New Years

Hi Everyone,

Sorry about not posting a lot but my family is here in Egypt and my days are fully loaded with events. Haha my family has an abundant source of energy that i wish i could find for myself. In the last two days I have gotten roughly 4 hours of sleep and there is no break for me...but its all totally worth it. I cant express how much fun i have with my family and its going to be sad when they leave so spending every waking moment with them may at the time seem like stressful or whatever but looking back already at the last week its really really amazing.

So other than that I figured its new years eve its time to do a little reflection on the year 2007 and talk a little bit about the expectations for 2008...

2007 - hmm, overall i love this year a lot. It was full of changes in my personally, many life changing events, and many decisions that had to be made. In terms of the material stuff and events, i graduated from college in the very merry month of May (just a little steven foster reference) also i of course came to egypt which is an event that is indescribable to how much its done for me in my life. Really opens your eyes to the world around you when you actually take the time to go look at the world. Hmm, i dont know what else really, i mean in terms of events, i was able to get something off my chest this year that was really gnawing at me for awhile which was a really big relief. In terms of maturity, haha, i mean i feel as if i matured in some aspects of my life. I am still very much a goofball and like a child but i mean hey i have been living in egypt on my own for awhile thats gotta require a little maturity to be able to be done, right? I really took time this year to do a lot of personal reflection which i tend to neglect because i want to focus on other things around me. So 2007 to me was about changes and significant ones at that.

2008 - umm, i dont have any expectations for 2008, why? because the way i see it if you expect too much you'll end up getting disappointed in the end. This is because no matter what you may plan there are always going to be things to alter them either slightly or maybe a complete and drastic opposite so if you hang yourself up too much on what you want from this and want from that when the inevitable change happens you will just be all whiny and sad when things dont go your way. So what do i say? let what happens happens with no expectations. Like i am not saying dont make plans because thats too much in the extreme of being lazy and a sluggard. So I will set plans and have wants i am sure but wont get too hung up or attached to them. Let God decide since He already did. So what do i want from 2008...i want to be a better person. Haha i know that sounds like Miss America but yeah i would like to be a better Andrew. As of right now i can be very stubborn and i think very lowly of myself and get on people's nerves. So i am praying that i become more flexible, that i learn to let others have their ways and to know when to stop being "too nice" haha so many people tell me that i am too nice and that its annoying so i am going to work on that this year. So thats about it to sum up...

2007:
-great year
-many changes
-many joyous events

2008:
-no expectations
-working on maturing


haha, if anyone has any suggestions for me please feel free to express them and i'll welcome them with open arms. Like the Bible says in the book of Proverbs chapter 12 verse 15.... "The way of a fool seems right to him, but a wise man listens to advice."

anyway happy new years everyone and be safe! Oh yeah, i'll tell you my plans for this year. So as tradition has it i spend my new years with my family and its awesome that they are here! So after work i will go find them and at 7pm we are going to a church service. Haha, there are two church services one from 7-9 and one from 10-midnight:30 and my parents have chosen to go to both so they can see as many people as possible. Haha, its going to be a long night but thank God i have a day off tomorrow from work and hopefully will get to catch up on a little sleep (thats wishful thinking though, haha) anyway once again good day to you all.

I hope Joe got to read this

Merry Christmas

Hi Everyone,

Its December 24th and its not christmas in Egypt (that is January 7th) but it is still Christmas eve in America and i am still American. So to everyone i wish you all a Merry Christmas. I pray for all your safety i hope the weather is enjoyable and that you all have a wonderful time with friends and family! I dont want to go on because i'll end up sounding like a christmas card. So from Andrew in Egypt i say "Merry Christmas to all and to too all a good night!"
-Andrew Nader Ghobrial

an amazing tale

Hello Everyone,

This is a post that is really really great. It has nothing to do with Egypt and it has nothing to do with me. It has to do with a man by the name of Paul Potts. For those who might know him he won this British version of American Idol this year called "Britain's talent" or something along those lines. Anyway this guys story is actually pretty cool and very inspiring. I will provide you all with the wikipedia biography of him and you should all take the time to read it.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Potts

also i want to provide you guys with the link to a youtube video of this audition or whatever it is to just see this guy in action.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DelJrP3P7tA&feature=related

and another thing i want to add is a reflection and a small commentary by the man who made me aware of Paul Potts. This is Tom Griffin's response to the video. So i wont add my own commentary because i doubt i can express it as well as tom did. I do have opinions and if you want to know them you may ask me and i'll gladly tell them to you.....

ok i'll post more about my cruise trip i just came from. Also my family is here! my father is landing in a few minutes at the airport but i unfortunately am at work and wont see him :'( its alright though i have had a lot of fun so far and i will post some pictures up for all you to see. Ok have an excellent day everyone!

"This whole year came and went quickly, and I think right now, out of all things that have been said to me and spoken to me have all come together, and been solidified by the mortar of one single instance… Paul Potts. Until today I have never heard of this man, but while reading an article I read about his remarkable performance on a show called Britain’s got talent. He appeared on the show for the first time, and when he walked on stage he was only a cell phone salesman. He stood there before the judges, and the look on his face was absolute fear. Here it was this man stood before these three judges and thousands as jury waiting for his sentence.

The music started and then he opened his mouth, and what carried from it was a sound that shocked me. As I listened I saw people begin to rise and applaud and shout, and I knew why. Because they had heard what I had, not a voice that tickles your ear for a moment but a sound that haunts and fills and overwhelms the senses. Filling the heart until it feels you are about to burst and the only way to release this is in a responsive outpouring of emotion. I felt my eyes tear up and then realized something very great—it is alright.

So often I am carrying this burden this and judgment, making it my own personal weight and my own personal burden, to hate or despise certain things, and in a way hate people I deem as foolish or stupid. Well in this moment, I couldn’t anymore, my heart just burst. This man was not just singing, rather he was speaking and preaching and fulfilling what I believe was G-d’s will. In that moment, as soon as he opened wide the gates of his tongue something spilled forth, a wave of song, baptizing him and making him something new. No longer a cell phone salesman, he was now a new creation!

The whole circumstance made me think of something else as well. This show came about because of the success of American Idol, whether you think the show is good or bad. From this spin-off one man was able to enter and to achieve something great—his dream. It is amazing how so much happening has resulted in such a great victory for this person, and how much occurred at chance to allow him to achieve it.

First had to be the proposal of the show (and even before that reality TV had to become big). Then it had to have multiple successful seasons than it would have to catch on in Britain, and then he would have to get up the nerve to try out for the show, and then even get to the main judges to get in the show, and then he would have to not botch up during his first performance. There are so many other variables that I haven’t even bothered thinking about that all had to happen that would seem implausible in conceiving none the less impossible to occur! YET THEY DID! All these chance happenings occurred allowing this one man to experience an amazing gift! The rest of his life from that moment on would be different.

It reminded me of a few things… Nothing is purely evil; this may sound funny, and truth be told it is a bit of an exaggeration, but I have never cared for reality TV and have felt that it is a silly moneymaking greed influenced creation. Yet here it is allowing someone to experience a different life and allowing for them to have success. Hence I have to conclude that even though there may be something that may seem evil something great can come from it. That we are not in control; for in this show one man as I had aforementioned received a miraculous gift which had come to pass through none of his own machinations. Instead this came about through things that were not in his control and he simply leapt at the chance. Hence I see that there are so many variables that affect our lives that simply are not in our control. Finally I see that there is something beautiful that is constantly revealed through people and circumstances. A message about hope; that we should always believe that there is something greater in each moment, I think that perhaps hope is not something better in our lives that is evident, but rather as scripture says is something unseen, so I can only conclude it is a mindset, a conscious decision to see differently. One other thing I have gleaned is that this man came forward with his talents things he was given. He did not wait or stand back and try to let this chance fall in his lap, rather he acted upon it!

So if I take these lessons into conscious action then I should believe and act in these ways—to see that not all is understandable in the moment, and I have to have hope and see beyond a single moment which may seem good or bad, yet not let a moment pass where I can consciously do better for myself or for another. How do I know these things are accurate? For when I heard this story, I heard Potts sing I experienced this for myself. Hope revealed through one chance instance reading one chance story which so happened to make me see something different.

