Exercising

I have to say that there are few things that make me happier than exercising. I just finished lifting weights with my two amigos, Daniel and Monte, and I just feel good about life. I always feel great when I'm finished exercising. I feel accomplished, happy, and sore. Those three make quite a killer combination for me.

I've come to a good realization being here. In times past I used to look at exercising as an obligation to get strong for my sport or a way to look good, but those aren't my reasons anymore. It is funny because I've been intensively exercising since I was in 6th grade and I now finally realized this. I have no obligation to get "buff" because I couldn't care less. I like being active because it makes me feel good. I like the feeling of getting a good workout. It isn't an obligation, it is a simple pleasure that I've got the opportunity to do daily.

It is ironic that I came here to teach, but honestly I think I've been more of a student here. I've learned a lot about life and, especially, about myself. I've come to enjoy the simple things in life and truly just soak them up. Everyday here is tough, in one way or another, but I think this is what life is about. The obstacles have made me realize the smaller things in life that I really enjoy- such as exercising.

I know I've said this before, but thank you so much to those of you that supported me and got me here! I know I will look back on this time as one of the defining points in my life, definitely the greatest yet. Thank you for giving me this opportunity.

Bad Influence

There is something to be said for responsibility. I came to understand a new point of leadership tonight, but before I talk about it I will fill in the details.

A few days ago I had just finished up teaching my 11th grade class about the Battle of Marathon, the Battle of Thermopylae, the Battle of Salamis, and the Battle of Plataea. I had decided that a movie would be a good thing to give them at this point so why not show them some of the clips of 300!?! That's a great idea, right?! Wrong.

I cut out a lot of the stuff that happened in the movie, but still there really isn't much to 300 than blood and fighting. One of my students told me that she couldn't sleep the night before because the of the fighting in the movie. She is an exaggerator by nature, but still there is an element of truth in every extravagantly told story.

The following day after the movie, I apologized to my class for the stuff in the movie. The guys yelled and hollered about how they wanted to see the rest and the girls gave me a nod or a "that's ok Mr." I decided that since the guys didn't get to see all of their movie I might as well show them an action movie back at my house. Hey another great idea, right?! Wrong.

I feel like I was the epitome of that verse in Proverbs tonight- "Just as a dog returns to its vomit, so one man returns to his foolish acts." At first I was going to show them a relatively innocent film- "Transformers"- but then one of the SM's suggested we watch "Equilibrium" instead. I'd seen "Equilibrium" before and I knew that there were some intense scenes in the movie, i.e. the hero chops another guy's head in half. You'd think that would have been warning enough for me, but NO I decided to show it anyways.

This was an interesting experience for me. I know why I showed it. I gave into my friend and my two students that wanted to watch a killing movie. The rest didn't really care and were more in favor of a comedy, but since I'm closer to the two students and my friend, I didn't want to make them upset by choosing something else. Although, I knew that it wouldn't be good to show them this movie. I knew it.

There were a few key lessons I learned from this:
1. Don't make promises you are unsure that you want to keep.
2. When I know that something can be harmful then I have to put my foot down and make the right choice. This is the true form of leadership. I'm not trying to "toot my own horn" but I am the unspoken leader of the villa. They look to me to be the decision maker, even though I look to Daniel because he is the oldest and he has been here for two years.
3. I, and only I, can make my decisions. They wanted to watch a movie that I knew wasn't the best. I was in charge and so it was my responsibility to make sure everything was "kosher".

Anyways, we started watching the movie and we were about 1/3 of the way through when some of the 9th graders came in with Miguel. I wasn't too opposed to the 11th graders watching it, but the 9th graders it is something different. The Egyptian students aren't NEARLY as desensitized to violence as American kids are. It doesn't even bother me if a guy gets his head chopped off and a spear jammed through his butt in a movie. I'm used to it.

So these guys start sitting down to watch and my head was screaming at me, "JUST TURN IT OFF!" I didn't have the balls to stand up and make a choice. About half way through the movie Dwight came in and he came in at the worst possible seen in the movie. The guy in the movie is beating the crap out of a ton of henchmen and blood is flying everywhere. In complete definition of the word, I felt ashamed. It didn't bother me so much that Dwight was seeing this, but that his presence was an blunt amplification of what I was already feeling. Dwight told Daniel to make sure they were all in bed in the next hour and walked away. Dwight had put the responsibility on Daniel, but I knew it belonged to me.

About 15 minutes later, I finally got my kahunas together. I stood up, walked over to the projector, and turned off the movie. I apologized to them for showing them this crap in my house and that in a few weeks I would make it up to them by showing them a decent movie. Two of them really wanted to finish the movie, but I feel like the rest agreed with me. They got up said, "Thanks" and even one of them said, "I used to watch stuff like this, but I don't anymore. Thanks for stopping it."

