Approaching Christmas...Although Not Egyptian Christmas

Here I am...once again a very absentee blogger. I do believe that this is the busiest year of my life. I'm constantly going going going...I'm putting everything I am into the preschool this year. When I'm not preschooling or preparing for the upcoming day or week, usually there's another engagement that I'm invited to, or someone asks me to accompany them somewhere. It makes for a very interesting year, but also one that doesn't have a lot of extra time. That's ok, it just sometimes makes it hard to get everything done that I need to.

I'm so excited that Christmas is approaching! But in Egypt, they celebrate Christmas in January, during the Muslim New Year (I believe). So January 7 is Christmas here, but I'll still be celebrating December Christmas. We're going to have a preschool party too. I can't wait, it's gonna be really fun!

I'll fill you in on some of the things that have been happening lately. In the middle of November I went to visit my sister Ali in Tanzania during a holiday I had. It was so amazing and I'm so glad I had the opportunity to go! We were able to go to a national park and see some wildlife, as well as visit a game park, a pool at a hotel lodge, and the site where 2 fellow Southerners are working as student missionaries. It was a really great trip and I will never forget it. It was also awesome to see my amazing sister again!

After I arrived back in Cairo, I was invited by some of the conference office missionaries to go to a Thanksgiving meal in Maadi, a rich area of town where a lot of foreigners live. It was so nice to go and eat a North American Thanksgiving meal with fellow Westerners! The lady who hosted the dinner is American but her job has taken her to Cairo. It was actually quite interesting...she knew my high school teacher Mr. Brock and sent him a message that I was at her house for Thanksgiving. The meal was so tasty and extravagant and we just had a really nice time. She also had a really nice apartment with an entire glass wall that looked out over the Nile River. It was a beautiful night view.

In December we celebrated the 4th birthday of my preschool student Kimo. His mom went all out and brought McDonald's Happy Meals for all the kids, pizza for us teachers, and a really nice and tasty Mickey Mouse birthday cake. We had a really great time and took lots of pictures.

Last week I got to babysit my preschool student Cindy and her older brother Abdiel, who live in the apartment below me. Their parents were out at a meeting so Manal and I got to spend some quality time with 2 of our favorite kids in Cairo. We took them out for fool and taomaya sandwiches (fava beans and falafel...they are so incredibly good here in Egypt)! Anyways, we had a lot of fun with them, as usual.

Last week I also made sugar cookies with my students. I made the dough the night before, and then in the morning the kids cut the dough into shapes with cookie cutters that Karin (a fellow missionary) loaned to us. They had the time of their lives! During lunchtime I came upstairs and baked the cookies in the oven. Then in the afternoon we decorated the cookies with green and pink icing (the red food coloring turned out more pink than red, but they were as Christmassy as we could make them). It was one of the funnest things I've ever done with the kids, and they enjoyed it immensely!

On Thursday I was invited to go to a Christmas party with my friend Anita (Cindy and Abdiel's mom) and her family. It was a party for the foreigners who take Arabic classes with the company that she studies with. It was really cool to go. I brought my violin and Anita brought her guitar and we played Christmas songs while the people sang and clapped along. It was really nice to be in the company of some fellow Westerners, as well as people from other parts of the world too. Then we played some fun games, ate, and visited before heading on home.

On Sabbath night I went to a movie night at the house of a missionary couple. It was a really fun time fellowshipping with some church people, and the movie was pretty great too.

This week I'm going to be preparing for Ali's arrival. She's coming to visit me during her Christmas break! I'm really excited to see her again and to show her around Cairo and let her experience some of the awesome Egyptian food that I love so much! I can't wait to see her. I'm really glad that I'll be able to spend my first Christmas away from home with one of my family members.

All in all I'm doing good and the preschool is full to the brim with lots of students! Recently we accepted 3 more children to bring our limit to 15, so needless to say, we're pretty busy. But I'm having the time of my life.

Anyways, thanks for reading, and have a great holiday season. I wish you the best Christmas ever!

A Positive Note

Hello one and all!

As usual I'm so very bad at keeping up with blogs, but if it's any consolation, at least I'm really good at keeping up with pictures! I have tons and tons of pics put up on facebook, so if you haven't checked them out, feel free to do so.

Things have been going quite well lately. We have a full preschool now, with 12 kids. They're really happy lately, and behaving quite well for the most part. We got some new things for the preschool too, so it helps to entertain the kids and keep them happy. We got a portable basketball hoop so the kids have fun throwing balls around with that, and then just last night we got a rocker toy that can fit 3 kids at one time. They absolutely loved it today! Slowly we're trying to expand the preschool and fulfill some of the needs that it has, and improving the outside play area is a definite need since there's the only things for the kids to play with outside have been 1 wooden swing and 1 swing toy, until we got these other toys. Next we want to get a couple slides and another rocker toy so we have enough toys to keep all of the kids happy and occupied. But our new additions are working quite nicely! We also got some duplos that came with a train and tracks, so the kids are enjoying that a lot too.

The biggest problem I've been having in the preschool lately is that there's so many people that are coming to ask about their children attending the preschool, but right now we don't have space. We have a growing waiting list. If we get another teacher, which there's a possibility of, then maybe we can up our limit of children a little bit and take some kids from the waiting list, but for now it's just me and Manal and the 12 kids.

As for what I've been up to outside of preschool, there's been some interesting things that have happened lately. A few weeks ago I finally went on a Nile cruise with a group of people and with the student missionaries from NUA. It was a really fun night and a great experience. Then the next week a group of us went to a really nice mall here in Cairo called City Stars. It's very huge and ritzy and expensive. I've come to realize that Cairo has very nice places that make you feel as though you're in North America, then places that are very poor and low-scale, and also places in between. It's interesting to see the differences though. I also attended an Evangelical church service which had such beautiful music. It was amazing because the musical talent in Egypt is very low, but this church really had a dynamic worship service. It was really cool. Oh, we also went to go visit Saif's family last week, the family that was in the bad car accident. They're doing much better now and his dad is back home from the hospital and improving. It was nice to go spend some time with their family and see that they're getting back to normal.

