It's Good to Be [Deputy Chief of Mission]

What up, Reader?

I waited an extra day to put up this post because I knew that doing so would yield even more fodder for blog tales. Several adventures were had this week, and I will struggle to do them justice in the short space I allow myself. I’d like to begin by noting that I’ll be off the radar screen next week, and possibly the week after, due to travel plans involving Jordan and Syria. So I figured I better get in one last good entry before disappearing for a little while.

And what an entry this promises to be. First, I attended my first ever interfaith devotional meeting, put on by my colloquial Egyptian dialect professor. He happens to be of the Baha’i faith, which emphasizes points of intersection between all religions. The meeting therefore began with about half an hour of devotional sharing time, during which each person took two or three minutes to sing a favorite hymn, pray aloud, or share a scripture (he has copies of the Bible, Qur’an, and the Kitabi-Aqdas, which constitutes the main corpus of Baha’i teachings). We then took about an hour and discussed the topic of education (each biweekly meeting centers on a different topic). It was a very productive discussion, especially because it was conducted in the spirit of mutual edification and with an emphasis on shared spiritual assumptions, rather than divergent doctrines. And then we capped it all off with food, which is the only way the meeting could have been any better.

Today (Saturday, 25 July) I went to a cookout at the residence of the Deputy Chief of Mission for the U.S. Embassy in Egypt, Matthew Tueller. He’s one step below Margaret Scobey, current U.S. Ambassador to Egypt; he also happens to be Mormon and goes to church with me, hence the connection. He’s had a long career in foreign service: he majored in International Relations at Brigham Young University and went on to Harvard for a masters degree. He entered the foreign service at age 27 as a specialist in politics with the U.S. State Department. He has worked in the Gulf states for most of his career, including posts as Political Counselor for the U.S. Embassy in Saudi Arabia and Charge d'Affaires/Deputy Chief of Mission for the U.S. Embassy in Kuwait. He served as Political Counselor for the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad, Iraq from 2007-2008, during which he oversaw much of the transition of Iraq’s burgeoning democratic government. As mentioned, he’s now Deputy Chief of Mission for the U.S. Embassy in Egypt.

And his current residence, 10 Taha Hussein St., is incredible. It’s a villa built in the 1920s by German(?) architect Michel “Max” Libermann, whose work dots various upper scale neighborhoods in Cairo and environs. The ground floor has several sitting rooms, a massive dining room complete with a silver collection and tapestries, and a foyer whose square footage rivals that of the house I grew up in. Persian rugs accent original pine hardwood floors. The main landing on the staircase features a gorgeous stained-glass window of a landscape scene, designed by a famous Italian whose name I forget. About twenty of us gathered out back to eat burgers and hot dogs and watch small children swim in the pool. It’s good to be king. Or in this case, Deputy Chief of Mission.

No. 10 Taha Hussein St.

I failed to mention this, but classes ended this week. Which means that my roommate and I will be traveling north with another student from our program, in order to enjoy the historic splendor of Damascus and Aleppo. I’ll be off the blog map for the next week or two, but I promise stories and pictures. Until then, I am yours,

K