eudaimonia & anagnorisis

<-- The kitchen-aftermath of a very well-enjoyed home-cooked Iftar. Belisa, who is this crazy interesting Brazillian girl that Sasha met at her hostel when she arrived, was living with us for the past week and has just left for London. Side note, she is getting her master’s degree in poliSci with this really cool program that requires you to live in 3-4 different countries over a period of 14 months. We had Iftar together last week as our final meal and wound up talking politics, and religion, and academia, and men, and languages, and life generally for a few hours. I’m bummed she’s gone because she was giving me hope of learning some decent colloquial Arabic – en fin! - but also because I’ve been thinking about how transient our lives are sometimes. Yesterday someone said, I wish I could live in the US for six months, and then a different country for six months, and then a different country for six months… And I was just thinking about how amazing that would be, but how unforgiving time would be. Life would pass by so quickly. I know study abroad is hyped up to be this time of infinite self-discovery, but lately I’ve just felt kind of numb. It’s like life is a sort of anesthesia that just won’t kick in – I get very happy, but I don’t go under, yet I still can’t really function like normal either. I don’t mind that I haven’t actually made my bed in weeks and that books, stray piasters, empty cartons, and clothes are tangled between the sheets. All I know is that I am happy for the time being to exist in a state of shrunken ambitions because I am still optimistic about the possibilities.

Eitherway, it’s getting cooler in Cairo. I rarely sleep with my window open and I find myself turning off my ceiling fan from chill. It’s October and I’ve never flirted with an Autumn as pleasurably mild. Some of my travel plans are finally coming together, since ma chere Melyn will be in Morrocco next semester and Emily Hyatt invited me to Israel after the Jewish holidays in October…

This past weekend I disappeared to Hurghada again and it was blissful. The weekend was entirely different – the crowd was nearly comatose in comparison to last week’s quirky chill bunch and fasting put a different spin on the trip, too– but the advanced diving course was exciting and the tranquility and sweet company were very appreciated. I basically spent the entire week with Sameh and Sawaan, but tried to snap a few pics of everyone else too. The night dive, deep dive, and wreck dive were absolutely pimp. I’ve forbidden myself to go out of town again anytime too soon, but I am plotting some plans for Dahab or Marsa Alam during the Eid alFitr break… on verra.

1. Osama's binat getting out of the water.
2. Underwater group shot, last weekend.
3. Greg is the resident pirate.
4. Osama, Sawwan, me, and Sameh.
5. the advanced course taking the Zodiac out for our drift dive.
6. team chai&sokar
7,8,9,10. a little chill time on the upper deck.