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Novela de la ausencia... Nada más.

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Wanted: Arabic Speakers

I had an epiphany in class the other day. I don’t want to make any new friends here. Then the thought process started to refine itself. I don’t want to see my friends leave. How do I avoid that? The people who leave quickly don’t speak or want to speak Arabic. I need more Egyptian friends.

All of this revolves around how difficult it is to see friends leave. In the past weeks quite a few of close friends left Cairo. I can pick my things up and leave, but there’s something about being left behind that prickles and swelters like a limb awoken from sleep. It forces me to move around, stretching out my social muscles, and sometimes limping to the next circle.

Undoubtedly those people who are leaving feel a sense of need to move on, to progress themselves and their careers. Some miss Cairo, and a few return. One of the most difficult aspects of these departures is the introspection that inevitably follows a good friend leaving for a new opportunity. Self-criticism, worry, and discontent displace the happiness I have for my friend who is moving on to the next thing.

It’s selfish, but self-destructing too. It's dismal nostalgia with unconfident future plans. Comparing myself doesn’t help me plan my future. However, it’s that solace repeated now too many times that’s lead me to a conclusion. I have to work harder to find better friendships. That shouldn’t be hard, I think quite often, but is it really so simple to find the right sorts of people?

I feel like an old hand after 13 months. It’s easy for me to make my way through the streets. I can tell who is new to the area simply by the look in the eyes, dress, and body language. It’s also easier for me to live here given my Arabic skills.

Nobody in their right mind will start studying Arabic as an adult and after a handful of years claim fluency. (I think that term should be banned from certain lexical conversations, but that’s another topic for another day). I mean that after two years of study, a year of which has been intensive training here in Egypt, I can hold a conversation on a very wide range of topics. My vocabulary has expanded from the immediately practical to metaphorical and abstract language. I can make my teachers, men and women, laugh from jokes or imperfect sarcasm. I have had screaming political debates with one of my teachers, which led to the unfortunate realization that I need to be very careful about who I start yelling at in Arabic because it might just actually make sense and get me in to some trouble — no more being written off as some crazy, confused white person. All of this is to say, I’ve made a great deal of progress because of devoted study, but I know I have far to go, and that means constant exposure. That’s my fundamental interest that brought me to Cairo. I need to be around more Arabic speakers.

Again, it’s selfish, but I’m not really looking for more of the same. At first, I realized I didn’t want to make new friends with people who are simply staying here for another three months to half a year and then leaving. It’s best to find more people that will be here on a long term. And then I thought about completely rejecting friendship with non-Arabic speakers. And then the real epiphany hit. I know so few people who, after being here for years, sometimes three or four, who speak Arabic. Where are the expats who speak Arabic? Surely they exist.

To be fair, many expats must be distinguished for they’re working full-time and can devote that much more time to using what I study to practice. I understand, but still I am unimpressed by the attitude’s of some blasé foreigners here who have zero desire to learn the language. That’s not to be confused with those who have tried while balancing a full schedule. If learning a modicum of Arabic isn’t for the love of the culture or eased living, then what about for self-respect? Imagine after four years in Cairo, a candidate walking into a job interview and the employee asks, perhaps rhetorically, ‘Well your Arabic must be pretty good now, right?’ And it dawns on that soul, actually it’s non-existent. That’s a tragedy.

It’s a tragedy because Arabic is not just a complex language, but a key to understanding so much more about this region, and certainly Egypt so fraught with subtle customs, traditions, and superstitions. In my eyes, language is always a function of culture. It’s the skeleton key to greater empathy and a hell-of-a-lot-more fun than running into the same people time and time again in the same dirty, under-served expat traps in the various islands of wealth in Cairo.

Why wouldn’t you want to get out of the rut? Surely, the people who enjoy themselves most are not the ones living a stunted and facsimiled Western lifestyle in the upscale parts of Cairo. To enjoy that lifestyle the most you have to go to the source. The most fun to be had here is homegrown. I know plenty of adventurous souls who have sought out these opportunities (often with more success than me) and who do not speak Arabic.

Why is it that I don’t see any three, four, plus year veterans with great Arabic skills? This might be utterly logical and derivative, but it’s the fact they do not hang out with the likes of me — they have left the station and tried to immerse themselves in the language and culture. They have dispensed of the notion of still speaking in English, still doing Western expat things, still thinking like that one more step from illusory success remains for a plane ticket back to Western reality. That’s never why I came here, and I feel ashamed I haven’t gotten up to my neck in the thick, swampy mess of cultural opportunities available to me here in Cairo.

That shame is likely the source of some resent and self-criticism I feel whenever a close friend departs. Too many people equate their time in Cairo with a besmirched record. As if it’s this horrible muck that clings to one’s skin and sullying one’s consciousness. Most of those people do not bother with Arabic. Those who have no desire to learn Arabic, certainly view their time in Egypt like a long muggy summer overcast with rainclouds. I understand that Egypt is a difficult place to live — it’s not a hardship though. And it's definitely not a place that can be understood without trial and error, sacrifice, and effort. Too many people just don’t want to try.

It’s those people I want to avoid, which isn’t hard. They make more money than me, and spend it inside safe places I cannot access sparing seldom infiltrations. No, my future is with the Arabic-speakers. Like those vaunted expats who have so adroitly blended into their surroundings so as to drop off the expat radar. The ongoing train wreck of a joke here is that each expat is only a degree of separation from the next, which inevitably leads to dissatisfaction, boredom, and unwanted drama. Indeed, the only disaster I find here is the one into which I voluntarily admit myself.

But I can't forget the luxuries that come from the Westernized parts of Cairo. The food is better and more diverse in these areas. There’s less harassment, and the housing is nicer. My friends that live there are generous, and I’d be ungrateful if I didn’t admit enjoying better alcohol, food, and comforts of their hospitality. All that said, my true comfort and wellbeing is a longterm process. That requires sacrifices and pushing myself out of my comfort zone into the Arabic speaking areas.

I need to take on the mindset of the people who have jumped into the deep end and survived with raw skill, desire, an open mind and open heart. I respect those people for embracing Cairo with all that it has to offer, which is surely plenty. I have other barriers and obstacles that challenge me from befriending more Egyptians, but I now I know its necessity for meeting my own goals and also as a defense mechanism. It makes it that much harder to continue living in a city otherwise so taxing and grinding. I have to invest in better relationships.

At the end of it all, I know I’ll take with me experiences and memories and forfeit the rest. I’ll leave behind all those people with little guarantee I see them again, just like they did me. Thinking about it will not make it easier when the day inevitably arrives. Maybe my attempt to connect on a deeper level will forge strong and lasting relationships.

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