This week

This week has been much more relaxed than last week in one sense but
also more stressful than last week. We haven't had a planned outing
since last week but we have a lot more work and studying to do for our
class. We have an Egyptology test today which will hopefully go as
well as the last test but I'm not sure. We also have to learn, study,
and memorize almost 300 words of vocabulary which should at least
double my vocabulary but alot of it is impractical. I like our morning
class because it is practical Arabic, we do alot of speaking and role
playing. Our afternoon class has been informational but much less
practical because we are learning about history. It's much harder to
learn history when we don't understand the language so we got the
vocabulary list but we haven't been learning them in class.

Tuesday night a few friends, Egyptians and Americans both, and myself
hired a boat (like the ones that go into the speicherstadt) and went
on a ride down the Nile for two hours. The boat had music so we pushed
the middle table off to the side and then used the middle as a
dancefloor. It was a great night and Cairo is even more beautiful at
night, it doesn't have the lights of new York or the skyline of
hamburg but the thing about night time in Cairo is that you can't see
the trash which is everywhere and especially in the Nile.

Tommorow morning we leave for Alexandria where we are being given our
first practical Arabic test, ordering completely in Arabic exactly
what we want on the menu at each plae we eat. So far we have ordered
lots of things at small restaurants, street vendors, and bakeries but
they understand hand signals such as pointing to what we want. I don't
think it will be a problem and if it is I will just go hungry I guess.
I'm excited for Alexandria for a couple of reasons but mostly because
I'm ready to go swimming and it's a huge plus that it's in the
medditeranean. We have a full schedule in Alexandria apparently bit
we have been told that it's all a surprise. Mina, our Egyptian
"chaperone" is planning the trip because it's his some city and I have
complete faith that he will male the trip fantastic. We get back
Sunday night and will have a double class at ILI on Monday because our
teacher was sick this past Monday. I like their policy of making up
classes when teachers are absent because I feel like we are getting
what we paid for (or had paid for us).

Last night we went to a cafe right at the end of the Germany-Spain
soccer game just in time for the Spanish goal which put a damper on an
otherwise good night of studying, talking, and just hanging out. I'm
proud of Germany, what other team can say they were in a position to
be in the top 3 at the world cup for 3 straight tournaments. Germany
wasn't expected to be this good and it's too bad that they were the
"favorite" last night. Spain is far and away the best team inthe
tournament, Germany has just outplayed everyone so far but that streak
was doomed to end at some point. Spain looked good last night and it
should be a great game with the Netherlands but I think that the
Netherlands will take the title and as some of you may remember they
were always one of my favorite teams. I have never been a fan of Spain
except maybe cassillas. Hopefully I'll be able to watch all or some
of the final but I'm not sure how realistic that is if we are in
Alexandria or on our way back. I guess we will wait and see...