in the fall of 2008 i spent a semester studying in cairo, egypt at the middle east studies program (mesp), which is run by the american council of christian colleges and universities. we lived in the neighborhood of agouza, just blocks from the nile. we studied arabic, islam, the israeli-palestinian conflict, and the society and politics of egypt and the region. listened to many guest speakers, the majority of whom were profoundly interesting. lived for a week with a coptic egyptian family in a part of cairo called garbage city. every few weekends we traveled to different places in egypt - places like the oasis of siwa in the sahara out near the libyan border, alexandria, dahab and mount sinai on the sinai peninsula, and luxor and the valley of the kings in "upper" (southern) egypt. we also spent a month traveling through the region, to istanbul and ankara in turkey, aleppo and damascus in syria, amman and the dead sea in jordan, and israel and palestine. wonderful friends were made, a ton of fun was had, and basically my wordview was fundamentally altered. definitely one of the more formative semesters of my college career!
