Almost
Homeless

I would have never thought that it would
be soooo frustrating, depressing and upsetting to know that within 5 days you
have to move out of your home and you do not have another one to move into.

My expectations of AIESEC, as I have
been trained, taught and as I have promised myself in the past is to help the
trainee in the country with all the basic requirements as well as well as the
cultural stuff.

Well apparently AIESEC here has missed
out, on what I find the most important factor that is the accommodation.  I
pretty upset at them, or rather maybe at myself for expecting too much.  I
have been put in an apartment and then told that I will have to move out within
2 months expecting that they will find something!!! 

Anyway, so I decided to, once again -
dejavu of Belgium - to find myself somewhere decent to live.  Here in
Egypt, as I have found out, things do not quite work the way as they did in
Belgium, there aren't big orange posters all over the place 'A LOUER' or
website, instead there are adverts on the paper, which would be fine if only
they were written in Latin letters and not Arabic letters.

Anyhow, I decided that the only way to
do this is to go into apartments that look cool and ask 'Ghandek Xaqqa ghal
tnejn' which means do you have an apartment for two people.  Although not
understanding a word of English and I not understanding a word of Arabic they
came to the conclusion that I would like somewhere to live!!! It is actually
quite a comical experience.  So here everything is by word of mouth!!!!
These porters meet up at night and ask around about places to live!!!!

I finally found somewhere which looked
pretty decent in Egyptian Standards until I got the shock that I am not allowed
to have a life of my own, that they will monitor who will go in and out of my
apartment and that boys will not be allowed to put a foot into the apartment,
not even for dinner or a drink!!!!   I was later told that this would
be the case in most apartments, as we would be two girls living together they
would not allow boys to come in, cause it would be a scandal for the
neighbors!!!!!!!!!  Can you believe it!!!

So now, 5 days to go before I'm chucked
out of my apartment and I do not have a home!!!!  I have done a couple of
other requests, met a couple other landlords and bargained a few prices!!!
Hopefully all will sort itself out!!!!!  It should be in the building I
live in now!! so the porters have already gotten used to my hoarish lifestyle
and I don't think it would really bother them if I bring some more guys
home!!!!!!