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A colder Alexandria

By amrawi

So clearly I was fooled yet again. Spring fling surely did not mean that spring was here in my book 10 degrees Celsius, or as Americans refer to it as 50 degrees Fahrenheit, is clearly not spring. Wearing a long sleeve shirt, a hoodie and pants, doesn’t seem like spring, am I right? I’m sorry spring fling u failed to bring spring to the DC district. I should have known that instead of signing up for spring semester abroad, I must have in fact signed up for winter semester abroad.

You see, this my be warm for most people in the east cost but coming from the coastal city of Alexandria Egypt, this is nowhere as warm as the month of April should be. Back home its almost 86 degrees Fahrenheit, now that’s seems more like spring to me!

Even though the uneven weather had me trading in my knee length floral dress and flip flops for a sweatshirt and boots, I still managed to get out and finish crossing some items off my bucket list. Paddling on the Tidal basin was definitely one of those things that I had to do before departing back home. With an orange life jacket wrapped around me; paddle boat turned out to be more of an adventure than a simple stroll on the lake.
rowboat

“Okay mam’am, this is a special edition for you, right, left and back,” said the man, as he noticed the blank stare on my face when he handed me a whistle and told us to go.

Once you get the hang of the steering wheel placed in the middle of the blue and white paddleboat; it all begins to feel right. Circling around the tidal basin and capturing what is most likely the last photographs of the disappearing cherry blossoms; did turn out to be a good Saturday afternoon. However once you step out of the paddleboat, that’s when you begin to realize how much of a workout that really is, one hour on a paddleboat sure does equal a day at the gym.

Longing for some Egyptian food, I was finally satisfied when I went to Zakerayat a Middle Eastern restaurant, lounge. There I finally had some Egyptian shawamra as well as some of my favorite Middle Eastern salads “fattoush” and “tabouleh”. Just like the area’s name, it really felt like I was in Alexandria, except this time Alexandria was a lot colder, and it was in Virgina!

salad

Maybe this time I will be heading to southern Virginia! Anybody know if the weather is better over there?