Clearly, living along a river that snakes its way through a vast desert, Egyptians have a certain appreciation for water. Ancient Egyptian culture was deeply informed by a dependence on the River Nile. This is something I'd learned in history class long ago. In college, however, the research one of my professors conducted in water policy led me to understand what a vital role water plays today in international relations and conflict. It was therefore with great interest that I read about Israeli FM Lieberman's visits to Ethiopia, Kenya, and Uganda, home to the two most important sources of the Nile. This while Egypt and the other Nile Basin states are attempting to resolve their differences over water use issues. Though I'll refrain from Biblical allusions, it looks very much like Israel is trying to use water as a means of leverage over the Egyptians.
What made me think so much about water today wasn't anything on quite so grand a scale: My flatmate Phil purchased a couple of bottles of Hayat brand water for me before my return to Egypt. He prefers it, apparently, for its taste. I am a Nestlé Pure Life man myself it having been recommended as a reliable clean and neutral-tasting choice. I'd always been a little leary of Hayat. Phil and I debated the finer points of the Egyptian bottled water industry (while we weren't in our rooms, noses to the grindstone, working on our theses) agreeing that Baraka tastes the least pleasant of the major brands. With all of the discussion and my admittedly unsupported claims that my brand was healthier than his, I decided to check into the matter further. Such a riveting topic apparently hasn't warranted much journalist attention or blogging lately, at least not in English, but I found an article from early last year referring to Ministry of Trade and Industry tests. The results (probably interesting only to potential consumers of bottled water in Egypt) were that only seven brands were both fit for consumption and accurately labeled for mineral content, etc.: Aqua, Aqua Siwa, Aquafina, Dasani, Mineral, Nestlé, and Siwa. Schweppes, notably, was considered unsafe. Unsafer still are other sources of water in Egypt. Some 40% of Egyptians drink contaminated water that leads to typhoid outbreaks, kidney failure, and thousands of deaths a year. Recent water shortages across the river in Giza have forced local residents to pump their own water only to discover that it is contaminated with sewage. If anyone finds more recent material on bottled water in Egypt, do let me know.

News & Issues

–Egypt

• The South Cairo Criminal Court has sentenced two US couples to jail in a high-profile illegal adoption case and is expected to hand down a ruling in another major case centered on defective blood products.
• AFP reports on the closure of AUC and other foreign universities and schools suggesting that the measures being taken by the Egyptian government may be in line with WHO recommendations.
• The government has taken an important step in tackling the un-Islamic practice of female genital mutilation (FGM). Authorities arrested a 69-year-old man after his circumcision of an 11-year-old girl left her hospitalized.
• A US NGO, Freedom House, is accusing Egypt and others of using their positions in the UN's Human Rights Council to limit the protection of human rights. Find Freedom House's "The UN Human Rights Council Report Card: 2007-2009" here in .pdf format.
• Resurgent 80s fashion trends apparently don't jive with Grand Mufti Gomaa's sensibilities; stretch pants are a no-no, but loose-fitting trousers have been deemed ok in a recent statement following the controversy over trouser-wearing Sudanese women.

–Islam

• Will the real Islam please stand up? Daily News Egypt reprints an article that first appeared in Arab News tracking the multiple forms that Islam has taken in practice in the past century and its possible trajectories.
• Sana from KABOBfest also recently examined the complex relationship between Islam and modernity in her blog noting that the two are far from antithetical.

