Dancing and the Mediterranean

The city of Alexandria is definitely not what I expected. Although it's on the coast of the Mediterranean and harbors (no pun intended) some amazing relics and ruins from the Greek, Roman, and Egyptian eras among others, we have yet to really explore and visit most of these sites. There is, of course, the Lighthouse of Alexandria which is now mostly in the sea, as well as the ancient Library of Alexandria. Although the ancient library does not exist here anymore, Alexandria has recently built a new library that is quite a tourist attraction in and of itself. Additionally, the city was the focal point of the Greek Empire under Alexander the Great, for whom the city is named after. There are palaces of old rulers, a Roman amphitheater, and catacombs, necropolises amid a host of other ancient monuments spanning many periods in history. And of course, there is the lovely coast, which we see every day on our way to class. Despite its antiquity and historical significance, however, the city is extremely conservative, at least the sector that the university lies in. Almost all women are covered and dress extremely conservatively. A mosque is right down the street, and there are a few native Egyptian girls who have come up to our floor with the explicit purpose of proselytizing us. It is said that Alexandria was not always like this. In the 1940s the population numbered around 300,000 with 40% of that being foreigners, however, today there are almost 4 million residents in the city, most of them Egyptians, and many of them having emigrated from the country. Walking in the streets is difficult- since women do not "hang out" in the streets like men do, the Egyptian males stare at you as you walk by, and you are usually verbally harassed and called to as you walk to your destination. I have seriously considered wearing Hijaab or Niqaab just so that I could stroll more peacefully down the street. But it is a learning experience as well as a great excuse to go shopping for more "stylistic" or shall we say "modest" clothing.
In spite of these difficulties, we have had the opportunities to experience some Egyptian culture outside of the conservative areas. Last week we attended an event for National Environment Day. We went to a public garden in the middle of the city and attended a big festival/concert, in which groups from all over performed skits and dances that dealt with the theme of the environment. There were groups of little children performing cute little dances, and some young men (shebaab) danced some songs as well. There was also live music and some skits. It was great to see the city come together and put on something themed around such an important global issue. Some of the dances were very interesting, and made me wonder about the relationship between religion and culture as expressed through dancing. Some of the dances were quite sexually-charged, even to us Americans, and involved belly dancing and rather revealing outfits. However, when the dancers came out after the show, many of them had their heads covered. It made us wonder how such externally religious girls could be willing to dance so suggestively, especially in front of a public audience. I suppose this dynamic is just another facet of Egyptian culture that I need to ponder and explore more during my time here.
A few days later, the girls in the program were invited by one of the Arabic teachers to come to her "beach house" in Montazah, a private beach which lies next to the palace and luxury gardens of Khedive Abbas Hilmy who defined this region as his summer palace. The evening was great- we dipped our feet and bodies in the waters of the Mediterranean and then experienced one of the best meals we've had in Egypt yet. Of course there were tons of people around. The professor is married and has two children, and other relatives and friends of the family were around, as well as tons of kids. After eating, we sat around telling jokes in Arabic and talking. Later the adults called for a game, and so, at the suggestion of the Egyptians, we played a table game, in which everyone puts their hands face-down on the table and tap the table successively with the hands, until people get disqualifies by not going in the right order (I know i've played this back home....). After we played and sat around a bit, the masters of the house ordered FaTeer, which is by far the tastiest thing I've eaten in Egypt to date. They kind of remind me of crepes and can come in sweet as well as normal variety. "Savory" faTeer have cheese and vegetables and sometimes meat as well, but the sweet FaTeer is amazing- it's covered in butter and oil and sugar and is ridiculously bad for you. After eating we sat around and chatted a bit more until it was time to go, where we were driven by the men to the gates of the palace gardens. On the way, we stopped to see the beautiful palace, which by now has been converted into a hotel. Hopefully we can make it back there at some point. We experienced such warmth, generosity, and hospitality at Montazah and the family that hosted us, and we finally had the opportunity to just be ourselves among a typical Egyptian family- in short it was a true breath of fresh air and an experience I will cherish always.

الاسكندرية

After an 11 hour layover in Frankfurt, Germany, we finally arrived in Alexandria, Egypt, and we made our way to our dormitories on the coast of the Mediterranean. Although arriving at about 3:00 am, we were greeted at the door by the girls and directors of the girls dormitory for the University of Alexandria. Most of the Egyptian girls who stay here are from Alexandria, but there are some international students (mostly from Malaysia) as well as a few girls from the country. At first we were quite surprised that so many people were waiting to greet us, but by now we've learned that staying up late is not only a vocabulary word in Al-Kitaab (the main text used for studying Arabic) but it is a vital part of the culture here. People wake up early and in the middle of the day eat a huge lunch (the main meal of the day) after which they take a long nap (conveniently avoiding the hottest part of the day). Needless to say, we are still adjusting to this schedule....Anyway, after being greeted by the women in the dormitory we were given a quick tour and then shown our rooms, where we gratefully succumbed to a very deep sleep.
After a few hours of sleep, we got up and made our way to our school, the TAFL (Teaching Arabic as a Foreign Language) Center at the University of Alexandria, where we began the very hectic process of trying to figure out class placement in Modern Standard Arabic, Egyptian Dialect, and Media Arabic. At this point classes are running fairly smoothly, and we're beginning to get out and explore the city (more on that later). One of the hardest things for us to adjust to was the daily schedule and the other girls in the dorms. Egyptian, indeed, Middle Eastern culture, is extremely social- people are always talking together and eating and hanging out. For many of us, it is nice to meet people and talk with them and get to know them, but at some point we feel the need for privacy, whether to read or do homework or sleep or even just think. We have not quite mastered the balance and etiquette required to really gauge these social interactions, but I feel we're getting better. To further confuse these societal differences, there are some very strict rules and expectations here: almost everyone is muhajiba (covered) and some women go all out and wear the niqaab (no skin showing at all, and even gloves!), making us "westerners" feel incredibly foreign and self-conscious in our T-shirts and jeans, and many of us at this point have tried adopting some of the Egyptian style. However none of us have really felt judged by the other girls, and everyone seems genuinely interested in getting to know us and spending time talking to us. Another issue we had to deal with was the 9:00pm curfew that was upheld by the dormitory, which was eventually changed to 12:00am. However, despite the differences, people here are very warm, encouraging and even tolerate our Egyptian Arabic, or lack thereof. Most of the Arabic education in the United States is focused on Modern Standard Arabic (MSA) which is used in radio shows and journalism and other official and professional purposes. However, all Arabs use a dialect specific to their region. Egyptian dialect is well-known throughout the Middle East for many reasons, chief among them being the extensive entertainment industry. This linguistic phenomenon is known as diglossia and it is one of the most difficult features of learning Arabic (at least in my opinion). Dialects can differ greatly- for example, if a Moroccan spoke in his dialect, and an Iraqi spoke in his, it would be very difficult if not impossible for the two to understand each other even though they are both technically speaking Arabic. This is one of the main reasons why studying abroad is so crucial- even if one has many Arabic materials at his/her disposal, they may not really have an opportunity to practice the dialect that they're wishing to learn because the focus is largely on MSA. We are indeed having a lot of dialect practice here and hopefully we will continue to progress. We are also beginning to get out more and more, and the routine of school is beginning to be felt.