A Rambling Post

...because I'm exhausted.

I've been MIA for awhile now. Vodaphone recently bought out our horrendous internet company, EgyNet, and then our internet connection was spotty for the week after. I dunno. It's Egypt. I probably wouldn't have posted anything last week anyway...I was pretty busy.

Sunday, our new quarter started and I was thrown into a frenzy preparing for the Wednesday and Thursday parent conferences. The parent conferences consisted of 10-minute meetings with parents from 1:00-3:50 on Wednesday and Thursday afternoons. No breaks. It was pretty intense and quite tiresome. This was a rather novel experience for me, since it's my first sampling of parent conferences in which the parent actually made an appearance. What's more, Middle Eastern parents have really high standards for their kids! They care a great deal about their children and feel very intense shame when the kids misbehave or do not perform well. I think it's like this everywhere: child's poor performance embarrasses the parents/parents feel responsible. It does seem a little more exaggerated here though. One parent cried in the meeting, another yelled at her son, and still another threatened to send him to the regular Egyptian school "where they still beat the kids there". It was all very dramatic.

The weather has started to cool ever so slightly, which has inspired me to cook and bake a bit more lately. Wednesday evening I hosted church home group at my house. I had providentially located some Granny Smith apples a few days prior, so I whipped up a tasty batch of Apple Crisp. Friday, I rushed home from church to prepare the aforementioned pumpkin pie for the neighborhood Thanksgiving potluck. I spent the better part of today on Bonnie's delicious West African Ground Nut Stew, which I had been craving. I'm hoping the leftovers will last most of the week so I can spend my evenings working on my THESIS. Ahem, yes, you heard me correctly. I have been taming the beast, chiseling away at the edits to the background.

Israel happens in 19 days and I'm stoked. My heart did sink a bit on Thursday after receiving the uber-A.R. itinerary which was planned, seemingly, to the minute. I'm not fond at all of big tour bus excursions and I do like to be able to go with the flow a bit- impossible with a large group. Still, there are so many Biblical places we're traveling to- Jerusalem, Bethlehem, Caesarea, Bethsaida, Mount of Olives, Golan Heights, Nazareth, Dead Sea, Mount of the Beatitudes, Negev, Capernaum...plenty more than I would be able to see if I were striking out on my own. I'm really excited!

Well, I'm really tired. Maybe tomorrow I can actually post some pics of my apartment or a few details about my trip to ______________ (insert Coptic Cairo, Pyramids, the Khan, Ain Sokhna, Greece, etc.) Definitely MAYBE. I guess it all depends on whether my delightful combination of a dysfunctional internet connection and prehistoric computer will collaborate. So many things I could post. Insha'allah.