This Sabbath I was asked to play special music as well as be the pianist for Sabbath school and church. It's the first time for me to be the pianist here, so I hope all goes well! Thanks for all your continuous love and support!

Lately

I know it's been awhile, as usual, but sometimes I just can't make myself sit down and write a blog post after a day of work, which lately has been giving me a run for its money. But before I get into the work aspect I'll start off by outlining a vacation I took at the beginning of September.

I went to a city called Marsa Matrouh, which is such a beautiful place! Not because of the city, but because it's on the Mediterranean Sea. The sea is absolutely gorgeous and has so many different colors of blue depending on how deep the sea is in different areas. I went with Mervat, a lady who works in the Healthy Life Center below the Egypt Field Office. She was vacationing with her mom and her 3 brothers. They go to Marsa Matrouh every summer. On the way there I went on the train, alone I might add, because Mervat had already been there with her family since the previous weekend, but I couldn't be gone from work for more than about 3 days. So Manal and her sister Rahil dropped me off at the train station, helped me find the correct train and board, and I proceeded to sleep during the night while the train chugged on closer and closer to Libya. I was somewhat scared of traveling for the first time by myself in Egypt, but it wasn't a problem and everything was ok. I did find out later that Manal and Rahil had directed me to the 2nd class seating but my ticket was for 1st class, so I missed out on that and Mervat was sad about that. Anyways, I arrived in the morning, got off the train, and found Mervat waiting for me to pick me up. I was also greeted by a delightfully welcome sea breeze. The weather was much more pleasant than my last trip to Sharm el-Sheikh. The next 3 days were rather interesting. I saw a couple famous beaches, Cleopatra Beach and Ageeba Beach. Ageeba was one of the beaches that we swam at too, and it was amazingly beautiful! The beaches in Marsa Matrouh are awesome because the water is so blue and gorgeous and the sand is really white. I got a decent tan with a little bit of burn, but not nearly as bad as my burn in Sharm el-Sheikh. It was a little interesting spending 3 days with Mervat's family because she has 2 deaf brothers and her mom doesn't know English, so I could only talk to Mervat and her brother who isn't deaf. Anyways, all in all it was a good trip.


I came back to a hard couple of weeks at work. Actually, I guess the first week back wasn't bad because there were still not too many children because summer was still in full swing. School starts rather late here because after Ramadan the Muslims have a feast, and then school begins after that, which is this coming week. Anyways, this week has been so hard in so many ways. More kids are coming back now that they're finished traveling for the summer, and some new kids are starting to come. One of them screams whenever their mother leaves and won't stop unless she comes back, one of them only likes Manal and cries whenever she leaves, which makes it difficult if she's helping a child in the bathroom or if she's on break, because then this child won't stop crying and disrupts the atmosphere of the room. I also found out that one of the preschool families was in a bad car accident on their way back from vacationing...incidentally in Marsa Matrouh, the same place I went to. The grandma died and the dad is still in the hospital with a problem in his lungs and is having many operations currently. The mom has a big gash on her forehead and I believe has a hard time walking because of something happening to her feet. Saif, the little boy from preschool, hurt the back of his head and his younger brother had some glass on him from the windshield. Saif finally came back to preschool this week after being gone for quite some time, and his younger brother came with him one day. His mom wants his brother to start in the preschool now, but he's not even 2 years old and we're making a new age rule. So we'll have to figure out how to handle that situation, but for now we'll let him come to the preschool while she's having a hard time going back and forth between her home and the hospital all the time. Anyways, next week all the children will be back because school is starting and some of their parents are teachers and will have to bring them back to preschool because they're starting to work again. It's going to be another crazy week next week!

Oh, last week we had 2 days of vacation in the preschool because of the Muslim feast, and on one of the days I went to 3 Coptic Orthodox monasteries with one of the preschool families (Miro and Youssef's family). It was really interesting and a great day. It was nice to get to know their family better, especially because they're such nice people. On the way back we stopped at a place with a grocery store, a restaurant, and a park, and we all ate together. I picked up some groceries too. It was just a really good day, and I really appreciate their family. I also went to a birthday party this week which was pretty fun. It was on the roof at the Sudanese refugee Adventist school at night. It was a really fun time and we had some good food. Also, my violin lessons to Youssef are going really well. He's practicing at home, he's enjoying it, he's doing a great job and learning and improving, and I'm also remembering things I used to do when I taught in high school. It's a good feeling. Next week I'm going to start teaching piano lessons to Kimo, a 3 year old boy in the preschool, and I'm also going to start teaching one of the preschool parents (Bibo's mom) some English next week too. Since Saif went on vacation and had the car accident I haven't started teaching him piano lessons again, but after things settle down we'll probably pick up where we left off. I think that's about all the lessons I can handle right now, especially since working all day with all these children takes so much effort.

Now I'm going to just focus on relaxing and spending time with friends and with God over the weekend. Tonight Manal and I are going to NUA (the academy) to spend the night and also Sabbath morning at the school. I need to start getting to know the student missionaries. I haven't been to NUA since campmeeting I think. Then on Sabbath evening someone is having a birthday party here behind the preschool so we'll come back for that. So I hope this weekend will be fun.

