I’m still lookng at schools and trying to figure out
what and where I want to do this. My latest option is a little
different that the last one… I’m looking at doing an Arabic immersion
program at the American University of Cairo. It’s a year long
program… From there I might go ahead and enroll in their master’s
program in Arabic/Islamic studies. I like this for several reasons.
First of all I’m facinated in Islam and its history, it would be an
incredible experience, and Arabic is much more likely to land me a
decent job than Tibeten will…
Yeah I know, it’s a long way away, and isn’t it
dangerous for an American named Isaac to live in Egypt right now? I’ve
been looking into the safety thing, and there doesn’t seem to be any
significant violence towards Americans over there right now. The state
department says that crime is very low in Egypt (no doubt due to some
rather draconian punisments) and they don’t have any warning for
Americans on their site. Maybe I’ll assume a not so Jewish name when I
go, any suggestions? I’m kinda partial to “Tito”, but I’m listening to
other ideas…
When I thought of the idea of doing an Arabic
immersion program, I immediately thought of safety. I’ll skip the
programs on the Saudi peninsula, Syria (yikes!), Israel, and a handful
of language only schools. I was looking at some immersion programs in
tunisia, morocco, and Turkey and as beautiful (and cheap) as those
places looked I think I’d rather go to a place with an actual
university and graduate programs…
Just on a whim, I looked on Monster to see what
kinds of jobs were being offered for Arabic speakers. A couple jumped
right out at me. There are multiple listings for interrogators(!), not
from the government, but government contractors… The army reserves
ads cracked me up. They will pay a bonus of up to $7000 if you enlist
and you have to enlist for an 8 year tour of duty… They say you “may”
be called up to active duty (yeah right) and the duties may include
doing reports on media coverage, translating documents to be given to
local governments, general clerical duties, and oh yeah, you MAY be
required to man checkpoints in Bahgdad. I kid you not, that was the
gist of the ad… As dreamy as that job sounds, I don’t think I’d
consider that in my future… no wonder the Army’s having trouble
attracting people.
Anyway, there seems to be lots of potential in a skill like that, so I’m thinking about it…
Isaac