...teaching English in Cairo

When I went around my beginner's English class and greeted each student individually last week, "Hello, how are you?" one of my Palestinian students responded, "I'm very sad." When I asked, "Why!?" he said, "Because my country is in fight and my city is in fire." That was the day the fighting broke out in Gaza. Cairo has been on fire about this.

They've since come to class with Palestinian flags and kaffiyas, as they've joined the protests downtown in support of ending the attacks on Gaza, and to pressure Morsi to resolve the situation. All three were smiling yesterday and there was something inside me that felt very proud of them, rather than sorry for them.

Teaching is going so well, so far. Ironically, my favorite class is my night class, which I didn't even want to teach in the first place. But the students have great chemistry together and everyone is a character. The three Palestinian boys are always laughing at my Arabic, and I laugh at their Arabic accents in return. I have a student who is always cracking jokes, one who must be unconscious for most of the class because he always says a completely wrong and random answer, and each of the 5 women in the class have sass. One is a mother of 5 and is married to an American and her kids are all American, so she thought it was about time she learned English. Another works in tourism and we all embarrassed her when she learned the word "boyfriend" and told us she has one. Simple things are so funny, like when i asked the unconscious guy, "Are you a sister?" and he insisted, "Yes, I am a sister!" the class broke out in laughter. We knew he meant he had one, but he didn't get my question.

The best part is that almost all the students will give me a hard time if I don't call on them to participate. So we just spend a great deal laughing and joking around with a tremendous eagerness to learn. It's very refreshing.

During breaks the Palestinian boys buy me coffee or tea. They're actually the best students in the class and bribes for A's aren't necessary. In my morning class, a female student is always bringing me these breadstix snacks that I love. The other teachers joke about how my students spoil me. I happily enjoy it. It's those small gestures of Arab hospitality that I just adore.

Yesterday I was caught up with some minor food poisoning and I actually had to stop in the middle of my first class to vomit, which took the life right out of me and the class. So at night, I told the class we'd skip our break and leave 30 minutes early. Funny thing is, we spent the first half of the class learning about food and the students were asking me to spell things like "macarona bechemel," "foul," "mahshi," "kawera," these are all Egyptian foods that could be translated, but there's no right way to spell them in English, like cappuccino, for example.

I'm enjoying it so much, that I'm going to add more classes next semester. In fact, I'm going to request that all my students in the Level I night class stay together next semester, and that I continue teaching them through the levels. The company's directors are both happy with me, and met with me to discuss progressing with them.

So everything's going well. :-)