After the students left the house I did something I didn't really ever see myself doing. I deleted all my trash movies. If I can't show my students this stuff, then how can I watch it myself and not be a two-faced fake? Dwight called Daniel to make sure the students had gone home and Daniel told him that we had stopped the movie. I apologized to Dwight for showing them the movie and I'm never going to forget what he said- "That's alright. In the future let's avoid stuff like this, but for now we'll just leave it as an experience."

That's exactly what I'm going to do. I'm going to leave it as an experience that I can learn from and use it as food to feed my growth because that is all I can do.

Failure

I hate making mistakes, I hate it.

Today was a day that I finally made a huge mistake in teaching my Algebra I class. The idea of making a mistake while teaching a math class was one of the things that haunted me when I heard that I would be teaching math classes. I was teaching inequalities today and I made a big mistake in one of my operations that I was showing them on the board. I don't think that it would have been a big mistake, but it ended up being one because it was at the end of class. I didn't have the time to clarify the truth with them and now I feel like a retard.

I've taken these classes before and all the way up to Calculus III, but I still doubt myself in Algebra I! I don't know why I let myself get so easily rattled when I teach this class... It is going to be difficult to say to my students tomorrow, "I made a big mistake teaching you guys how to solve an easy problem yesterday." After I say that, I'm curious how they will react. I'm sure there will be the kids that are failing that will use it as fuel to justify there cheating behavior and lack of effort this quarter. Some might not even care. Others probably won't even notice.

The biggest problem is that I screwed up on something that I'm supposed to be an expert at. I have always been my biggest critic and I hate it when I screw up. Such is life and I know what I need to do to fix the situation, I just don't want to admit that I'm wrong. I laugh at myself, I feel like such a child saying that, but that is really what it comes down to. I don't want to admit my mistake.

This will be good for me.

Camping = Man Time

Last night was one of the best times that I've had with my students thus far. A few weeks ago one of my 11th grade students, Peter Reda, came up to me and said, "WE HAVE TO GO CAMPING!" I said, "Ok, let's do it." It took us a few weekends to get it together and go do it, but we eventually got our stuff together. We went into the center of Cairo to buy some pancake mix and marshmallows the other night, because what would camping be without marshmallows?!?

Anyways, so we were talking about what time we would go out when two of my rowdy 10th graders, Wagdy and Malak. Malak is a short, stocky, really well built 19 year old who loves to mess with me and tell me he's going to beat me. Wagdy is 18 and is really loud, loves to try to push my buttons, and is always trying to show me how strong he is. Unfortunately, he isn't a bit like Malak and is pretty scrawny. I have to say that they are really annoying in class, but I love these guys. They're my type of guys, but not too much in class ;). I decided to invite them to come with us. They were naturally interested and so I told them to go grab some blankets and mattresses. It turned up that we had a group of nine guys, Malak, Wagdy, Wael, Maged, Peter, Daniel (the French SM- GREAT GUY!), Medhat (Egyptian staff member- also a good guy) and myself.

To summarize the night, instead of writing huge paragraphs, we:

-Built a fire and roasted marshmallows
-Lit our farts on fire; and now you understand the title. Daniel was the only one who really got a round of applause.
-Made Bedouin Tea with our steel ladle
-Wrestled a lot; I think that was especially good because I can't beat my students with a yardstick like I would like to, but I can wrestle with them in the free time. It was my first time really wrestling around with these guys and I feel a different bond with them now. I can tell that they have more respect for me, since I beat each of them, except Peter because we don't wrestle around. There's a different type of relationship, he's 17 but he's probably the most mature Egyptian in the school.
-Got completely jumped! Wael, Wadgy, Malak, and Maged decided that since they couldn't beat me individually they'd all take me on. I wish I could say that I took them on, but there wasn't a chance! Wael and Malak easily subdued my arms while Maged and Wagdy sat on me and tickled me until I honestly had tears coming out of my eyes. I'd forgotten how you could actually cry if somebody tickled you relentlessly. Needless to say, I remember now!
-Had some good talks about spirituality. The topics of freedom of choice and why does God change so much in the way He deals with people from the Old Testament to the New Testament. It was good stuff, they're guys who have the courage to admit they doubt the character of God that has been portrayed to them and it was great to think things out with them.

We went to bed, I didn't sleep too well, but it was DEFINITELY worth it! We woke up and made some pancakes and headed to church. This will stick out as one of the "good times" from my experience in Egypt. My students make my experience here. I hate the stuff they do at times, but I love these kids. I laugh at myself as I write this because I'm getting really sick of the culture here, at times, but I know that it will be really tough to leave Egypt.

