It’s Tuesday night and I leave Thursday afternoon. I am beyond excited and so nervous. I am a mom. Do mom’s do this? What if I forget how airports work or if I fall asleep in the terminal and miss a flight. It’s a 20 hour process, I could fall asleep. What if I forget something important? What if I didn’t try hard enough to learn the things I needed to learn prior to leaving?
Everything I have read talks about the panic before the actual departure. After I walk through security at the airport, it is complete “do what I have to do” mode. I have to get where I am going. Once there, I can figure the rest out.
Cairo has 20 million people in it. I have been in LA, Portland, OR, Seattle, WA, and Anchorage, AK (far far smaller.) I am having a hard time conceiving of that many people.
I picture in my mind this old society. I don’t know why, even after reading and looking through pictures, that Cairo is wrapped in the sense of extreme antiquity. In between the images I have in my head of the busy city streets I have seen here, the history I have studied, and the reading I have done on Cairo today, I still have this..not romantic, but historical attachment to the depth and length of the history there.
I know that I will see extreme poverty. The poverty there is worse than anything I can grasp based on the poverty I have both lived and seen here.
Another biggee for me is that I have 10+ tattoos that all need to stay pretty covered, I am a woman, so modesty is a must, and I don’t know with 100% confidence that I have a good grasp of the attire expected of me beyond that.
Finances are a HUGE concern. Right now the exchange rate for the US Dollar to the Egyptian Pound is 6 to $1 American. I just don’t know how much things there cost. I got every scholarship I had time to apply for. I hope the money I have to go with and my monthly inheritance is enough to keep me afloat and to still be able to do and see the things I am there to do. why travel around the world if I am just going to stay in a dorm, right?
There are so many fears to be faced in doing something like this. There are fears you don’t even recognize. I know that I have been having strange dreams and haven’t been sleeping well, but I couldn’t tell you what I was dreaming about. I must check my email 30 times a day and my bank account the same amount. Once I am on the plane, it isn’t possible for the other shoe to drop, but right now, it’s still entirely possible for something to happen. Right now, I am just doing everything I can do and praying that I did every single thing I could and can.
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