Finals Loom
Posted December 17, 2006It's finals week at AUC.
The undergrads walk around with tired eyes, carrying piles of books and flashcards and study materials, making up for studying they missed during the regular term. Their regular classes are done, so their only appointments this week are with the opening and closing hours of the library and their exams. I was in their shoes six months ago.
For the ALI, however, classes are still in session. I have three days of class this week, then two finals on Wednesday, after which I will have completed my first semester at the Arabic Language Institute. Most of my homework is review material, to assist my studying for exams. Though I am studying, I feel confident that I will do well on my tests.
Last week, the entire ALI took the Unified Exam, a single test whose purpose is to stratify us into ability levels for next semester's class placement. We filed into a large auditorium and answered questions on a scantron for a few hours. Since the test was designed for all ability levels, there were questions I could not answer, constructions I had never seen before, and passages I could not comprehend. For those parts, I was using my test taking skills more than my knowledge of Arabic. Still, I feel good about my performance, especially considering that I arrived here with no Arabic at all. I suppose that's kind of a "Hard to be less than zero" way to look at it, but we'll see what Arabic classes I place into, and I can always change to a higher or lower class if the difficulty does not suit me.
The non-academic side of my life has been pretty busy, too. A couple weekends ago, one of the dorm RAs put on a Christmas party event. We made ornaments for a tree, decorated the tree, and decorated cookies with frosting. My friend Alex and I played some guitar, which we do every couple of days anyway.
It's not the usual kind of Christmas tree, but it sufficed.
Later on, the Muslims here in the dorms took group pictures with the Christmas tree.
Guitar ornament!
On the guitar front, I'm still writing music and practicing my small classical repertoire. I'd like to expand on it, so I'm undertaking the project of arranging the tango Por Una Cabeza for two classical guitars. You may recognize it as the tango from the movies Scent of a Woman and True Lies. Since Alex plays guitar, too, I now have someone I can exercise these ideas with. Arranging is tough work. I spent six hours listening to the same eight bars over and over, writing out the music and rearranging fingerings in order to make the piece sound good. It'll be a while before I'm through, but it's good ear training, plus I love the song, even after a million repeats.
Some arrangements I'm working on.
On a slightly related note, I think I'd love to one day learn to dance the tango.
Colin and I are still on an apartment search. We've put in scores of man hours looking at places, hiking around Zamalek and making phone calls and evaluating dozens of locations, but have had marginal success. We did find one place we liked, unfortunately located five feet from one of the major bridges here on the island. The noise wasn't actually too bad, but we realized that on days with no wind the vehicle exhaust would kill us, so that place is off our list. We'll look at another place tonight, above a large grocery store.
Every weekend there are parties, because that's one thing college students love to do, regardless of location. Many of my friends from this term are leaving after this semester, so I try to spend time with them before they fly away for good. Most of them leave this week, anxious to get to their homes before Christmas.
One final event from the last week that's worth mentioning: I came to Cairo with several white t-shirts and pairs of socks. I now own three pink t-shirts and three pink pairs of socks, courtesy of a maroon shirt I bought in Aswan, which bled in the wash. Don't worry, Sara, I'll only tease you about it forever. Noqta!
Not pictured: the third pair of pink socks, on my feet when this picture was taken.
