(Grace and Lilly at Alwan wa Awtar Children's Center, Muqattam). Today, Sunday June 1, we visited all of our Service Learning sites - glass-blowing workshop (Establ Antar), quilting/knitting workshop (Muqattam), children's center (Muqattam), and carpet-making training center (Hadaek el Koubbeh). Our goals were (a) to show our draft websites to the men and women who run these various centers/workshops and (b) to purchase as many of their products as possible! Collectively, we spent a respectable amount of LE/$$ on blown-glass and knitting/quilting products (table cloths, handbags, even oven mitts!).
We are now in our final week of classes; the final class is this Thursday (Dr. Mo has an Engineering final on Friday morning). And we will have a "debrief"/wrap-up a week from today, 8 June, at al-Azhar Park http://www.alazharpark.com
If you are a parent reading this, please encourage your child to "play it safe" on our final 2 "free days", this coming Friday and Saturday. Some students want to go outside Cairo, which is fine IF they use our own drivers (unfortunately, this would be at their own expense). Some students have been invited by our Egyptian "dialoguers" (their new friends, whom they met through our Dialogue at Fulbright) to visit some resort areas. I told a few students that I do not want them riding in private cars OUTSIDE of Cairo; inside Cairo is another story, but traveling outside of Cairo in cars driven by people I do not know ... I do not recommend this, and in fact I will not "allow" it. Of course, I cannot prevent them from doing this, but if your child is thinking along these lines, and if they ask your advice, please help me discourage them. But, if you think I am being too cautious, then you (and they) may of course ignore my advice ... I would prefer that the students end their time in Cairo in a relaxed, even "reflective" mood - enjoying Cairo their last days here; thinking about their time in Egypt; and of course finishing their course assignments for me and their other professors.
