One month down...

So it's been awhile since I've last blogged for real. A good amount of stuff has happened since the end of July. I'm now in my fourth week at work. I get to do a variety of different tasks. Not only am I helping to develop a program to make the American Degree programs here better, I just found out today that I'm being put in charge of coordinating a college fair the company is putting on in the middle of October. I think it'll be a good events planning opportunity. Besides work, I've actually have had things to do lately! People came to Alex about three weeks or so ago. We hung out and I got to see more of the city. Since then I've been to the beach - got into the Med. Sea - to some pools and gone to a good fish place. The American Center, where m office is located, has movies every once and awhile, so I've been going to those.

Last weekend I headed to Cairo to get away from Alex for a little while. I was missing Nisrin and having more of a larger crowd to hang with. Of course we still haven't made it to the museum them. Sleep always keeps us from the touristic stuff. I did manage to the Cairo Jazz club which doesn't actually play jazz. It's a bar type place that has a DJ that plays techno and on some random weekdays, they may have a band! I also went to Citadel, which is this ancient city in Cairo that was used as a fortess (my facts may be a little off). While I was there I visited the Military museum and got to learn a lot about the various wars Egypt has been involved in. I also went to two mosques. I can't remember the first one right now, but the second one was the Mosque of Mohammed Ali. It was really beautiful (I've got lots of pics that I can't upload from that day!)

Around this time my roomie from Turkey left to go back home, so it's just been me and Jana for the last two weeks now. Thankfully last week we ended up with plans every night, so we weren't totally bored. We met up with some trainees from Cairo who came to Alex for something work related. Met a former @er named Nora who's koo peoples. Went to a lot of cafes (it's the number one pass time here, go to a cafe, smoke some sheesha and chill out).

Then this past weekend an @ from Germany, Dan, came to visit even though the Alex Cultural Event had been cancel. We had a lot of fun. We went to the Alexandria Museum, headed to Qaitbey Fort and then grabbed some grub. It was great because it was Dan's first time in Alex and me and Jana had yet to explore really, so all three of us kinda found our way to everything. I found out that the tram goes past downtown. I'd prolly had never figured that out without Dan. So now I can do some exploring on a different part of the city (if you've never looked at a map of Alex, you should, this place is sooooo long). We also were taken to this nice restaurant named Jungle. And it stays true to its name. The place was amazing. It was in a huge hut type thing, had waterfalls and even had flamingos! Of course, I didn't think it so incredibly nice the next day when I realized that I had over 30 mosquito bites on my feet; the only part of my body that wasn't covered while we were there.

That weekend Nisrin came up too so that she could have a relaxing weekend. She actually left today, lol. Alex is the place whee everyone comes during the summer to relax and get away. And actually August has the highest volume of people in the city! It takes forever to get around sometimes. I mean the city already has a population of 3.5 - 5 MILLION people. Can you believe I live somewhere with that many people in the same city.

I've been able to read a lot since I've been here. Within this month I've complete 3 novels. Part of my weekend of touring Alex, I finally got to go inside the Alexandria Library. I found great section on Sociology and Political Science. So I'll be going there to get through some educated materials into my reading. It's crazy, already I can tell a difference in my interests. I knew coming here would force me to pay more attention to what goes on in the world. I actually want to watch the news. If you've ever spent a fair amount of time with me you would know that this doesn't happen. I've signed up for email alerts about what's going on in the world. I have to be prepared here because it's starting to happen that the minute someone realizes that I'm American, they want to know my political views on a certain topic.

I'm supposed to start taking Arabic classes this upcoming week, but I'm not 100% sure if that's actually going to materialize. There's currently only one other person signed up for the course, and I get to go for free, so it's not looking so good right now. I'm picking up a little of the language. I can do some interactions. This weekend I've got the place to myself. It'll be the first time in over a month that I will be alone for an entire day. I just realized that last night. I'm looking forward to some me time. Next weekend I'm heading back to Cairo for the weekend. No specific plans but it's kind of become a pattern that I go to Cairo then people come to Alex then I have a weekend in Alex without any visitors. So I plan to keep the cycle going for awhile.

Nothing too much going on. I get my first paycheck next week, so I'll be starting to venture off beyond Cairo and Alex. Some of the places I want to go include the Red Sea, Sinai, Luxor, the Black Desert, the White Desert and Siwa. The journey's just beginning....