However, in the end, I am not in control but something greater than me certainly is. Whether it is chance, or some great divine formula, or perhaps I shall simply call it G-d for now, the same One who has allowed all things to work out for the good who love him, the same One who has through nature, circumstance, and song, revealed Itself to mankind."

Happy Eid

Hello Everyone,

I hope everyone has prepared their sheep for today to slaughter for the Eid...no? ok that makes sense. So in Egypt there is a Muslim holiday called Eid El-Adha (Adh-ha) which means basically "to cut the lamb". Basically its based on a story in the Qu'ran about how Allah asked of a man to sacrifice Ishmael but in the end provided a ram to be used instead. So in Egypt during this Eid everyone gets a sheep or a cow or whatever they can afford and all slaughter them together and give the meat out to the poor and feed them. Its to symbolize how Allah provides for them and in gratitude they give to those who truly need. I think its amazing the culture and mentality of this country...

anyway This post will be relatively short and I wont be updating for some time because I am headed to a Cruise! Yes, my first Cruise and it should be exciting. I do however have a fever currently and pray that it leaves me before I eventually have to start having fun. My temperature is like 38 degrees celcius which is a litle over 100 degrees fahrenheit so not too bad but its all good. Thank God that one's physical self has no effect on how one should feel overall so overall i am awesome. Why? well i guess i have to be happy because my little sister is here, haha. I am kidding i am very happy she is here. I took her to the pyramids and sneezed a lot but it was enjoyable. OH! Let me tell you guys about waiting for her arrival. She is supposed to land at 12:15pm in Cairo and we suppose it will take her about 30minutes to get through customs or whatever maybe an hour tops. But the plane gets delayed and is going to be 2 hours later so we wait and wait and then eventually she lands and comes through. But thats not why i bring this up. I dont care waiting i am somewhat patient and it was a nice day so its great, but here is what happens. I am standing at the gate waiting and people start filtering through and everyone is whatever an Egpytian here an American there, but then...oh man...this just HUGE guy comes out and all of us are in shock (when i say us me and all the other Egyptians waiting for our passengers) like i cant possibly describe how big this guy is i will show you a similar idea to what he is. This isnt an exaggeration i just "googled" big arms and I got this picture. Not exactly him but very close. Haha, wow he was scary.

(just imagine him in a yankees hat and a really really tight t-shirt...yuck)

But thats not the funny part all of us were just in awe until someone who hadnt noticed at first turned and was like "eh wahsh da!?" (ay weh-sh deh!?) this means "What is this monster!?" and that was a very accurate question because no one knew. Haha and then people were like "lazam tarzan wal la haga" ("must be tarzan or something") Anyway yeah that was nuts but its all good. I am headed to a cruise now and i will provide pictures or something from that trip. I hope everyone is good and well. Keep safe in the snow storms and beward these monsters out there....Lord he was huge...

I hope Joe got to read this.

I am back

Hello Everyone,

I am back from upper Egypt and successfully returned safely from my building and have suffered no injuries. I know some of you are anticipating me to talk about the build and what i did and what i got from it, but i am sorry to disappoint you all that i cant. Its not even that i wont its seriously i was in awe and i dont think i can express it in the form of writing. I will however gladly tell all of you about it when i return and can do it in person and be able to use the proper hand movements to describe things!

I will give you some minor demographics however. We went to a village in Minya called Tayeba ("Tie-ay-ba") and it was really really amazing. We worked on a house that just needed a few brick walls so we were able to brick up a wall with some cement. I have now learned how to mix cement manually and i am not sure if that will ever prove useful in my life but it was fun learning! Other than that it was nice and i enjoyed it a lot and its really given me perspective on stuff...

My weekend is what i will talk about. It is the end of the semester at the seminary and they had a nice all day fellowship/party thingy and they let me join in. So it was saturday and me with about 40 other students get on this bus at 9am to head over to this place called Wadi Degla (Waa-dee Deg-la) it was this nature perserve...haha and when i say nature perserve i mean a desert. It was really beautiful and amazing. It was like a 10kilometer walking path in between these huge mountains. It was nice and hot (thank God), and i got to just talk with some people and everything. I had a really really cool conversation with this one kid Remy about religion which i enjoyed. Anyway after the walking we headed back to the bus and went to the seminary. There we hung outside did more talking and i was able to eat my first sugar cane! It was really really nuts trying to eat them. What you do is you bite and strip the green layer (i guess its the bark of it) and then once that happens you can bite into and chew on the sweet goodness inside. Its very trying on your teeth and jaw and i definitely felt it in the morning, haha.

After eating and playing some chess with people we ate a delicious lunch of BBQ'ed meat and macaroni beh bashamael. Bashamael is a type of creamed topping you put in the form of a casserole. Then there is macaroni with ground beef(or lamb) and sauce. Basically its delicious. After eating we had a football/soccer game and that is always fun. Afterwards i went back to my room where i then went to my cousins to babysit. Overall it was an excellent day!

So i will post more eventually on stuff but i have some reports to write up and we have vacation tomorrow for the holidays! There is a Muslim Eid i believe and i dont really know much about it at hte moment i am sorry, i know it has somethign to do with slaughtering a lot of animals. There is so much livestock in cairo now awaiting the day to be killed on wednesday? maybe thursday? i dont know. I feel bad though because i live up the street from a butcher where tied the street is a cow, sheep, and...camel. I have never eaten camel and i dont think i will begin...the poor thing is a baby too :'(

anyway tomorrow my little sister joyce is coming and i have to mentally prepare myself for this three week headache that i will soon have to endure....haha joking! haha it should be fun so i'll post later hopefully in the week about what i do. Good bye all.

I hope Joe got to read this

a simple apology

Hello Everyone,

first off i need to apologize that i wont be doing a thursday post this week because i will be in upper egypt building and wont be back for a bit. This might be a regular thing so i'll announce when i wont be around of course...

I also want to apologize for something more fo' serious. It has come to my attention recently how frustrating i can be when i am being stubborn. For this i apologize to all of your who had to endure through that all and i thank you all for your continuous patience with me. I could try and come up with some excuses to why i am like that or to soften the severity of it, but i wont. I just wanted you all to know that i now realize it and i am planning on changing it and fixing my stubbornness. So God willing the next time you guys are around me i'll be more tolerable and easier to enjoy a meal with. Ok see you guys when i get back from my build! have a good weekend.

Sincerest Apologies,
Andrew Ghobrial


I hope Joe got to read this

my weekend!

Hello my friends,

I am just going to give you the haps' (the happenings, aka the things that happened) on my weekend. So first off i would like to say i had a really good time. I did many things, i saw many things, and it cost very very little! so a great great time.


Saturday - This was a very good day in that i got to do and see many new things. I started off by waking up at like 7am (on a saturday!?) yes because i have put myself into the habit of waking up that early everyday for work so it transfers to the weekends at times. So yeah i woke up at about 7 had time for prayer, reading, and all that cool personal alone time stuff and then i was off to the computer lab! In the computer lab i did some research on something that has been on my mind a lot (i chose not to share it because if i did i would have to dedicate an entire blog entry to that topic...) So after some research i played UNO with my friend Hanna. I hadnt played UNO in a long time and it was really fun learning how to play it again. Anyway after awhile we decided to head out by bus to think place called "Khana Khalili" (phlegm-an-ah phlegm-ah-lee-lee") Its a place with this huge bizarre where tourists all go to buy things all the time. I went with Hanna just to walk around and see it we didnt buy anything but we did observe the most crowded street ever. I felt really bad for the foreigners (the ones that look like foreigners, haha i know i am one but i at least look egyptian) so yeah they couldnt take like two steps without someone in their face with something saying things like "1 dollar, 1 euro" or trying the guilt thing like "my family wants you to buy this" or something like that. After some walking and talking we stopped at a famous Mosque in Azhar and we went in. This is the first time i have ever been inside a Mosque and it was absolutely amazing. I cant really describe it on a blog because i wouldnt do it justice without so just know for now I am in awe of it. After the Mosque visit we ate dinner which was SHAWERMA! haha i really really love shawerma and i eat it so rarely that its truly an awesome experience. For those who are not aware of what this amazing meal is its simply shredded beef with some things like onions and other vegetables cooked and put into some bread...simple...and...awesome. After eating we went into a cafe which is what cairo is famous for. I read an article on the plane ride saying that there are i believe over 200 cafes in cairo alone so yeah they are famous for that. So we went in and ordered this delicious drink called karkadeaya ("Car-kah-day-ya") This is a hot drink that can also be served cold and its made from that hawaiin flower...the one thats like everywhere. (its called a hibiscus)



