A Long December

And it's only the second day.

I have to admit, though, that I am so relieved that the semester is ending. It has been - I'm trying to think of an appropriate adjective here - arduous? difficult? soul-searching? - whatever its been, its almost over. I am ready for the new semester specifically because it is new - a lot of new things. A new apartment, a new set of classes, new people, new chances, new experiences. On the other side of December bright and shiny and new.
But that means I have to get through December first. And that means a lot of other things. I have to finish a paper by the end of the term, and give a presentation about another paper I have already turned in. I have two exams, but strangely not really concerned about either of them. I have to revise, edit, and prepare a portfolio of my writing, as well as write my own curriculum for my independent study for next semester. I have to move out of my apartment, and watch everyone leave me, again. My roommates, friends, everyone non-Egyptian, basically, heads back to the states this month. I have to watch everyone leave, again. And I spend Christmas when everyone is gone. And I have to wait until March to see anyone from my life back home. Sometimes, I don't think my heart can take it.
Granted, December means Turkey. It means a break from school. It means I'm that much closer to going to London, and Paris. I'm that much closer to going home. I can't tell what is closer and what is farther away - my perception has gone all distorted.

It's scary. Everything seems so far away here. People, responsibility, the rest of the world. Everything just seems distant.

I've got to find a way to reconnect. Otherwise, this is going to be a long, long December.

"more luck than brains"

The title is a reference to a discussion with Ana Menendez, a Cuban-American author that came and spoke to our class about her work, In Cuba I Was a German Shepherd, and about her career in general. She describes the events of her professional career as a combination of luck and laziness, and was extremely funny, inspiring, and encouraging. She's also a Fullbright fellow here at AUC, and a writer-in-residence.
This class is incredible for me in a way that a class hasn't been in quite sometime. It's not particularly challenging in a conventional sense, but it has made me think very critically about the direction of my life and making sure that it includes things that challenge, inspire, and motivate me to do something with my time. Insha'allah.

odd relief.

a note on this fear: I completed not only my first story, but also was asked to be featured in the class critiqued by the professor, and quite literally made someone cry from it (though that was highly mortifying and unintentional). that's a response I never expected. I also never expected to love the class so much - it is the only one that I consistently look forward to every week, and I feel both responsible and capable in it - like I know what I am doing. Writing and reading has become this one fixed point in the kind of cyclonic clusterfuck that has become my life in the past week or so. Like it's the only point in my day that I can truly relax between the insanity of the city, the frustration of the school, and the drama of the apartment. Maybe it is something I should think about seriously continuing?

on mint tea and goodbyes.

There is a crumbly rim of sugar on the edge of my tea cup, still steaming although its been sitting undisturbed for the past several minutes. Absentmindedly, I am stirring the escaped mint leaf around as I think about everything that is poured into that cup of tea, or poured into my life over the past two months.

I have been sitting here, in this café, drinking tea and avoiding the reality of saying goodbye to everyone who has left their thumbprint on my life here in Cairo - and then understanding that most of them will not be here when I get back. I am torn between that crushing reality and the happiness of me stepping out into Hartsfield-Jackson on Monday night and seeing so many people that I love that have been absent from my life for the past two months, and will be absent again after the first of September. What weighs more - the pending heartache over my friends that are leaving here, or the existing one for everyone in my non-Egyptian life?

I find myself avoiding the responsibilities of my life at the moment in my cup of tea, including answering that question. Although I know it isn't true, I keep stirring pretending that I can drown all of those thoughts like a mint leaf, and they would dissolve like sugar.

Tibet's on fire.

Pictures have an incredible power. This one struck me, much like my visit to Dharamsala did this summer. It is so violent and emotional and it makes me want to move or scream or travel to the other side of the world.

