If you've ever been to the area in Los Angeles known as Sun Valley (in northern San Fernando Valley), you'll know that it's known for its car junk yards. There are certain areas in Sun Valley where "wreckage yard" and "auto dismantling" signs densely saturate the skyline as much as the billboards and ads do on Sunset. If you ever need any type of car part, head over to Sun Valley because that city has it all.

Well, I think I've found the Sun Valley of Cairo. Because I live in it.

My street is named after the French heiroglyph Jean-François Champollion, who was given the task of deciphering the Egyptian portions of the Rosetta Stone from 1822-1824 and is credited as giving birth to the field of modern Egyptology. This guy was huge, to say the least.

The street starts at one of the main streets in Downtown Cairo, 26th of July (and along its stretch is home to Abou Tarek, a popular Egyptian koshary joint... closed during Ramadan), and ends at the foot of the famous Cairo museum, the Museum of Egyptian Antiquities, wherein you can find artifacts Champollion no doubt had his hands in, and where the mummy of Ramses II himself is safely kept.

So if the man was a big deal, the street should be a pretty big deal as well, right?

Or should I say football.

The other night, when we went shopping at Spinneys and ate dinner at Ruby Tuesday, we couldn't help but hear cheering and grunting in the distance (and even at the table across from us).

Turns out, there was a big football match that night, Algeria versus Egypt (or more specifically, JS Kabylie versus Al Ahly Cairo). I won't even act like I know the magnitude of these two teams matching up, but it was quite the sight when we left Ruby and walked over to a massive crowd of Egyptians huddled round plasma screens.

While the energy was palpable, I was only able to grab this shot of this one girl looking extremely horrified. I guess Egyptian men handle their emotions differently than Egyptian women (if you know what I mean... and if you've never been to a Middle Eastern country, you don't). I only stood there for five minutes so I couldn't get a shot of an enormous uproar (like when Egypt scored their first goal) or a gigantic groan (like when Algeria scored their tying goal), but hey, this one will do for now.

And to explain further how deep the Egyptian/Algerian rivalry is, the next day at AUC orientation, we did something where this lady read a list of every country that was represented in the room and those students would stand. Naturally, Egypt was very well represented. And when Algeria's name came up... boos rang wild. haha.

My friends are now finally getting acclimated with Cairo: They’ve been here for nearly a week and have slept less than 10 hours. The true Cairene lifestyle. But more important than resetting their sleeping clocks, they’ve now found a place – a rather beautiful place, Mashallah – not too far from me. And with the ownership of a new place comes the necessary ‘buying of all the stuff’ for that place. So we went to the biggest mall Cairo has to offer: Citystars in Nasr City.

It wasn’t my first time at Citystars, I went there last week to do a little exploring (check my Cairo page on Flickr for photos from that trip). I wandered into the biggest mall I think I’ve ever been in. It’s a mall, three hotels, houses thousands of apartments and offices, a movie theatre, and a mini-amusement park. Place is gigantic. But probably the coolest thing they have at Citystars (aside from the gigantic Spinneys – a Costco-esque Arab supermarket – which was the reason for our trip out to Nasr City) is the Ruby Tuesday on the fifth floor.

They told me before I left, but I didn't give it a single thought. It didn't really faze me to be honest.

Few washing machines, and no dryers? Psh. Big deal.

But a few days after I landed, the realization of the piles of laundry that started to stack up -- not just of clothes that I had worn that were still clean, but literally of clothes that needed to be washed because of the humidity here -- started to pile up.

The hostel I stayed at washed clothes for LE 2 each.

This guy at the bottom of my flat washes and dries shirts for LE 3 and pants for LE 5.

But what about the rest of my clothes? Who's going to deal with those?

First off, I’m sorry for not writing in a while. My flat’s Internet has been pretty dodgy (stealing it from a neighbor) and thus I haven’t been able to properly update here. But the owner says he’ll have better Internet, just for me, up soon so after that it’ll be smooth sailing. The last couple days I’ve been trekking down to the McDonald’s near Tahrir to get free and fast Internet at 3 in the morning, but I don’t want to do that long-term!

Speaking of my owner though, he got into a BIG argument with our doorman a few nights ago just before we broke our fast. I heard it from my living room and couldn’t help but stick my head out the window to listen in. Everyone on the street did the same. It was an intense fight. Yelling, pushing, name-calling (swearing perhaps?!). Other people nearby had to even come in and break it up! What were they arguing about?

I’ve been traveling for one week now – it was exactly seven days ago this hour that I was packing my bag to start this Middle Eastern adventure. Parents were sad, I was excited, Cairo was indifferent.

