Sharm El Sheikh - Fun Times, Eerie Setting

So, I got back from Sharm El Sheikh last night and what an experience it was. I had such an amazing time. I went snorkeling twice, tubing, parasailing and swam, all in the most beautiful water I have ever seen, the Red Sea. However, all the fun and good times were haunted by an odd feeling as I walked past countless alomst empty restraunts and walked on only slightly crowded streets in an area that just weeks ago would have been packed so tight that it would be difficult to move. I went into one of the most elite clubs in the area, Little Buddha, and found only a small number of people. Sure, the non-crowded beaches were enjoyable, and not having to wait for any activites was nice, but all the same it was odd to think about how much the economy in the area must be suffering. The entire area is designed and run on the premise that it would be filled with people right now, but now, due to a senseless act it has been left almost destitute. Seeing the bomb sites was a sight I shall not soon forget, to see half a building demolished and countless shops with their windows broken out and shattered products lying on the floor. There is really no words to describe what I saw, and I can honestly say that what you see on the news or in pictures is nothing compared to what I experienced in actually being there. It really hit me one night that I was sitting in a cafe next to the bombing site in the old market how much damage had really been done, both in the physical sense and in the huge impact it had on the economy and overall life of the city. I have mixed feeling of both great joy of all the fun times I had while in Sharm, and sadness at so many things that I saw and experienced. What I know for sure is that the terroists attacks did nothing but to hurt and maybe ruin the lives of many people who depend on tourism for their livelyhood. Well, I will try to post a couoe pictures and write a final post about my trip when I get home on the 4th, goodbye for now.

Update From Egypt

Well, I arrived in Egypt at 12:30am last night (5:30pm EST) and it has been really fun so far. We have really done too much yet today, still kinda setteling in, but Cairo is a HUGE city. I have seriously never seen anything like it. There seems to be lots to do tho an I can;t wait to go out for the night with my sister and her friends. Our plans at this point are to go to Sharm, enjoy it, not worry, and just plain have fun. We will only be there a couple of days, and most of the time will be spent outside of the majo tourist area so none of us are worried. Also i will definately visit Alexandria and a couple of other cities. Well, Morocco was great, and Egypt is lookin like it will be too. Well, its time for me to go now and get back to seeing and exploring the massiveness of Cairo and the rest of Egypt. Goodbye for now!

Posting From Morocco

So, it has been nearly a week now since I left the confines of cincinnati and came to Morocco, and it has been alot of fun. The moroccan wedding was absolutely amazin, I can't even describe it in written words. Rabat was a beautiful city, a little boring for nightlife tho, but that didn;t matter since we spent late nights at the two wedding ceremonies. I just arrived is Marakech after spending a day in the city of Casablanca. Casablanca was realyl awesome, it had an amazing nightlife and lots happening, as well as very western places to go. I arrived in Marakech about an hour ago and just got into an internet cafe. The weather has been pretty hot but not really any worse that Cincinnati was when I left, not sure about now ;). I am spedning on night here is Mar and then flying off to Cairo tomorrow morning. We are not sure what we are going to do yet once in Egypt, as we had orginally planed on going to Sharm el-Sheik for a couple of days, but in light of the recent terrorist attacks there we are not sure what we are going to do. Alot of our decision will be based on what the people we know that live there think, so yea, we should know after we get there what we are going to do. The only definate thing at this point is that we are going to Egypt for sure and I am still returning on the planned date. I am really upset that people have not just commited a rutheless act, but also, as slefish as it may sound, have disruppted my vacation plans. All the same, I am sure Egypt will still be great, and even if I don;t make it to Sharm that all the other places will be beautiful as well. I must go now as I only have one day here in Marakech and want to see as much a I can, hope everyone is well, and to my friends at home, I will see you in a few days. Ma-asalama (Goodbye)!

Skippin School to Further My Education

So, today I skipped school in order to go on a visit to OSU (Ohio State University). Since I had to be up at OSU at 9am for my tour I decided I would leave around 6am, meaning that I had to wake up at about 4:30am. Since I ended up arriving at 8am I think I can be pretty sure that I could have left a little later, but oh well, it wasn't too bad, I picked up some Starbucks and went on my merry way. The tour of the school went pretty well, I generally liked the campus. The housing wasn't quite what I had hoped for, but pretty damn good for university housing none the less. I didn’t really get to see a lot of specific things, it was more a general overview of the campus and housing, but I did get to drive by the new Mechanical Engineering being built, it did look pretty sweet. I guess my only real disappointment was the day was learning about OSU's recently changes parking policy for freshman. Next year (2005-2006), my freshman year, the university decided to prohibit freshman who live in dorms from having cars or a parking permit, so yea, that is pretty depressing. I had really hoped that I would be able to bring a car, and had felt pretty good about OSU because of the thought tha I would be able to have one, but I guess that hope is out the window. As dumb as it may sound, the idea of not having a car is actually forcing me to reconsider my college choice. I absolutely loathe public transportation, so yea, I do not look forward to having to deal with that. Then there is the feeling I will have of being trapped knowing that my house and some of my friends are only going to be an hour to two away and I'll never be able to see them. The new rule change really pisses me off, I mean, at the time I sent in my acceptance fee there was no mention of parking changing, I was only informed when I got my housing app and there was a card saying there were some changes to parking policy that I should look at. So yea, I went to the website and was stricken by the bad news. So, at the moment I am really not sure of my college choice anymore, at all, which is really bad considering I have to decide by May 2nd. I hope to find some guidance in making my decision, but I don’t know where it is going to come from, I just know I need it, and soon! Well, I don’t really have a lot more to say, I just hope I'll be able to figure out all this college stuff soon, and that I will be happy with whatever decision I make.

