty drunk and all the Egyptians were looking to take advantage of the drunk little Iranian, but we left her in Beckett's hands, who eventually did get her home safely, long after the three of us had already gone to bed.

Last night, we decided the time had come to do Nile Bowling. Seven of us (me, Emily, Beckett, Kyle, Tara, Erik, and Ellen) got in two cabs and
attempted to get to the building. The problem was we barely knew anything about this place, other than the fact that it is on the Nile. Someone at the dorms who had already been there said the address was 125 Nile Street, which sounds absolutely made up. He also said it was across the street from the "Swiss Restaurant", which was a little too vague. But one of the cab drivers insisted he knew where it was, so off we went. We got caught up in conversation with our cab driver, who just kept naming American presidents to see if we liked them or not. ("George W. Bush is good big boss man!" "No no no no no. Bad bad big boss man," we all replied. "Bill Clinton?" he asked. "Yes! Yes!" we all shouted.) But we soon noticed we had crossed back and forth over the Nile about four times, and even though Erik and Kyle kept giving me two thumbs up from the back of their cab, it was pretty clear no one knew where the place was. Eventually we just got off on a bridge, paid the drivers the standard five pounds, and tried to find Nile Bowling from the bridge.

Beckett was 100% positive he knew where it was, so we followed him. We walked all the way across a rather wide section of the Nile, and then along it for about two miles, until we decided we were not in the right place. Who would have thought the Nile would be this long?! We went into some strange little playground/dance hall/fishing pier to ask directions, and got several directions that didn't help at all. But yours truly put the pieces together and realized it was all the way two miles back near the bridge we got off on. All we had to do was take a right when we came off the bridge and walk for ten minutes. Instead we took a left and walked for miles.

But we did find it, and it was spectacular. There were about eight lanes total in the little place, but you could look out at the Nile while bowling, which is probably better than any bowling experience any of you have ever had. Also, I won, even though I'm actually really bad at home. I love Egypt! We're definitely going back many times, and we've already started recruiting people for our next outing.

Afterward, it was 2 AM, but none of us had any desire to sleep. Then someone (Tara, I think) suggested buffalo wings, and buffalo wings became our mission. We chose - again, not joking - TGI Fridays for a really late-night meal. But this TGI Fridays was awesome. It's in a boat on the Nile, and it's where all the young, rich Egyptians go to hang out. We were the only white people in the joint, even though it was completely packed. And why were there small children at a TGI Fridays at 2 in the morning? It didn't make any sense.

All we did was ordered a crapload of food to share - three orders of wings, a cheeseburger and fries, a "fajita tower", and Emily got a fishbowl-sized virgin strawberry margarita that was basically pure sugar. We had an absolute blast, and I think Nile Bowling and late-night TGI Fridays are going to become a frequent tradition.

Today was more orientation, which we haven't had to sit through in quite a while. I slept in two hours late, so I missed some good Tomader stuff - apparently she basically told a Muslim girl who won't shake hands due to her religious beliefs that her religious beliefs were absolutely wrong, and then Tomader claimed she's a descendant of Mohammed. She's crazy. I got there just in time to learn about the various sports and clubs (I'm totally joining the Marionette Club), and to hear this awful guy drone on and on about "Who are the Egyptians?" He spent an hour talking about the many identities these people have - Egyptians, Arabs, Africans, Muslims, blah blah blah. It was kind of interesting, but I couldn't get past his voice (if you closed your eyes, Michael Moore was giving the presentation), and I thought it was all kind of useless, since every single person on this planet has at least two identities - national and continental. But my biggest concern is that he's an Egyptology professor, so there's a good chance he'll be teaching me. Fantastic.

Can't wait for the Red Sea tomorrow. Bright and early at 7:30 AM.

All Tutted Out

2007-08-27T15:34:00.000-06:00

Remember what I said about not being able to remember the day before? This one is going to be difficult. I don't remember anything before my Survival Arabic class. And I don't remember if I've written anything about Survival Arabic yet, but it's awesome. We're all really learning a lot in such a short amount of time, and our teacher is really good. She clearly cares a lot about teaching (she's been teaching for, like, twenty years, but I truly thought she was only 30 years old until she told us her birthday today - she's 44). I feel like I can actually get around now. Today she taught us the most important thing - how to tell the cab driver to drive to the church across the street from our dorm, since no cab drivers know the dorm, but everyone knows the church.

After Arabic, I went up to my room, intending to sleep. Since sleep isn't done here, however, the second I left my room to go to the bathroom, I ended up going out to eat with two guys from my floor, Ian and Matt, and one from the floor below us, Eric, who is from Boston but is actually a freshman undergrad here - he's only in the first week of his four years at AUC! We went to this place that had really good pizza and ended up getting three large pizzas for the four of us. Eric can eat like me, so the two of us probably put away a pizza each.

Right before we had finished, Ian's friend from when he was here at AUC two years ago (he's 24 and he's practically a walking Cairo guidebook) called him to tell him he had just driven into town from Siwa. We knew people were going to this awesome place downtown that looks exactly like the kind of seedy bar Indiana Jones would hang out in, so he offered to pick us up, to save us from having to fork over the 25 cents each it would cost for a cab ride. When we got downtown, there was actually a rather large group of people, but people started leaving pretty soon after we got there, since it was already kind of late. I ended up going back to the dorm in a little bit with Emily E and Harty, a girl from my Arabic class. Emily regaled us with stories of some of the most embarrassing things I've ever heard, and we were so distracted that we drove right by the dorm. We then spent about ten minutes trying to direct our cab driver back to the dorm, even though we were totally lost. At one point he yelled out, "Oh my God!" He was pretty pissed with us.

I later found out that my cell phone fell out in my pocket in the cab. I've heard stories of people losing things in cabs and the drivers bringing them back the next day or later that night, but once I knew it was gone, I was sure there was no chance this guy would bring it back. He hated us. So now I have to buy a new phone, and I've lost everyone's numbers. Crap.

The next morning, I got up and met Emily, Harty, and Emily's boyfriend who is in town until Saturday, to go to the Cairo Museum. First we went out to lunch, and Ellen joined us. Ellen is also in my Arabic class (our class is filled with all the coolest people), but she's missed the past two days because she was bit by a possibly-rabid cat. So the doctor at orientation wasn't lying! She's fine, but she has to keep going back to the hospital to get the series of rabies shots. And now we're all on edge around these cats, which are literally everywhere. Cats just stroll around even inside the dorms - these Egyptians take their love of cats way too far. So anyway, we had lunch, where I tried for the first time the local mango juice. And now I'm addicted. It's mango season here, and I've heard stories about how great it is, but I had yet to experience it. There's no way I'm going to drink anything else until mango season ends.