Warning: Gruesome Topic-Read At Your Own Risk

Well one of the main things that have happened since my last post was that my former roommate and fellow teacher Eriny got married in her village in Upper Egypt, so I went to the wedding and what an experience it was! The night before the wedding there was a big party at both the bride and the groom's houses, which is the custom in Upper Egypt. Loud Arabic music was playing well into the night and tons of people were gathered in the small dirt roads to celebrate with the families of the wedding couple. The most significant part of the night for me occurred when they killed a cow in the street right outside of Eriny's home. This is what happens at weddings in Upper Egypt and it was quite horrifying for me to witness the murder of a cow. Everyone there is so used to it and meat is such a vital part of their diet that they aren't even phased by the tortuous death that the animal goes through...they're just watching eagerly, ready to eat the meat that the cow will eventually provide them with. They tied the cow's hooves together and laid it on its side the ground, and the proceeded to slit its throat. The cow just laid there as its blood filled the street. Some people got blood on their shirts from when the cow moved around trying to get loose. The whole process was so agonizingly long too. The poor cow was suffering for so long while everyone just swarmed around it to watch. The men who were carrying out the cruel task then started hacking away at its throat and cutting through its mouth and tongue and everything so that its head would be cut off completely, but it took quite a long time so they kept stopping for breaks along the way, while the cow just kept suffering through it. Sometimes they stuffed their hands in the cow along with the knife, to help rip the head off faster and more effectively. After what seemed like forever and ever the head was finally off and the cow was out of its misery. I think it was pretty much alive until the head was right off, cuz it moved sometimes throughout almost the whole process. Anyways then they stripped its skin off and hung it from these poles in the middle of the street and proceeded to hack off pieces of meat well into the night. Oh and I also saw all the stomachs of the cow after they were placed into a bucket. Then they took them away to sell. Anyways that's the story of probably the worst thing I've ever seen happen.

So the next day was the wedding. Manal and I went to this beauty salon to get our hair done, and they started doing this fancy thing in my hair and then topped everything off by putting all this makeup on my face. I asked them to keep it simple and natural but when I opened my eyes it was definitely not natural. But it was ok for one evening, and I really liked my hair even though it seemed too fancy for someone who wasn't in the wedding party. So the wedding was scheduled to start at 7:30 on Monday night which I thought was an odd time for a wedding. Anyways we finished at the beauty salon and headed to the church, arriving at 7:15. I was supposed to play my violin while the wedding party walked to the front. But when we went inside the church we discovered that the wedding was already in progress! I was expecting it to start pretty late cuz Egyptians usually start everything like 1 or 2 hours late, but we found out that they started the wedding at 6:30! I was so shocked that they had started an hour early, and not even waited for Eriny's own sister to get there before they started. I guess they played some random music for the part where they walked to the front, but I felt so strange cuz I had my violin and I didn't even use it, and I was all dressed up for nothing, cuz the wedding was almost finished. Manal and I went up to the front of the church in this side hallway thing and when they saw we were there they told me they still wanted me to play my violin. So I quickly got it out and played Ashokan Farewell, the piece I had prepared to play at the beginning of the wedding. But this time it was more like a special music. After I finished they said the closing prayer and the wedding was over. I felt sooo weird for being all dolled up and then only being there for a few minutes before it ended. Anyways I went back with the group that came from NUA and I met the SM's that had just arrived in Egypt the week before that. We finally got back at about midnight or something. And that's the story of the wedding that I attended in Upper Egypt!

My First Preschool Party

So this week was a rather interesting one. There were some unfortunate events that happened in the preschool and I am quickly becoming aware of all the difficult situations that can arise when you teach preschool to a group of 2-4 year olds (and sometimes 1 and 5 year olds) in a foreign country. There were lots of good parts too though. I just am learning that it's not all fun and games, especially when there are children who have behavioral and/or aggressive issues,not to mention having to worry about potty training a couple children too. But all in all I'm loving my job and Sunshine Preschool and the children and their families. I don't think there's any other place I would rather be, or any other student missions job I would rather be doing. I feel as though God lead me to this place and wants me here, and that He knew where I was needed and where I would be happiest. There's so many people here I have met and therefore I don't have homesickness or problems with loneliness, so I praise God for that! My roommates have been amazing and we have become to be good friends. The sad part is that one of my roommates spent her last day here yesterday, as she is getting married in a couple weeks. So for awhile it will be just two of us in the apartment. I'm not sure yet if someone new will come to help out in the preschool, but I hope so because the way that the preschool is operated really calls for more than 2 teachers, and especially more than 1. I find it hard that they accept children as young as 2 years old, and that they actually want us to accept children who are 1 year old also. It's also hard that the preschool runs 5 days a week and its hours are from 7:30 in the morning until 3:30 in the afternoon, and that some children stay 1-2 hours after the time the preschool ends. We accept children who are not yet potty trained, and also the parents are free to drop off and pick up their children at any hour in the day, so sometimes when all the children are being very well behaved and listening or working or playing quietly, then a parent comes to pick up their child and then all the children become distracted and we have to pick up where we left off after the child leaves. These are all issues I don't have much control over since I can't make the rules of the preschool, but I have learned to work around these little bumps in the road and try to just find the best way to handle them.

One interesting tidbit is that within maybe 1 month's time I will (apparently) be having a roommate. She will work at the Adventist elementary school here in Cairo, but I don't know really anything about her at the moment. I hope we can become good friends though. It will be nice to have another girl around to hang out with too.

So the big news this week is that we had a party in the preschool which is the first one that I've had since I've been here. I was here for the party that the previous SM had before she left, but this is the first one that I've planned and been in charge of. It was fun and went pretty well. Some parts were not as organized as I would have liked, but I'm just going to do my best at everything and learn from every situation that I experience, and then the next time will maybe be even a little bit more successful. I hope that I'll be a pro by the end of the year.

