February, where did you go?

Oops! All of a sudden it's March, and I haven't updated for 2 weeks. This is an excerpt from an e-mail to Mom about last weekend, to catch you all up to speed a bit before I write about this past weekend of travel.

Feb 24:
"This weekend was really relaxing - on Friday night we had 4 lovely friends over for a Shabbat dinner, and on Saturday we went to a gorgeous park in Islamic Cairo. I made lentil soup for the first time on Friday, and it was delicious! I was pretty proud of myself, especially considering I had to go to a special spice shop to find oregano and thyme. They have spices in huge bins here, and we buy them by the 1/8 kilo - 5 LE (Egyptian pounds - 5.5 in a dollar) for 1/4 kilo of spices! We also made stuffed red peppers - stuffed with rice, mushrooms, onions, and paprika - and mashed potatoes, and Sara fried up some delicious sea bass fillets with bread crumbs and rosemary. Our guests brought dessert and helped do dishes - all in all, a wonderful first dinner party.

On Saturday we went to al-Azhar park, which was really gorgeous - and one of the greenest places I've seen in Cairo! It felt like a European park, full of fountains and wide boulevards for strolling. There were couples and families with picnics sprawled on all the grassy lawns. It was a lovely respite from the constant (and dirty) hustle and bustle of downtown Cairo. Admission to the park is 5LE on weekends, but only 3LE (about 50 cents) on weekdays, so we plan on going back often. Also, the park has several snazzy outdoor restaurants - definitely a romantic locale, if ever I have need of one!

I just had a conference with my colloquial Arabic professor, because she wanted to meet with each student individually to discuss our progress and the future of the class. She's very sweet, but a little odd, and not a particularly rigorous or focused professor. So far our lessons have been to unstructured for my taste, and I get a lot more out of my amiyya tutoring, but I hope that she will hit her stride now. Speaking of tutoring, I had a 2 hour session today (for about $10, gotta love the exchange rate!), and I really love my tutor. She's very young - probably only a couple years older than I, though I'm not sure - and she offers the focus and structure that my professor is lacking. Plus, she's really sweet and encouraging, and she says my accent is quite good!"

It's incredible that I've already been in this country for over a month. Time is going by too quickly, but at the same time I've experienced more than I thought possible in just 4+ weeks.