Ellen went back to the dorm to risk more feline attacks, while the four of us headed off to the museum. We ended up paying some dude standing outside to take us on a tour of it, since we had only an hour and a half before class. But it quickly became apparent that the guy only studied some things, and he knew nothing except what he had memorized. He'd fly past all sorts of cool, 6000-year-old stuff, and whenever we stopped to ask him about stuff, he'd obviously get very upset, and then would just lie. Between the four of us, we knew more Egyptian history than him, so it was really easy to see when he was simply making things up. Eventually, we told him we had to leave earlier than we thought, paid him way more than we should have had to, and then did the museum on our own. The place is definitely a multi-trip spot. It's impossible how much stuff they have. They literally have just thrown things in corners because there is too many artifacts. Emily and I made sure to touch as much of it as we could, because there's nothing better than touching old crap, right? One of the coolest exhibits was, of course, King Tut's room. We got to see his famous golden mask, which was beautiful. And they had all the golden jewels and stuff that were on him when he was buried. It was staggering how rich these people were. We didn't see any mummies, because it costs extra and we figured we'd save that for day two at the museum. But if there's a way to touch some old dead crap, I'm definitely going to do it.

Then we all ran to Arabic class (with the exception of Emily's boyfriend, of course). Afterward, a small group of us went out to a bar for dinner, where we had some awesome food. We chose the place based solely on the fact that it had spring rolls, and Tara and I had been talking about Chinese food since we first met.

I really need to get better with these pictures. We tried our best to sneak our cameras into the museum, but it seems practically impossible. They've very thorough in their searches - the guard literally had his hand on my genitals several times. We did see one guy who had a camera phone taking a picture in the museum, and when a guard started yelling at him and demanding the phone, the guy just gave him a bribe and the matter was settled. Classic Cairo.

Feluccin' Awesome!

2007-08-25T11:23:00.000-06:00

I fear the blog updates will become more and more scarce as the semester goes on. There's just too much happening all day, every day, and not enough time for me to even sleep. But I don't mind at all.

The problem with this is that even though I've been here for... four days, I think? It feels like at least a week and a half, so I'm having a hard time trying to remember what happened yesterday, because it's already become hazy. Which is another reason why I should keep updating this as much as possible, so I don't forget everything the second I get home. You just do so much all day long from sunrise to almost sunrise again in this city, that the days just go on forever. Which could be good or bad, depending on how much you like Cairo.

So day two of orientation was yesterday, but it was just a "general advising" meeting, where we got information on what we should do to prepare for registering for classes. It was hosted by, of course, the fearsome Tomader, and her really nice and obviously abused Dina. Dina was actually in charge of the thing, and she gave a real powerpoint presentation this time. She made it about two minutes before Tomader grabbed a microphone and cut her off, to basically say the exact same thing. This continued for some time (Tomader started whistling into the microphone while Dina was talking, to signal that it was time for Tomader to speak), and then some Doctor of Something came up to tell people what to do if they want to be in a higher Arabic level, and of course Tomader not only cut him off, but actually made him set down his microphone so we couldn't hear them when they started to get into fights. Then it came time for the questions from the students, and all hell broke loose. People started yelling at Tomader about the fact that we were told our tuition fees covered up to 15 credits (which we were told), but it was changed after we paid to only 12 credits. Well, then. You do NOT yell at the Tomader. It turned into sort of a screaming match, and that just opened the floodgates once people saw a sign of weakness in Tomader. This other girl who failed the Arabic placement exam twice thought she still deserved to take it a third time to place in a higher Arabic course, and Tomader shut her up pretty quickly with some sharp words. At some points, all sorts of people were just shouting stuff, or booing Tomader until she changed her mind about inane things people were fighting with her about, like what time the test results would be posted at. Even though we were supposed to cover more classes than Arabic, the orientation had to be dissolved, because I think Tomader feared a coup. All in all, it was very, very entertaining.

I took off with Emily and her roommates, because they kick ass and all the guys from my floor slept through the orientation. We successfully navigated the subway system to some area I think Emily wanted to go to. But when we got there, it was sort of slummy and filled with only American stores and restaurants (a Hardees with a Pizza Hut above it on the second floor, next to a Baskin Robbins). Plus it was noon on Friday, which is the time when everyone and everything stops to pray for a couple hours. At one point, we got in two cabs to try to find a specific restaurant, and while waiting for the cabs, some kid came up to me and started begging for money. He couldn't have been older than eight, and he was totally covered in dirt. He was part of a group of nearly twenty kids, who I suspected were orphans. I couldn't give him any money, because then I'd have to give all the kids money, and things would just go sour once I took out my wallet. But he wrapped his hands around my wrist and picked his feet off the ground, so I was actually carrying him. I pried his fingers off my arm and got into the cab (front seat, so the girls don't get raped, right Tomader?), and then pried his fingers off of the door so I wouldn't get them stuck in the cab. Then he punched me in the face through the window. It was more of a light push with his fist, but he was obviously pissed about the lack of money. I felt pretty bad, and I understand why he was mad, but I certainly wasn't going to give him money after he hit me. Still, seeing poverty like that was really depressing.

Anyway, we couldn't find a restaurant and ended up going to some cafe so the girls could use internet, since their apartment doesn't have any. Some of us then had to take the shuttles to campus for the Survival Arabic Course, which will supposedly teach us enough Arabic to get around Egypt. Everyone's split up into classes of six or so people, and I was already friends with the majority of my classmates (with the exception of the guy who mumbles everything and is constantly smiling like he's the Grinch or something), so I knew it wouldn't be too bad at all. Plus our teacher is really good and pretty funny. So even though it's three hours a night for the next week, I have learned a ton in only two days, and the class isn't too bad at all.

After Arabic, we all went back to the dorm for the dorm orientation. It's optional, but most people signed up for the free food, drinks, and felucca (basically an Egyptian sailboat) ride on the Nile. First we sat through another orientation run by our RA's who are all really nice, but I'm pretty sure they lie to scare us out of stuff. For example, there's no way a girl in previous years went to Alexandria for a weekend and ended up marrying some Egyptian guy who clearly only wanted a green card. But then it was time for the food (Pizza Hut, which is spectacularly awful in Egypt) and drinks (Pepsi). But whatever, it was free. A small group of us just grabbed a whole pizza and took it out into the courtyard to talk about things like female castration and abortions.