So the party was a mix of a birthday party for 2 children who have birthdays this week and next week and are both turning 3, and also a goodbye party for Eriny who was my roommate and fellow teacher. Yesterday was her last day in the preschool before she gets married and then starts her new life at NUA (Nile Union Academy). We had cake and another type of sweet thing to eat called something like konafa. It was pretty good! The parents of the birthday kids brought the cake and konafa, and we provided mango juice. After we ate we gave the kids some little gifts from the preschool and then we sang the song Who's the King of the Jungle for the parents. I've taught the song to the kids and they really like singing it. Then we watched a video I made for the birthday kids Bibo and Dodo, and also for Eriny since it was a party for her too. The video had given me some issues because first my computer completely stopped working as I was making it into a video file, and then later when my computer finally started working again (thankfully!) then it wouldn't work when I tried to make the video into a file. So we ended up just watching in the window of my movie making program. I hope it'll make it into a video file when I try to later because the parents want to get it on their flash drive. Anyways after that we had the kids go outside to search for some eggs that had candy inside. Hehe, I guess it was kinda Easter-ish but we didn't have anything else really besides eggs to put the candy in, and the kids loved it cuz it was easy enough for all of them, even the little ones, to understand and they got to go outside which they all wanted to do anyways, and have fun searching for the eggs. I wanted to have another game for them to play but every game I've taught them so far has been hard for them to understand so we need to try it multiple times before they will be able to get it, plus the party was winding down by that time anyways so I think it was good to have it end there instead of keeping a good thing going for too long and turning into a not-so-good thing. I think the parents of the birthday kids were really happy because we had something nice and special just for them, and because there were a lot of ppl there to celebrate with them. Some people from the office came and some of the kids' families came, and also Anita, the wife of the missionary pastor from the Dominican Republic, and her daughter Cindy who turned 3 last week. We celebrated her birthday too since she came to the party.

The other thing that happened this week is that I started teaching piano lessons to Saif, a 3 year old boy who is one of my students. I've never taught piano lessons before so this week has been a new experience. I'm struggling a little bit because I'm not sure yet how to teach piano effectively and also interestingly, but I hope I can make it fun for him and also help him learn how to play well. He's pretty little but he understands English pretty well since he's been coming to the preschool for about 2 years I think. He'll be 4 in October so he's an older 3 year old instead of a just-turned-3 year old. His parents want him to have 2 lessons a week so every Sunday and Wednesday after preschool we'll be having a piano lesson in the church since it's right close by (attached to the preschool). It's also hard because his parents aren't going to be attending the lessons because his dad works till he picks him up after the lesson, and his mom is looking after Saif's younger brother at home, but I hope I can help him learn and understand.

Well that's about all for now. I'm ready for Sabbath, and then hopefully after that I'll be ready to forge into next week. Thanks for all your thoughts and prayers! Bye until next time!

It's Been Too Long!

I originally intended to write a blog post every day of my year here...trying to keep each one short and sweet, but write one daily so I could look back on my time here and see an overview of each day. I quickly fell behind though, and now it's been weeks since I've last written. But from now on I will really try to write more often.

So much has happened since I last wrote a blog! I went to a couple days of campmeeting at Nile Union Academy, and I also went to Manal and Eriny's village (Ashruba) in Upper Egypt over one weekend. It was quite an experience. It was even more hot than it is in Cairo, so my sweat glands got a really good workout while I was there. The trip to Ashruba was probably the hottest trip of my life. We were crammed in a microbus (like a large van) without air conditioning, and I wasn't beside a window. I was so boiling I could barely stand it. But we finally made it to their house, where the heat continued since they didn't have any air conditioning, and the fans did little to help. My roommates' family gave me a galabeya which was so nice of them. A galabeya is a long dress type thing that goes down to your ankles and also has long sleeves. Both men and women wear these in Upper Egypt. The galabeya their family gave me is a kind of turquoise/teal blue which is my favorite color! Manal asked me my favorite color and then told her family so they could find a galabeya that was that color. It was a really nice surprise. Anyways, we spent Friday night and Sabbath morning there and attending the Adventist Church in Ashruba which was a very interesting experience. They had no piano or anything so all the songs were sung a capella. Anyways since Sunday is a workday here in Egypt we had to leave that same day to get back for work in the preschool the next day. The trip back was much more pleasant because we were on a big bus and it was air conditioned. The whole trip was a great experience though and I'm so glad I had the opportunity to visit their home!

Since then I have also been to Sharm el-Sheikh which is a famous tourist city in Egypt on the Red Sea. I went on the annual Heliopolis church trip and it was quite an experience. I got so burnt that I couldn't sleep one night because any way I laid hurt my skin. We also went on a boat ride on the Red Sea, and I swam in the sea twice.

The preschool is running pretty good lately. We have 11 kids now so it's doing quite well. It's a challenging job but also very rewarding. The kids are so great and I love all of them so much! I can't imagine how much I'll miss them after I return at the end of my year here.

My roommate and fellow worker Eriny is spending her last week at the preschool this week. Thursday will be her last day because she is getting married in a couple weeks and then living at Nile Union Academy after her wedding. On Thursday we're going to have a party in the preschool at the end of the day because she will be leaving us, and we're going to celebrate 2 of the kids' birthdays as well because 2 kids have birthdays coming up very soon. It should be fun. Then in a couple weeks I'll be going back to Upper Egypt for Eriny's wedding. It will be so great to experience an Egyptian wedding! Oh I also started teaching piano lessons yesterday to Saif. He's 3 years old and is the first piano student I've ever had! I hope I can help him learn to play piano well this year. Well that's a brief overview of some of the things I've been up to. I'll try to write again soon!

July 9 and 10

Friday was quite relaxing. I finally got a chance to sleep in but I woke up at about 9 or 9:30 and couldn't fall back asleep. But it's ok because I wasn't that tired anymore. I had a lot of time to just lounge around in the afternoon, and then later Manal and I went to the market and then to Royal House (a local grocery store) to get some food. Eriny is gone to her village in Upper Egypt to prepare for her wedding in August, so for the next week Manal and I will be holding down the fort in the preschool. But 2 other girls will be coming to help and will probably be with us for most of the summer. Anyways then at 7:30 Manal and I went to the evangelistic meeting in the church and then had some skype partyness and introduced each other to some of our skype contacts. It was a pretty fun night.

On Sabbath after church I went to another potluck outside in the preschool yard again. It was going to be at a park but for some reason it got moved to the yard. It was another nice time. After visiting for awhile when the potluck was done I came back to my room and had a very nice and lengthy nap which was quite appreciated. Then Manal and I made some food and watched The Blind Side. It was really motivating and I liked the message. I hope I can always have the same type of spirit that the mom did. Now I'm off to bed and ready for another week of work ahead of me. Goodnight!

