Independence Day

So its the 6th of October. In 1973, Egypt pushed Israel and all its allies out of the Sinai, regaining it as their property. This is a national holiday, celebrating the strength of Israel. Last night, while being dragged around a friend of a friend of a friend's wedding by a friend of a friend who insisted on introducing me as his girlfriend, I observed a lovely wall statue of the Egyptian conquering soldier surrounded by fighter jets. Strong and pained and sacrificing. O Egypt, most important nation in the world with the best soldiers in the world as all Egyptians will tell you.

So today I feel free. I feel happy and I feel free, appropriately for this Independence Day. I woke up, I talked to this girl I met in the metro a few weeks ago. I walk to the zoo to meet her. I spend a lovely day with a huge chunk of the population of Cairo staring at animals and enjoying a national holiday. Being there with a very generous Egyptian girl was awesome. She bought my tickets, my water, even though she herself was fasting for the holiday, and discussed with me on any possible topic. She's an Economics TA so told me all about why America is having a financial crisis, she told me about her fellow TA that she is pining for and who she changed her higab style for but who is not giving her very good signals. She told me about how Muhammed the prophet says woman must wear a larger higab and skirts, but that she knows Christians can wear pants and what does the Bible say about this? She told me about Condoleeza Rice's report on religious freedom in Egypt, we talked about how we must remove the log from our own eye before removing the speck from our brother's. We talked about how Egyptians say "if God is willing" when they really mean no but don't want to be impolite. We talked about teaching, how easy and difficult it can be, and how I must visit one of her classes. How she was given a full scholarship for her masters at a top school in London but her mother made her turn it down because she won't let her travel even one night within Egypt, let alone abroad. And we took pictures with monkeys and bears and elephants and birds. We talked about peafowl. We talked about children and illiteracy and bad men.

Then she realized she forgot to pray, the zoo was closing, and so the day came to a close. I got 2 giant sweet potatoes from the sweet potato mobile oven cart (my favorite snack in the world), took them to the bridge and ate them while watching the sunset over the Nile: faint call to prayer from all sides, then lights coming on a few at a time, slight fog and fall breeze, and red green and white sail boats under me. Beautiful.

And I thought to myself, in the words of Keith Urban, "I'm young and I'm free, who wouldn't want to be." And I prayed and I realized, I am exactly the best place I could be, in the city I love, surrounded by great people in Cairo and back home and with my whole life ahead of me, in shah allah. I am free from whatever could hold me down (mainly myself), and not because I deserve it, but because I've been set free.