Maddening Mosquitoes and Other Frustrations

The acuteness of the pervasive and ever-present sense of struggle that is living in Egypt is returning, exacerbated by unforgiving mosquitoes who are smaller and faster than those in Minnesota. Just when I catch one in my sights, their tiny forms silhouetted against the dingy, uncleanable wall whose shade of paint is what only the sunniest of optimists could call cream, they sink down, blending in with the non-descript "neutral" tones of the haggardly area rug or the olivey fabric of our strange-smelling furniture. Sometimes, while typing, I suddenly notice a little hematophage feasting on my arm or foot or, as just now, I hear one buzzing past my ear. While I can take swipes at them while awake, the numerous red welts on my feets, legs, arms, and even face are evidence that they manage to let themselves into my bedroom (one of the windows in which, I have just discovered, cannot be properly shut and has a rather unconvincing mesh screen).
Like mosquitoes, the small aggravations that come with living in Egypt are most unnerving they're numerous, difficult to deal with, seemingly endlessly elusive, and pop up one right after another, just when you think you've vanquished them. I won't go through and complain about the particular problems with my apartment beyond the pesky flesh-nibbling one I've described and to say that after the fiasco with my landlord and my neighbors, I feel compelled to find other lodgings (Ahmed called Catherine all kinds of foul names I won't repeat her, told her he had the upper hand because he was a doctor and an Egyptian, reminded her that his "uncle" who lives upstairs works for the Ministry of the Interior, etc.) Beyond this, I keep wavering on whether or not to stick with the program I'm in and turn it into a Master's. I'll go for weeks at a time, convinced of the soundness of my plans, and then get discouraged and think I'm perhaps not on the right path. At school, my papers are seeming daunting and I should really meet with my professors to try and understand better what's expected (though I've been getting good grades thus far). Taxis, the service (or lack thereof) at restaurants and grocery stores, the stares, the things shouted, and the general lack of logic as I'm accustomed to it have again become wearing. Add to the stress emanating from my living conditions, school, and my interactions with Egypt an email reply I received from my scholarship coordinator at Rotary HQ in response to my first report in which I explained the difficulties that have prevented me (along with the three other scholars in Cairo) giving speeches yet, and I've just about had it. The email said that the scholarship coordinator would not accept my report without the "Required Presentations Form" with the "correct number of presentations listed and the appropriate signatures listed." Lest I offend, I am going to refrain for the time being from making further remarks about this, but will report on how it all ends up resolved.
Last evening, I met up with my friend Sheila who, in the nearly half-decade since I'd last seen her, had married an Egyptian investment banker and had traveled to the Middle East a dozen times, seems to be doing really well. We had dinner with the requisite reprehensibly rude service at Sangria. Some of the food was pretty good which, combined with the fun of catching up with an old friend, sort of made up for the rest of it. A taxi driver who drove like a maniac was my means of returning home and became disgruntled when I didn't give him the exorbitantly high fare he demanded.
This evening, I had Thai with classmates who were also quite good company. The service was spotty, as is obviously the theme here and so it was when I went to Metro Market afterward to try and get groceries. They were out of the bottled water I'd gone there to buy and I won't even delve into the antics of the cashiers in the check-out lanes. Thankfully, the taxi-ride home tonight was calmer and more peaceably concluded than the last. I mailed some postcards and greeting cards to friends and family, bought some bottles of water, and came back to seek solace in aish baladi and halawa only to receive the aforementioned email.
I'm reading through the news now and it seems some minor violence erupted downtown today, see the first article below. I heard some commotion earlier, but suspect it was just your run-of-the-mill brawl and not connected, though you never know. I'm not sure how close Ghad headquarters are to my part of Downtown.

News:
Clashes erupts at Egyptian opposition party headquarters
Osama bin Laden's son, currently living in Egypt, was refused asylum in Spain
Optimism in Egypt in wake of Obama win

A Sudanese Soirée in Ain Shams

After making significant headway on my book review (of Barbara Harrell-Bond's Imposing Aid), I ran a couple of errands. The first took me to the market down the street to get a box of water. The guys that work there know my face by now and we all try to make friendly conversation in our Arabic-English pidgin. One guy inquired if I was from Germany. I get that a lot, so I must be phenotypically faithful to my German genes. I'm sure me lurching about trying to carry this box containing eighteen liters of H20 was a sight to behold. Undaunted, I heaved and swayed the three or four blocks back to my building and then climbed the steps to the fourth floor. I was so motivated, that after a brief moment of respite, I struck back out again, this time in the opposite direction and in search of bread. It's not at all like hopping in my old '96 Mercury Mystique and buzzing over to Kroger to buy multi-grain organic goodness. I feel like I earn every carbohydrate in the bread I purchase here just walking to get it.
After finishing off some baba ghanoush and indulging in bread and halawa, I settled in to trying and firm up the topic for one of my papers. In the middle of researching the treatment of Somalis in Minneapolis and Cairo, however, I was invited to joined Natalie and Cynthia in Ain Shams. These two girls are insanely dedicated to the St. Andrew's Youth Violence Prevention Initiative, investing most of their time here in trying to provide opportunities to Sudanese refugees to help themselves escape violence and hardship. I didn't want to pass up the opportunity and thus found myself in a dingy flat scrubbing walls and washing floors along with fifteen or so southern Sudanese guys for whom this place will be a school. I've been switched to that location to teach English as the times of classes at the Ma'adi school conflicted with my classes. The whole ordeal was a lot of fun, but it was sobering to think what kind of struggles these young men have had to face. They are here in Cairo without their families and have turned to forming gangs to cope. The school in Ain Shams is just starting up and there's a lot to do to ensure it's success, but the fact that so many of the future students came today and have taken such pride in the place is a hugely positive indicator.

News of Egypt and the region:
Somali pirates threaten Egyptian economy
Democracy in Egypt
UN withdrawing non-essential employees from Yemen in wake of terror threat