Teaching, Instrument Shop, and a Cathedral

Thursday was pretty cool. In the preschool we studied articles of clothing and then we made hats (actually I guess they were crowns). The kids loved them and some didn't want to take them off all day. In the afternoon we turned on the sprinkler and got all wet which was very welcome in the hot weather. Girgis, Eriny's finance, came with some other people from NUA to the preschool and he cooked for us. It was very much appreciated, and very yummy! After work I helped Manal make some signs for a missionary couple that were coming back from furlough. Then later on I went with one of the preschool families to an instrument shop to help them find a violin for their son Youssef, who I will be teaching violin lessons to. They are the nicest people and are such a gracious and kind family. After that we went to their Coptic church. The cathedral was very huge...I believe they said it's the biggest Coptic cathedral in Egypt. While the dad was at a meeting we went to the club area. I met some people and talked with the mom while we waited. It was a very interesting experience. They have large areas for children and youth to play and there's also a food shop. They bought me some food and a couple pops. I sang the ABC song with Mirey, their 2 year old daughter who comes to the preschool, and went over some colors. She's getting pretty good at knowing her colors and she especially likes the color orange. Whenever I ask her at preschool which color of paper she wants (for a craft or something) she always picks orange. We stayed at the church for over an hour and then headed home. Mirey fell asleep on me in the car...it was very cute. I think Youssef is excited to learn to play the violin, but I just hope I can teach effectively to an Arabic child. So my day was quite interesting and I'm loving each new experience that I am having.

July 7

Today was a rather regular day. In the preschool we made fans out of folded paper and colored them. I thought the kids could use them well in this heat! Oh, I also took some of the dress-up items that I brought with me to Egypt down to the preschool today. The kids loved putting them on, so I hope they can continue to have fun with them this year. The afternoons get really long and hot because the air conditioning in the preschool stopped working this week so we get pretty warm. After work I basically just relaxed all evening, which was very welcome because I didn't have to go out anywhere. I guess I'm getting a cold because my throat has been pretty scratchy and I've been coughing a lot, especially after I wake up. But I hope this will pass quickly. Ok well that's about all I have to report for this day...

Beginning of July

So my Sabbath was really nice. After church we had a potluck out in the yard by the preschool and the food was sooo good! There were about 12 ppl there I believe. After we finished lunch we stayed outside just talking for a good while. We also watched the missionary pastor play with his kids in the sprinkler which was amusing. He wasn't intending to get wet but the sprinkler fell and got him all wet so he ended up drenching himself and playing with his children. Later on I had some time to relax in my room, and then after sunset Manal and her sister Jackline and I went over to Karin's house to visit with her since she had been feeling sick that day. She was doing ok by then, besides her usual shoulder pain. We had a nice time with her and she offered us some really yummy food as well.

Sunday was back to work. We made sunshines out of yellow and orange construction paper and then put the kids names on them and let them decorate it with small colored pom-pom ball thingys and also glitter. Then we put them up on the wall above the bulletin board. Since the preschool is called Sunshine Preschool I thought it would be fitting to have sunshines up on the wall with the kids names on them. In the evening we went to the evangelistic meeting in the church and then I talked to some of the church members for awhile after the meeting. So those were the main highlights of the day.

Monday I worked on implementing a somewhat modified schedule from what the preschool had been operating on. I'm still trying to find what works best and then make my ultimate schedule, but so far the mornings have been working out really well. I couldn't believe how well the kids behaved for worship on Monday. They were as good as gold. We're doing the story of Joshua and the Battle of Jericho this week and so after worship we made a craft that was related to our Bible story. We colored on paper and then rolled the paper into a horn, like the horns that you hear of being used in Bible times, and to call the army to march around the city. The kids loved the horns and really enjoyed tooting through them too. I'm so glad for some of the items that I brought that I almost didn't bring. I was going through all my old things at home this summer before I came to Egypt and I came across quite a few items that I was going to get rid of, but then realized I could use them in the preschool. One such item is this blow-up ball that has a map of the world on it...so it's like a ball and globe in one. The kids absolutely love playing with this ball. When we play outside they kick it or throw it or bounce it off their heads. It's really cute to watch. They don't have any large-sized balls at the preschool so I want to buy some for the children. Anyways I'm so glad I brought my globe-ball. Oh, after work I finally got around to sweeping the floor in my room. People keep telling me that in Egypt you can sweep one day and then the next day the floor will have dust all over it again. I believe it...it's impossible to go outside without your feet getting completely dirty. At nighttime I went with Anita and Manal to a store. Cairo is very busy at night...people also tell me that Egyptians come alive at night, and it seems to be true. This works for me since I'm definitely more of a night owl than an early bird. But I'm trying to go to bed earlier than I usually would because I have to get up early and also because I've been getting tired pretty early while I'm here...probably because of all the work in the preschool. So anyways that was my Monday.

On Tuesday we used puppets to tell the Bible story and the kids really loved it. Oh I also taught a couple of the older children how to play bingo. We did color and shape bingo on Monday and then did number bingo on Tuesday. They like the game but still find it a little tough. They know how to count out loud but aren't as familiar with recognizing numbers. But it's ok, we'll keep working on it. They're doing pretty good considering they're not even in Kindergarten yet. All in all they're pretty good kids. I went on another excursion at night with Anita and Manal, and also Ranya (a church lady) and her son Youssef, who helps out in the preschool sometimes in the summer. I also witnessed a fight on the streets when we were about to leave. I don't know what happened but 2 men were mad at each other and people were trying to hold them back so they wouldn't fight each other. It was a little scary since it was right on the road in front of the Adventist church and my apartment. All the traffic was stopped behind these 2 vehicles because they got out of their cars. So people were upset at them and honking their horns, but that happens every second of every day on the streets of Cairo so I guess that's nothing new. Anyways that concludes my updates. Oh and don't worry cuz I'm having a great time. It's a lot of work and I'm very busy, but it's also very fun too. I'm sure God has a great year in store for me.