But there was no time for that crap, because we had a felucca to ride! Emily (heretoforth known as Emily E., to differentiate her from Emily S. from Madison) and I had a great time getting fake excited for our first-ever felucca ride. We tried to get everyone on our bus to our level of excitement, but the rest of the losers seemed kind of indifferent.

When we got to the Nile, we had to walk down some steps to get to the dock where about ten feluccas were waiting. Of course, there were hundreds of us, and we only made it about halfway down the steps before we were being yelled at by the RAs to turn back around. So we did, and stood in a massive group pretty much in the street. Then we went back down the stairs, only to be turned back again. This sort of stuff goes on all the time in Egypt, and it never gets less funny. Finally, we all boarded our various feluccas, and we were out on the water. At first, the breeze was really nice, and it was very cool actually sitting on a boat on the Nile, but eventually we were getting sore from the seats and a bit bored because we weren't moving, and the breeze had stopped so it was back to ninety degrees. But our captain didn't seem to want to turn around, because he just unfurled the sails and let us sit out there for close to half an hour. The felucca definitely wore out its welcome. Although we did spot "Nile Bowling", which is a bowling alley right along the Nile. So we have to go there.

Once everyone had gotten off their feluccas, a group of about 10 of us hopped in two cabs to go to some bar on top of the Odeon hotel. It was in some strange back area of Cairo, but this guy Ian, who has lived here before, knows everything about this city, so we had no problems finding it. The night was really fun, even though the group pretty much split in half, mostly because five of us really hated this guy who tagged along with and refused to speak a word of English in favor of Arabic, even though he's American. Which is like the most pompous thing you can do. Just because you're fluent in Arabic doesn't mean you have to be a dick to everyone. So the five of us had a good time planning our hopeful trip to climb Mt. Kilimanjaro. Two of the guys, Beckett and Kyle, are in the room directly next to me, so it was a relief to no longer be alone on my floor. Two of the girls don't live at Zamalek, which sucks for them, and the fifth one, Tara, proved to be a lot of fun. She's traveled pretty much everywhere, and she's fluent in Farsi, and knows a lot of Arabic and French. None of that helped when she got her tab and found out her three gin and tonics set her back over 200 pounds.

After our late night, we were up bright and early for the tour of Old Cairo, which I should have slept through. There were, again, nearly a hundred of us, and only one tour guide. So we couldn't hear anything, it was over 100 degrees, and most of the time was spent waiting outside of small churches and stuff for people to empty out so you could get in. We did see some cool stuff, but I want to go back there without the group so I can actually enjoy it. I have no idea what any of the stuff we saw was, but I think we went down into some room where Mary lived for a month and saw a well she drank out of, and then another well that has something to do with Moses (I think maybe it was his favorite well in Cairo or something), and also the first mosque in Egypt. The mosque was actually really cool. The rest I could have done without.

This is really long. So the same group from the end of our table last night went out for lunch after the tour. Dina (Tomader's abused underling) tipped us off to a great Egyptian place in Zamalek. The place was dark and very Arabic, and the food was fantastic. We bought a huge amount of appetizers and main dishes, and just gorged herself. I spent 45 pounds on pigeons. That's right, I ate two pigeons. And they were actually pretty good!

So more Arabic lessons and stuff. I'm bored of writing. At least I finally took pictures.

This is the best picture I have of the shore of the Nile from the felucca. At least you know what part of the felucca looked like now.

Mary totally loved this well.

Mutilated and divoured pigeons!

Boreientation

2007-08-23T22:52:00.000-06:00

Today I woke up and got on the crazy little shuttle to take us to the AUC campus (I had to sit in the front seat with no seatbelt, which was terrifying) for orientation. I met the only person I knew before arriving here, Emily, which was great. No one in Zamalek seems to understand my sense of humor, so I get a lot of weird stares and blank looks when I make a joke. Emily gets it, so I actually have someone to laugh at everything with, which is really all I ask. Too bad we're not in the same dorm. Hers seems like a bad mix between a hotel and an apartment. There's eight of them in four bedrooms, and they have a kitchen and a full-sized refridgerator and stuff, but they have to buy pretty much everything else. They don't have internet, towels, desks, or shelves. But judging from all of the people I've met from Marwa, and the people that live in Zamalek, I'd trade most of the luxuries I have here for some tolerable company. Okay, that's harsh. The people here are tolerable - just not really my type. Everyone at Marwa seems like they have personalities, and all of Emily's roommates are really cool.

Orientation was a blast. Everyone (all 400 of us) just sat around in this courtyard, completely confused. There were tables all around us with food and drinks, and some people were able to get some, while others were stopped by the employees. We had no idea what we were doing. Then about four people made a small line at this table, where two women were waiting with lists that we had to sign, and information packets to give us. Luckily, Emily and I figured out what was going on early, so we were about fifth and sixth in line, and didn't have to wait in the line for practically two hours like everyone else. We were also able to get the food (bread and butter) and drinks (juice boxes), so I guess the whole ordeal was a success. Once everyone had gotten their stuff, some people started yelling stuff at us through bullhorns, and then everyone just started to move in opposite directions. Eventually we got sorted out into smaller groups of about twenty people, and we went on a tour of the campus. It was all pretty confusing, and I know I'm going to be so lost once classes start, because we never saw any actual classrooms, so I don't know where those are. Again, I was relieved Emily was there, because she was perfectly willing to make fun of the whole ordeal with me. We loved the kid who seems like he only came to AUC to work out - constantly asking where the fitness center and gym are, what kinds of weights they have there, and salivating while peering through the door once we actually got to the fitness center. But our favorite part was the esteemed "Rare Books Library", which everyone was very serious about. I tell you, you've never seen such rare books as those. No one else seemed as amused with the Rare Books Library as us.

After the tour, orientation took a turn for the worse. We sat through hours and hours of lectures from all sorts of people telling us boring stuff about insurance and the medical clinic and registration and visa applications. The best part was the main woman, who will also be doing our advising and registration, Tomader. She's a fiesty, crazy older woman, and was possibly drunk at the time. At one point, she started fighting the guy telling us about finances.

