AK-47 girl:"right through here"

she leads me through the burned out bottom level of the British Club in Mohandiseen. it had been 2 days since the fire. they don't think that it was arson.

AK-47 girl:"and up here"

we climb the stairs and find ourselves in a small pub with several small roundtops and
a pool table. the patrons seem, rather unsurprisingly, to be British mostly - middle aged and social. we take a seat at an empty table. it is my birthday.

AK-47girl's real name is (red) Sonja. despite the fact that she grew up maybe 3 miles from me, went to a neighboring highschool, went to the same university as i did, studied the exact same subjects and classes as i did, and graduated at the same time as i did, i have just met her. in Cairo. i became aware of her online, and decided i had to contact her after seeing a picture of her in Yemen with an AK-47, and a smiling mustachioed Akbar of some type in the background. the picture alone had earned her my instant allegience.

we talk for some time, swap stats and find ourselves once again in somewhat similar shoes. her shoes tho are much more broken in than mine. she has been in the region for some 2 years. she has a strong command of spoken and classical Arabic, and a good amount of regional experience. its the kind of hard-won experience i hope to gain in the region over the next 1-2 years.. at least according to Plan A.

but.. after all of this time teaching learning anf travelling in the region.. .she is completely fed up with the region.

"its a worthless region" she told me later. "honestly, i don't see it going anywhere. its completely culturally intolerant and it's backward thinking. there is no such thing as progess. honestly - im sick of it."

and already i can't help but agree. we talk more. unsurprisingly, given our mutual backgrounds, we are thinking many of the same things. the only Arabs of any international standing were educated in. .. yep, the West. racism runs veeery deep all over the M.East. treatment of women is backwards (although, just as bad as most of the rest of Asia.) and cannot be written off with cultural relativism. etcetc.

she's seen these things over 2 years. i however, have been here for 7 days. i knew i wouldn't love the Cairo - that was no doubt. but i wasn't prepared for how much i would dislike it. i wonder if i will make it a year here.

maybe i just dont understand something crucial yet - maybe it will all fall in place - maybe that same bug that bit me when i first got into the middle east will come back and pull me back in - the multiple cultures, the languages, the mystery of islam, the Challenge of it all - the obsession i had for years reading insanely boring books about the region -

maybe not.

honestly, at this moment i don't think so. now that i can see it with my own eyes, i don't want to make excuses for these people and this culture anymore. while the people are outwardly warm and friendly, its fucking backwards, and its hostile at heart, and overall, it is intolerant. the question is - do i want to stay here for a year of my life to figure out how to keep it in check - how to keep it from threatening he place i have strangely becme so proud of in my absence? the place that, for all its problems, created hip-hop, the internet, BBQ, womens lib, Goonies, Fugazi, bluegrass, NYC, Austin, Jefferson, Dylan, the 1965 Ford Mustang Fastback, daisy dukes and mufuckin' NutterButters?

we'll see.
im considering switching to japanese.

--


BAE: "marry the woman with the lowest education that you can find!"
cem: "yeah?"
BAE: "you don't want smart wife - you want good mother. you want a little bit pretty for your wife, not too pretty. but your girlsfriends must be pretty!!"

he shut his sagging eyes and pursed his lips together as if to sneeze - then unexpectedly burst into the kind course, gutteral laughter which can be produced only by Slavs, and only when past the point of socially acceptable drunkedness. the rest of he British Club's patrons paid little notice.

the Bosnian Abassador to Egypt was an antique man. he thought it fitting that on my birthday he should give me life advice, and called me his "American Nephew". this was OK with me. later, he joined in with everyone in singing me happy birthday. this was OK with me. his ancient, pink belly pushed out through an unbuttoned section of his button-up. he hunched over on his stool and raised a thick, crooked finger. i sipped my bourbon and prepared for more Balkan wisdom.

it was my birthday for chrissakes, and everything was going well.


--


"vatch out!" said the guy with the goofy rings.
and then he made a goofy record-scratching motion, touched his invisible headphones and bobbed his head staring at me.

in the most retarded way concievable, the Egyptian man across the pool table was trying to intimidate me at the beginning of the game. clearly not in keeping with the Detroit hip-hop affect he was attempting at, he kissed his male friends hello and held hands with one.

i cocked my head to the side and smiled. what a fucking idiot.

"Belcome to Cairo!" i said to him in a mocking horrible Egyptian accent. it was the phrase they all learn in school, and every little boy and girl is instructed to greet tourists with the line.

he wasn't amused.

he lost with 3 balls on the table.


--


vemg:"so are you going to tie me up?"

the beautiful veiled ethiopian muslim girl who i had ended up kissing in Sonja's apartment elevator the night of my birthday seemed to be enthusiatic about our next encounter. reflexively, i quickly glanced around the phone booth to ensure that noone could hear me before i answered.

the booth was a teal kind of green, it read "Menetel" in English and in Arabic. 3 mechanics were taking a pause for their evening prayers about 3 meters away, pressing their heads to the ground, facing mecca, like perhaps 100s of millions of people at this very moment around the region. dead opposite of mecca, i thus recieved a fantastic view of 3 egyptian mechanic asses. i hoped these asses didn't speak english.

cem:"sure."

'jesus' i thought 'i can't believe i just said that. how retarded. and.. tied up? what the hell?'

I thought of her black headscarf, symbol of her eh.. piety, and her sharp featured semetic face. I thought of catholic school girls in virginia, and the reputation they carried among us hormonal public highschoolers as being extra permiscuous as a reaction to their extra-strict and repressive religious educations. it must be the same with muslims - but worse.
its the same principal of human nature. you tell a kid no, and she-

vmeg: "i want to be tied up."

- wants to be tied up. christ. christ? no, mohammed. thank-you mohammed.

this is not what i expected from a covered girl.. . or .. from anyone in Egypt for that matter.

her god will strike me down for this.

again, i don't understand but
im beginning to
but still -
what the fuck?


--


"FUCK!"

"eh, vhat Jeem, eh .. problem?"

i was teaching Gamel English, and he was teaching me the spoken Egyptian dialect. he was an incredibly fast learner.

"Gamel, a bird just shit on me."

I looked up at a row of pigeons on a wire above. They shook their bird-asses, mocking me.

"Goods lucks! This mean good luck in Egypt. You are goods lucks!"

I looked down at the stain on my pants. It was bright white, like paint, with a brown smear in the middle.

"This is fucking good luck?"
"Jyes. Goods lucks."
"OK.."

I wiped the good luck off my pants and tried to wipe it on Gamel. He jumps back, laughing.

"My luck goodgood! Always! I don't want!"

We laughed. The guys at the next table seemed to understand, and they laughed too.

Something clicks.