Productivity? What?

Shocking turn of events today - I actually felt useful at my job at Ana Al-Misri. I don't mean to disparage what I've been doing over the past 6 weeks; I've formed strong relationships with some of the kids and given them some of the attention they all crave and need. Yet I've accomplished nothing that I can point to in three, six, or twelve months and say, "I did ________ to help street kids in Cairo." At least, until this morning's planning session. The seven of us who work at Ana Al-Misri have formulated a plan to start a game room and library for the kids, which would be implemented by the students on our program next summer. We're hoping that this will not only give the Ana Al-Misri kids something to do (their toys and games are very limited at this point; often I see kids playing jacks with pebbles) and instill in them a sense of responsibility, but also give future participants on our program a more concrete project to work on. We spent our morning at the center working out the logistics of our proposal, from a timeline to mission statement to required materials, and the accomplishment we all felt was incredibly uplifting. I'm very excited to get to work on the initial phases of the project, mainly writing grants and collecting games and CDs through various organizations at home, and I hope that this will be a success and we can have a lasting impact on the center (inshaallah).

The only other truly notable part of my day was the insane taxi ride I took home from a movie. The drive started off oddly: just after we'd gotten in the cab, someone in another car offered the driver a 50 pound note to do... something? But the driver replied, "No, I'm driving Americans." (We weren't really sure what that was about.) Then came the drive itself; I don't think I've ever been more scared for my life. He was speeding and swerving and honking, yelling at other taxi drivers who then flicked him off. At one point, he stopped the cab on the side of highway, saying he needed to get water. He retrieved either water or oil from the trunk, opened the hood, and poured some in, then got back in and started us up again. At this point, I was pretty sure that the cab was going to burst into flames within the next few minutes. We continued to zoom in and out of traffic, at one point passing a car bedecked with blinking Christmas lights, and finally arrived back at our apartment, in about half the time the drive should have taken. I was definitely happy to be out of a moving vehicle and ready to climb into bed. Masa al-khair!