So far I have spent the majority of my break doing nothing. I told myself I was going to memorize like three chapters worth of Arabic words/grammar that I did not properly memorize during the last few weeks of school, final papers and all that. So far, I’ve not even opened the book once and my break is over in 10 days. I should do it though, it can only help me next semester what with my overloading on credits. I picked up the second book in the Al-Kitab series while I was visiting some friends in Sacramento, and I just happened to read the back of it today. It tells me that I get to continue to enjoy the story/relationship between Maha and Khalid. Ustathati told me that the second book did not contain the story. Clearly, that was a lie.

I picked up a new Digital camera over the break as well. My Canon Rebel, while still a good camera, is entirely too bulky for me to be lugging all over Egypt. I think that if I have a camera that I can put in my pocket, I’ll be more apt to bring it along with me. I don’t want to get done with my Masters and have no pictures to remember Egypt with! That would be a sad, sad day.

This website continues to not get used. This is also a sad thing. Mostly all the stuff that I do is behind-the-scenes, and only involves keeping the software up to date. Maybe trying to update this on a daily basis will be my New Year’s Resolution? Probably not. I’m not a pessimist, just a realist. But I do have a lot more online stuff that I will have to do this year because of the Graduate Students’ Association, so perhaps I can manage to work this in? Hopefully.

Speaking of that illustrious organization of ours, check it out! http://www.aucgsa.com.

Yours,
Scott

So school has started again, and I am beginning to question my basic understanding of myself. Case in point: my Arabic class is four days a week at 8:30am. That means I have to get up at 7am 4 days a week. Why did I not learn my lesson in during my undergraduate career? I keep saying I’m going to pick a later class next semester, but Lord knows I’’ll probably end up signing myself up for the early class again. So goes the plight of Scott.

So yeah, that’s all for now.

My original flight took off from Sacramento and was about three hours long, wherein I arrived in Minnesota. Ate McDonalds, then a plane ride (where they thought we were going to sleep?) to Amsterdam. It was like 9:30 when we finally took off because they couldn’t find one of the passengers. We get in the air they serve us drinks and crackers. Then like 20 minutes later they’re serving us dinner. Thankfully each seat had its own entertainment center where you could watch TV shows of recently in theaters movies. I watched The Watchmen and The Simpsons. I tried to sleep for a few hours, then it was apparently breakfast time.

I landed in Amsterdam purchased some Euros’ (*shakes a fist*), purchased a train ticket, and headed towards Den Haag Centraal. My entire goal in daring to step foot outside of the Schipol Airport in Amsterdam was to see The Peace Palace, which finds itself in the area known as The Haag. Now, I arrived at Den Haag Centraal and asked the very kind persons there which tram would take me to The Peace Palace. They spoke fluent English, but I confirmed their directions nevertheless! I get on the tram in question, ride it for about two stops and then decide to ask the lady next to me if she would tell me when I should get off if I want to see The Peace Palace. The kind woman informs me that there are two trams bearing the same number, and that they each go two different directions. I was not on the proper tram. I cursed inwardly, and got off at the next stop. Thankfully I was able to just follow the train tracks back the station. I got back to the station, and hopped the next train back to Schipol. There ended my adventures for The Haag. Until next time, sweet, sweet International Justice!

I arrived in Cairo, tried to cram through some mess they had going on. Apparently we all needed to fill out a card letting them know that I was carrying no known diseases. Much to my dismay, when I finally did get across to my baggage, the person who was supposed to pick me up was not there. Sadly I had to pay like $10 more than I should have needed too, but alas it was like 3:30am and I didn’t care. I just wanted to sleep. I spent a week in Hotel Longchamp’s. It’s a very lovely hotel that is on the Island of Zamalek on Ismael-Mohammad Street.

I found a flat mate and a flat via Cairo Scholars, and I am now living in an apartment in Al-Rehab which is in New Cairo. Its a very nice community. There are children … everywhere outside our apartment building. It’s Ramadan, so I’m assuming they get to stay up late (they’re there until 1am sometimes). Or maybe that hour isn’t late for them I do not know enough about the culture to say one way or the other.

Anyway, writing this blog has reminded me that I have failed to register my new residence with the local Police Station. I’ll have to do that monday.

Goodbye, friends

Therefore, most of these orginal posts are (and should be considered) the ramblings of an idle mind. I am currently in the process of trying to get all the bugs worked out of this website before I really start to do any real blogging. But I do not want to give the impression that this website is going to simply be about blogging, as I do not intend it to be so.

As I previously said…or at least I think I said it, but if I didn’t then I am saying it now: this website is intended to be a congomeration of all things me. When it is finished it will be a place where all of my online activities will collide into a beautiful rainbow of magic.

At the time of this writing I have just finished upgrading the software that runs this website, as well as deciding on a domain name. If all things work out, insha’allah, then this site will hence forth be known as ‘Bombastic.org’. I thought it a fitting name. It’s nothing if not humbling.

What I really should be doing right now is my studying for the GRE. I registered to take the examination on January 5th and I have a lot of math review to get done if I wish to get a decent score. In fact,  it was said review that helped me come up with the name for this website.

Until next time,

Yours.

With the Gallery2  program that I have here, I will be able to embed photos as well as any videos or other media that I create and want to share.

My current problem that I cannot seem to fix is the Twitter Update tool. For some reason it does not seem to want to update my Tweets when I post them to twitter. I may try downgrading to a previous version later today to see if that fixes the problem or not.

Updates and upgrades to follow later today.