Christmas Break Part 11: The Return to Cairo

The morning that we headed out of the White Desert also happened to be the morning that we decided to go back to Cairo. We were originally planning to stay another night in the desert at Beharaya Oasis, but Monte got 300 LE stolen from him when we were at the Anwar Hotel and we were kind of ready to head back to the school anyways. So we made the decision to take the trip back to Cairo.

When we arrived back in Dakhala from the desert our guides took us to a place by the side of the street that was supposedly the stop for the bus headed to Cairo. They helped us with our bags and Monte gave them 50 for all of us for a tip. We were about to go when one of them put out his hand and said, "Baksheesh." I'll be honest that whenever somebody asks me for baksheesh, I rarely want to give them anything because they always give you this puppy dog face and want more- no matter what amount you give us. They'd charged us 50 LE extra to go to a free hot spring that was on the route back to Dakhala so we figured they'd be doing just fine in the area of tips. We told them on the way that we wouldn't bargain on the price and whatever was left over from the expenses (nothing) we'd give them in tips. I was already personally planning to give them 20 LE, but I changed my mind and put my money back in my pocket.

I'd say that is one of the most frustrating things about being here is that a lot of people are just trying to exploit me. They fight dirty, too- pity parties, guilt trips, anger, and other creative methods of manipulation. I understand their situation, but it gets tiresome dealing with them and still trying to show respect for them as human being because they stoop REALLY LOW. I guess desperation can have that kind of effect on people...

Anyways, we were waiting a big guy that walked with a bit of a swagger told us to come with him to his bus. I was really skeptical at first that he was going to take us to Cairo, so I double checked which direction the bus was headed on my compass. He was actually headed towards Cairo and I felt a bit of trust towards him. We asked him how much, he told us 35. I double checked and then Daniel asked him again, just to make sure. We didn't want a repeat of the day before.

We boarded the bus and it was CROWDED! Every seat was taken once we sat down and almost everybody was carrying some type of luggage. I don't know why, but it seemed like 90% of the bus was hostile. When I'd look around and make eye contact with somebody, I'd smile and get a glare in return. I'm not sure if my distrust of the bus owner was shining through to the other people or my own feelings of frustration were more visible than I realized, or maybe it was because the book I was reading had an American soldier on it. These are all attempts at a guess, but I won't deny that I was getting pretty annoyed. Usually when you smile and say, "Hi", the Egyptians return a smile and a hello. Not this time.

I decided I'd just smile if I made a contact and show respect in what way I could, but I'd resign myself to just talking with Kevin. We had some good conversations, but everytime we'd laugh or get excited in our talk these guys would look over and glare at us. I started to just get flat out angry because it happens at times on the metro, but never on a scale like it was with this. These guys knew nothing about me, what was their problem?

The swaggering bus owner came through a few hours later to collect money. He put out his hand and said authoritatively, "Give 35 pounds." I got out a 50, he rolled his eyes at me and said, "Give small money" I told him that was the best I could do and he begrudgingly sifted through his wad of bills and handed me change. He waddled off to his seat under the weight of his rotund belly and I was just thinking, "What is wrong with these people?"

The bus ride went on and we stopped at Beharaya Oasis. I walked around and bought some dates and Beharaya grown olives. I got a great price for the olives -20 LE for a 3 kilo jar!! I was pretty happy about my purchase, but I ended up leaving them on board the bus when we arrived in Cairo.

We got back on board the bus and once again more glares. The trip continued and eventually though one of the guys looked at me, I smiled and he smiled back. I thought, "hmmm... maybe this guy isn't so bad after all." It turned out that by the time we got to Cairo they were all really helpful with making sure we found our way back to the school (even though we knew it, but we figured we'd just take the good intentioned help).

I learned a lesson from that bus ride. I'm still not sure why those people were so hostile towards me in the beginning, but I feel good that I walked away from that ride victorious. It proved to me yet again that you can't control other people, but you can control yourself. I had better control of myself than they did and they eventually came over to my "conditions" for our short temporary relationship. It worked because I showed the most respect to them. They weren't giving me any respect, but I gave them respect anyways. I prayed a decent amount on that ride and I know I didn't do that by my own because usually I would've just said, "forget them. I'll glare back, too." This time was different and I'm glad it was different. I'll remember that bus ride as the beginning of a journey to alter my mentality of dealing with people.

Christmas Break Part 10: Farafra and the White Desert

Once we arrived in Farafra and waved goodbye to our dishonest mini-bus driver it was nearly dark. We'd decided in advance that we wanted to do a trip into the desert after a night in Farafra, but once we realized how utterly small it was we decided to see if we could get out on a night safari into the White Desert.