My First Full Week

Wow so much has happened since my last post! I wish I could post everyday because I want to keep a record of every one of my days here, even if some of them are short, but I just haven't had time so far this week. So in this post I'll attempt to recount all the happenings since my last one. Here we go:

Monday:
First of all Ana and I started out the morning by going again to exercise. Then we came back and went to staff worship. I introduced myself to all the staff in the Egypt Field Office, and then all introduced themselves to me. It was good to do. I don't know how often I'll get to go to worship, because if I go to exercise then I can't really take off more time in the morning. Manal, Eriny, and I each get a one hour break in the morning and then a 30 minute break in the afternoon, since our day goes from about 7:30-5:30. Preschool ends at 3:30, but Steven, this 2 year old little boy, stays an hour late, and Omar who just started coming this week will be staying 2 hours late. Luckily the money that comes from kids staying late is split between Eriny, Manal, and I. Anyways, after worship we dove into a full day at the preschool. This was my last day not being the leader. I basically just took part in all the activities, played with and helped the kids, and tried to understand how the preschool worked. Honestly I can't remember what exactly went down this day, which is why I want to blog at the end of every day or at least every 2 days, so I can remember everything that happens. Oh, after all the other kids left I brought out this nice book of matching that has a grid and tiles that go along with it. I taught Omar how to use the book, and he loved it. I told him he was the first one to learn how to use the book and now he could teach other kids how to use it too, which he did. The next day he taught Youssef (another 5 year old boy) how to use it and they really enjoyed it. Oh and yes, in the evening Pastor Llew and Karin took Ana and I to a Lebanese restaurant. It was about a 20 minute walk away or so. The food was really good. We had these things that were like some type of puffy bread with cheese and vegetables inside. I had mango juice too which was yummy. That was about all I can remember happening on Monday.

Tuesday:
This was my first day in charge at the preschool! Ana was still here, but she was packing and getting ready to leave since she flew out at 2 in the morning on Wednesday. Ohhh this day was sooo hard! Things were so disorganized and I just felt like I couldn't do this for a whole year. Kids were crying and fighting and I felt discouraged. I got there really late because after I came back from exercising I had to go with this man Yousry who works in the Egypt Field Office. We went somewhere in the city for me to get my permanent visa, since the one I got in the airport only lasts for 15 days. We took a taxi on the way there. After we got to the place I waited around for a long time while Yousry did what needed to be done, since he could communicate with the people there and I couldn't. After we left he had to make a couple stops so we walked around the city for a good while. We walked all the way back and I was so hot and boiling by the time we finally got back. Then I went to work in the preschool the rest of the day. My two Egyptian helpers, Manal and Eriny (who are sisters) were holding down the fort until I got there during lunchtime. Anyways, I finally got through the day at the preschool...hallelujah! After work was done I went to the beauty salon with Ana and a lady named Renee. Ana got her hair straightened and got all prettied up for her last night in Egypt. Then they dropped me off back at the apartment while they did a few last errands. I tried to fall asleep but I'm not sure if I actually got any sleep in. I was pretty tired. After they got back we went out to eat at Pizza King. The pizza was really good and reminded me of Pizza Hut pizza. There was a nice big group of us who went out. When we got back I said goodbye to Ana because she had to head for the airport. Some other people went to the airport to see her off, but they didn't tell her they were going, so they surprised her when she got there. I was really tired though and so I didn't end up going. I was really sad to see her leave, because she had helped me out so much, and when she left it was like my instruction left, plus a new friend. Anyways she went off on her way and I mentally prepared myself for the next couple days of teaching before the weekend.

Wednesday:
I made the trek to Pastor Jim and Joyce's house all by myself for the first time. It was a little nerve-wracking but I found my way and got my hour of exercise in, and made it back all in one piece. Tuesday was my first day in charge, but Wednesday was my first official day of being completely on my own, since Ana was still at the preschool a couple times throughout the day for awhile. I was actually amazed that this day went surprisingly well! There were a few sections that didn't work very well, but for the most part the kids were happy and abstained from fighting and crying. So the day was basically a reasonable success for my first official day as the director. I introduced the kids to some of these squishy puzzles that I brought from home and they really seemed to like them. Oh! New development: I'm going to bed teaching violin lessons to Youssef! He's 5 years old, but almost 6. He was coming to the preschool for just the summer since he's in school in the fall, but now he's going to another place because there weren't any other kids his own age until Omar came. But his mom decided to send him to this other place before Omar started coming to our preschool. Anyways his little sister Mirey still comes so I'll still see his mom and be in contact with his family. So on Wednesday when his mom came to pick the kids up she asked me if I would be interested and willing to teach him violin lessons. I think it's a great opportunity to use my music skills to further serve and witness, so I said I could for sure do that. She said she knows another boy who might be interested too. Anyways I explained everything to them, and they want me to go with them to help find a violin that will fit him, and then teach 2 lessons a week during the summer and 1 lesson a week during the school year. So I think that's pretty cool. I hope it goes well. Ok so then after work I came upstairs to my apartment and started cleaning and putting my things away finally! I got a lot of things done but I didn't finish before I went to bed.

