More Cairo Pictures

Since I am going to be gone almost ten days, I'm going to leave you with some more pictures from Cairo. When I return, I hope to have some great pictures of Paris, London, and my friends. Happy New Year's, everyone! :)

Mosque at the Citadel in Cairo


Inside of the mosque


Gorgeous view of Cairo from outside the mosque


Our nighttime falucca ride on the Nile - so fun!

Dinner at the Hard Rock Cafe after the falucca ride

Me and Mohab goofin' off

Me and the guys...from left to right: Ash, Ahmed, Mohab, and Walt. (Huka took the picture)

Koshary, one of my favorite Egyptian meals

License plate in Arabic...from left to right, the numbers are 424490

Merry Christmas!

Or as they say in England, Happy Christmas! :) I hope everyone is having a wonderful day today. Tooley and I slept in, and then opened our presents to each other and the presents from my host counselor and his wife. Santa Tooley was great this year! We have SOOO much candy! If anyone would like some Cadbury's chocolate, feel free to fly over and eat some with us. :) It's hard spending Christmas away from my family, but I want to thank everyone for the special things you've done to make my first Christmas away from family and friends as easy as possible. Thank you for the cards, gifts, e-mails, and calls...they really mean a lot! This afternoon, Tooley and I cooked a HUGE meal - I'm stuffed! We cooked a turkey with stuffing, mashed potatoes, corn, rolls, and snacked on a yummy cheese tray while we cooked. We also had a cute little snowman cake for desert. I'm not going to tell you how long it took us to cook everything, but we had a great time doing it! We also watched some classic Christmas movies..."National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation," "Elf," and "Bridget Jones's Diary." Well, "Bridget Jones's Diary" isn't exactly a classic Christmas movie, but it got us excited about heading back to London for awhile. :) Tomorrow will be my last post for a week or so, because I'll be in London and Paris with my friends until the 5th of January. Tomorrow, I'll post a bunch of pictures from Cairo. Here are some highlights from mine and Tooley's endeavors in the kitchen:

Our turkey, complete with the stuffing inside. Thanks, Marks and Spencer! (popular department store/grocery store in England)

Dinner and a movie...on my laptop!

Tooley showing off her turkey carving skills

Doesn't this look delicious? :)

Our cute snowman cake

Get it, Tools! :)

Cairo, my favorite. :)

