but not here. sadly, there aren't too many leaves here and they're more of a palm frond variety. but i digress. sorry i haven't been too active in the blog-o-sphere, either on here or on my personal blog. it's been a long couple of days and honestly, i'm starting to get the shock a little bit. "the shock", as the egypterns have so lovingly deemed it, can also be called "medina rage" (medina being the arabic word for city or market) but is basically just culture shock that makes you want to freak out. while i'm loving cairo and am so glad i'm here, there's some things that are just hard to adjust to and some days are worse than others. so in order to harness this negative feeling and have a cathartic experience, i thought i'd detail some things that bring on the shock for me personally.
1. an egregious lack of real diet coke. so this one's pretty obvious. we all know i'm obsessed with diet coke and it just simply doesn't exist in large enough quantities here. please see my facebook wall photo for an example of what is unacceptable.
2. my work computer. i wish i was joking when i said that my computer at work crashes almost every 30 minutes. like total melt-down crashes. this becomes a problem when i have 2 drafts of a speech i'm writing for the president of AUC and i lose them both. fml. this brings me to another point.
3. cairo time. unfortunately not a reference to the new motion picture. cairo time is how long everything takes to get anywhere or to get anything accomplished in cairo. so my computer problem is on the way to being fixed, meaning our assistant ordered me a new one and it was supposed to get here september 30th. it is now october 12th. let's get real. additionally, this applies to cairo being worst planned city in terms of infrastructure. 22 million people + their cars + insufficient roadways = traffic. all the time. imagine standstill traffic in atlanta but everyday. everywhere. it's stellar. and finally, this applies to people. in the real world you can email someone who has information you need and they email you back in an appropriate amount of time (in a really busy office environment, like 2 days max- we're talking people that work on the same team here)...in cairo time, this translates to 2 weeks.
4. coffee. there's no such thing as good ole american coffee here. okay, i'm lying. you can find coffee beans that need to be ground and then french pressed at the super market. one certain one by my house. BUT in terms of buying coffee. it just doesn't taste right. and you guys know i don't drink a ton of coffee, but when i wake up at 5:30am to get to work by 8:30 and there's no suitable diet coke, i gotta have something. this lack of beans has resulted in a few grumpy/groggy mornings at best.
5. staring/catcalling. these 2 are a toss up. i can't decide which is more obnoxious, it may depend on the day. so men in the streets will cat call you (which can sometimes be entertaining) especially in the markets. some of my favorites "let me take your money from you quickly" and "i like your hair". however, the women will just stare at you like you're a street walker. and that, i think, is way more uncomfortable. i suppose it's cause i'm dressing like a hussy. but i mean, i gotta be me, ya know?
6. ice. or lack there of. this goes for europe, too. just a lack of ice in drinks in general. i love a good, cold, iced drink. does not exist here.
alright, even i'm getting tired of complaining via the interwebs. overall, i'm obviously loving being over here. but i'm an american and i love america. and that, my friends, won't change...even for the most open-minded of individuals.
i'll follow up this post with the things i love most about cairo to give some perspective later this week.
love you all.
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