Protest Here, Protest There; Protest, Protest Everywhere

(Less) Fun Fact # 5:

There are generally thought to be fewer than 100 Egyptian Jews still living in Egypt. That's right, in the whole country. 

For the past week and a half, AUC students have been protesting. They want to get rid of their tuition increase, they want higher quality instruction, they want transparency from the administration, especially about the budget, but mostly they want to show that they have the power.  Protesting is part of the way of life here, I get that. But the AUC students haven't convinced me yet.

The locked AUC gates.

 That's not to say that I don't understand. The AUC administration is a mess, the budget is a mess, and I totally side with the students in terms of their general goals. However (and this is a big however), the students have completely ridiculous, impractical, and unrealistic demands and an unrealistic timeline, in general seem to know very little about what they're actually fighting for, and come across as spoiled, naive, and entitled. I mean, on the first day of the protest they blocked a gate with a BMW and a Mercedes. I've known more about the university's finances than all but one student protester with whom I've spoken. And I've only been here for a month. For the past week they've chained and locked all of the gates to campus, which prevents anyone from getting in or out and is why classes have been cancelled. The administration removed the gates last weekend, and the student protesters responded by building their own gates. I was actually pretty impressed. The whole situation is still fascinating, but I'm ready to go back to school. And I'm not alone. Many of the Egyptian students I've spoken to express views quite similar to mine, particularly the scholarship students. It's usually along the lines of "I generally agree with the cause, but we've paid for this semester and I would really like to graduate on time, so please stop wasting my time."

Mubarak Style?

The student protests have created some more interesting situations for me though. On Sunday I went to school because there had been no official announcements cancelling classes. I take the first bus of the morning, so the only thing to do is go and find out. Once at campus, I took tons of photos of the protests and talked to students and faculty and protesters. By the time my friends and I were ready to leave, the buses had all been cancelled. This was problematic because the campus is literally in the middle of the desert and not within walking distance of anything other than construction sites. So we hitched a ride to a nearby mall, took a cab from there to the nearest Metro station, took the Metro to downtown, and walked back to Zamalek. It was quite the expedition. Don't worry, I'm not making hitchhiking a part of my routine. And I certainly wasn't alone. Sometimes you get stranded in the desert, so you do what you've got to do.

The view of the Mosque of Muhammad Ali from the Mosque of Ibn Tulun

In the past week I managed to be a complete emotional mess, fall down a flight of stone steps, piss off a professor, make a professor love me, see another neighborhood of Cairo, skip multiple trips accidentally, try sugar cane juice, consume an obscene amount of mango juice, and also visit some sights. I saw the Nilometer, which is this really cool old monument thing that was used to measure the water level of the Nile in order to calculate taxes. It's basically an example of ancient engineering. I also visited the Mosque of Ibn Tulun, Cairo Tower, and went back to Tahrir Square because I wanted to see the new graffiti. The wall that I visited a month ago was painted over last week, which made people really angry since it was basically a memorial to heroes and martyrs of the revolution.  So I went back and took a lot of pictures. I'm really glad I did because now it's all far more angry than it was before. It used to be sad and angry, but also hopeful. Now it's just angry. Really, really angry. And the blockade that used to be partially dismantled and had people climbing over it is now back up in a solid wall. I also a bought a book that I really wanted. It's a timeline of revolutionary art from the past year and a half, and it was definitely worth my 200LE ($32).

The Joker and Morsi

The Southern view from Cairo Tower. Garden City, Rhoda Island, Gezira, and the Nile. Yes, that's smog.

My last thoughts for now are about anti-semitism in Egypt, and surviving Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur here. I knew that anti-semitism was a big thing here. It doesn't surprise me when I hear about television shows that are outwardly hateful towards Jews or when I'm on campus and I hear people say really horrible things. It's not news that many Egyptians equate all Jews with the Israel, and therefore hate them. There are basically four people who know I'm Jewish, all from the US or Canada. It's not something I discuss and it's not something I should discuss. When my roommate asked if I go to church, I said no but didn't elaborate. In the US I would totally have elaborated. Yet these were all things I expected. What I did not anticipate was how difficult it would be for me personally to get through the holidays here. I sort of assumed that since I'm not super observant, it would be easy for me to be on my own for the holidays. But I've never not attended synagogue for Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur. Synagogue is not even an option here. Sure, there are a few synagogues. But it's very much an "attend at your own risk" sort of situation. And most of the synagogues are orthodox and have trouble making a minyan even on holidays. It doesn't help that it's not entirely unheard of for people to throw booby trapped suitcases through synagogue windows.

Basically, I miss having other Jews around. Even in Appleton, Wisconsin, where the Jews are few and far between, there are still Jews. They gather together. There's a community. So as much as I knew I wouldn't be going to synagogue while I was here, I guess I just didn't really put all the pieces together. I didn't realize that there would be no honey cake or crazy dinner to break the fast. It's ok, I did my own thing. The "Jewish girl in a Muslim country" version of the high holidays. It still counts. And I broke my fast with a fresh mango lassi and a samosa. And about a liter of water.

New graffiti on Mohammed Mahmoud Street.

Also, I've been taking TONS of photos and they're all on Flickr. They're not all amazing examples of my photography skills (probably because I don't have photography skills), but they get the point across. Most of them are not on Facebook because there are too many people without a Facebook. So if you're thinking "hey, what's the Nilometer?" you can check Flickr. Or not. I don't care. But I know some people are just here for pictures. And that's where they are. 

Happy almost October!