Anyway its really good and its good for your kidneys. So after that we walked back to the bus and went home where we played ping pong and i watched a scene from Chainsaw massacre 2 and immediately left because i was really really grossed out. HOW CAN YOU PEOPLE WATCH THAT SORT OF THING!? where is the enjoyment of watching like a 14 year old girl running for her life crying and screaming as this maniac chases her around and stuff? then to find out her friends were behind this to kidnap her and then have her watch as some other 14 year old girl gets her neck bitten off by this other weirdo! I will never understand people who like horror films. When I sit down to watch a movie i want to laugh, smile, or at least be intellectually challenged not watch someone mutilate another human being...anyway thats for another post entry as well haha.

Sunday - This was much like every sunday. I went to church in the morning by bus with my friend afterwards i went to my tunt nabila's house like i do every sunday for family day. I helped her with the computer we picked up my little cousin samy from school and eventually the rest ofthe kids came where we drew (rather i drew...) haha ok let me explain something. Every sunday i would draw with the kids something, usually it ends up me drawing the same thing for them 5 times (there are 5 kids) since they dont like the way their drawings came out. Yesterday i made the mistake of drawing a colored, "more complex" drawing than i usually do before the kids came. So what happens? the kids come, see my drawing and each want one of their own. Haha so there i am drawing the same thing 5 times but what happens? one of the kids put a mark on their drawing and wants it again...so i am a softy that is not a surprise to anyone and i might need to learn to say no but you guys gotta see these kids....they are adorable! so haha in the end i drew the same thing 7 times along with another drawing of a giraffe. So since i have talked about this drawing enough i might as well show you what all the "hype" is about. Allow me to implicate my MSPaint skills and re-draw the drawing.

haha ok, so other than that i went to church again and heard an amazing message which haha once again is worthy of its own post. So if you are interested in finding out about it tell me and i'll be more than happy to tell you guys about it it was sweet. Ok so now i am in the office many meetings and what not to take care of so be good and have a great time everyone!

I hope Joe got to read this

Marc Gottlieb: friend, brother, story teller

Hello Everyone,

So how is everyone? I am doing well i am back to egypt time so i am not really exhausted during the day. So today i have selected my good friend marc gottlieb to be the focus of my thursday dedication post. Why marc? to those who ask this i say to them why NOT marc? I have know marc for quite a bit now since freshmen year of high school i believe, however marc and i did not start off as friends. We didnt hate each other just we hung out in a group and wouldnt really say much to one another. I remember the first time i actually hung out with him and we became actual friends. It was during the summer and nic palar invited me to go fishing with him at the harbor and he invited marc as well. So it was the three of us hanging out for like 5 hours at the harbor trying to fish and i guess thats when i finally got to know marc more and we hit it off!

Anyway time to move on. So Marc is known for different things by different people but one thing i am sure everyone can agree on is about marc and his story telling. Marc is a man who loves to tell stories (who doesnt, right) but whem marc tells a story its like completely different than when other people tell stories. The first thing is that he takes a really long time to tell a story always running off in different tangents. A lot of people rag on him because of it but to be honest i love it because its not like the tangents he goes off on are boring or something all of it is very interesting and entertaining.

The other thing about marc's stories is that he tends to repeat them a lot. Haha, usually repeats them within a few hours of originally telling them. I remember one time at like night we are all hanging out and marc is telling a story. Haha, and as usual its taking as some would say a unecessary amount of time to tell when all of a sudden our friend nic, who has been hanging out with him all day, interupts him and is like "listen marc i have heard you try and tell this story 5 times today and i could tell it in about 20 seconds." We all had a good laugh about it i hope but yeah marc does tend to repeat himself a lot and tries to add on more details. Not making things up but describing more and more each time....haha i love it.

Anyway one of the greatest moments in my high school career was at graduation day. We the graduating class were sitting in the auditorium waiting to be called outside. Then Marc stands up to give a speech and like final encouragements to us all his class. He proceeds to tell one of those jokes that goes on for a really really long time and then the punch line is terrible or something. So marc tells a 10minute story and at the end with a terrible punch line and nobody laughs except for me because it was hilarious! That was an awesome thing and i really appreciate marc doing that. Anyway the point is if you dont know marc go out of your way to meet him and talk to him. He is really cool, intelligent and just a really fun guy to be around. Ask him to tell you a story but knowing marc he'll probably tell you enough stories to last you a life time haha. But yeah seriously marc is great.

I hope Joe got to read this.

can i use your mobile?

Hihi everyone!

I am back in Egypt and the work is a lot since its piled up. We have a build team coming in a week and i have a lot to do to prepare for it. But regardless of that i am setting a little time to post to my friends.

So i was in the states for two weeks and i noticed so many differences that i might have not if i never went to egypt. The biggest one was how scared a lot of people are to interact with others. Granted due to my arabic appearance people might be a little more likely to not want to interact with me in fear that i might i dont know i guess go terrorist on them or whatever goes through their minds. But yeah i guess over the last four months i was so used to walking down the street making eye contact with everyone i passed and saying some sort of greeting, even sometimes shaking their hands just for the courtesy of it that i figured it might cross over the seas to America.

So as i walked down the street i would say hello to like everyone or just give them at least one of those nods of acknowledgment to say "yes i see that you exist" but i was a little sad to how many rejections i received. So it would usually go something like this i would be looking straight ahead while walking down the sidewalk or something and see someone i was eventually going to pass by. I would see from a distance that he sees me and he sees from a distance that i see him, so i figure "ok this is cool now i can say hello" so we get closer and as we get to a vocal proximity of one another he looks straight down as if to hide from me or to fool me to think "oh this guy is really busy looking at his sneakers, i shouldnt bother him with a greeting" haha, this happened many many times and some people are more creative like they would look at their watch just as we get close enough to each other, one guy even went out of his way to fumble for his mobile phone just so he can do something which would make him appear busy. It blows my mind the the effort people go through just to avoid interacting with someone else....oh well what are you going to do?

Haha, saying mobile phone also brings up another thing i noticed. One of course is that now i say mobile phone instead of cell phone just out of habit of being in egypt. So what happened was one of the days i was back in the states i went to SUNY albany my old university to pick up some transcripts and see some old chums. So on the way up to albany i was talking on my mobile so long to the point of it completely running out of battery life and left me in a tight situation in that i sort of needed the phone to talk to everyone for the rest of the day. So i get to campus i go to my friend Austin Shea's building but i cant get in since i dont have a key or anything so i am waiting outside in the cold for someone to open the door or something and since i dont have my phone anymore i cant call him. So i see a guy across the road smoking a cigarette and i figure "hey he must have a phone i can use to call austin so i can get inside" i go over to him and ask him "excuse me, would it be ok if i use your mobile to call my friend? the battery in my phone died." He looks at me, and replies "umm, i would prefer not to" haha i had no idea what to say to that except "ok, well i guess thank you for your time..." and i walk back to my side of the road and stand their for about five minutes before someone finally opened the door. Haha, so yeah i dont know why people are afraid of talking to other people in the states maybe its the media, maybe its the educational system, maybe its everything all together, who knows. The point is i am going to challenge you all in the states to just try talking to people you dont have to be their friends, you dont have the feel pressured in that if you talk to them they are going to eventually want something from you or whatever just be polite and say hello at least! I know i am going to pursue this type of behavior when i return and for the rest of my days.

Ok back to work i hope everyone is well. Good bye for now!