Early Saturday morning, Walt and I arrived in beautiful Cairo, a city of 15 million people. The Muslim weekend is Friday and Saturday (Friday is their Holy Day), so the work week is Sunday through Thursday. Pretty different! Walt and I stayed in Rachel McDonald's flat, which was SO nice! Rachel graduated from MSU with me, and has been working in Cairo since summer. One of my very good friends, Lacey Kuhn, went to visit her this summer and met a lot of great Egyptians. One of Lacey and Rachel's friends, Mohab, met Walt and me at the train station. The three of us just clicked! He was great, and drove us around the town (there are basically no driving laws in Egypt...no lanes, few stop lights, and no one pays attention to the speed limit...it can be scary!) Mohab took us to the Egyptian Museum, where we saw treasures from the tombs of the pharoahs, and we even saw some mummies! Mohab showed us the amazing sights of Cairo. It's a gameel (Arabic for beautiful) city! It's very modern, but there are some parts (we didn't really go through them much) where people are living in poverty without electricity or indoor plumbing. You can basically find a little sample, whether it be a house, church, or furniture, from every decade, beginning 7,000 years ago! We drove through Islamic Cairo and Coptic (Christian) Cairo, where there are lots of mosques and some Catholic churches. Walt and I were surprised to see that you can find more American products in Cairo than you can in the UK! McDonald's, Pizza Hut, Hardees, and Chilli's are popular restaurants, and you can find just about any American magazine or beauty product if you look hard enough. Mohab took us to City Stores, which is the largest mall in Egypt, and then he dropped us off at the Khan el-Kalili, a HUGE outdoor and indoor market. Walt and I picked up a few souvineers! :) That night, we went out to eat with Mohab and his friend Ashraf (Ash), and they took us to the highest mountain in Cairo to see the amazing view of the city at night. The four of us just hung out, admiring the view and discussing Egyptian and American politics...it was pretty cool! I learned so much about Middle Eastern culture and the Muslim religion during my trip! The Egyptian president, Mubarak, isn't a favorite among the Egyptian people. But, his opponent in the past presidential election mysteriously wound up in jail. Mubarak's picture is up all over the country, but we were assured by many people that Mubarak put the picture up, not any of his fans. On Sunday, Walt and I had coffee with Rachel's flatmate, Cam, who's from London and coincidentally goes to the same school at Walt! Then, we walked along the Nile and explored part of the city. After lunch, Mohab, Ash, and their friend Mahmoud (Huka) picked us up so we could go to...the PYRAMIDS! Wow! It was so neat to see them in person! They're huge, but I was surprised to see how small the Sphinx is. Anyway, by the time we got through the Cairo traffic, we had to run in and out of the pyramids before they closed, but we were laughing the whole time. How often do you get to race through pyramids? :) After we took tons of pictures outside of the pyramids, the five of us went horseback riding through the desert...AMAZING! It was so neat to gallop on a horse through the desert, and to turn your head to the right and see the pyramids next to you. We all stopped on a cliff to watch the sunset, and headed back. Minor incident along the way...all of horses started crowding each other on the first part of the journey, and Mohab's horse started bucking. Since Walt and I were right behind it, the horse kept kicking us in the leg. My foot is still a little swollen, and Walt had to get two stitches! But it was all part of the adventure. After horseback riding, we met up with Ahmed and the six of us headed to Huka's house, where his mom had cooked us a huge and delicious Egyptian meal! It was so nice, and the food was great! I've realized that I'm a huge fan of Arabic food and music. I also love the Arabic language, and really want to learn it better! The guys were great about helping me learn new words and work on my accent. A popular Arabic phrase is insha7 alah, pronounced "in cha alla," and it means "God willing." The Egyptians say it after anything that they say will or may happen in the future. For example, "I will return to Egypt soon, insha7 alah." It's so neat! After supper and cheesecake, the six of us visited Ahmed's sister and nephew, and we tried asop, which is an Egyptian drink made of sugar cane juice...it's very sweet! Later that night, Ahmed, Ash, Walt, and I explored the Marriot hotel, which is the largest Marriot in the Middle East. Hotels are popular hang out spots in Cairo. On Monday, Walt and I went to the Citadel, which is a fortress with a mosque that was built during the Crusades to protect the city. You can't wear shoes in mosques, and girls have to have their heads and bodies covered. No tank tops or bare heads! The mosque was very impressive...some amazing architecture! We also saw a breathtaking view of the Cairo city scape from the mosque. That afternoon, we explored Zamaleck, the section of Cairo where Rachel lives. It's such a neat place! The main street is 26th of July Street, and you can find neat bookstores and clothing shops. Most signs and stores are written in both Arabic and English, which is a relief! That night, Mohab, Ash, Huka, Ahmed, Walt, and I went on a falucca ride on the Nile, and then had dinner at the Hard Rock Cafe. Those guys are so much fun! They were the perfect tour guides, because they're all native Cairoeans. :) The six of us just clicked, and we had the best time! Tuesday was our last day in Cairo (sad!), so Walt and I went to the Al-Azhar mosque, home to the world's oldest university, and made one more trip to the Khan el-Kalili market. Mohab picked us up at Rachel's flat, and drove us to say goodbye to Ash. Mohab's dad managed to get Walt and me FREE train tickets back to Luxor, so Mohab hung out with us at the train station to make sure we made it ok. It was SOOO sad saying goodbye! Luckily I've been keeping in touch with my Eyptian buds through email, and Walt and I are planning another trip to visit them this summer. :) I just had the best time ever in Cairo! I felt so safe, too. I was really worried at first, because the news makes it sound like Middle Easterners hate Americans, but I had the best experience and felt completely safe! On Wednesday morning, Walt and I arrived back in Luxor, where we walked around til it was time to fly out. I had a wonderful experience in Cairo, and I think it's an incredible city...unlike any place I've ever been!

