Global Reflections

I remember standing in line to pay for my coffee in the cafe on campus. I remember looking up at the muted television mounted to the wall. I remember seeing the smoke billow from the Twin Towers, and reading the closed captioning, and wondering how a plane had gotten so out of control.

I remember realizing that it was a deliberate attack. I remember the shock. The disbelief. The horror.

I remember staying on campus and pretending to work, while refreshing Drudge every ten seconds or so. I remember giving up and going to my apartment so I could turn on the television news.

I remember the tears streaming down my face as I watched images and heard stories of broken people and broken lives.

I remember the grief and pride of knowing that heroes rushed in, sacrificing their lives, while others rushed out.

I remember the rage that burned away the last of my shock and forged a determination to do what little I could to prevent something like this from ever happening again.

I remember, and I will never forget.

We had planned to be in Cambodia by now. We aren't.

There were a few paperwork snafus and some additional steps we had to take before we can move on to our next post, and we're in the process of sorting everything out now. It looks like we should be ready to go by the end of this month, and then I'll start this blog up again in earnest.

I just wanted to make it clear that I haven't forgotten about this blog or decided not to do it. Things are just taking a little longer than anticipated.

Update: We have tickets! We finally know when we'll arrive in Cambodia ... but it's still a little longer away than we had anticipated. We should arrive on 6 October. I'm not sure how long after that I'll have to wait for internet access, but I'll start blogging again as soon as I can once we arrive.

This blog has been set up in preparation for this fall. Posts should start appearing sometime in September 2011, after my family reaches our new home in Phnom Penh, Cambodia.

I have imported the entries from my former blog, Reflections From Maadi, which was written while we were posted in Cairo, Egypt, from June 2008 to June 2011. I hope you enjoy looking through them as I take a break from blogging this summer.

Today is the day.

By the time this post publishes (it's been scheduled a little in advance), my family and I will have left Egypt.

What to say on a day like this? One chapter of my life is ending today. It's a chapter I'd like to keep open for a while longer. I expressed my nostalgia in my "Saying Good-bye" post not too long ago. Now I've said my good-byes to my friends, my favorite shops and their keepers, my favorite restaurants and their owners and employees.


What I haven't said yet is "Thank you." Thank you, embassy community, for preparing the way for me and for providing so many small and large luxuries to make my adjustment easier. Thank you, expat community as a whole, for welcoming me, embracing me, and providing a supportive social network during every phase of my life here. Thank you, Maadi Community Church, for showing me a glimpse of what heaven will look like. Thank you, Maadi Women's Guild, for giving me the opportunity to fellowship with other Christian women, to participate in group Bible studies, and to serve people who need it more than I ever imagined possible in my comfortable life back in the States. Thank you, Caritas Egypt, for running the baby wash program, which was my first foray into volunteering in Egypt. Thank you, Mother Teresa's, for running the orphanage and daycare where the children stole my heart from the moment I met them.

Thank you, people of Cairo, for welcoming me into your country. For being supportive and not impatient with me as I mangled your lovely language in my attempts to speak it, and for your attempts to help me learn it better and more quickly. For caring about my daughter and looking out for her welfare, even when I disagreed with your advice. For offering me a seat on the Metro even though I'm sure you were more exhausted and in need of it than I was. For using your own Metro ticket to get the turnstile to let me out that time when my ticket decided to stop working during transit. For banding together to protect my daughter, myself, and my property from your less upstanding neighbors during the Revolution.

Thank you, Egypt, for showing me that I'm stronger, more adaptable, and more capable than I realized. For showing me how good my life is. For showing me how good life can be even for people who have so much less than I have, as long as they have faith, family, and a sense of humor. For giving me a taste for adventure. For helping me understand that adventure does not always feel adventurous. For helping me realize that a laid-back attitude doesn't mean that things can't get done, just that they get done in a different way and with different timing. For showing me that things don't have to get done how and when I want them to, and I'll still be just fine. For allowing me to expand my horizons and those of my daughter.

Good-bye, O Egypt, and thank you.

Ma'salama, ya Masr, wi shukran.

I have enjoyed writing Reflections from Maadi over the last three years. However, I just don't see my way clear to continue writing Reflections from Maadi once we no longer live in Maadi.

Take heart, however (or be discouraged, if you rejoiced at the thought of this blog ending), for although this blog will end, a new one will begin. I decided to start a new blog, with a new name and a new address that aren't so country-specific, so that it can stay with me as we move from post to post over the years. The plan is to import the content of Reflections from Maadi and eventually delete this blog.

I do intend to publish one more post here, my good-bye to Egypt, so stay tuned for that.

My new blog will not have any new posts until this fall. I may feel compelled to write a little something before our arrival in Cambodia, but it's more likely that I won't post anything until September, after we arrive and set up internet access. This summer I will not be blogging, although I hope to keep up with the blogs I read.

My new blog is called Reflections from a Global Nomad, and it can be found at http://global-reflections.blogspot.com. Consider this post your invitation to join me there. I hope to see you there in September!