Some things I enjoyed during the mostly painful three hours:
-The "powerpoint presentation", which was really an old-school projector with transparencies that had bizarre drawings and stupid slogans that added nothing to the information, like "We do the DETAILS so you can do the LEARNING."
-The doctor who assured us that we most definitely will be vomiting if we eat pretty much anything.
-The same doctor, who assured us that all the millions of stray cats around the city will scratch and bite us and give us rabies.
-Some guy with the most boring Southern drawl ever, who calls himself the Warden of Cairo, and thought we'd be impressed that the last time there was an emergency and he needed to contact all the students, he got in touch with 60% of them within a day. He claimed that was a good number, but that means almost half of the American students were technically lost. His excuse was that they were probably "at parties or what-have-you."
-This little slut from the American Embassy who was supposed to tell us how to register with the embassy but only seemed to care about the extravagant parties the Marines throw at the embassy for all us Americans. Tomader cut her off and told us not to go to those, because they have just tossed drunk girls out on the streets in the past. I think the "drunk girl" in the story was actually Tomader.

Emily and I skipped out on part of the lecture to go exploring, because the hall had the most uncomfortable chairs of all time. I scored a two-liter bottle of water for only 25 cents, but we returned after getting hassled too much to buy a bunch of crap, and because we needed to get back to the air conditioning.

After the excruciating speeches were over, nine of us managed to catch two cabs (guys sit in the front seats because women might get raped by the cab drivers, explains Tomader, which I think is neither true nor possible) back to our little island in the middle of the Nile, where we finally found cell phones to buy. It took a while because the first store we went into was "out of phone numbers". I know it meant he's allotted a certain amount of numbers per day or whatever, but it was funny to think that there are so many people that they actually have used up all the possible 10-digit combinations, and there are literally no numbers available. "So what, we have to wait until someone dies?" I asked. Only Emily laughed.

We split up and four of us went to get some sort of meal, and I'm ashamed to say my first official meal in Cairo was a New York Sandwich and potato chips. But, really, we've been hard-pressed to find any Egyptian restaurants. Plus we were really hungry and it was the first place we saw. I then came back to my room, thinking of napping before dinner, but all of the sudden there was a knock at my door, and two guys, Josh and Eric from the fifth floor, were asking if I had a balcony. Apparently some rooms have enormous balconies, and they were searching for them. We ended up talking for a while, and were joined by three guys a few rooms down from me. The six of us decided to go get some dinner, and we went to find this Italian restaurant one of the guys, Zeke, had seen earlier. But since this is the most confusing place on the planet and two different streets have the exact same names, we got lost. We toyed with going somewhere else, but we decided not to give up, and eventually did find the place. You may be confused by my lack of Egyptian food, again, but Italy is so close to Egypt, so it's not as bad as American food. Plus it was about four dollars for a huge bowl of fettucini and a soda. Have I mentioned how much I love Egyptian money?

I know I promised a picture, but there's no time to stop and take a picture. Okay, that's a lie. I'm just a reluctant photographer.

Too tired for a good title.

2007-08-22T21:42:00.000-06:00

This has to be quick because I'm exhausted and I have an early morning.

So, I'm in Cairo finally. The flights were fine. I hate to use the word "ghetto" as an adjective, because I feel like there are usually more apt words, but the only way to describe AlItalia is "ghetto". The planes are just generally crappy, they have only about four drink choices, the meal choices were "beef or fish?" both of which were either un-seasoned beef rolled up into balls, or un-seasoned generic fish rolled up into balls. It was disgusting. And the Milan airport, which I was expecting to be swanky and fashionable had leaky ceilings due to the rain, so you had to step over and around buckets half-filled with rain water, and through actual mud puddles in the middle of the airport. It was very classy.

As I was sitting, waiting for the flight to board, some guy came up to me and said, "Are you going to Cairo?"

"Yes," I replied.

"AUC?"

"Yes..."

"I'm Bryan."

"I'm Danny," I replied, shaking his hand.

"Do you have a blog?"

That one threw me for a loop. I admitted I did, and he said he had found it while searching for information about AUC. The problem is I had planned on keeping this a secret from everyone over here until I knew I didn't hate them, just to make sure they wouldn't be able to read the nasty things I might end up writing about them. And now the first person I meet has already blown my cover before I even get to Egypt.

So there were 14 of us on the flight from Milan to Cairo, two of whom were from Madison. I'd say, "Small world," but they came through Chicago just like me, and Chicago to Milan to Cairo was the cheapest option. Wah wah waaaah.

The flight in was really, really cool. First I watched the Mediterranean go by, followed by the green, lush northern coast of Africa, followed suddenly by barren desert literally from horizon to horizon, and then an enormous city just sprung up out of nowhere. All the buildings are fairly low, and you'd be hard-pressed to find a paint color used on a building other than brown or tan. So it looks like the sand just kind of hardened into building shapes. And this city is enormous. Tokyo was mind-blowingly huge, but that was only, what? 5 million? Psh. Cairo's packing twenty million.

When we departed the ghettoplane and arrived in Cairo, all of us were noticeably confused. None of us were really sure if anyone would be there waiting for us, but when we got out, sure enough some guy with an "AUC" sign was waiting for us. He led us through immigration and waited while we all grabbed our bags, which took forever, mostely because AlItalia had lost two girls' bags. The driver led us through customs, which I was nervous about for many reasons. I've heard so many things about how hard it is to get laptops into the country, because they think you're going to use them for seditious behavior or something, and you usually have to pay a hefty tax so they don't steal it from you. Also, I had a Salman Rushdie book in my backpack. Good choice for an Islamic country, right? Well, all those horror stories about customs may be true, but not when you've got AUC on your side. The customs agent looked at all the kids and all our bags, said, "You have nothing to declare? Okay!" and then laughed and high-fived our driver while letting us all through. I snuck so many drugs into Egypt! We then followed our dude through the chaotic crowds outside the airport, who were trying to coerce us into their cabs. The second we hit the outdoors, we were blasted with the 95 degree, extremely humid air. Within literally two minutes, everyone was pouring sweat.

This disgusting, confused, and exhausted train of American students followed our driver across crazy streets, through a tunnel, and across a parking lot. We came up to a huge coach bus, which I assumed would be ours. But, in a move made for the movies, the driver kept walking and took us to our real bus, which was waiting just behind the coach bus. Actually, "bus" is being generous. Let's go with "van". So we had to fit 14 kids, each with two suitcases and a backpack into this barely air conditioned bus. I don't mind heat - give me this over Wisconsin winters any day - and it was good because it allowed me to separate everyone into people I like and people I don't, depending on whether they laughed about the absurdity of the whole situation, or just whined about it being too hot. Most people whined.