I hope Joe got to read this

I am Back

Hello Everyone,

I know what you are all thinking..."what an andrew post? i thought those died away with the dinosaurs..." well you were wrong and i will explain why. I am sure most of you know already but yes the rumors of Andrew Ghobrial sightings in America last week were true. I was in America for 2 weeks and i just arrived back in Egypt yesterday. Very quickly i apologize to all who i didnt see but i did my best to see or at least talk to those i could reach while jumping from doctor to doctor. Oh yeah so i'll explain why i was in america. It was thursday november 15 and i was in the office. I get a phone call from my mother and its like 4am in america so here is how the conversation goes

Me: "umm, mom how are you...whats...up?"
Mom: "andrew you have a doctor's appointment on monday."
Me: "oh ok, who is it?" (by the way my mom and i talked about going to a doctor in egypt)
Mom: "Howard Zeitlyn" (my doctor back in america)
Me: "...uhh, so he is flying to egypt?"
Mom: "what? no i also bought you a plane ticket for tomorrow"
Me: "...!"

haha, so thats how that went the rest of the day was seeing if i could take time off, stopping by to pick up my passport from my cousin and then flying to america. The plane ride was good and i got to see Die Hard 4 and i liked it.

In america i had an excellent time where i got to eat, and give a lot of my blood away for tests. Just to let everyone know i am perfectly healthy and my blood is in good shape so yeah no problems there.

I thank all who took the time to see me and hang out with me and such i apologize again for those i didnt get to see but dont worry i'll be back before you all know it! (haha, and maybe before i even know it apparently)

So yeah i am back in egypt now the office is really busy since i have to catch up on a lot of work so i'll start posting again soon when things cool down. I hope all is well and yes i enjoyed my time back in the states but i am really happy to be back in egypt because the weather here is so much better than the weather in new york. Ok God bless everyone.


I hope Joe got to read this

i had to share this with everyone just because its hilarious.

Andrew Ghobrial: Marmaduke has had quite an afternoon of misadventure (Marmaduke Fun Fact: Marmaduke is responsible, either directly or indirectly, for approximately 85% of all criminal activity in his town. It's true... Google it!).

Andrew Ghobrial: i dont know why marmaduke hasnt been put down yet

"Austin Shea": cause marmaduke could overpower you

"Austin Shea": and eat you alive

Andrew Ghobrial: haha

"Austin Shea": have you seen how big he is?

Andrew Ghobrial: even from a distance?

Andrew Ghobrial: like he sleeps a lot

Andrew Ghobrial: you cant just wait and like take him out with a high powered sniper rifle

"Austin Shea": i think you're saying that like

"Austin Shea": a bullet would kill him

i know most of you wont find this funny, but for those who might happen to find it funny then awesome!

taking a break

Ok,

So i am going to take a break from this constant blog posting thing. I mean if something truly ridiculous or amazing happens i'll probably post but other than that not much else. So no more thursday dedications either, haha sorry but they'll be back eventually i am sure. Anyway you guys should stop spending so much time in front of the computer screen! go outside and play or something. Anyway have a good time everyone.

I hope Joe got to read this

meh

Hello everyone,

I dont know how often i will be updating these days since i am getting tired and i am starting to get the feeling like i need to post to entertain you rather than just post because i want to post...

so anyway i will say something cool about yesterday. So i was walking back to the seminary when a car flags me over to him. He asks if i know where some street is and i of course dont know anything so i say "marafsh" (mah-rufsh) I then say sorry and he goes "inta kalam shwaeyet engleez?" (do you speak a little english?) haha i said sorry instead of the arabis "asif" so i am like yes i speak english, i am from america. He then goes "oh, i lived in ontario for 2 years, where are you going?" i tell him where i am headed and he invites me into his car to give him a car....haha, so of course i didnt get in for two reasons, one i had to be egyptian about it and argue about having anything done for me and since i argued more that its alright for me to walk he let me go but also because i worry my mother enough as it is, i dont want her going crazy thinking i get into cars with complete strangers. BUT how cool is that? Just like that he was willing to help me out because he wants to be hospitable. I am a visitor technically to egypt and he wanted to show the kindness of the egyptian people...man that was cool.

Other than that i have said i got a haircut and people have requested to gaze upon the amazingness which is now my head....haha, so here it is my hair cut!

haha, pretty fancy huh?

Haha, anyway thats my head now, its nothing special but yeah tomorrow i am going to two birthday parties, one is for my uncle amin and the other is for my grandfather! it should be exciting i may post about it, but who knows. Ok have a good day everyone

I hope Joe got to read this

"do you have a match?"

Hello everyone,

My weekend was really cool and enjoyable. If you would like to know more about it i can tell you guys later in more detail. Basically i went to a sports camp where they were having a bible message televised on a really popular channel called "Sat 7" anyway it was great and other than that I got a haircut and saw family and played with my little cousins. Great weekend.

Haha, so i might have described getting a haircut before but i'll go quickly into it again. This was my second haircut since i have been in egypt and i went to the same place. I was quite surprised that they remembered who i was. They were very nice and it was so cool getting a haircut in egypt. haha they are very thorough, very excellent, AND they massage your head at the end. Haha it was so awesome and the best part is it only cost 25 pounds total with tip. I hear there are places where you can get a hair cut for 5 pounds. 25 pounds is a little less than 5 dollars and 5 pounds is less than 1 dollar...so yeah really good service for like a fraction of what you pay in america. Anyway i feel refreshed to have a hair cut again.

Ok, so i titled my entry do you have a match is because the phenomenon of asking for a match in egypt. So i was in a taxi going to work in the morning and all of a sudden this car pulls up to us and the passenger asks the taxi driver "andokoum kabreet?" (an-doe-kome ka-breet) which means do you guys have a match? the taxi driver did and in the middle of driving down this high way they are exchanging this book of matches back and forth and then the car thanks us and drives away. Haha, i dont know what i am more amazed at, that the driver asked for a match or that the taxi driver was so willing to give it to him! I remember many times back in freshmen year at the University of Hartford. My suitemates all smoked and i hung around them or we would be walkign and someone would simply ask, "hey do you have a light?" and they would always so "nope" or "just ran out" when it wasnt true at all! I would be like "why dont you just give him a light?" they would just respond "if he wants a light so bad he should just go buy his own and stop trying to use up all of mine." haha i just didnt understand, like a lighter costs maybe a dollar 2 dollars and they werent willing to give someone a hand? These people in egypt without thinking about it will give up their stuff in the middle of moving traffic! haha so crazy how different people are here. Anyway that was a cool experience. One thing i dont understand though about taxi drivers here is that for some reason a majority of them have these fake rubber grapes hanging in their cars. I cant figure out if there is a reason for it or if they signify anything. I asked my cousins but they dont ride in taxis often enough to notice i guess. Oh well if i ever find out i'll let you all know.

Hmm i dont really have much to write about these days, i dont know why i cant really sort out all my thoughts...got a lot on my mind i guess. Sorry everyone but soon enough i'll have many exciting things to say.

I hope Joe got to read this

Quick weekend update

Roar! hello everyone!

Ok so a quick update from this weekend. Yesterday i went to an all day christian conference and it was amazing. There were thousands! yes thousands of christian egyptians gathered in one place to enjoy each others company. It was cool, great weather, and a lot to do. There were some rides and games to play but i didnt really want to do any of them. My tunt fifi made me go on this bicycle thing where you peddle really fast and go in a circle or something. Haha it was sort of fun but it was really easy due to all those like 20miles bike rides Dan Larkin and i used to go on! So i circled the thing 25 times and stopped. Haha anyway here is a quick shot or two just to see. I will tell you all more about it but i dont have time right now! Hope you are all well.

B.B.F.G.

Ok its thursday and its time for the dedication blog entry. So let me first update everyone a little bit of what i did this week that i might not have mentioned before....

