now lets see if i can remember everything...

so three more days of arabic. as of right now i can read at about the level of a preschooler, meaning that i know most of the letters and most of the sounds and it takes me about five minutes to figure out one word, plus i have to refer back to my notes on occasion. and i know the numbers well enough to haggle taxi prices, which i did tonight, so thats good. and i know how to order food and how to say thanks and ask someone their name, and i can say "thank God" if someone asks how im doing, which is apparently an appropriate response here. its really a beautiful language, mostly because it revolves around Islam; dialogs are so formal and nice, and they usually bring God into the picture. for example, instead of saying "nice to see you again" they say "i am lucky to see you again." i just think thats rather pleasant. and now that ive typed it out it seems trivial, but im going to leave it anyway.
lets see... more wild adventures. three nights ago AUC threw a party for the study abroad students. it was on the new campus so i assumed that it would be like every other party that a college administration has thrown, that is, kids sitting around making awkward small talk. but actually these orientation people throw a pretty good party. they started out by giving everyone a free robe thing-y; its not called a robe, and they actually get offended if you call it a robe because its like official traditional Muslim garb, but anyway they gave them out and most people put them on. naturally i traded my male version with a girl because hers was bright pink and covered with sequins. so then there was food and then there was a dance, surprise, so i was pretty excited because dancing in a huge crowd of strangers is awesome, so i danced for like 4 hours straight and all of the girls were like, aww, youre so cute, you suck at dancing but you try so hard, and i was like, i know, im like totally adorable. and that was that.
then two nights ago luke and mark randomly walked up to me while i was reading in the lobby and were like come with us now and i was like okay, so we hopped in a cab and went to the equadorian (sp?) embassy where we watched a random movie in spanish, but with, thankfully, english subtitles, about some kid growing up in the hectic environment and debilitated government of equador. it was entertaining, i thought, but luke and mark both fell asleep. but it was free, so thats a plus.
then one night ago, which was actually tonight just a few hours ago, i was just hanging out in the lobby and i heard about a lazer-light show at the pyramids, and i was like wow, that sounds cool, how can i get in on that, and my friends who were going said that i had to have signed up and paid like 130 pounds. mark and jonah were walking by then, too, and we all decided that we didnt want to pay that much but that we would go check it out anyway, so we hopped a cab and went to giza and found a three-story pizza hut and got onto the roof and watched the show from there while we ate pizza. so we got to see the show, which was totally not worth 130 pounds, for way cheaper than everyone else, plus we got pizza and not one but two sketchy cab rides. the only particularly cool part of the show was when they shined a giant moving face onto the sphinx; i thought that should have been the narrator, but alas, it wasnt.
and in about 5 hours my whole room plus a couple of random chicks are taking a bus to an oasis called siwa. im not sure what is there, exactly, but i know that there is water donkey carts and i think that i have heard something about a safari.