My dorm was the last out of the four that the bus stopped at, so the trip took over three hours due to the insane traffic. I can't complain, though, because it went through some really beautiful parts of the city that made me instantly fall in love with it. There are so many huge mosques and ancient Egyptian ruins on the side of the road, and there are markets all over the place with bright fabrics and woven baskets filled with spices and people stopping on the sidewalk to get down and pray. It's pretty impossible to describe Cairo. Part Indiana Jones, part Arabian Nights, and part Tatooine is the best I can do.

So we got to the dorm and waited in the lounge while watching really bizarre Egyptian TV, and one by one we were led to our rooms. I was told I was getting a quadruple, but surprise! I was upgraded to a triple. This is awesome. Even better, I have zero roommates! And this room is as big as a house. Well, the no roommates proved to be sort of a bum deal, since my floor is also deserted, and I was forced to go out for the night with a group of only girls, since this place seems to be totally devoid of dudes. My harem and I walked for about an hour around our little island in the middle of the Nile, before we all were about to fall asleep and had to return.

Tomorrow orientation starts, bright and early, and goes for six hours. I hope we do a lot of ice-breaking games!!!!

Sorry for the lack of pictures. My camera's somewhere in my luggage. I promise at least one tomorrow.

Tokyo, Chicago, Madison, Appleton

2007-07-29T16:32:00.000-06:00

What follows probably isn't interesting. Actually, the past four weeks' worth of entries probably weren't that interesting. Too bad I put a disclaimer at the end and not the beginning, huh?

6:03 AM: I woke up to the air conditioner starting up, which was absolutely freezing, and all the lights being suddenly turned on. Finally, we were freed from our prison, and now I'm back on the fourth floor lounge, waiting to be able to check in.

10:13 AM: That was strange. The oldest man in the world approached me (right as Harry and Voldemort were facing off, of course). I could see the entire shape of his skull through his skin. He explained that he had his middle school students with him, and he wanted to let them practice English on me.
Suddenly I'm surrounded by six nervous students reading questions from sheets of paper. They asked easy questions like, "What is your name?" and "Where are you from?" but then moved onto much more difficult questions like, "What is famous in your country?" (I was a bit of a jerk here - I said, "The Statue of Liberty, hot dogs, and the Atlanta Braves") and, "What is most important thing in life?" which just left me baffled (I considered giving them the same three answers as the previous question). Never a dull moment, not even in an airport.

11:47 AM: Nearly 24 hours after I arrived, I finally got through security. Since I'm flying Business Class, I got into the Red Carpet Club, which is totally awesome. Now I can enjoy all the free drinks and food I want, and nap in relative luxury. Also, they gave me a ticket for a mini suite during my layover in O'Hare, where apparently I'll be able to shower and eat breakfast. I'll have to see what that is all about, but right now I'm in heaven.

11:50 AM: I finally discovered where the smell of vomit has been coming from - my track jacket. I foolishly shoved it into my backpack while it was still damp after the typhoon in Kyoto, and it must have gotten mildewy or something, because the worst smell of all time is coming from it. I have to remember to keep that pocket closed on the flight to avoid embarrassing myself my first time in Business Class.

11:54 AM: I tried to get a Time or a Newsweek, but all they had was hardcore pornography. Way to stay classy, Japan.

4:34 PM: Well, we're up in the air now, and it's totally awesome. Not only am I in Business Class, but I have the front seat, so I've got a crapload of leg room. The seats recline, with leg and footrests, and I'm constantly being waited on. The second I sat down, I was given orange juice by one of the flight attendants, who saw my book and was impressed that I had gotten Harry Potter in Japan. Then I was given a menu, showing all the elaborate courses in the meal service. Soon after, I was given course after course of the best-tasting airplane food I've ever had, while I watched The Last Mimzy.
The one downside is that while the food tasted good, it is airplane food. Let's just say it's a good thing I'm within ten feet of the bathrooms.

10:23 AM: I finally finished Harry Potter. Little did I know that all the flight attendants were waiting the 10-hour flight so I could tell them what happened. The second I closed the book, I was called up front, where I proceeded to ruin the entire book for five eager flight attendants.

Even though it's been over a week since I got back, I figure I should finish this. Long story short, I got stuck in Chicago, but luckily my sister was in Chicago at that time, about to head back to Madison, so she picked me up and brought me to her apartment, where my mom met us and drove me home. One week later and my body is just beginning to readjust to the time difference. The jet lag is killer.

Looking back, I can't believe what an incredible trip I had. I'm not even 21 years old, and I've been able to see and do some amazing things that some people much, much older than me haven't even been able to do. The main purpose (besides fun and seeing some really crazy things) of my trip was a success - I am so confident in my ability to survive on my own in a completely foreign world, and I am no longer nervous about getting by in Egypt. In fact, Egypt should be a breeze compared to this - I certainly won't be hopping from train to train every day! I look forward to stepping off my plane and onto African soil, but until then, I'm happy to have these two extra weeks to spend with my friends and family at home. Check back here on August 22nd for my first Egyptian update.

Tokyo - Trapped in Tokyo

2007-07-21T16:03:00.000-06:00

Pearl and I woke up bright and early for a super-important and super-nerdy mission: to get the seventh Harry Potter book. It was being released in Japan at 8 AM, which I assume is midnight in London. But it's only 6:00 PM back home, so I was able to feel great about the fact that I had it 6 hours before my much more obsessed sisters could get it. Losers! Of course, I was the only person in Tokyo to have bought it, since it hadn't been translated to Japanese. The people standing at the sad little Harry Potter table outside the bookstore practically went nuts when I bought it. They also gave me a gay little bright orange Harry Potter bag to embarrass myself with on the subway.

We packed our crap up and left for Tokyo Station. Pearl would be returning to camp, and I would be going to the airport to try to get my flight moved up two weeks.

Some of you must think I'm crazy for cutting my vacation (a vacation from not working, however) short by two weeks. But any of you who have been to Japan for more than two weeks probably know that - no offense to Japan - it all starts to become the same. All the temples and shrines blur together, and same goes for all the neon cities. I'm sure it would be a great country to live in, but sightseeing here for six weeks in a row can get a bit redundant. And rather than two weeks (back to being alone, mind you) of the same old, I thought my time would be better spent at home with my friends and family before I take off again.

So Pearl sat and waited with me for my train, where we had a nice, half-hour goodbye (she really hates goodbyes, but loves to drag them out, apparently). I can't help but be struck by the fact that four years ago, when I stopped in the hall at school to comfort a little Asian girl crying about failing a Spanish exam, I was setting in motion events that would lead to the two of us hugging goodbye in a train station in Tokyo. I think she and I are both in agreement that our time together in Japan was a bit surreal. But I am very lucky to have had her there with me - she puts up with my sarcasm that often borders on being just a plain old asshole, and she knows how to have a good time anywhere (much to the bewilderment of the quiet, reserved Japanese). It's a shame she won't be in Cairo with me.