Last night i got to play football again and it was awesome! Haha, so i fell again and am now 2 for 2 on injuring myself while playing, but thats just part of the game! Also the first time was my fault for losing my footing last night was crazy. So someone was about to take a shot and i dove in the way to block it. So i kick my foot high up to catch the ball but the opponent on the other side was there with me and did the same. Haha but since we were like right next to each other his foot came up under mind kicking my already elevated foot thus spinning me like a pin wheel in the air! So haha i start falling now on my side and i throw my hand down to catch myself so i dont like break a rib or anything and it worked! haha it worked at the expense of cutting up my hand and arm and breakign a few blood vessels in my palm. I regret nothing of course for i was able to save the ball from getting into the goal and we moved on to win. Unfortunately this happened to my left hand which is my drawing hand :'(

Haha anyway that was a lot of fun and speaking of drawing i may be doing a bit of work that involves my "drawing talent" and its also paying work! haha i'll tell you guys more about it when i iron in the detail (or however that saying goes...i dont think you can iron in details..ironing out? yes! ok when i iron out the details...haha ok)

So now onto the dedication post. So i chose my friend Christopher Armand and the reason is, i mean he is cool and stuff, but i was trying to reach this thing high upon a shelf and had to get a chair...haha BUT if Chris was here he would have been able to get it probably while sitting, because Chris Armand is TALL. I mean tall tall like the name of the blog entry is BBFG. It is in regards to that old children's book "Big Friendly Giant"so i had to tweak it to "Big Black Friendly Giant" haha because that pretty much sums up this guy. He is huge and he is one of the friendliest nicest guys i have met. Whenever i would see Chris i would give him a huge hug and wouldnt have to worry about hurting him, because i think its impossible....Haha i remember the first time i hung out with him. We were in the cafeteria and all of a sudden these two silly girls we were hanging out with started like a food fight! I couldnt believe i was in college and there was a food fight going on! haha with Ice cream non the less. So anyway chris took those two out easily, unfortunately there was one causilty...my sweater...i got hit twice with these two huge handfuls of ice cream my sweater was never the same again.

But yeah Chris is tall, nice, and really intelligent. He can talk about just about any sort of topic in a lot of detail because i am pretty sure he knows everything...thats just a guess. Anyway i dont want to flatter him too much or anything. Basically he is the man and when i get back i think i shall challenge him to a game of Basketball. Ok here is also a picture of him. I chose this picture because it has me and him in the same picture and it attempts to give an idea of how tall he is.

In the picture i am standing on the tips of my toes.

I hope Joe got to read this

Rubber Necking

Hello Readers, how are you all doing?

So i dont know how long this post will be but forgive if its too long or too short...

So i walked home last night. The walk is about an hour and half and i have gotten from people that doing that is ridiculous and too much. Haha, I know where they are coming from but hey i used to go running/biking a lot and so i think an hour and a half walk is equivalent to a 30minute run or something like that. It would be one thing if i had some place to be but i didnt so why not enjoy a nice walk? Haha anyway...so i walked home last night.

The thing i like a lot about walking is that you really just get a chance to observe the life around you, speeding down in a taxi you dont really see much so you get to reflect on the things you look at and things like that. Haha, one funny example is before the seminary there is an Infantry School....now i'll give you an example of walking as opposed to speeding by. I see the sign for Infantry School all the time but dont think much of it because i am going by too fast to see anything...haha i'll be honest with everyone and i thought at first it was a giant daycare (haha get it? like a school for infants?...anyway) yeah but just kidding its this huge military complex and the other day while walking i got to witness the army transporting 7 tanks into the school! how awesome is that? these huge massive tanks right in front of me. So yeah walking really gives you the opportunity to see things in a more detailed fashion.

The other thing i saw while walking is that the traffic was stopped completely, so really it was faster at that point to walk than drive. The reason it was blocked was because there was a terrible accident where a car had i guess sped too fast and flew into a pole splitting it in half and killing the two passengers. This is where the title for the blog entry "rubber necking" comes from. For those who arent aware rubber necking can mean a few things, for this its referring to the lines of cars slowing down to see what happened or stuff. In America generally the reason for rubber necking is because people are interested to see an accident and the precise damage done to the person and the car. In one of my criminal justice classes I read about a study where someone did like a huge survery across a few cities to ask "why do you slow down when you come across an accident?" Do you know what the number one reason is? no joke, people said its because they want to see how badly injured the person might be. How ridiculous is that!? People actually stop because they want to see blood and gore so they can tell their friends or whatever about it. I think thats terrible. So yeah whenever you are stuck in bumper to bumper traffic because of an accident know that a good portion of the reason you are stuck is because the people in front of you want to see a dead body...ugh.

So yeah this was actually my second horrible accident to see in Egypt since i got here and both within two weeks. The other accident was a taxi flying into a curb and the driver being hurled through the windshield and smashing his head against a telephone pole and killed instantly. It was terrible and i think the first time i saw a dead body...so haha i am still trying to deal with that and then another one happens. Anyway i wanted to tell you guys the reason why there was bumper to bumper traffic. The two people in the car were dead and there was a bit of rubber necking going on but not because people wanted to see a dead body or anything. Just about everyone stopped right in the middle of the street, got out of their cars, and would come around the bodies to pray, like to honor the dead. That was amazing for me to see. It was a few people, it wasnt even the family members or anything, it was a majority of these strangers just coming together to pray for those who had passed. I said my prayers for them as well and eventually went on my way as well. But yeah it was really impressive to me that the people of Egypt have such a burden for one another such unity, and such a sense of national identity together. I mean they all feel like their know each other and its amazing to see this up close.

Hmm...ok so yeah umm i wanted to just say that because i dont know really how to cope with seeing so much death in such a short period of time, i figured i would share a bit of it with you guys. Other than that work is fine, arabic lessons are fine, i saw my cousin amira and my tunt maggie who came from abu dhabi and that was a lot of fun. Haha, they are really really big night people. I met them at 8 and we sat around in a hotel lounge talking till 2:30am haha, so i mean granted i was exhausted when i got back to the seminary and had to wake up in like 3 hours but it was worth it because i love spending time with my family. Anyway Umm nothing else is new, i need a haircut so i might go do that.

OH! i am going somewhere tomorrow for the entire day. Haha i know that doesnt sound like much but i cant really tell you guys because i am not sure what i am doing...so i wont post tomorrow and all weekend. BUT monday fo' sho i will tell you guys what i did and whats happening. Ok have a good day everyone and a good weekend.

I hope Joe got to read this

Field Trip

Hello hello,

I wanted to take the time to talk about my weekend and how much fun it was. Yes, i had a lot and a lot of fun! So i was invited to go on a field trip with the students of the seminary. They were going to visit the pyramids, the egyptian museum, and go on a faluka ride (its like a boat down the Nile ride). So i said i would go. We were supposed to leave at 8am but we ended up leaving at about 9:30-10 because of the wonderful thing which is EST (Egyptian Standard Time). Haha i am very used to it since i have lived with this all my life. We are supposed to go to my Tunt and Uncle who live in North Carolina. We are supposed to be there by 1, maybe 2 so we can have lunch and everything. NC for us is a 12 hour drive so that means, haha, we need to leave by like 5am. My sisters and I dont sleep the night before just because its easier to stay up all night than sleep for a little bit and wake up. So we are supposed to leave by 5 but we always end up leaving at like 10am...haha i mean usually EST isnt to such an extreme, but the Ghobrials are a family that takes things to the extreme!....anyway i'll go on

There is a good number of us and we get into this huge bus and drive off. During that bus ride i am listening to all the noise thats going on and its great. Everyone is so close and comfortable with one another that you really just feel great being in their presence. So we get to the pyramids and here is how it works. For an Egyptian with an Egyptian ID the cost of getting in is maybe 50 piasters, 1 pound tops haha but for a foreigner its 50 pounds....so i had to pay 50 pounds (which is only like 9 dollars) while everyone else paid about a fraction of a cent. It didnt bother me because just the opportunity to go and spend time with everyone is amazing enough. We walk, talk, listen, take many photographs and have a good time. After an hour or 2 we move on to other places to see the sphinx and the tombs of the old pharaohs. I had a really cool time and it was a lot of fun the second time around with a group of people.

