Putting it All Together

It is now August and not a day goes by that I don't reminisce about my experiences in the Middle East. But my semester there was not all fun and games (or so I tell my parents); it had to in some way enhance my education. I began conducting the primary research on my senior thesis just two weeks ago. The History department suggests that your thesis be rooted in the same field as your concentration, and since my concentration is Middle Eastern history, I decided to write my thesis on the American involvement in the Suez Crisis of 1956.

The first stop on my research tour was Abilene, Kansas, home of the Eisenhower National Library. It's amazing that my study of the Middle East has brought me to middle Kansas. I rolled into Abilene on July 26, which completely coincidentally happened to be the 53rd anniversary of the Suez Crisis. July 26th also holds a special significance for us Cairo veterans because its the name of one of the major roads in Cairo and the name of a bridge connecting our island of Zamalek to Downtown Cairo. It was a bridge we crossed nearly everyday. I needed to do this on the cheap. Since I didn't figure out my research topic until the last minute (I was too busy having fun and playing games in Egypt), I was unable to get any funding. After briefly considering camping for my three night stay, I eventually opted for the Budget Lodge. Abilene at first seemed sleepy and boring to me, by the time I left I really grew to appreciate the place. I easily conversed with people about 4H and the upcoming Kansas Fair, and the fact that it was a small town made it an easy place to manage for a place I had never been before. And in some aspects it reminded me of a live and functioning Fowler, Indiana.

The Eisenhower Library were easy to use and the archivists were extremely helpful. It was a great experience and for the first time I was truly happy to be working on my thesis. It's hard to describe the excitement that comes from looking through boxes upon boxes filled with file folders filled with hundreds of papers and finding buried within some gem of a document, some memorandum of a high-level conversation or minutes from a National Security Council meeting pertaining exactly to what you're researching. And even for the documents that weren't relevant to my topic, it was still exciting to hold pieces of paper once held by President Eisenhower or other historical figures. It was amazing to see the signatures of such people as Nasser and Ben-Gurion. Ever wondered whether Gamal abel Nasser spelled his name Nasr or Nasser? Its Nasser. What About David Ben-Gurion? He signs his name with the the dash, not without. Looking at the declassification dates of the documents was fun as well. The more recent the better, since that meant it was more likely that I was looking at something unavailable to people who previously researched the same topic.

I got back from Abilene on July 30th and today arrived in Princeton, New Jersey, the location of the papers of John Foster Dulles, Eisenhower's Secretary of State. My trip here reminded me of traveling in Cairo. Today was the first time I had been on a plane since my return flight from Cairo, and my first time on a train since the last time I went to Alexandria. If there is one thing I've realized, its that traveling is much more fun with other people, especially when traveling through seedy places. Princeton is not an easy place to get to. I had to fly to Philadelphia and then take the train to Trenton, then take the bus to Princeton and then take a taxi to my hotel. The train was not bad, but the bus wasn't exactly pleasant. Public transport isn't as interesting in your home country. While going through sketchy places in a foreign country is exciting because you get to claim freedom from the standard tourist tract and it usually makes for a good story, doing it here is just forgettable. This isn't exactly a new observation, but public transit in this country really is underutilized, especially when covering between cities rather than within one.

Oh, and then there's the cab. The ten minute cab ride from my bus stop in Princeton to the hotel cost twice as much as the combine two hour train and bus ride from Philadelphia to Princeton. When I tried to negotiate the price (like you would in Egypt), the guy looked at me like I was an idiot. Dismayed, I exited the cab. This is going to be much more expensive than Abilene.

So far, researching has been a great way to stay connected with Egypt. I'm looking first hand at some of the things I studied last semester and I will also be able to visit many of my friends from Cairo when I go to DC to research in the National Archives.