So anyway, I got to the airport and, as expected, things turned sour. Since my tickets were bought with frequent flier miles, they could only get me specific seats, of which there were none between the 21st of July and the 5th of August, my scheduled departure date. I tried several different ticket agents, all of whom appeared to be heartless, ignoring my cries of, "My sister was hit by a car!" (Five years ago, but I didn't tell them that.) One guy even started yelling at me when all I asked was, "Isn't there anything you can do?" I think I found my very first mean Japanese person!

Since it was a Saturday, there was literally not a bed in Tokyo or any nearby city, unless I was willing to shell out hundreds of dollars for the Park Hyatt (where Bill Murray and Scarlett Johansson stayed in Lost in Translation). Which I wasn't. So I settled down for a nice, long weekend in the airport, even though I knew it would be impossible to change my flight before the 5th.

After searching online to no avail for any room of any kind, I began to explore flight options. I found one that was fairly cheap (read: cheaper than two weeks in Japan) from Osaka, so I called my dad, waking everyone at home up at 3 AM - sorry, family - to ask if I should do it, since I would have to book it and hop on a train to Osaka as soon as possible if I was going to make it in time. By calling, I regrettably ruined my planned surprise - I really wanted to beg my way onto a flight from Tokyo, so I should show up at my parents' doorstep in a few days, much to their surprise. My dad said he'd look for better options online, and said he'd call me back. And that's where we are now. I'll try to provide updates as things go along.

5:32 PM: This couple has officially been in this airport lounge making out for three hours now. I got to watch the whole process as they introduced themselves, and now this. I can only hope I'll get to see them break up within the next couple of hours.

5:34 PM: Why do they pick the most nasal woman to do the announcements?

5:39 PM: My dad just called. He said he's just going to use miles to fly me from here rather than Osaka. Isn't he the best? By the way, I forgot to mention that when Pearl and I were leaving the hostel, Sebastian the creepy German said, "See you later," even though there's no indication they'll ever be able to find each other again. Unsettling.

6:37 PM: My god, how things turn. I am now flying business class directly to Chicago tomorrow. I'm still spending the night in the airport here, which I'm fine with (although I'm beginning to suspect that since I'm not past security, I'll be kicked out on the streets at some point), but I figured I would try to check in 20 hours early and spend the night in the Red Carpet Club lounge. I was so excited to deal with the nice Business Class people rather than the frigid Economy Class bitches, but when I went to the Business Class area, the desk was empty. So I went back to Economy, and asked if they would be back so I could check in.
The woman said I would have to wait until tomorrow, and when I asked what time the counter opens, she actually rolled her eyes at me, like that was a totally inane question to ask. Then she shrugged and said, "I don't know. 11:30?" Brilliant customer service.
Now my problem is that I got from the ATM a crapload of money in anticipation of staying here for two more weeks, so I bought an enormous pile of junk food for my dinner, and then settled down in my seat/bed for some Harry Potter. Just another wild night in Tokyo.

10:29 PM: For the past three hours, I had been watching this lone security guard walking in a circle around me and the three French guys also sleeping in the lounge up here on the fourth floor. He was visibly nervous about saying anything to us, since there were four times as many of us as him and he was uncomfortable with using that much English, I took comfort in his unease and slept up there even though it was obvious it wasn't allowed, as did the French dudes. Next thing any of us know, he's waking us up, saying, "Stay. Follow me." And then he just walked away. All of us were confused - did he want us to stay or follow? He stopped about 20 meters away and just stared at us. Finally, one of the French guys went over and asked him what was going on. He came back and said to me, "If I understand, we have to go to ze first floor to a zpecial area."
So we all gathered up our stuff and followed the security guard through the strangely deserted airport. It wasn't so much a parade as a hilarious shuffle, since the security guard was sort of meandering at his own pace without even looking back to see if we were following.
Eventually, we got to the lounge on the first floor, where a couple guards watched over thirty prisoners - er, passengers. One by one, more passengers shuffled in, escorted by guards, looking as confused as the rest of us.
The worst part is we had to leave the empty, perfect quiet of upstairs to this cramped, loud lounge that has been totally taken over by a huge, sleepless group of Japanese teenagers.

10:59 PM: Now all of our guards are making their way through the crowd, checking passports and tickets. It makes sense, since we're not behind security so we could be hobos or something, but it isn't detracting from the prison feel they've got going here. The guy that checked my information wasn't happy with my lack of a ticket, or the fact that all the info I had about my flight was scribbled on the back of a receipt. But I think I passed, and I don't have any reason to fear being taken out behind the dumpsters, where I saw them take a Jewish family who never came back.

Tokyo - 1 Crab Hat, 2 Crab Hat, Red Fish, Blue Fish

2007-07-20T15:41:00.000-06:00

I woke up to the creepy German guy who sleeps across from Pearl hitting on her. He was so obvious in what he wanted, and his lines were hilarious. Stuff like: "You're funny," and when she kept her sheet on like a cape, "Are you going to save the world?" Or my personal favorite, claiming he spoke "three and a half" languages, but quickly amending it to five, because apparently he forgot he speaks Italian and French. Pearl was strong enough to resist his charms, but I was tempted to hit the greaseball in the face.

We wanted sushi for breakfast, but when we couldn't find the sushi place we were looking for (after that, I stopped carrying Lonely Planet entirely), we settled for the first place we found, which had a lot of great tempura.

After that, shopping. This time, however, it was for me. I needed to get a lot of gifts, but more importantly, I had to get these frog hats I've seen all over Japan but haven't been able to find. Eventually I found some hats shaped like crabs made by the same company, so I bought one, settling for my more unique hat. As we were leaving the store, I came up with a brilliant idea: any time anyone is fighting in front of me or acting crabby (get it?!?!?!?!), they have to wear the crab hat. For the two people fighting, though, I would need a second crab hat, and I was much too embarrassed to go back for a second one. So I gave Pearl my debit card and she bought the second (and last) crab hat, laughing hysterically while I peeked around the corner as she paid.

We then went to the Sony Building to check out all their amazing things. But mostly we just sat in several of their high definition lounges and watched high definition home videos of babies with skin rashes and creepy clowns. The place was really cool, though, and we got to try out some stuff that isn't even available for you suckers yet.