After the pyramids we went to the egyptian museum, again 50 pounds for a foreigner and about 1 pound for an Egyptian, i didnt really like paying that much so my friend hany bought me a ticket and when we went to the guard he asks you where you are from. I of course dont have an egyptian ID so i just handed him the ticket and he is like "inta min fein?" (where are you from) i go "enna musri" (i am egyptian). haha i am really bad at hiding things so as i said this i was looking down at the floor. the guard grabs my shoulder and is like "If you are egyptian look me in the face and be proud!" (haha i dont feel like typing out poorly spelled arabic translation) so he let me in and it was great. I would have brought my camera to take pictures but the battery died while at the pyramids, and also you arent allowed to have cameras in the museum....so i guess the first reason didnt matter so much....whatever. The museum was filled with so many amazing artifacts and stuff. I got to see a fossilized crocodile from the nile a couple hundred years ago....they are huge. Like seriously, they are really really big. But yeah so the museum is something i am really glad to have visited, and God will, if i get an egyptian ID i'll go more often.

After the museum we got sandwiches from a place called "Momen" and its like fastfood i guess, but really really tasty. Everyone was given 2 sandwiches, a beed sandwich and a chicken sandwich and they were nice and refreshing since we were all starving. The best part was we ate on the faluka boat as we went down the Nile. It was amazing because we went just as the sun was setting so the scene was breath taking. Haha, unfortunately my battery was still dead so i didnt get any pictures, but someone else had a camera and said i could copy some pictures from them later. So when i do i'll share them. Anyway it was a lot of fun we did cool guy stuff like arm wrestling matches and i actually won a few! I mean granted i might have won a few more if i was using my left hand, but i wont make excuses it was fun haha and we talked about governments and what not.

Either way after the boat ride we headed back where i relaxed for a bit and then went a played ping pong which is a lot of fun. Ok so i'll show you a cool picture of the group i went with. I had fun and i think i bonded with some people? Anyway yeah here is the group.

ps. I tried out these new glasses i have. They turn into sunglasses when sun light hits them and they worked beautifully. So now i am all cool and macho with sunglasses. haha ok thats about it

I hope Joe got to read this

Jenkins...David Jenkins

Hello everyone I will get to my thursday dedication section in a little bit i wanted to first talk a little bit about what i got to do last night.

One first thing i have to mention is...i got to talk to talk to Alex Stein yesterday! haha yep, Alex is in Shanghai and was in an internet cafe and we saw each other online and decided, its time to bring out the skype. Skype is an internet program that is strictly for making phone calls. If two people have a skype account they can talk for free and its really awesome, so we got to do it. Haha his conneciton was really bad though so the conversation was about 3minutes long, BUT it was still awesome. So yeah that really made my day to get to talk to someone. Ok now for the other stuff...

So it was 10pm and i get a call from hanah and he is saying that in about 5minutes they are going to play some football and that he wants me to join. So i am like....man yeah i am in! So i get ready and i head downstairs and last night was my first experience at playing street ball! Yep we got a football headed out to the street set up teams and began an intense game of streetball. (just a note football from now on means soccer) Ok so i dont know if i like street ball more than regular football but i will say they are both a lot of fun. I of course am not as good as everyone but thank God for my stamina and the ability to stick on to people. Haha my shooting is terrible but i can get the ball and pass it to people who can so its fun. The other thing about street ball that i learned, haha, the hard way is if you fall or slide it better have been worth it because the consequences are much greater than when playing on grass. So i mean i only fell once which was good because everyone fell at least once and all i suffered was a couple scratches on my knee, hands, and back. However the reason i fell was to dive and save the ball from going out of bounds which in result was hit to my teammate kamal who then scored! Haha, so it was very worth it and everyone gave me compliments like "bravo elliak (bravo el-lee-ak, which means bravo on you) and stuff like that. So it was a lot of fun and even though we ended up losing it was much fun, i got a really good sweat out of it, and got invited to join them everytime. haha unfortunately by the time we were done playing and i got back to my room it was 1:30 and i had to wake up at 6 :/....totally worth it though.

Ok so my thursday dedication is to my friend David Jenkins. Hmm for those who know him then you guys know there is no proper way to fully introduce this man and possibly express the fullness which is David Jenkins. So for those who dont know him i'll give some demographics. He went to Tufts university and studied Theater....he is an amazing actor and from what i heard last he is in New York city working and he just finished a performance in a park and i heard it was awesome. So yeah david and i met i would say in the 7th grade and haha, it wasnt a very good beginning, but God has a purpose for everything and from getting to know david in the beginning he taught me the meaning of sarcasm. Yep up until then i didnt know what it was and haha David Jenkins back then was chock full of sarcasm and i'm glad i could gain an understanding of it. Anyway i dont want to get into that sort of thing because sarcasm isnt what i want to touch upon about david. The reason i chose david today was because at the office someone had complimented my shirt and i offered it to them because its just a shirt to me and i dont mind giving away anything i own, haha. So he declined of course and they asked me "is it normal in america to give your clothes and trade it with others?" i said yes, women do it all the time, but not so much men"....then i thought about david. Why? NO not because he is a woman you jerks, but because david and i have a special oath to one another to be each others "pants pals". What is pants pal? its simple really. David and i wear the same size pants and we made an agreement to one another that if either of us should ever need a pair of pants we would without a doubt lend them a pair. As of right now I have lent david a pair of my jeans on one occasion when he needed one....hmm....ok so i know i am not in the states now and it might come to pass that david will need another pair....DAVID JENKINS! "I give you permission to go to my home whenever you need to pick up a pair of pants if you should ever need one" Ok, haha so yeah thats what came to my mind today, David Jenkins and I: Pants Pals to the end. So other than that i hope when i get back i'll be able to see him in a play. I saw him do a performance of monster while he was still at tufts and it was ridiculous! (Monster is a play about frankenstein and david played Mr. Frankenstein himself...and not the monster the monster is not named frankenstein, the name of the monster is frankenstein's monster...) so yeah that was the last performance i saw and over time you can only get better so i am really excited to see what david has up his acting sleeves next chance i get. Ok Have a good day everyone.

I hope Joe got to read this

Activities!

Good day to you all,

So yesterday was filled with many many things. Most of it good, some of it actually kind of terrible...

Ok so i'll start with the terrible. So i have been in Egypt for about 3 months now and have had the pleasure of being part of that the ridiculousness which is Egyptian traffic...everyone drives really really fast and never obeys traffic laws. Haha, I see many times someone just backing up in the middle of the highway withs cars barreling down all around it just moving out of its way...ridiculous. So yeah the thing is that being part of this sort of thing i always figured i would see accidents and broken cars piled up on the sides of the rode, but out of the 3 months nothing...until today. Unfortunately today i bore witness to my first automobile accident in egypt and it was pretty scary. No....i wasnt in it i was in a taxi driving behind. Ok, so this is what happened. We were driving down the street and a car was in front of us but it decided to turn around and go back down the street so it started to do a broken U turn (a three point turn, whatever you are used to calling it) But an impatient delivery scooter decides it doesnt want to wait and tries to go around it, i guess the car didnt see it and just smashes the scooter causing the delivery man to go hurling into the sky and falling onto the ground several feet away. The taxi and I stop of course and so does everyone around to see what happened. Thank God the man was alright and in fact so was the delivary scooter. Haha, since i couldnt really communicate with them i went off and fetched his shoes which got thrown off in the impact. Basically everyone around was just saying "are you alright? anything broken?" and he would say "no" and everyone would say "Thank God" eventually when we saw he was fine we drove off. The taxi was talking to me about how he should have been patient and i agreed. But yeah that was my first experience of an Egyptian car accident. I really liked the genuine concerns that people showed.

