Travel: Studying Arabic in Cairo

Margaret Santillo, West Seneca East International Club adviser, had told me about the scholarship being offered through AFS. Its purpose was to teach young Americans the Arabic language in order to promote understanding of the Middle East.

After a round of interviews from AFS, I was chosen from 300 applicants for one of the 25 places on the trip.

It was so scary, to be honest. I was not expecting this curveball in my life. I was leaving senior summer to go to Egypt for six weeks with people I had never met before.

Before the trip, we had several conference calls with previous program participants giving advice on what to expect. I knew I was in for a different experience. I knew I would have to dress more conservatively because Egypt is a mostly Muslim country.

So, at the end of June 2007, I said goodbye to family and friends and began a journey that would change my life forever.

After an orientation in Washington, D. C., we stepped on the KLM flight to Amsterdam and then to Cairo. It felt like a dream.

We arrived in Cairo at 4 a. m. As we drove from the airport, we began to drive past images one sees in those commercials where orphans are asking you to support them for 18 cents a day. I was honestly terrified. I think all of us were wondering: Is this where we’re going to live?

We arrived at the Cairotel and after an orientation, met our host families. I met my Muslim family: Sara, Hager, Abdullah, Mohammed, my host mom, Nadie, and my host dad, Abdelwaheb. My host dad was a manager for Egypt Air and my host mom was an Arabic teacher –so that helped on some homework I had. My host siblings ranged in age from 14 to 22, and all were students in something like high school and college.

I fell in love with their flat. Although it was in a rough part of Cairo, it was huge, with four bedrooms, two bathrooms, a dining room, two living rooms and a wrap-around balcony. It was an awesome place to call home.

My host family fought together, mourned death together, ate dinner and spent quality time every night together –something that American families do not do anymore. They honestly gave me a different view of Islam that I never had from the American media. This was one of the first things I learned when I was there: Never judge someone by appearance or label alone.

For the first three weeks of my trip, I felt like I was suffocating. I didn’t particularly like the food. The Egyptian diet usually consists of bread, falafel, foul (a bean mixture), koshari (a mixture of lentils, chick peas, noodles, rice, and red sauce), and more bread. They rarely eat meat because it’s so expensive.

As a woman, I had to wear nothing that was above my knee and that showed my chest or arms. I had a curfew of 10 p. m. every night even if I was with my older brother, Mohammed. I sometimes got glaring looks because I didn’t wear a veil.

For six hours a day, I studied Arabic at the Kalimat Language Institute. The teachers pushed us to live in the Arabic language.

By the end of my trip, I could read Arabic and understand Arabic conversation. Not only did Kalimat give me the tools to learn the Arabic language, it gave all 25 participants a bonding experience. We could talk about what was bothering us and at the same time learn how diverse Cairo is, since each of us lived in a different part of the city.