Exhausted from all the walking and the madness of Shibuya, we returned to the hostel for a little nap. For the second time that day, I awoke to the now-shirtless German trying and failing to get into Pearl's pants. She was nice enough to try to sneak out to get a cake for possibly my last day in Japan (we'll see about that tomorrow), but couldn't find a cake shop. It was still a nice gesture, though, and she did end up buying me sushi, a crepe, and another small meal later. But mostly because I had run out of cash and Japan hates credit cards.

We went back to Shibuya to see it at night on a Friday, and it didn't disappoint. The neon was overwhelming, and there was an insane amount of people. We ended up getting a little pre-meal at a stand-up sushi place. What you do is you just walk in, stand at the bar, and yell your orders to the chefs, and then pay at the end based on how much and what kinds of fish you had. We were a little confused, but one chef took pity on us and gave us a giant English menu, and he made sure to ask us what we wanted, since we didn't know how to get his attention. It was really fun, and the sushi was pretty good.

Later, we met Ixchell and Kaz for karaoke. Unfortunately, the karaoke place was filled with Japanese businessmen waiting to get in, and we wouldn't have a booth until 11:50, and that was too late due to hostel curfews. So there went my last chance for Japanese karaoke. Instead, we went to an arcade, where we played a Dance Dance Revolution-style drumming game, and marveled at all the ultra-high tech games. There was horse race betting more realistic than the actual race tracks, some weird, giant undersea roulette thing, and this really crazy game where kids move their Magic cards around on this sensitive table that somehow reads the cards and then acts them out on a video screen. It's hard to explain, but it was unreal. Watching the kids who have mastered this stupid game move different cards to fight off approaching armies was a bit like watching Tom Cruise work the computer in Minority Report.

We returned to the hostel, which had become twice as packed as before. It was already impossible to sleep there, but with all the new people, sleep became some sort of foreign concept.

Tokyo - "It would be so nice if something made sense for a change." - Alice

2007-07-19T15:14:00.000-06:00

We woke up bright and early (okay, not that early - only 6:00) to go to the Tsukiji Fish Market. For some reason, the French people that were up the night before at 2 AM were still awake at 6:00, all of them on the internet. I guess the French have no need for sleep.

When we got to the fish market, the majority of the really crazy stuff was finished, but we still some some cool octopi, eels, huge tunas, and the like. We picked a sushi shop for breakfast and watched the chef prepare our meal right in front of us from fish that were alive only a couple hours prior. Of course, it was the best sushi I've ever had.

After the fish market, we kind of strolled around the downtown area of Tokyo, which was a bit mindblowing. We were absolutely exhausted, so our schedule consisted of finding comfortable places to sit down. First we stopped at a cafe that overlooked the busy intersection, where I ate an entire second breakfast, to Pearl's disbelief. Then we went to a bookstore so I could stock up for when I surely get stuck in airports (more on that in a couple days), where we sat in the really comfy chairs and Pearl actually napped.

Although still exhausted, Pearl called her two friends from her English camp - Kaz and Ixchell, who have lived here for more or less five years. The first thing we told them to meet us at - the giant Sony Building in central Tokyo - they were unable to find. Then Kaz suggested we meet at Shinjuku Station, one of the busiest stations in Tokyo. When I asked where specifically, he said, "Uh... the exit." So far, not so good. Then he called me half an hour later, saying they had gotten off at the wrong station. And they were supposed to show us around?

Eventually they found us, and they turned out to be really cool. Kaz speaks fluent Japanese, so he was a huge help, and Ixchell is hilarious. They took us to Harajuku, this crazy shopping area for teenagers. And I mean crazy. These kids have decided to completely avoid any sort of real fashion and have invented their own. The only way I can describe it is if an acid-crazed clown raped Alice in Wonderland. Some of the girls wear Alice-type dresses, complete with awful shoes and huge, floppy bonnets or bows. Others tan themselves until they look like dark chocolate, and then dye their dreadlocks different neon shades. It was horrifying. We entered a few of the frightening stores, which unfortunately don't let you take pictures (but I did sneak one of a gay pirate outfit for sale), which was a shame. I was dying to take pictures of the girl in the baby doll dress standing in front of a huge mirror, trying to decide which giant bonnet worked best with her outfit.

After that, we went to the famous Shibuya, which many of you will remember as that busy intersection in Lost in Translation. It wasn't as packed as usual, but it was still very chaotic.

First the automobiles rule the intersection...

Until the chaos begins.

Then the shopping started. The girls dragged Kaz and I to an unbelievable amount of stores. It was brutal. But I did find some good gifts. Hours later, we returned to the teen area, which was much more filled than it was at noon. Strangely enough, the girls started going into the stores we were making fun of earlier and actually started to buy things! By this point, my feet had already gone numb.

After a lot more people-watching and shopping, we went to a photo booth. I don't mean a normal one where you take four pictures in a little booth outside of a store. In Japan, entire buildings are filled with these little booths. You take about six or eight pictures, and then you run to the back side and throw all these tacky graphics and words and effects on the pictures until you can barely see your faces, and then you finally print them out, hours later. Against my will, it was actually a lot of fun. And these girls take their photos seriously. It seems some girls could make a whole day of photo booth-going.

We went to get some tempura, where Kaz was kind enough to order for all of us. After a long time filled with excellent food and great conversation, we all split up, since Pearl and I were exhausted. Pearl literally fell asleep the second she sat on her bed.

Tokyo - Too Many People

2007-07-18T14:53:00.000-06:00

The first order of business was getting the hell out of Osaka. We were worried that the anal retentive employee at the front desk would be mad that we were cutting out early, but since this is the only place I've ever seen where you pay day-by-day, I'd imagine this sort of thing happens quite often here. In our haste, we neglected to follow some of the hundreds of pre-check-out rules. We definitely did not "fold your brankets" (I'm not making fun of their accents - that's how they spelled it on the signs).

We boarded a train to Tokyo (oh, how I missed these long train rides), and three hours later we were in the middle of the madness of Tokyo. I've been in Japan for nearly a month now, but nothing can prepare you for Tokyo. It has to be the craziest city in the world.

After a few not-so-difficult transfers, we were at the station closest to our hostel. The problem is I had felt so rushed at the Apple store in Osaka that I hadn't written down the name of the hostel we were staying at. All I had was a hand-drawn map that said to cross some water, pass the Mercedes-Benz store, and eventually take a right.

Unbelievably, we were unable to find the hostel with that detailed information. We wandered for close to an hour through tiny little residential and warehouse neighborhoods. The woman at a nearby information center pointed us to the Mercedes-Benz building, so we were at least in the general area of the hostel. We asked several people, but none of them knew any English. At one point, Pearl just opened the door and walked into some old woman's home. In her defense, the woman had decorated her house like a hotel, and even had a little "welcome" sign out front. The woman was pissed at us.