But now seven days later, I can now say I completely underestimated not only traveling, but traveling during Ramadan. One of the first things that I thought about when I realized Ramadan would overlap with my study abroad was that there is no way I’m not going to take advantage of fasting in a Muslim country. It would just be so unlike anything I’ve ever experienced in America. So I scheduled my plans so that, no matter what, I would spend nearly all of Ramadan in Egypt.

I fasted the first day in Los Angeles, the day my plane took off. It was no big deal. It’s Los Angeles. yawn. I didn’t fast the second day (August 12) because I was in travel mode and you don’t pray while in physical travel. But when I landed at Cairo International last Friday the 13 – ahh!! – I got a quick bite to eat and started my fast.

Like I said, I completely underestimated it.

There’s nothing really more American than a McDonald’s. Especially a McDonald’s in Egypt.

I told myself that the first thing I’d do when I landed in Cairo was to go looking for a Burger King and get myself a whopper. I keep halaal and in America, halaal food isn’t as easy to come by. And you’ll almost never find a halaal fast food joint. So being in a Muslim country, I wanted very much to eat me a whopper – because I’ve always been a BK supporter rather than a golden arches supporter. We have our loyalties.

But when you’re walking down a busy Cairene street on a humid night that could give the Amazon a run for its money, seeing that magical M in the distance is something no one can dare pass up. Especially if you haven’t yet properly broken your fast. And I figured, since I ate street food last night, it wouldn’t be a crime to eat “American” food tonight.

Walking in, I was hit with a blast of cold air. My God did it feel exquisite. The red and yellow theme, hijabs and mustaches all over the place. It felt good to be home – well, almost home. I surveyed the condensed menu. Big Mac. Quarter Pounder. Big Mac Chicken. McArabia (grilled kofta!). Double McRoyale. I’m lovin’ them all! But which one to pick?

I’ve spent my first day in Cairo now, so get ready for an in-depth write-up. It’s a doozy! No really, it’s really, really long.

It was very dark above the Mediterranean – when my Tarom airplane’s interior lights were turned off, you could see stars glimmering brightly above, brighter than anything I’ve ever seen in the states, even at Joshua Tree.

The moment we hit Egypt, between Alexandria and El Mansura, the glimmering lights in the sky became with the glimmering lights on the ground. It was beautiful, the patches of lights here and there. But the beauty didn’t reach its height until we were on the outskirts of Cairo and the glimmer-free Nile sat below our plane.

I have been surveying and studying Cairo in Google maps for quite some time, but what we on the plane saw cannot be considered on par with anything Google could ever give us. It was breathtaking. I didn’t know whether to record the scene and watch through the camera or to throw it aside and take it all in on my own. Luckily for you, I chose the former.

(click here to watch a short video of the flyover to Egyptian music!)

The moment I exited the plane, I was reminded of Russell Peters’ joke about what happens to you when you get off a plane in India. I was relieved that his smell was not the same in Egypt, but there was definitely a smell. A very distinct smell. As if someone left a car’s engine running next to the plane for the last 50 years. Like I walked into an old wrecking yard in Sun Valley. You get used to it fast.

The time above is Paris time, which is +2 GMT (9 hours ahead of Pacific). And the photo above is Terminal F at Charles de Gaulle International Airport in the city where the sky looks so gorgeous words cannot begin to describe. But instead of photographing it, I’m writing about it. Genius, eh?

Seriously, I apologize to Air France in my earlier update from 11 hours ago (or so?). You guys were so nice on the plane. Perfect flight. And the French I spoke to on the plane were very nice. On my left sat a Frenchie and on my right sat an Israeli. All three of us conversed about traveling – the Israeli has traveled all over Africa as well as the Middle East, but I had to explain to the Frenchie that Cairo was in Egypt. That’s okay though.

Air France gave me my Muslim meal (chicken curry for “dinner” and some kind of Indian breakfast/sweet for “breakfast.” I don’t mind that Muslim means Indian food, haha. I surprisingly ate all of it with fervor. I had originally just broke my fast with Mountain Dew, and then ate that $10 pizza from Wolfgang. So a proper meal was no doubt needed. I’m not fasting today because I’m traveling, but when I land in Cairo in about 8 hours Inshallah (after I stop in Bucarest, Romania) I’ll eat real quick and then fast again.

I'll make this one quick because I'm currently sitting at Gate 25 at Terminal 2 at LAX, connected to the Internet via Android tether and my row is boarding (row 28).

I'll say a few things, and forgive me if I sound like a newb because I've really never been on a plane... let alone an international flight! Food is super expensive!! $10 for a Wolfgang Puck pizza. $2.50 for Mountain Dew. $2.00 for the restroom. Okay, not the last bit, but would you put it passed them?

And no offense to the French, but Air France is kind of rude. And so too are the Customs people. No time to go into detail because I literally have to get on the plane.