Disappointment, Frustration, Conflict, Honesty, Belonging

So this week has been pretty major. I've been balancing out the parts of my personality and trying to get to a life that I feel is truly mine. This week I decided to stop being friends with my friends from work because of their sketchiness and damage to my reputation and not exactly trustworthiness. So I had this talk with my co-worker about how I wanted to live my life in a straight line, he lived his life in a crazy curvy zig zag pattern so we couldn't really be good friends. I finally got this slightly self-righteous point across when he broke it all down by saying, "ok no problem, you are the metro (going straight), I am a minibus (going all over the city), I will meet you at Ramses (square downtown where all the minibuses and the metro go)." Hahaha!

So I got a new job, working as a copy-editor and setting up an NGO in the U.S. I cut down my hours at my teaching job. I reconciled with my friends from work again, realizing that we loved each other too much, my issues with them had something to do with what time of the month it was and other people's judgments, not my own, and since when do I get rid of friends or decide to avoid someone based on my reputation or their sketchiness in the eyes of society? As Alissa indirectly reminded me, "that's un-Biblical." I would even say, anti-Biblical. Luckily they easily forgave me without me even asking.

So anyway, sitting in our lighted garden at work during Iftar break after downing my pomegranate seed juice with the guys at work, I confessed the fact that I took a new job and was cutting down my hours at our center. An awkward silence settled, you could hear the wind in the small trees behind us. One understood my reasons, the other was being passive aggressive, "whatever you like Miss Kristin" and called me out on being selfish while pretending I'm not. And then it comes out, one is leaving at the end of the month, the other will leave then too. Then my co-teacher comes outside and makes his own personal confession. So then we all of a sudden know that this is over soon. All of a sudden honesty and affection and disappointment and impending change are all out floating around us, and savoring this moment, sitting in this garden together, becomes very important, and the humid air seems thicker. My co-worker gets the Qur'an and recites to us the Sura of Mariam (Mary, mother of Jesus). I could sit and listen for hours to the sound of the Qur'an being recited (which is a good thing because I hear it several hours of the day here, from our neighborhood mosque, from radios in every store, home, and taxi, and from the pious Muslims around me). I make some after Iftar tea. The guys "drink" a couple cigarettes (that's how it translates from Arabic), we breath in the heavy air.

Last night the guys, my co-teacher, and I got to have restaurant Iftar because our resident cook went home to eat with his wife. We take a taxi to Mo'men (an American style fast food restaurant, the name means "very good Muslim," which is why me and my co-teacher couldn't work there, haha) We order our food right before sunset and the crowd kept amassing. We get our food about 15 minutes after Iftar and eat out on a planter outside. Mmmm. My first fast food Iftar, thoroughly satisfying, and thoroughly strange culture clash. Came back to the center and I went out shopping. One of the guys went looking for me because I was gone so long he thought I was lost. I bought everyone some sweet potatoes.

Later last night I make my way to Masaara to see my family. I brought them some figs and I finally got to hear what is up with their sister in law. The father told us never to go upstairs where the sister-in-law lives. I found out why from the women. She doesn't like us being around for various reasons having to do with reputation, time, envy, and money. She was also bribed by a cousin to convince her sister-in-law to marry him, at age 16. I knew at some point that we must be a burden to this family, but it saddened me to hear this. On the bright side I heard about the family's approval of Alissa's friend as her husband and the story of the father and mother in the beginning. I also got to hear about how the family thought I was very shy and quiet and slightly unfriendly at first but now I am much much better. This morning Julianna, Gigi and I went to church at this church / monastery on the Nile. I successfully handled money changing in the mini-bus since I was next to the driver even though Gigi was convinced I couldn't.

Tonight my host family couldn't have me over for Iftar because the Mom and middle brother were involved in some kind of extended duel with their uncle in their village so Rebecca and I headed out for a nice dinner. On the way back on the metro, we must have hit the last train of the night because the thing was packed to the people bouncing off point. Luckily I was squished in the corner in the middle of this very funny, very happy, very big Muslim family. I asked them where they were getting off, we struck up a little conversation, they said I must live here because my arabic accent was so good (haha, very funny, but much appreciated), and then when my stop came up they successfully shoved me through the crowd to the door on the other side. Rebecca and I finally pretty much fell out of the metro as if we were coming home from a long night of drinking because of the sheer pressure built up inside that metro car. I get to the exit turnstile, put my ticket in and it won't let me through. Now this happens to me ALL THE TIME and I am no longer amused. I start mildly cursing / hitting the machine and jump over the turnstile. This is a pretty common Egyptian way to get away with not paying for the metro. The metro guy comes out of his office and yells at me. I throw up my hands, Rebecca's ticket in one, my ticket in the other in exasperation and yell, "feeh itneen!" (there are two!) "maksoor!" (its broken!) He smiles and waves me on. I walk out the door and all of a sudden I can't believe I just did that, cavalierly yelled at the Metro monitor man in Arabic after jumping over the turnstile. I'm toughening up and my temper is shortening.

So I have started to feel that I belong here, I have roots here. People are being more honest with me, I'm being more honest with people. This honesty is often the painful kind involving hurt and disappointment, but this seems to be necessary to be part of life and to have any kind of real relationship. You can't be part of life anywhere without experiencing a large share of hurt and disappointment it seems. The pain and frustration almost makes it real. It hurts to hear that our sister-in-law doesn't like us around. I hurt others by saying that I'm leaving and their life is not correct. Others hurt me by not following through on their promises and not meeting my expectations. So we have the point in life that conflict arises and then we have the point in life that the opportunity for honesty arises, and then the point where we move past it all together. Laazim (we must).