Finally, a nice cop gave us directions. It was to the sister hostel of the one we were booked at, but they pointed us the right way. And then we had to wait at the hostel for the receptionist to get back from lunch. Luckily for Pearl, they had an open bed that night, so she wouldn't have to go back to that old woman and ask to stay at her house.

The hostel is a step up from the one in Osaka (a pile of feces would be a step up), but it's filled with loud French people. Pearl and I are sharing a room with these three guys from California currently skateboarding around the country while sporting really trendy 1980s moustaches (when asked, "Where are you going next?" one responded, "We just go where the boards go, man.") The place is really hard to sleep in, but we shouldn't be here long.

After checking in we tried to find a cool-sounding restaurant in Lonely Planet. Of course, the maps were wrong and we never found it. I'm done following these maps. In fact, Pearl called her friends in Tokyo to show us around the next day so we don't find ourselves completely lost anymore. Because Tokyo is really, really big, believe it or not.

We went to the neon craziness of Shinjuku, where we had Chinese food, much to Pearl's dismay (it's like me going to Japan to have a hamburger). But she did speak in Chinese to the waiter, who made fun of her Wisconsin-accented Mandarin. The food was incredible, and I ate two full-sized meals, because it was an absolute steal. I spent the rest of the night wanting to either vomit or die, I was so full.

After dinner, we had only one destination in mind: the red light district! Lonely Planet was wrong again, but after about half an hour, we found it. You can tell when you're there, because there are hundreds of signs showing you all the choices you have for dancers/entertainers/sex slaves. Most of them are actually men, which was surprising. It was really funny to see some of the male escorts sitting outside their clubs, talking on the phone and doing normal stuff in front of the billboards offering them for sale. One guy in his picture was in full S&M gear - he even had The Gimp's mask from Pulp Fiction. It was a really freaky area, in short.

We then made our way back to the hostel at only 8:00, since we were exhausted from getting lost all day, and we had to get up early for the first market the next morning. Plus my modeling shoot should be coming up and I need to look well-rested.

Osaka - Osaka Sucks

2007-07-17T14:29:00.000-06:00

Before we took off, we got up to watch the Gion Matsuri parade that marks the end of the festival. And boy, was it hilarious!

There were thousands of people lining the road - the crowds stretched all along the route and were almost an entire block wide in some places. The cops tried to control the masses, but it was literally surging against them as they tried to make a human wall. I should mention that the crowd was 75% senior citizens. These people go nuts over their traditions.

It was incredibly hot as well. Within ten minutes the sweat was pouring down my back. Finally, the first float showed up. But these things are centuries old, and they're not that advanced. It's this ten-story thing on wheels, pulled by two teams of about twenty guys (half of whom were white and looked like confused tourists that somehow wound up pulling massive floats). Oh, and the floats don't turn. At all. They had to lay down all this bamboo and water the ground to drag the float 90 degrees around corners. The process literally took half an hour per float. And there were roughly forty floats.

This sex kitten stood pressed against
my shoulder throughout the parade.

Then people started dropping, after only the first float had passed. All sorts of old people were being carried by the cops to ambulances, but still the crowd tried to push past the cops to get a better view. It was pandemonium, and I began to see why the parade is such a big hit - it's a really, really fun time. After about five floats, though, we had enough, so we pushed backwards through the crowd, which was quite the ordeal, and went back to check out.

We went to Osaka and found our hostel, which we had booked right before we got on the train. Katie had written me earlier that they were in a "HELL HOLE" in Osaka, so we were worried we would be at the same one. We weren't, but we might as well have been, because our hostel could only be described as a "HELL HOLE". It was so ancient and strict (probably due to the Christian owners and managers) - no eating or drinking in the rooms, lights out at 10 PM, showers (group, not individual) are only operational for 45 minutes, one room key has to be shared by all eight dorm members. It was hilarious. Pearl and I planned to stay for three nights before going to Tokyo, but within about ten minutes we had shortened it to two nights. And later that night, we decided just to go to Tokyo the next day.

We quickly got out of there (since we had only a few hours before bed time), and I dragged Pearl to the Osaka Aquarium. It was actually the best aquarium in the world, I'm going to assume. They had all sorts of crazy fish, and they tried to make their tanks as large and realistic as possible - they even had spider monkeys and sloths in the rain forest section. But the star attraction is the freaking whale shark. That thing is huge, and it's at the center of the spiral-shaped building, in the world's largest aquarium tank. It was so cool. Consider my aquarium thirst quenched.

We then went to the "America Village", which is supposed to be filled with people living the "myth of America", but is actually no different than the rest of Japan. We also hit up some small little neon-filled streets. And then we were out of things to do in Osaka.

We went to an Apple store for free internet, and decided to look for a place in Tokyo for the next night. I found only one place available, since it was the weekend, and booked myself a bed. Pearl went to do the same, and I had gotten the last bed! We laughed for about five minutes in the middle of the Apple store, and then left quickly after receiving glares from the staff for abusing their free internet. We would have no option but to beg for Pearl's sake at the hostel in Tokyo.

We quickly raced back to our creepy little hostel in the middle of the woods, since it was almost curfew. But on the way, I got stopped by a young Japanese man. He claimed he was a fashion designer, and started asking me my measurements. He then offered me a job as a male model, to shoot in Tokyo on the 20th and 21st. I lied and said I was going home really early on the 20th. He then held a finger to his ear, like he had an ear piece (he didn't) and said, "Oh! It was just changed to the 19th!" I don't know how legit of a career this could be, but he was persistent, so I let him take several shots of me right there on the sidewalk. I tried to make a Zoolander face, but he wasn't having that. And for those of you who don't model (unlike me, of course), let me tell you - it's the most awkward thing in the world. I suddenly became extremely conscious of my hands and feet, and I had no idea what to do with them. I kept kind of raising my hands up, and then crossing my arms, and then just letting them dangle. I'm positive that guy got some really awkward pictures of me.

He claimed he was sending the pictures to Tokyo tonight, and said he'd either call or e-mail me (I gave him my roommate Bodnar's phone number and e-mail address) before the nineteenth. The whole thing seemed very sketchy, and I'm sure he's just masturbating to the pictures. But it won't stop me from telling everyone I'm a model in Japan, and Pearl can attest to the fact that my ego began to swell throughout the rest of the trip.