Ok so after getting back to my room, i called my friend Hana and he was in class. So i did some reading and when he was done we went to play some ping pong and afterwards watched a volleyball game. Unfortunately since we were playing ping pong we missed the beginning and couldnt join any teams but it was still really fun to watch. Haha there is one guy named Hany who was on a team and he had no idea how to paly volleyball so everyone was just saying "just watch us and do the same" So after a little bit the ball finally came towards him but he still didnt really know what to do. The ball was flying way back so he ran in front of it turned his back to it and....he bicycle kicked it! Haha! he jumped right up into the air did a bicycle kick and it was beautiful what an amazing arch and it landed perfectly on the other end....had it been a legal hit they would have gained a point. But of course you arent allowed to do that and everyone tackled him saying he was so stupid for doing that and yelling at him and we all laughed and had a good time. Afterwards it was time for some serious business; chess. Haha, i am really really rusty at playing chess. The last time i played chess was i think was at least 5 years ago when i worked at the Public Library and when i played it was against a group of 8 year olds because i was teaching them how to play. So yeah i played this really really good player and we played 3 games. I won the first game, he won the second technically...and he then destroyed me the third haha....the reason i say techincally is because i would have won but i let him redo a few crucial moves but yeah either way what happened happened and i lost. But it didnt matter because it was a lot of fun....haha we played and took our sweet time though because when we finished it was 1am....and i had to wake up at 6. So anyway i went to bed after doing a little more reading/meditating and slept by 2:30 or so. Over all i am really really exhausted because i am used to sleeping at 11 and getting 7 hours of sleep but it was totally worth it because of the great time i had.

Anyway I am supplying those who are not familiar with football (soccer) an image of what a bicycle kick is so you can try and fathom the amazing thing i saw....



I hope Joe got to read this

quick note

Ok i dont want to take any attention away from the thursday dedication post but i had mentioned how much i love honey now and i wanted to show you my pride and joy as of right now. There is a man who lives on the street and owns a cart. He goes around and sells this honey he collects by himself and sells it as his only source of income. I bought it and its so delicious you can tell because i am smiling a lot. Ok its really cool and still has the honey comb inside the jar!

ok read the post below!

The Palar Express

Hello Hello My friends it is thursday which means i am going to dedicate this post to someone eventually....let me first take care of some house cleaning...

I can safely say i now have friends at the seminary i am at, we have officially exchanged mobile numbers and have done the spend time together thing. Last night Hana introduced me to two guys by the names of Maged (pronounced Mag-ged) and someone named Hany (Han-ee) so the four of us walked around the streets and stopped in a shop so they could buy a book. Haha to my surprise they were buying the Qur'an. The reason is because they are taking a course on Islam and to understand the religion i guess you gotta go to the source which is their version of the Bible (for those who might not have known). So after buying the Qur'an we went back to the seminary and they invited me to eat with them. Sooooo i got to sit in the cafeteria i always pass by everytime going to my room for the first time. They gave me something called fetir (pronounce fit-eer) its like a flat croissant and we had white cheese (from now on i will call it gibna beyda) and honey. So just to let you guys know i used to not like honey for whatever reason but after being exposed to it within the last 2 years i have decided to try it and i love it i am now a honey fan so for those who dont like honey...give it another shot. After eating we went to the lounge where they have a TV and weights for lifting and machines. But the thing they also had was a ping pong table so for the next like 2 hours we played a lot of ping pong and i actually won a game! Haha now let me quickly explain...

...out of the 4 of us i believe i am the worst and the only way i won was because the person i beat was trying to do these ridiculous things and missed more times than he should have and i ended up winning...so yeah i am not good but i will hopefully get better as the days go on. On a side note snapple says that if you play ping pong for 12 hours you lose one pound, so we'll see how that plays out.

Ok enough of that i need to leave room for the dedication....From the title of the entry i have chosen my good friend Nic Palar. For those who dont understand the literary reference there was a childrens book called "The Polar Express" and i think they made a live action movie of it or something with Tom Hanks...i dont know how they made a full length feature film out of a 12 page childrens book with about 1 sentence on each page...but yeah i guess thats why i can never make it in Hollywood. OK so It was really really hot this morning and i had a jacket on. The reason i did was because last night was freezing. Like my hands were numb because of how cold it was and i was in shock. So this morning i played it safe and wore a jacket and people looked at me because of how hot it was. So then i was like "you know i feel like nic palar right about now" BECAUSE, haha, always wears pants and on many occasions wears a hooded sweater in the middle of spring and parts of summer while everyone around him is wearing shorts and stuff. Now i can relate to Nic because i for the most part never wear shorts except for playing soccer or doing a sport, but Nic is tried and true and continues to wear long pants. So yeah thats Nic Palar.

I also remember first starting to get to know Nic after first i never really said anything to him because he was always quiet and seemed to only talk to a select few in the group. More and more we hung out but it wasnt until one time we were driving together and got lost for awhile. As all of you should know I have a terrible sense of direction (and thats even for places i already know) so put me in a place i haev never been and i am hopeless, and with Nic he first got his ability to drive so he wasnt familiar with many roads at the time, and it was night so nothing looks familiar. We were driving and both agreed "hey lets take the Saw Mill Parkway, that seems like a nice innocent safe way to get home"....little did we know that the saw mill parkway is the worst road ever created and it led us straight into the heart of Yonkers, NY.....ugh..... haha...ok so i have a lot of friends from yonkers and they are all great but yonkers is a place that will forever remain on the negative side of me. So we drove around for 2hours! trying to get out of yonkers but we couldnt. Haha we had listened to the same hip hop CD like 3 times at this point and the radio wasnt that good (Nic Palar also loves hip hop even though he may physcially not appear that way) So thank God i had at that time the mobile number of shirlene thomas so i called her and haha had to make her father give us direction out of yonkers....man that was crazy. So yeah during those 2 hours though i got to know Nic more and we are good friends (at least i think so) so anyway so some demographics on Nic, he is a genius, reads a lot, knows everything about history, he is a nice guy always willing to help and supply his car to drive people around. He loves soccer (like all should) and likes hip hop. Nic Palar is basically the man and if you dont know him i'll be sure to introduce you whenever i get the chance.....haha the word Banzai i also associate with Nic Palar but thats for another post.


I hope Joe got to read this.

News

Hello my friends! I apologize for being away for so long but i had a small vacation and i went to the Red Sea with my family. I wont go into much of what happened at the Red Sea because really not much happened except that i relaxed, swam in a lagoon, and i ate EVERYDAY. Yep thats right i ate 3 meals a day (ugh...sometimes more haha) everyday for 5 days in a row. I mean i guess i shouldnt expect you guys to be proud of me because i should be doing that sort of thing regardless haha...but yes I enjoyed the vacation a lot i walked and talked with my family and had a good time. Also Nancy Ajram was there performing and Amr Diab (the egyptian elvis) was staying at the hotel near our house with his wife and kids. It was just an overall good time and i got a tan :( ....i was swimming then i layed down on a chair to warm up and i fell asleep then when i woke up i was a little darker...so yeah thats about the news on the Red Sea vacation. I'll put up some pictures once i get a chance of the view and other interesting things! Now onto even more news!!!

Ok So after my arabic lesson i go back to the seminary like any other day. I say hello to the man at the gate and walked towards the building. And for the first time there were people! yep people. An elderly caucasian woman and 2 egyptian men (my guess they were professors) so they looked at me the 2 egyptian men said like "izzayak" or some other sort of greeting and i replied with a simple "enna ta-mam" (everything is perfect) and then the caucasian woman says "hello" and i reply "hello, how are you?" haha she looks back not expecting me to speak english and without an accent at all and then i walk up the stairs to my room. I sit down start reading my bible and then about 20minutes later there is a knock at my door. I open the door and its the woman and she introduces herself as elaine and she is a professor who teaches english at the seminary. Haha so i invited her to sit down and offered her the food i had (at the moment i have a few chocolate bars, and sesame breadsticks) then we talked. After awhile she gives me the scoop on how things work and how i in fact am allowed to use the library and computer lab i just need to figure out the schedule. The computer lab is supposedly open till 11pm (i think thats 5pm you guys) so i may be able to communicate directly with everyone! haha but who knows how that will go....

