First Days

Finally have some time to write:

The flights went suprisingly very smoothly, although I wasn't able to sleep at all on either the flight from Boston or from Paris. I landed in Paris around 11:35, but somehow through changing terminals across the airport and going through security again, I got to my next gate with only 15 to spare before boarding. Although I was a little flustered I was happy that I successfully transfered on my own, and to make things better, in the line to board, I met two other American students, Laura and Brian, going to study at AUC. We began talking and decided to wait for each other after the flight so that we could all traverse the Egypt airport together. This was definitely a good idea because the airport was packed with Egyptian families when we landed. We made it through immigration, custums, and the baggage claim really quickly, and then went to find the driver scheduled to pick us up. The driver didn't speak much English, but somehow he managed to get across that we were to wait for one other person. It was about 7pm on tuesday now, but we waited until 845 for some kid who never showed up! I don't know whether he missed his flight, but I felt bad that he had to tackle everything by himself.

The ride to AUC took about 35 minutes, but it was TERRIFYING!!! I was covering my mouth the entire time, expecting to hear the scraping of metal as our van narrowly missed other cars squeezing between them. I swear we almost got in 10 accidents and almost hit three people!

Once we arrived at AUC (around 940) it was pretty desolate. We had to run our bags through security and then the guards pointed us in the direction we were supposed to go. We wandered a bit, but eventually found the check-in (one check-in for boys, one for girls). There were two other girls waiting there as well, one of which happened to be my roommate. Her name is Michelle and she's form Georgia. I'm really glad I got an American roommate because it just allowed for us to explore the campus and figure everything out together.

The rooms are really nice! Huge, and they have lots of storage space. AND AC!! The bathrooms are a bit gross though - two showers and two toilets, and the showers tend to flood.

The next day Michelle and I met up with Laura and this other girls Liz to get breakfast and start getting our IDs, bus passes, registration, money, etc. They have a "Quick 24" which is open 24 hours and sells breakfast items, candy, drinks, toiletries, etc. AND, THEY HAVE HONEY BUNCHES OF OATS! Made my morning. I got some cereal and then a really good MANGO juice box :) After breakfast we began to tackle all that we needed to get done.

For an American University, it was really surprising how little english many of the workers and guards know. It was pretty difficult locating where we needed to go to do everything. The best part was when we went to get our bus passes, I asked the attendent where the bus picked us up, or where we met the bus, and he said he didn't know! AUC has proven to be very helpful.

Throughout the day, we continued to meet people. There are about 10 of us who have been meeting up and grabbing meals. Since we all don't have cell phones right now, we've had to go back to setting a time and place in advance to meet. Tonight, however, an RA may take us into town to get cell phones for a good price.

There isn't much to do on campus, at least as of yet. It's pretty isolated, being about 40 minutes from downtown Cairo. Mostly, we've just been hanging out and talking in the common area that has one tv with one channel that plays horrible movies constantly. We hope to go into Cairo soon, perhaps later this evening. We're also starting to plan trips/places to visit. The school offers a trip to the pyramids, a nile river cruise dinner, a trip to a bazaar, and a trip to old/coptic Cairo. Since they don't offer trips to Luxor, ALexandria, or Sharm el Sheikh, we're looking into that. We found a reallllllyyyy cheap place to stay in Sharm el Sheikh for about 8 US dollars a night, per room. RIDICULOUS. And the place looks amazing. It offers diving, safari, and desert excursions. We were going to try and fly there (1hr flight from here for about $100 each way) this weekend because we don't start class until the 9th, but we found out we need to give the schools ten days notice if we want a ride to the airport. So we just do a trip some weekend in the future after class on thursday until saturday.

That's it for now, more later!