We started out with trying to go through the Sunrise Hotel aka "Sunrise Dump". The guy told us it would be 1500 LE for all of us and we said, "No, 100 LE each". He laughed at us and said, "There is no way you will be able to go to the desert for less than 900, but he would give us a special price of 850" I took it as a challenge and suggested we leave and then come back. We eventually found a guy that would do it for 700, but take us out the following morning. We didn't want a day tour, but we used it as leverage with the other guy.

After a series of bargainings and telling him that we would go to the other guy, but "we really liked him" (that's the way they talk here, "well because you seem like a really nice guy I'll give you an outrageous price for something cheap!") and wanted him to make money. This is really great after a series of "phone calls" where he was holding down the receiver!!! We had a tour out to the desert for 600 LE- I'm once again quite proud of the negotiations we pulled off as a team. Daniel and I have learned to work really well to pressure sellers in a bargain as a team and it has saved us a lot of money! I still think he got a good deal out of us, but we got the trip we wanted and for 250 LE cheaper.

We headed out into the desert with the two best Egyptians we met the whole trip (besides Zowek). They weren't obnoxious about trying to sell us stupid stuff and they were just laid back. They weren't dying to entertain us and they were both just "down-to-earth" guys.

The White Desert was the best way to end the trip! The stars were ABSOLUTELY GORGEOUS. You hardly ever see more than two or three stars in the sky at the school, but in the desert you could see SO MANY! I haven't seen the sky that lit up in a long time and it was a really good experience. It's funny how you don't realize how cool somthing is until you don't have it anymore. Oh life lessons.......

I had a good talk that night with one of our guides about the character of God. He was a Muslim and had a practical view on God. He said he really loved everything about the Koran, but somethings confused him. He said that a loving God is the only God that made sense to him and I talked with him about my views on God. We were both from VERY DIFFERENT backgrounds, but we somehow had a similar view on God. It was good to talk with him.

The following morning we went to a place called "mushroom" rock. A huge rock that looks like a, guess... Mushroom! Who would have guessed. After that we went to a hot spring in the desert and then boarded a bus headed to Cairo. The trip could not have ended any better! I saw a lot of cool things during my break, but the White Desert stands out as my favorite experience.

Christmas Break Part 9: The Trip to Farafra

The trip to Farafra was probably one of the more intense experiences that we had on our trip. We had asked one of the guys waiting at the bus stop what the price to Farafra was and he told us it was 17 LE. So we got on board and headed towards Farafra.

Three quarters of the way there the driver started getting money from all of the passengers and we passed up our 17 each. He said back to us "Arabic, arabic... give me more money.. more Arabic I didn't understand, Arabic I can understand - you need to give me 25 LE each." Daniel replied back, "No."

Let me give you a background on Daniel. This is his 2nd year SM'ing in Egypt and he is a really independent, strong willed, justice inspired, and sometimes really stubborn guy. He values fairness in all situations and doesn't have much tolerance for the crap that a lot of the Egyptians try to pull on us.

Back to the story. The drivers assistant or co-pilot as I like to call them started yelling at us and telling us to give him more money. I told him, "No, 17 enough, all pay 17." He turned around and started talking to the driver, then suddenly the guy slams on the brakes and stops the car. He gets out of the car, comes to us and starts demanding more money. We argued back and forth with him for a little bit and at first the Egyptians were either silent or on our side, but somehow the co-pilot convinced them we were cheating the driver.

The arguing continued until eventually the guy said our bags on the roof is what cost us the extra 8 LE, but there were also many other packages on the top. I laughed at him really obnoxiously because the guy was being so ridiculously dishonest. Even the guys that had "sided" with him started laughing because they knew he was being dishonest.

After this, though, things got pretty serious. Some passengers started yelling and swearing at us in Arabic. Daniel wasn't willing to budge because he didn't want to pay more, but I realized the "chemistry" of the mini-bus was changing. There were only two Egyptians left on the bus who weren't yelling at us and the prospect of getting thrown out of a bus in the middle of the desert wasn't appealing. I gave in for Daniel and paid his extra 8 LE because I didn't want to get thrown out of the mini-bus.

Looking back on it there is a part of me that feels I shouldn't have paid them the extra based on principle, but then the other part of me knows I made the right choice because the area we were in wasn't the most "Western-Friendly". There were 12 guys yelling at us and the fact that we were four in the middle of nowhere didn't seem like a good time to start a fight over a total of 32 LE ($6). I was really tempted to leave a ton of trash in his bus, but I decided against it because I don't want to be a revenge driven person. It seemed so fair at the time, but I'm glad I didn't.

Once we gave him the money he started up the car again and we continued to head towards Farafra.