The world is swirling with talk of homelands and people, displacement and responsibility. Discussions around China, the Olympics, and Tibet in the past few days - spurring from anything like Bjork's outburst in Shanghai to Steven Spielberg's abandonment of the Olympic games - continuously remind me of my feeling of...I don't know how to put it...solidarity with the Tibetan people. To be fair, there is still so much I do not know about China, about Tibet, or about their history. And it is not just in the far east that I have found or felt this. The recent news of Israel building new settlements in Gaza also creates a similar feeling within me, simultaneously frustrating and baffling me. Kazakhstan recently mandated a "reteaching" of Kazakh culture and language, a cultural re-education that some have called dangerous. All of Africa is on fire, in a metaphorical term, and constantly people do not know homes, families are being separated or killed, and so many, so many have died. There are still people living in poverty in my own city left over from Katrina, two and a half years ago. The recent procurement of an independent Kosovo has also created a heated debate about the future of the former Yugoslavia.

I tried to explain this to someone - this feeling of confusion and empathy and anger - they were similarly confused, but not as to why people, nations, leaders allow this to happen - but to why I cared. There are people not only pushed from their homes, but their homelands. Cultures are being forgotten, dissolved, I said.
They countered - so what? I have my own problems to deal with. Like whether or not I get money for the alcohol I will be consuming over spring break.
Don't you want to learn about everything that happens beyond your own personal bubble? Or worry about the impact it will make on the world? I ask.
No. They said. And that's fine by me.

I crave to know more, to do more. Always, I want more. I have, since I was little, been trying to learn all I can. I constantly attempt to educate myself - though not always in the way Georgia Tech insists. I want to create an impact, to create a legacy that will change lives and conceptions and nations. I want to be old and look at my life and think that it had been greater than the sum of its parts. This person, in previous conversation, had said that they wanted to live as they did now, with children and grandchildren and never have to leave the country. But how can you not be curious about what happens to everyone else?

Curiosity kills cats, they say.

Well, apathy and megalomania kills everything else.

Little Tibet

A weekend excursion to the Himalayas and a small village called McLeod Ganj led to some thinking. This village, the home to the Dalai Lama and the exiled Tibetan government, led to some thinking. Mostly about the meaning of home. I thought about the six weeks that have passed since I had left my home, willingly and enthusiastically setting out to impact the world. But knowing the history of Tibet, what would it be like if I could never go home? The life of a refugee is impossible to imagine or define - these people will never have a home. They may one day return to Lhasa, perhaps even claim the province as a sovereign nation, but it will never again be their home. Too much has happened, too much has changed their life for them to consider anything home.

And what about me? What if the changes that have occurred in me during the past six weeks, and there have been many, are too great? Will I be able to call Atlanta home after living and experiencing all that I have in India? Reading about other's experiences about reverse culture shock scares the hell out of me, and hearing about the changes that have occurred in others (to a negative effect) after being abroad scares me even more. Will everyone accept the new me? Will the new me even fit in my American life?
So in this beautiful, incredible, even spiritual place - all I could think about were the changes that India has carved into me. Sometimes I wish I could just shut my brain up from thinking so much, but I know that is what makes me human. I just wish I wasn't so damn vulnerable.

But McLeod Ganj is beautiful, and the people I experienced it with were incredible. A day of trekking and talking with Buddhist monks at the foot of a Himalayan waterfall, reciting mantras in the home of the Dalai Lama, and listening to him teach his disciples was followed by a night of shenanigans. We rented a house in a small village about five kilometers north of McLeod, called Dharamkot, and lived like kings for a night - drinking, dancing, and talking about everything and nothing until 3 in the morning. Followed by spooning, lots and lots of spooning. I woke to the clouds surrounding the house, the most delicious chai I have ever tasted, and a cool breeze with hints of Himalayan rain.


The trip back to Chandigarh was harder than you can imagine.

the times they are a changing.

the semester is almost over.
which makes me think about impending finals.
which makes me think of how i felt the last time i took finals in the spring.
which makes me think of one night when i knew everything had changed.
which makes me think of the way it was before it changed.
which makes me think i might miss that.
which makes me think - there is no way that i can go back to that moment.
but why would i want to?

so many amazing things happened this year. college has changed my life. for the better i think.
i can't believe where i was just one year ago - and how far i have come. and yes, i measure my life in school years because i am not in the real world yet. thank goodness - i don't think i could handle it.

coming up:
working in India. a new semester. traveling to paris to visit jimmy. another international conference. more @. more independence. a new me.