So yeah after talking with elaine two guys walk by and she jumps up and drags them into my room. The two guys are Hanah and Sadak and they are both second year students at the seminary. Their english is well enough that i can talk to them and they are both really nice. Hanah runs the sports at the seminary and i signed up for the football (soccer), ping pong, volleyball, and chess events. This is all really amazing but i think i am going to have to start eating because they dont start playing soccer till like 9pm and i usually sleep at 10pm. So as of right now my body might not be able to handle late nights of rigorous athlete activities with my current eating habits. So we'll see how this works out. Thats pretty much what happened last night in that department...

hmm other news...OH YEAH! so i woke up today and i look at the window...what do i see? BAM! I see rain everywhere and then a huge lightning bolt strikes across the sky and thunder! I have not seen rain since i left the states and its like raining really hard. So it cheered me up to see a little bit of home. Haha soon after though i remembered the "joys" of being in the rain in the cold without an umbrella. So eventually i got into a taxi because waiting for a bus was going to give me influenza. So the taxi i had was great he was such a pro. It was raining like crazy, he doesnt have any windshield wipers and that didnt stop him from racing down the streets weaving in and out of cars. Haha so we got to my work in one piece and that was that. Ok so thats about all thats happened in the past few days. I'll update again soon enough and get some pictures going all up in this place....word.


I hope Joe got to read this

The Hotdog Man Cometh

Hello everyone how are you all?

Ok before i get into thursday's dedication post thingy, i'll give you guys the conclusion to my possible change of living....ok so i am not taking the flat. I talked it over with my cousins and we decided that there is no rush and there are much much better places to live especially in Heliopolis. So yeah i mean the place was very run down but i didnt mind so much but in the end they said i shouldnt be paying to live in a place that is in worse condition than where i am now. So yeah i have my room in the seminary till May and if i need to find a new place before then i will because i should stop worrying about things so much. I gotta learn how to take things in stride better. Anyway yeah i think though living in the seminary being surrounded with the people i want to eventually become is going to be good for me.

haha, another note is thank you all for your concerns on my eating situation and FINE i'll eat more but i wont like it...anyway haha seriously its ok i am still in good health and besides this new diet is doing wonders for my figure....haha anyway yeah dont worry i'll fix that.

And now onto my thursday dedication thing. As all of you know i dont think about this thing till i come to sit down at my computer the day of. So no need to email me requesting a dedication your time will all come...so yeah here we go: This morning i was talking with one of my co-workers who is going back to the states for a fund raising mission. Going state to state talking about Habitat. She hasnt been back to America in a good time so i asked "what is the first thing you are going to eat when you get back?" She said it was simple...she is from Colorado and is going to Chicago or something as the first stop and she said the first thing she is getting is a Chicago style hotdog...its like this huge hotdog that has mustard, pickles, and other things. Now back in the day i would think this sounded delicious...but now when i hear the word "hotdog" 3 things come to my mind:
1. how i never want to eat one again (due to a hotdog eating contest which i can talk about another time)
2. a bacon burger dog (the fictional amazing sandwich created by Bill Cosby and is often referenced in the Cosby Show...man it sounds so good)
and
3. Jon Heyman

Jon Heyman is the man who has been selected for thursdays dedication post. I met him when i transfered to SUNY Albany and i can remember what people had told me about him. They said "he is crazy...", "we call him bonk", and "haha, what is bonk like? you'll see..." so i mean i had no idea what to expect when i would eventually meet this "Bonk" but yeah when i finally did he was extremely normal and nothing like i expected. But i asked him what he wanted to be called if he really liked being called bonk, he said he would prefer jon, so jon it was. Anyway after that i got to know him eventually becoming my gym buddy and going with him after dinner to the gym to lift weights and be men and stuff like that. Haha there were many good times and many characters at the gym we eventually looked forward to seeing such as "cast away", "socrates", and others. Anyway i'll get to why the word hotdog puts jon heyman into my head all the time. He was telling me about back in the day when he and his friends had things called "meat pops" or something along those lines....basically they were frozen hotdogs and you just ate them straight up out of the freezer...haha yeah i mean i'll admit i have yet to try such a thing yet but it cant be that bad, right? i mean people eat weird things all the time. I have a friend who eats pears with american cheese, i have a friend who eats ketchup on ice cream, why not a frozen hotdog? OH! I am just reminded right now of another thing that has created a bond between jon heyman and me.

Salami and Cream Cheese on a Bagel. does that sounds weird? i dont think it does the more i say it the less weird it sounds, but people have said its weird. Anyway one day i was in the cafeteria with everyone and wanted to eat something i was like "i am going to have a salami and cream cheese sandwich on a bagel" everyone looked at me like "umm yeah you go do that" but jon heyman was like "no way...i thought i was the only one who ate that" and so it began an unbreakable friendship structured around salami and cream cheese on a bagel. The way i came to having discovered salami and cream cheese was when i needed to make lunch at home. We usually had some sort of deli meat around and i could make a sandwich but one day i opened the refrigerator and found very very limited selections. No bread, only bagels (meh no big deal) and then the only meat was salami...but what else? no lettuce or tomatoes, no mustard, i was not going to put mayonnaise on that thing but it needed something...anything....then i saw it cream cheese. I am like why not? So i did and BAM it was perfect it was so delicious. And so it began the most delicious thing i came up with on my own and i find that jon heyman shared my thoughts. Haha anyway yeah so for those who have never had a salami and cream cheese sandwich on a bagel. GO GET IT. It needs nothing else...well actually i should be fair i now add hot sauce to it thanks to shirlene thomas who puts hot sauce on everything...and i approve. If you can handle it hot sauce improves everything.. Anway thats about it Jon Heyman is the man and also just to state i admire his character.

He is a man of integrity and morals/ethics. You dont see many guys out there with a genuine care and concern for others. I mean i havent even seen this guy litter. So yeah he is cool and thats all i gues..


I hope Joe got to read this

a possible change

Hello Everyone,


So for those who dont know i am looking into the possibility of buying a small flat that is much much closer to the office (a 20minute walk actually). The flat is a two bedroom flat with a bathroom, a kitchen, a balcony to dry my clothes but no washing machine (not a problem), and it has a refrigerator. The cost of this is only 500 pounds a month (this estimates to about 90 American dollars which is nothing). I also need to pay for electricity water and gas but altogether it comes to about 45 pounds per month ontop of the 500 (45 pounds is a little less than 9 dollars) so yeah the price is ridiculously amazing and the location is really nice. I went in to check it out yesterday and haha wow oh wow. My first impression was umm...let me see...you guys know the saying "you get what you pay for"? well yeah i mean it definitely came to mind with this place. But that isnt a big deal because like i have said before i am a man of adaptation and flexibility. The fridge works, the stove works in the kitchen, the bed is comfortable, it has windows, and all the pluming works in the bathroom. Haha ok i'll be honest and say that the biggest thing to get used to is the bathroom. I didnt bring a camera with me because that would be rude but i drew a small picture of it using the Microsoft program MSPaint....here it is

If you dont understand the picture i'll try and explain. It is very small and the sink and toilet are very very close together. The shower is in the middle of both and hangs above and over them as well with a drain in the middle of the floor. I was told this is how a bathroom in a cruise is and i have to take their word for it because i have never been on one. Anyway the only thing that will take getting used to is not being able to use the toilet or anything else after i take a shower because i have to wait for it all to dry up but thats isnt a big deal at all.

Unfortunately there is no phone line so i cant really have internet but i havent had internet in the past so its not like that is a problem getting used to. I will look into getting dsl somehow connected into the building its not the expense that is the problem its whether or not it can be installed. So yeah that is what i may or may not be living in. I havent decided because i dont know what to think. I cant figure if money or time is more important to me. I mean if i live at the seminary i can live their rent free and just pay like 400 pounds a month for transportation and spend a good amount of time always commuting, or i can pay about 600 pounds a month (i added some in for food since my parents yelled at me for not eating :'( ....) and be able to save hours in commuting a week. So i dont know. I will live a little more primitively than i have been previously but who knows it might make a man out of me yet! I am bringing my cousins around to see it and decide any final negotiations that might be needed....OH! the big thing that is missing is there is no water heater. I tell everyone its not a big deal because i've been taking extremely cold showers for a month now but they all say "just wait till winter" so we need to see if the landlord can install one for me or if i will have to do it myself. Anyway what do you guys think? time or money? i am leaning still towards saving money and taking advantage of being in a seminary surrounded by students and professors because i want to do seminary myself when i get back.....but like i said i cant decide....ok thats all.


I hope Joe got to read this