Sordid Saturday

Yea, basically, this whole day has been terrible. First off, there is the whole issue of the cocktail hour for McAuction being at my house this evening. From the time I woke up I was working on stuff to clean the house or make the grounds more suitable, which may not have been so bad if it weren't for the terrible weather outside. I would have loved to have been outside working had it been a nice sunny 60-70 degree day, but instead it was a gray and windy 40 degree day. So, yea, that wasn't exactly a great way to begin my day. In my free time during the morning and afternoon I worked on drying out my cellhone that I stupidly got into a hottub with yesterday. Yea, I;m sure your laughing, but I was pretty pissed off. I did manage to get the phone to turn on and it worked with my parents' battery, so I am hopeful that it will work again. However, the HOPE that my phone MIGHT work again was the HIGHLIGHT of my day. So yea, my day started out pretty bad, the afternoon and early evening dragged on and I mingled a little bit with the guests who were at my house for the cocktail hour. Now, this is where my day starts getting shitty. I had planned on hanging out with a couple of my friend and my house was empty and I had finished locking it up, however, one of the people I was gonna hang out with decided to change her plans, basically ruining any chance of me going out tonight. So yea, I have spent the entire night just sitting at my comp. I watched a NASCAR race, that was OK, it's fun every once in a while. However, that was about all I did. Everyone was out so I didn;t have anyone to talk to, and I have ended up spending my night in the seclusion of my room, so yea, I am not exactly in the best of moods. Now, I can't blame my friends for tonight, it is really jsut a matter of circumstances, but still, it doesn't make me any happier that I my entire saturday has been wasted. But anyway, I guess there is always tomm, I'm gonna get a new battery for my cellphone and my cousin may stop by on his way from OSU to his internship in Kentucky, so that could be cool. All I know is that I hope that tomm is better than today, because if I spend one more day beign as bored and secluded as I was today than I don't know if I am gonna be able to take it. Well, that is really all I have to say right now, as I really am in no mood to do anything other than rant and be pissed, so yea, that's all.

LIVE From Mr. Hoar's 3rd Period Comp Sci AB Class

Yep, that's right, this class is so useless that I am actually taking time to put something up on this blog. So, you might be asking "if you'r at school shouldn't you be doing work or something?" The simple answer is, NO!!!! You see, its 4th quarter senior year, I have given up on all educational activities for the rest of the year, well atleast in classed where my exam exemption is guaranteed, and mostly in the other classes too. Yea, it has been nice putting school on the back burner. My weekends have been more fun and I have been had alot more freetime to just hang out with friends nad whatnote. I am def looking forward to summer. I have my senior trip all planned out, goin to Ft. Lauderdale, Florida in mid-June with some of my friends. It is gonna be AWESOME!!! Oh, of course I can't really forget about the whole college thing yet, atleast not for another week or so. I am plannin on visitin OSU next week and may take a look at UC again, if for no other reason than to get a day off of school. I have to send my housing app in to OSU in the next couple days, so I am pretty sure I am gonna go there, and if I don;t I am gonna be out about $350, not alot, but yea, still wouldn;t be fun to lose that ;). Well, seeing as there is a prefect in for our comp sci class today and I can be doing just about anything I want, I am gonna go have some more fun! I'll be back with another update later. Until then, I am gonna keep having fun and just enjoy my last few weeks of high school. ¡Viva la clase de 2005!

Quick Update

Yea, I don't have alot of time to post, and I haven't really too much lately. Ok, well, I am probably making my self seem mor busy than I am since alot of the last two weeks had been spent sitting around, watching movies, hanging out with friends and doing anything I could possibly do to avoid work, but I swear, I am actually busy now, and have been since Sunday. On Sunday I spent all day working on a presentation for my American Dream class (which for those who don't know is a class where we read books focusing on the American Dream). The presentation was a group presentation and so I spent Sunday over at one of the guy's houses working on the project till about 7pm. Then I got home around 7:30, and just kept on working till around 11:30. Well, I finally got to bed around 12:30 or 1, then had to wake up at about 6 to meet my group memebers at school at 7:15, so yea, Monday turned out to pretty a really long day, but luckily the presentation went well (yea I forgot to mention we were starting and finishing it the day before it was due :-P). Now it is tuesday and things haven't gotten much better. I have a paper due for American Dream tomm, which, at this point, it about 50% done. Also, I have a physics and math test tomm. Damn Mr. Becker refused to move the physics test back despite only a small percentage of the class understanding what is going to be on it. Math shouldn't be too bad, but I have to admit it is getting increasingly difficult. But yea, overall tonight has been pretty crappy. I did get to talk to my sister on the phone for a bit, that was cool, I always enjoy talking to her, but that was the highlight of my night. Well, as I am going on and on about all this stuff I realize I should probably get back to working, so yea, that is just a quick update/bitch. I'll get back sometime soon with a less bitchy update and a more indepth view on my life ;).