A Place Apart

THE ABODE

[Go to Flickr link for photos. This text is only supplementary.]

It has been one month since school began. I have written my first paper and taken my first test. By my standards this means I am settled in, regardless of the articles of clothing that have still never seen the inside of my armoire, and the bags still lounging on my floor. This means it is time to do my semesterly apartment report.

It’s a nice place on the west side of Zamalek , eleven floors up, overlooking the water. We have a combined living room and dinning room with a balcony and clothes line, and a nice little kitchen with a serious lack of shelf space. There are one and a half bathrooms, neither of which has light. At first there was a working light in the hallways, but that burnt out about two weeks ago, and we have not gotten around to replacing it. The full bathroom has a little window, so during the day you have light. At night you either light a candle or wing it. There are three bedrooms. Jessica’s room is just off of the entrance way. The other two rooms are on the hallway with the burnt out light across the living room. First comes Gillian’s room, the master bedroom with the master balcony. Sam and I share the room at the back of the apartment which has a small balcony.

The apartment was consistent water, that gets really hot, and the power has only gone out once, as far as I know. We have some sort of cable or dish that gets in a few English channels and a few French channels which Sam uses. It takes about 20 minutes by taxi to get to school and is a 5LE ride, unless you get a driver with expectations. We are 7 blocks from the dorms and 9 blocks from the closest grocery store, Metro Market. There are also a few little hole-in-the-wall markets in the area and a couple fruit and vegetable stands. The biggest issue with the apartment is that we have no internet. We sent in our application at the beginning of September and it was supposed to take 7-10 days. Nothing has happened. TeData DSL still hasn’t contacted us. Hours on the phone, spent by me, seems to have brought us no closer to getting hooked up.

In total we pay 6,000LE per month. This is about 2,000LE more than we were expecting. I think we are paying for the view.

 

THE ABODERS

When I entered the apartment for the first time it seemed stale and cold and small. Over the last month however the apartment has blossomed with decorations. The best of these decorations however are not the ones tacked to the walls or hanging from the lights, it is the moving ones—no not the nice glass balcony doors in Sam and my room that don’t latch correctly and bang against the walls and keep me up all night. It is the decorations that lay down on my homework and chew the side of my text books, the decorations that drift out to the balcony to talk with me at 4:00 AM after a long day, the decorations that make me dinner when I have a too much homework to be bothered, the decorations that scold me for doing homework when we have guests over, the decorations that bang against the walls and keep me up all night.

Jezebel: A crazy white cat with a brown tail. Do not pick her up for more than 5 seconds unless you are wearing gloves. Jezebel will attempt any feat of acrobatics once, and, if it does not kill her, she will try it again.

Greatest moment in my eyes: Running all the way up the balcony curtains to pounce on a fly… that was on the ceiling.

Morrison: An odd ash cat with white trim. He is my preferred of the two and hangs out with me more. He once went missing for a day and after causing much worry was discovered under Jessica’s bed.

Greatest moment in my eyes: The first time he responded to me when I said, “Mmmrraaaaooww, mraaaaaow, mmmmmerrrrrroaw,” which is cat for, “please get off my book. I have to read that.”

Sam: A happy blond human with a love for candy. Sam forgot his razors back in Oregon and has been getting progressively scruffier as the semester progresses. I keep telling him he can us mine but he turns me down. I think it is one of those college moments. He tends to emit strange noises like, “Ooga booga!” and “grawmph!” and “eeughxgl!” He was once in a punk band called “The Worst Thing Ever,” at least that is what he always calls it. They released one album but decided to keep it a secret.

Greatest moment in my eyes: Saying, “Cole, lets go down this way. Whenever we come past here I want to go check out that tree.” It was a comment that led to the discovery of one of my favorite places in Cairo.

Cole: A dopy dark brown human with a bit of feline in him. Do not pick him up for more than 5 seconds unless you are wearing gloves. He recently discovered the joys of pristine side parts. Cole has been thinking a lot lately, trying to break cycles, and debating the net benefits of taking it easy. He has started smoking and is questioning his sexuality. If you do not know him, he would like to meet you.

Greatest moment in my eyes: Discovering that he can talk to cats, or at least Morry.

Gillian: A snarky very dark brown human with a scull in her bed. Gillian is creative artistic and spontaneous. She is almost done making a dress out of one of the junky old blankets that was stuck in a corner of the apartment. Graphic novels are her bread and radiation laced butter. She would probably date anyone first name Super last name Man. Do not give her chocolate, peanut butter or potatoes. Gillian is a self declared misanthrope and likes giving Cole a hard time. She projects a very hard exterior.

Greatest moment in my eyes: Being provoked into beating the tan out of me when I had not felt some good pain in a very long time.

Jessica: A joyous nearly-black human with stories. She is an amazing writer currently working on at least one graphic novel which is being illustrated by Gillian. Jessica is Gillian’s big sister (or younger twin depending on which mythos you follow). She arrived a couple weeks ago and will be studying Arabic next semester. It is hard to say what it is about Jessica that makes her so very special.

Greatest moment in my eyes: Telling me that she writes about me a lot, but can’t post any of it now that I know her blog address.