Day 65

Sunday March 23rd

Today I woke up bug-bite free. I had wore the same clothes as last time, except this time I covered my face with a towel and put bug repellent on my ankles, hands, waist, and face. Anywhere bugs had a place of entrance. So instead of eating the guys the girls had eaten alive that night. We still didn't sleep past 7 and so spent the morning on the beach again. The beach reminds me a lot of Flathead lack in Montana, where you can walk out forever and the water is warm and there mountains right next to it.

We left around 10 to get to back through Israel. We weren't sure how long they would detain our muslim friend so we decided to give her a lot of time before we had to catch the 4:30 bus. This time they only messed with her for about 15 minutes. We were thus able to spend a lot of time in Eliat, hanging out in the malls. Israel, is like a little America in the Middle East. They dress and act Western. We went shopping and got some good deals. It was weird being in a country where they had infrastructure and space in between buildings and didn't have 30 people doing one person's job. Development is nice, running water and bathrooms are nice. I miss development.

We were really happy to get back to Egypt. Most of the security guards greeted us with open arms and didn't mess with anybody. Except for at the metal detector. Here they said the knives we bought at souvenirs were big problems in Egypt. I knew they were shitting us, and simply wanted to keep the knives for themselves, and I wasn't about to let them screw us over. So as I argued in terrible arabic and knowing that eventually they would have to cave in to the power of my passport, our little muslim friend came up to talk with them and said how we were her friends and that the gifts were for her brothers (in arabic of course). They caved in and let us pass. The girl felt better as finally her being of a brown descent helped her rather then hurt her. I remarked at how f.u.b.a.r. race is in general.

After crossing the border we found a mini-bus driver who was willing to take us for 40 pounds each straight to zamalek. It was 3:30 and we would have had to wait for a hour to get out of there. Plus, the bus only took them to New Cairo station and we would have to catch a taxi the rest of the way. It was scheduled to get in at around midnight. We opted for the mini-bus and gave our bus-tickets to other AUC students who were also making their trips home. It turned out to be a good purchase as we got back by 10 and had some time to settle in before class started tomorrow.