Mohab and me outside of the Egyptian museum.

The Khan el-Kalili market

I wish I could do that!

Pyramid and the Sphinx!

Ash, Huka, me, Walt, and Mohab at the pyramids overlooking Cairo

Ash, Mohab, me

Me and my horse, Isis

Cool view, huh?




More pictures to come tomorrow! :)

More Luxor Pictures

Walt and me on our falucca ride on the Nile!

Pretty cool, huh?

The Valley of the Kings

Checking out a tomb in the Valley of the Kings

Karnak Temple

Karnak Temple

Karnak Temple

Luxor train station...yikes!

We had to hike over this pile of rubble to get to our train.

EGYPT! Wow, I loved it! :)

Hello, everyone! I'm back in good ole England after a fabulous week in Egypt! It was simply amazing...I saw some awesome things, and learned so much! I'm going to have to break the trip into at least two days worth of posting, so I'll begin with Luxor. Walt and I flew out of Birmingham International Airport and arrived in Luxor, Egypt, on Wednesday night. The weather was surprisingly warm (it doesn't take much to be warmer than England - ha!), so Walt and I walked along a boardwalk on the Nile. The next day, we explored the town and went to Hatshepsut's Temple. The exchange rate in Egypt is amazing...10 Egyptian pounds = 1 British pound, and 5 Egyptian pounds = 1 U.S. dollar. Not too shabby! Walt and I hired a nice guy named Tourkey to drive us around the East and West Banks of Luxor for the day...for a grand total of $12! Luxor is a medium sized town, but very very poor. There are people all over the streets trying to sell you souvineers, taxi rides, carriage rides, everything! We quickly learned how to say "No, thank you" in Arabic - la shucron! :) I really like the Arabic language...it's beautiful! The main form of transportation for locals is a minibus (like a minivan, but serves the purpose of a city bus), car, and...donkey. No joke! I saw many people riding donkeys! It was very surreal! From Hatshepsut's Temple, you can see the lush Nile River Valley of the West Bank. It looks amazing when you contrast it with the desert on the other side of it! While at Hatshepsut's Temple, we met lots of Egyptian schoolchildren who enjoyed practicing their English on us..."Hello! How are you? What is your name?" - so cute! Three of them asked me for my autograph, and two took pictures with me...but I'm not sure why! Egypt is 90% Muslim, so there are mosques EVERYWHERE, and they're absolutely gorgeous. Muslims pray five times a day, so when it's time for prayer, someone in the mosque reads the Koran in Arabic over a loudspeaker from the mosque, which you can hear all over the city! The first prayer time is 4:30 a.m. Our hotel was next to a mosque, so imagine my surprise to be woken up at 4:30 a.m. to the sound of Arabic chanting! Since Luxor is very poor, the streets and town were pretty dirty, but the people were SO nice! Walt and I tried shawerma, a yummy Egytian food that is basically lamb meat on a baguette. On Friday, we went to the Valley of the Kings, where the tombs of the pharoahs have been discovered. They're located in the valley of a tall, limestone mountain. We got to roam around in tombs that are over 4,000 years old, including King Tut's tomb! It was pretty awesome. Later that afternoon, we went to Karnak Temple, which is supposed to be the largest temple in the world. I'm so amazed with the technology of the ancient Egyptians...wow! The temple was incredible, and I can only imagine what it looked like thousands of years ago. We also went on a falucca ride on the Nile. So cool! A falucca is like a sailboat, and the weather was perfect for a ride on the Nile...sunny and in the mid 80s! The Nile is gorgeous...I can totally picture Cleopatra floating down it on a royal barge! Our falucca was named the Mickey Mouse - pretty funny! On Friday night, Walt and I went to the Luxor train station to catch the sleeper train to Cairo, a nine hour trip. I must say, the Luxor train station is in an awful state of disrepair! We had to climb over rubble to get in our train! Check out the pictures below. Tomorrow I will write about Cairo, which is my FAVORITE...that city is just incredible! I can't wait to tell you all about it! Fun fact - the soap opera "The Bold and the Beautiful" comes on Egyptian T.V., complete with Arabic subtitles. I'm sure my mom will be happy to know that! haha!