Thursday:
This day was an anomaly to me. There ended up only being 3 kids that came to preschool that day: Steven, Mirey, and Saif. Steven and Mirey are 2 and Saif is 3 but I think he's almost 4. Saif was the first kid in the preschool. I actually just found out that a girl I know from when I was at Southern was the first one to start teaching this preschool! I knew she came to Egypt, but I didn't realize she was teaching at this preschool. Anyways when she started, Saif was the only kid, so he likes to think of it as his preschool. He's a really good little boy. But the day was so weird because there were only 3 kids, but in some ways it was crazier than Wednesday when we had 8 kids. Anyways we got through the day and after Saif and Mirey left I was playing with Steven outside...he gets picked up an hour late. He seems to do really well when it's 1-on-1 and no other kids are around. After we had played for awhile I picked him up and held him while I was swinging. I wasn't expecting it at all but he ended up falling asleep. He was so tired and just fell asleep to the lull of the swinging. It was really cute to see. His dad came to pick him up shortly after he was completely asleep. So after he left we got to work cleaning. We clean every day after we finish because there's so many ants and flies, and the table and floors always get dirty. But Thursday is the end of the work week here (Friday and Saturday are the weekend instead of Saturday and Sunday), so on Thursdays we clean everything thoroughly, including the bathrooms. When we were finally done that I came upstairs and got more of my things put away. Then Eriny, Manal, and I headed out to NUA to stay the night. When we got there I met Eriny's finance Girgis and also Manal and Eriny's uncle and aunt. We ate supper at their house. It was rice and this green Egyptian food that you put on top of rice. It was really good. I also met this little 1 year old boy named Michael which is Girgis' nephew, and then this other 3 year old girl named Donna (after Donna Rose from Kelowna who served there for 10 years). She kept putting pieces of popcorn into my mouth, it was pretty cute. Later we walked around the academy. It was night so it was hard to see things, but I got a feel for the grounds. Oh to get there you have to take the metro for maybe 20-25 minutes, then you take a taxi to the academy. NUA is in the middle of a really rustic and dirty village. There's a wall around the academy, and once you get inside the gate it's a stark contrast from the village on the outside. They have big gardens where they grow a lot of food for the school, and they have lots of trees. Anyways then we went to one of the houses where one of the missionary families live. They were watching The Gods Must Be Crazy, and they served us watermelon. I was so tired I fell asleep on the couch, so we decided it was time to go to bed. We slept in the apartment where Eriny and Girgis will live after they get married in August. Since she'll be living there I might get a new helper so that I maintain my number of 2 helpers, or maybe Manal and I will just continue by ourselves. We'll see. I was so tired that I fell asleep at the foot of the bed, but then I woke up later and moved to the head of the bed, and then woke up another time and moved under the covers haha.

Friday:
I'm sorry this post is so long! But it would be just as long if I split it up into 5 different posts...they would just be separated instead. Anyways after we got ready for the day I ate breakfast at the same place that I ate supper the night before. I had pita bread, beans, and falafels and it was yummy! Then I saw the academy in the daytime, went to the house of the girls dean, and then saw the girls dorm. Then I went back to the dean's house and she offered me her computer to use the internet which I gladly accepted. Then she threaded Manal's eyebrows while I was on the internet. After that Manal, her sister Jackline who goes to NUA and is living and working there this summer, and I headed back home. Eriny stayed for a class that she had to do on Fridays. She goes to NUA every weekend since her finance lives there, and so she won't be back until either tonight I believe. After we got back to Heliopolis, the area of Cairo that we live in, Manal and I went to the market while Jackline went back to our apartment. She's spending the weekend here. I think she spends most weekends here actually. So anyways I finally got some of my own food from the market. Then we came back and I finally got done putting the rest of my stuff away! I also discovered that I had acquired almost 50 mosquito bites on my legs...uggghh. I was wearing capris and so they go the bottom of my legs. I remember now that when I got my vaccination and medication consult before I left, the nurse told me that the mosquitoes here aren't up by your head but are down by the ground and you don't know they're there and don't feel them. And since there's not really mosquitoes here in Heliopolis I didn't think about the fact that there would probably be a lot at the academy. So my legs are nicely covered in many red itchy dots. Oh well. Then I went downstairs to the apartment below me where Anita and her family live. They're a missionary family from the Dominican Republic that are volunteering for a 2 year commitment. They've been here for almost a year now. Anita's husband is the associate pastor in the Heliopolis church, and then they have a 5 year old son and a 3 year old daughter. Anyways she invited me to come to her house to do our nails. She did mine, and also did hers since I told her I was very bad at it. Then we just sat and talked for a long time, and I stayed with them while they welcomed in the Sabbath. They light a candle in the kids' room, sing a song while Anita plays her guitar, and then pray. After they finish the kids have an ice cream bar because they let their kids have ice cream every Friday to make them look forward to Sabbath, which I think is a cool idea. Then I came back upstairs and watched Fireproof with Manal while we ate popcorn and cantaloupe. We both fell asleep during the movie since we were so tired, so bedtime was very welcome.

Thus concludes my first full week in Egypt! I will try to blog more often so each post won't have to cover so many days. But all in all things are going great, I'm starting to love it here, and it's actually starting to feel like home (or my 2nd home I suppose...hmmm or maybe my 3rd home, after Kelowna and then Southern). But yeah, if I can just nail down the teaching part so it can be as effective as possible then I think this year shall be pretty amazing. I'm so happy I came to Egypt because it's a great place and there's so many great people here that I'm sure I'll never be lonely. Until next time, God bless all my faithful (and maybe not so faithful) readers!

First Weekend

So on Sabbath we woke up and headed down to the children's Sabbath school which Ana has been teaching this year. The kids sang 2 songs for special music at church, so we practiced them at Sabbath school.I played my violin and Anita (another missionary lady) played guitar. We did God Is So Good and I Have Decided To Follow Jesus. The kids sang the last song in 4 languages: English, Arabic, Spanish, and Swahili, since there are a couple kids that know Spanish and Swahili here. It went great and everyone seemed to love it. There was communion after church which was really nice. Then Ana and I went to Pastor Llew's house for lunch. He's the president of the Egypt Field. He and his wife Karin started their 5 year term here about 10 months ago. They're from Scotland and are awesome people. A couple missionary people and families from Nile Union Academy were there too. We had a really nice lunch and everyone gave me a piece of advice for living here, and also taught me an Arabic word. After lunch we sat around talking for a nice while and then we had a really sincere prayer for Karin because her shoulder has been in so much pain lately that she can hardly work. So if you remember her in your prayers that would be appreciated a lot!

