Single digits!

Yep. It's been about twelve days since I've last written. Apologies for that. In my defense, finals have actually provided me with legitimate work for a while. In those twelve days, not much happened. ISA had a Christmas lunch on Thursday which involved lots and lots of the foreigners on campus, listening to Christmas music, in the middle of sunny Cairene desert in New Cairo, eating gingerbread cookies, cupcakes, cheesecake, and all of the holiday essentials together. It was pretty awesome. I got to see/talk to Nancy and Amal again (two of the ISA workers who helped me retrieve my wallet just about three months ago) and of course Nancy pushed a cupcake upon me as I left to go to my anthropology class. "I'm stuffed."

"Take it for later! Put it in the fridge!" "I don't have a fridge!" "Take it for the road!" So I took one. "Now, eat the cupcake. Bye!"

Since twelve days ago, I've finished writing my paper on Jewish memory post-Holocaust in Europe and in Israel for my Zionism and Modern Judaism course, I've taken my exam for said class, and now what I have left is another paper on the role of women in Iran, my presentation for said paper, a Hieroglyphs exam, and an art and architecture exam. I'm not to worried about art and architecture, but glyphs is my issue. The way the course was taught to me was not entirely helpful for my learning style. It's really fun when we do group work in class and I can actually figure out what stuff means and read the glyphs themselves (who would've thought that I can actually read those previously ambiguous pictures! It doesn't really say 'left facing bird, circle, square, triangle, pyramid' but an actual word!) but when I have to do the exercises, which are a lot harder than what she puts on the tests and what not (except for last quiz, what the heck?!) I get sort of frustrated.

And I hate Egyptian verbs.

Anyway. Yesterday, Amelia and I went to get gelato for breakfast (not as good as Greece, and I'm sure still not as good as an Italian gelato would be, coughAlexcough) and I got one that was 'vanilla and chocolate' but was REALLY vanilla with Nutella. Yep. We had decided the night before to reward ourselves as such, and on the way to get gelato, we stopped at a shoe store for Amelia to look at shoes, and then we went into two bookstores and get this - I walked out without buying a single book. The only thing I got was a packet of 24 really cool stamps from all over Egypt for 8 LE!

I proceeded to get groceries, and then finished my paper by around seven thirty last night and then rewarded myself again by playing Sims 3. It seems so odd not to have legitimate homework or reading and just finals to study for and papers to write. And then when I look on Facebook and see friends who are also abroad this semester and their countdown to go home, I remember that I get to go home too, eventually, though later than everyone else.

First to arrive, last to leave, I suppose. A full four months.

There are a lot of mixed feelings that I'm feeling about being here and leaving, mostly concerning whether or not I've figured out if I truly felt like I belonged here this entire time (don't worry, not angsty anymore, thanks to Rose and her speech she gave me when I expressed my troubles) but I think I'll save that bit of my blog for either the day before I go home, or afterwards. Regardless, I have four days after my art and architecture final to explore, and some days in between Thursday and Sunday also to explore. We plan on hitting up some Mosques, Khan-el-Khalili (possibly several times?), Coptic Cairo (I really want to see the sight of the Ben Ezra Synagogue where the Geniza (massive depository of old Jewish documents) used to be but no longer is (sadface... primarily the fault of the Russians and British). And some other sights as well.

I'm sure these eight days will go fast. (Actually, I'm hoping the fifteen hours of flying, six hour layover in Amsterdam, and customs go faster!)

And that's kind of what I'm hoping for in a very large way! I will miss how everything here is so cheap. I'm going to get back home and freak out that soda costs one dollar. "SIX POUNDS?! ARE YOU CRAZY?! I PAY 2.75 LE FOR THAT!"

Yep. It's gonna be good.