**England is ready for Christmas! There were two markets in Stratford today, and a little bitty ice skating rink, too. Tooley and I saw "The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe" tonight...it was great!**


Luxor Temple at night

A crowded street in Luxor

Nile River Valley from Hatshepsut's Temple

Guardians of the Valley of the Kings

For some reason, I can't upload any more pictures right now, but I'll put up more from Luxor tomorrow. :)

Egypt for a week!

Tomorrow (Wednesday), Walt Cain and I will be going to Egypt for a week! I'll be back on Dec. 22, so be looking for a new post and pictures from Egypt as soon as I get back! We will be going to Luxor and Cairo. I'm very excited, but a little nervous. Keep us in your prayers! :) I hope everyone has a great week.

A Day in London with Two Mississippi Girls

Today I went to London to spend the day with Mariclaire Ingram and Sarah McDonnell. It was SO nice to see people from Mississippi and MSU! I met them at 12:30 in front of Rendezvous, my favorite yogurt shop in Leicester Square. We walked through the Leicester Square and made our way to Trafalgar Square, which is beautiful. The weather was absolutely perfect...sunny and a little warm! We went to Buckingham Palace, and walked through St. James Park to get to Big Ben. Luckily, all of the BIG London landmarks are relatively to close to one another, so it's easy to walk around. The girls went through Westminster Abbey, but since I've been before, I went by 10 Downing Street (the English equivalent to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, a.k.a. the Prime Minister's home) and also got something to eat. After Westminster Abbey, we hopped on the Tube and made our way to St. Paul's Cathedral, where Princess Di got married, and also where the sing "Feed the Birds" in Mary Poppins. I've been in St. Paul's before, and I've even been to a couple of church services there, but I've never gotten to go on the full tour, so it was fun getting to do that with Sarah and Mariclaire! We went up to the dome, and even on to the roof of the dome, where we had a great aerial view of London. We had to climb a TON of steps to get to the top...my legs are probably going to be sore tomorrow! We went down into the crypt, and then headed to Covent Garden to look around the Apple Market. (They don't sell apples there...instead, they sell fun jewelry, purses, and antiques!) We ate dinner at a little cafe in Covent Garden, and walked down the Strand, a bustling street in London, back to Leicester Square. Mariclaire and Sarah booked tickets to see the Andrew Lloyd Webber musical "The Lady in White" tonight, so we walked around China Town before they had to head to theater and I had to head back to the train station. We saw a LOT today, and I had a blast with those two girls! :) London is just magnificent. It's my favorite!

Me, Mariclaire, and Sarah outside of Buckingham Palace

Me and Mariclaire outside of Westminster Abbey

The Dome of St. Paul's Cathedral

More of St. Paul's...you're not supposed to take pictures on the inside, so I couldn't use my flash. Sorry if the pictures are a little dark!

London from the top of St. Paul's

Supper in Covent Garden!