After I left their house I helped prepare for the preschool year-end party. Even though the preschool runs through the summer, Ana wanted to have a party because she's leaving the kids on Wednesday to go back to the states. The party was really fun. The kids sang the same 2 songs that were done for special music, and I played violin again. We ate this Egyptian food called kushari that was really yummy! Ana introduced me as the new preschool teacher, and then she had a little graduation for the kids. They wore these little blue grad hats made out of construction paper. They looked adorable. Then they showed a video of pictures from the year, and parents said some nice things about Ana and how much they would miss her. It was a great day all in all.

On Sunday I got up and went with Ana to exercise at the house of another missionary couple-Pastor Jim and Joyce. She went to their house to exercise most workdays this past year. We used a video and got a really good workout on all different areas of our bodies. Then we came back and worked in the preschool until it closed. Sundays are apparently quieter days in the preschool because not as many kids come since some go to church that day. We had 6 today I think, out of 9 who will be regulars this summer. One little boy came for the day but now it looks like he'll be here for the rest of the summer. His name is Omar and he's a pretty cool kid. After he was done his painting project today he came and asked if he could paint his teachers faces, so we ended up with rainbow faces. It was pretty cute. After preschool Ana showed and told me a lot of things I needed to know in order to run the preschool, and then later on we went to an evangelistic meeting in the church. Anyways that's all for this time...tune in again to hear more of my experiences!

Finally Here!

Hey, well I know I didn't write a blog as soon as I got here, but I have an excuse: my computer's internet wasn't working. But it got fixed and now I can finally write about my experiences so far. The first thing I wanna say is that I finally rode in a 747! I've always wanted to but have never had the luck of having one of those planes on any of my flights...not even really long ones. But I guess 747s fly into Egypt a lot. Anyways the trip over was good and there were no problems or anything...everything went smoothly. I got to Cairo after midnight on the 25th and was picked up by my hosts. We got to my new apartment at 3 in the morning and I promptly went to bed.

We got up at 7, so I didn't have long to sleep. The reason we got up so early was because we headed off to an Egyptian bath. Ana (the SM that was teaching the preschool this past year) took me with a couple of her friends. She has a Muslim friend from Cairo that knew about the bath and wanted to take her there. We took the metro and then walked for a long ways through the city to get there. We finally made it, and when we entered the bath area (which was only for females) we were struck by a huge wave of heat. It was super hot and humid in there. The place consisted of a small but deep hot tub type of thing, in a partitioned off section. In the main area there were 2 ladies who were scrubbing the girls' skin after they were done with the bath. It was quite an experience. I got all my dead skin scrubbed right off when I was done. I had gray rolls of dead skin all over me. After that there was a place where you could shower off all the skin. So that was the first of my adventures. When we got back home we quickly showered and then went off to buy things for the preschool year-end party that was on Sabbath night. Even though the preschool runs throughout the summer, Ana wanted to have a year-end party because she's leaving the kids on Wednesday and going back to the states. Friday finished off with vespers in the church, and then it was off to bed with me.

I'll write more about Sabbath and Sunday later when I have time. I miss everybody back home, but I'm having a good time so far. It's bound to be an adventurous year!

A Day of Observation, and 4 Days Till Departure

This week I spent a morning observing a preschool. Actually, it was the preschool at the academy that I graduated from, which is a Preschool-Grade 12 school. I know the preschool teacher from when I had attended the academy, and when I asked if it would be alright for me to come and observe a day of class she said that it would be perfectly fine. I had a really nice time there and got a lot of ideas from simply watching what occurred during the morning. The preschool runs every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday from 8:30-11:30, which is quite different from what I'll be doing this year. The Sunshine Preschool where I'll be teaching in Egypt goes from Sunday-Thursday, since Sunday is a working day in Egypt and Friday and Saturday are the non-working weekend days. Also, it begins at 7:30 in the morning and goes until 3:30 in the afternoon. It sounds more like a daycare because it runs all day, but they call it a preschool. I think it must have qualities of both since it caters to kids of all pre-kindergarten ages.

Anyways, I really enjoyed myself and appreciated the fact that all the kids really seemed to like me, even though I was merely sitting and observing, instead of playing with them. They talked to me and showed me their coloring pages and dress-up clothes and other such exciting things. They waved to me from across the room with adorable little smiles on their faces. When the class moved outside to play, two little girls brought me a few small flowers that they found growing in the grass. They were all really sweet kids, and throughout the morning I found myself becoming more excited about developing relationships with the children that I will be teaching this year. I also got a few interesting quotes from one child. I added them to my Quotes page so feel free to check them out.

All in all I think observing the preschool was really good for me. I got a clearer idea of what was in store for me, I took some good notes and got some new ideas, and I became more mentally prepared for the year ahead of me. I'm leaving for Egypt in 4 days, so it's coming up really quick! I don't think it's fully hit me that I'll be in Egypt in less than a week. I have a lot to do before I head off and I know this year will probably be very challenging in a lot of ways, but I'm confident that God will bless me if I stay close to Him as I serve. I'm excited and nervous at the same time, but I'm prepared to go out and live this year as bravely, adventurously, and spiritually as I can. I just hope that throughout this experience I learn and grow and become the person God wants me to be.

Gradually Getting Closer

Time is flying by and my summer will soon be gone. I can't quite believe that I'll be leaving for Egypt in less than 2 weeks! My ticket has been purchased so it's completely official now...I'm leaving on June 23. I have so much to do before I go! I need to gather all my preschool plans together and get them in place before I leave so that I'll be prepared to dive in when I get there. I'm glad that I'll at least have a few days of overlap with the current SM whose job I'll be taking over on June 30. These next couple weeks will be busy ones. Pray for me as I prepare to leave on my year-long journey!

Confirmation of Upcoming Year

I finally know where I will be serving as a student missionary next year! I will be going to Egypt to teach preschool in Heliopolis, a district of Cairo. I'm supposed to be there near the end of June, which leaves me about one more month of summer before I venture out into this new 12-month journey. I'm excited, but I'm also a little apprehensive of what I will encounter. I want to strive to witness to those I serve, and to grow closer in my relationship with God. I ask for your prayers as I get ready for this new chapter of my life.