AMANDA OF ARABIA

By Friday afternoon it was beginning to become clear that I was very quickly falling very, very ill. I considered becoming a temporary recluse in my room, but around evening-time, Aleema invited me to go on a felucca ride with her, Jessica, Rob, Scott, and Rajiv, so I consented. We met Rob and Scott downstairs in Zamalek and crammed into a taxi headed for the Tahrir metro station, where we met Rajiv. I don’t know much about Rob or Scott, but Rajiv is of Indian origin (like my roommate Aleema) and a student at West Point (and is familiar with my dear friend Ashley Romero). Rajiv is also a stellar student; he’s already been nominated by West Point for the Marshall and Rhodes, and on top of that he’s a good guy. I’d like to get to know Rob and Scott better, since they seem cool. Both Rob and Rajiv aspire to go to law school, although judging by our conversations Rob intends to go the public defender route and Rajiv intends to go to the corporate law route.

After the felucca, which was rather uneventful because there was no wind and a felucca is a sailboat, we ate at the Pizza Hut in Tahrir Square. After that, I was visibly sick enough that no post-midnight partying would be had by me, so when we headed back to the Zamalek area I bid everyone farewell and retired for the evening.

On Saturday, I was largely sick the entire day, and in fact I stayed in bed feeling entirely deathly untill I had to rise to meet Joseph and Naamah for our group Arabic assignment. We had to work on a homework drill together, and then Naamah and I attempted to complete the listening assignment with only varied results. Naamah and I were able to get to know each other, and she seems to be an excellent person and rather like-minded (and we all know I used “like-mindedness” as my main metric for potential friendship). She is from New York City but attends the University of Michigan.

After that, Matteson called and invited me out, and I was extremely dismayed to tell her that I was too sick for any such social activity. I instructed her not to misread my refusal of her invitation as an indication that I don’t want to hang out with her. I then headed back to Zamalek, finished my homework, and went to bed.

On Sunday, I slept until my noon class, still rather unwell. Then I had Arabic from 12-2, then Latin tutoring. Latin tutoring will prove to be the main motivator in my week, as I simply delight in the chance to get to talk (with ultimate authority) about my favorite dead language to two paying customers. It’s fantastic. They think I’m crazy, especially after seeing how much joy I got out of their translating including some lovely, if rudimentary, parallel structure, but I think they like me (well, I hope they like me). Mrs. Stewart was kind enough to drive me back to the Metro station.

Last night there was a “meet and greet” at the dorm, which translates to free food. Aleema, Jessica and I went down to partake in this most sought-after tradition, and we ate as much as we could while socializing with Rob, Scott, Rajiv (who came all the way from another residence), someone’s roommate Mahammad, etc. Rajiv and I had an interesting discussion about post-undergrad life.

Today was the start of my real week, as I had that 9:30 art class. Once again Dr. Karim (I’m not sure if she’s a Dr. but I assume) was fascinating and the lecture was truly engaging. I’ve never had a 75-minute class pass more quickly. We learned about the Nilometer and the Mosque of Ibn Tulun. After that, I had a one-hour break during which I killed time and ate a sandwich. Arabic was three hours, but it’s broken up by switching rooms in the middle, so it’s manageable. We already have a test on Wednesday, for which Naamah, Ben and Joseph and I are going to study together tomorrow evening.

Next is the second week of Islamic Law about thirty minutes from now.