! في و من القاهرة

- which is to say, in and from Cairo!

Some of you have been reading this thing for years (God help us all…) and some of you are new.  Either way, hi!  It’s certainly been a while since I’ve been here…  Life’s been a tad crazy.  There’s a little overview in the “Blaggage” page, but if you’re too lazy to have a look:

- I finished at Columbia (yay!) and now have a BA in Music from Columbia (cum laude, no less, courtesy of the Brahms – more yay!)
- I spent the following six months having mono, singing in a handful of wonderful things, chilling with wonderful people, living with my aunt and cousins in New Jersey (also wonderful – this bullet point is sponsored by the word “wonderful”) and working 2-3 jobs in the city at any given moment while commuting in and out nearly every day (slightly less wonderful, but with lots of wonderful moments)
- Unfortunately, the above meant that I had no money or time for voice or conducting lessons; this was not wonderful.

So basically, I was stuck in place:  I couldn’t move forward (take lessons, study, improve enough to eventually apply to, be accepted into, and enter a grad program) because I had neither time nor money, and I couldn’t stay where I was (much as I loved living in Jerz and as fantastic as my family there is, it was always meant as a temporary solution, and the fact that I wasn’t moving forward was slowly – or not-so-slowly – driving me insane).  After a lot of whining and crying and complaining and job-hunting and whining and one really horrible weekend where I (fortunately) had the house to myself, threw a minor temper tantrum, and talked to the cat a lot, I made up my mind to apply to AUC as a non-degree student, study there for a year or two, and apply to grad schools (both in the States and Europe) from Egypt.  Even as I wrote the application, I wasn’t sure of the decision…but then they got back to me in less than forty-eight hours (I kid you not) and that was that.  So I tied up my loose ends and did a bunch of packing (with a bunch of help) and shipped my bodyweight in books to Egypt and said a lot of very hard goodbyes, and four days ago, on the 1st of January, I flew to Cairo with my parents (and six 50 lb. checked bags, two rolling carry-on bags, two tote bags, one very large backpack, and three winter coats).

Talk about a New Year’s Resolution.

So here I am.  Thus far, I’ve managed to unpack most of my clothing, lose my voice, whine a lot, and attend a very interesting seminar on vocal pedagogy (except for the session through which I slept because of the whole having-a-cold thing).  Yet to come:  unpacking everything else, getting more furniture from the university, the arrival of all the stuff I shipped, auditions for lessons, auditions/recording for summer programs, registration and the start of classes, private lessons, working with the university choirs, a lot of photo-taking, probably more whining and homesickness…  And you get to read about it!  Lucky you.  (Hopefully.)

Goals for this blog:  amusing stories, chronicles of life in an interesting place, photos of all the cool shit around here (there’s a lot of it), a reasonable amount of multilingual vulgarity (just because it’s my blog and I can and not at all because I’m sticking my tongue out at my father – er, a story for another day, which is to say, next Thursday).  Also to avoid whining about how homesick I am (a lot) and how annoying Egypt can be (a lot), except when I manage to make those things amusing (which will hopefully happen on occasion).

I was going to say something more, and now I can’t remember what it was, probably because of the cold medication.  So instead, I will leave you with a mildly edited version of the note I sent around once I got home on Monday night (quite late, and I was exhausted, so read with kindness, please – I’ve fixed the obvious stuff but it’s mostly the same).  Other than that, this is it for the moment, but stay tuned – there’ll be more, إن شاء الله.  Thanks for reading, y’all.

 

!في مصر

Or, in the words of Ricky Ricardo, “Honey, I’m hooooooome!!”

Hi from Egypt!!  Sorry for the group email – my parents moved to this apartment right before they came to the States (literally, they moved in and then left eighteen hours later), so my internet is coming from a little USB stick, and it’s a tad slow (slow enough that my GChat isn’t working, grawr), and annoying, and anyway I really wanna unpack a little and go to bed…sorry to be lame.  I’ll write all y’all real (aka individual, lol) notes soon.

The trip was long and boring but ultimately fine.  I picked up a sore throat somewhere along the line this weekend, so that was frustrating…but the flights went smoothly and I slept through most of our layover (the upside to traveling with others, which I’d forgotten – can you tell that I’m used to traveling alone?)  The trip home from the airport took forever and our luggage was never not hilarious (we had six checked bags between the three of us, plus two rolling carry-ons, two tote bags, and a large backpack, and our three winter coats on top of everything else…), but we made it eventually…

As stated, my parents just moved – before, we were in Al-Rehab, which was wayyy out on the edge of the city near the new campus.  Very nice and clean and new, if somewhat boring, and totally in the middle of nowhere – if you walked out of the neighborhood the wrong way, you were in the Sahara, seriously – and right by the new university campus (where Dad teaches), but eons away from everything else in the city, including the old campus and nearby offices (where Dad runs rehearsals in the evenings and Mom works – she’s with the university publishing house).  So now we’re back in Zamalek, which is where Dad lived when he first came, before the new campus was built – same neighborhood, new street/building.  It’s an island in the middle of the Nile, about ten minutes away from the old campus (and also from Tahrir, which is right by said campus) and about an hour away from the new campus, assuming traffic treats us nicely.  The neighborhood is lovely.  We’re right by one of the AUC dorms, there are lots of shops nearby, and though the area is older, it’s a nice place to live (in part because there are a lot of diplomatic residences on this island, so things stay clean, safe, etc.)  It’s also a neighborhood with a lot of expats, which is nice, because it means you can find lots of interesting things (many imported, sometimes expensive, but always interesting, and generally delicious) – as we speak, I am typing away at a Mac computer, sipping Cyprian juice, eating German biscuits, waiting for leftover Italian lasagna (made by Italian people!) to heat in the oven, while wearing a hat knitted somewhere over the Atlantic ocean.

I’m feeling very cosmopolitan.  ;-)

Ok, that’s a bit of a lie.  I’m tired and frustrated and mad that my throat is sore and I don’t even want to think about the absurdity that will be unpacking (everyone’s stuff is mixed together – at least the stuff I shipped isn’t here yet!), let alone the conference thing that I’m doing tomorrow.  But I’m ok.  I’m very happy to be home, safe, in one piece, no longer in an airport or on a plane, etc…  I do miss New York already (the thought of trying to buy cold medication here is nervewracking), but I’m also excited to have my favorite Egyptian treats, get back into some nice practice rooms, set up my room (and my laptop, which is finally fixed!), and get settled in.  After feeling like a nomad for the last six months, it’s very good to have a place to call mine.

I’m going to stop rambling and go eat some lasagna…this was supposed to be a two sentence “hey folks I’m home and safe!” letter, not an epic work.  Oops…  >.<  Hope you’re all well and enjoying Day 2 of the New Year; be safe and take care of yourselves and I’ll talk to you all as soon as I can.

Lovelovelove,

Hilary :-)