Natalie's Farewell

On Friday night, Tooley and I went out to eat with Marfo, Michelle, and English Natalie to say goodbye to American Natalie. We ate at Cafe Pasta, which is a nice little Italian chain. It was sad saying goodbye to Natalie, but I know she's excited about seeing her family and boyfriend again. The rest of this weekend has been very lazy! Tooley has been planning trips - Italy, France, and Scotland for her mom and two sisters, and London, Paris, Italy, Spain, and Switzerland for her and Mary Virginia (I'll be going to Spain and Switzerland with them). I got a plane ticket from Barcelona to London for 20 Euro, which is less than $30...how great is that?! I've done a little bit of work on my paper, but not as much as I was hoping to get done. In other news, our oven is broken! Luckily the stove works, so we can heat up pasta, coffee, and hot chocolate, but Junko has decided to not to get the oven fixed until Jeremy comes home...in over a month. Tooley and I were planning on cooking a big meal for Christmas, so I don't know what we're going to do now! It's gotten a little cooler today. Really, the weather hasn't been that bad! When I first got here, English people kept telling me that the winters are horrible because the sun sets at like 4:00 p.m. (it really does) and you basically don't see the sun for three months. One Rotarian even told me that more people commit suicide in the winter because the extra hours of darkness adds to their depression! How scary is that? Luckily, the sun has been shining brightly nearly everyday the past week, and it doesn't rain as much as I thought it would. I hope I didn't jinx myself just then! The next two days are going to be very busy...tomorrow, I'm going to London for the day to hang out with Mariclaire Ingram and Sarah McDonnell. It'll be fun to see some good ole Mississippi girls! Tooley is going shopping in Birmingham for the day...the mall there is incredible! On Tuesday, I have to run errands and pack for Egypt, and Walt is coming to spend Tuesday night with us, because we fly out of Birmingham EARLY Wednesday morning. I'm so excited about seeing Egypt, but a little nervous, too. But how cool will it be to see the pyramids, Sphinx, Nile River, and places that are so old that they're Biblical? I mean, we're talking Moses and Pharoah here! It's going to be pretty awesome. Hopefully I'll have some fun pictures with Mariclaire and Sarah posted tomorrow!

Tools and me at Cafe Pasta

We'll miss you, Natalie!

Dinner at Natalie's and our School Christmas Party

What a busy but fun past two days! On Wednesday night, Tooley and I went to Natalie's house to for a little dinner party, because she's going back to the University of Alabama next semester. She leaves Saturday! She lives in a UCLA professor's house (he only lives in Stratford-upon-Avon during the spring), so she has the perfect place to have a get-together. Tooley, me, Marfo, English Natalie, and Michelle enjoyed a feast of red beans and rice, stuffed mushrooms, Greek apple pie (from Marfo!), and Jello cookies and cream (thanks mom and dad!). The red beans and rice were WONDERFUL...Natalie brought a bunch of Zataran's boxes with her, so it tasted like it came straight from New Orleans. English Natalie and Michelle got to try their first Jello...they don't have it in England! It's hard to describe Jello to British people, because their words for jam, jelly, and pudding are different from our definitions of those words. They said it's similar to Angel Delight, whatever that is! Today (Thursday) was a beautiful day in Stratford! There were markets on nearly every street in town...it was great! I went to the library to do a little research, then came home to get ready for our school Christmas party. It was SO much fun! Everyone was decked out and festive, and there was a nice buffet with pizza, sandwiches with eggplant (or aubergines, as the English call them), chips (fries), and mini sausages. For dessert, we had mince pie and mini chocolate pies. Mince pie is really popular in England! It's a pie filled with fruit and jam...pretty good! At first I thought mince pies had meat in them, because they call ground beef "minced" meat. Thankfully, there is no meat to be found in mince pies...they're more of a dessert. After eating, we had a big dance party...it was SO much fun! Everyone was breaking it down, including my teachers, which was kind of funny. The British may have the reputation of being reserved and uptight, but they aren't scared to dance if there's good music playing. Emily even taught me a British dance similar to the Macarena. I've never had so much fun at this school! It reminded me a little of Chi O parties, which I miss! After the party, Michelle, English Natalie, Emily, Bryone (pronounced Bry-on-ee), Marfo, and I went to Celebrities, the dance club that we went to last weekend. It's so much fun! They played Outkast, Madonna, B-52s, all kinds of great dance songs. It was a great night! Tomorrow night, we're going out to eat for American Natalie's last night...sad!

Bryone, Marfo, me, and Emily

Me and Powder, the other American in my program. He went to Yale!

Michelle, American Natalie, Emily, English Natalie, Marfo, me

My wonderful housemates, Marfo and Catherine!

Michelle and me taking a break from dancing

Being goofy (yes, that's a bust of Shakespeare, and he's wearing a Santa hat)