Egyptian dating

Tonight I had my first date with an Egyptian girl, two in fact. Samah and her friend Nora met me at Groppie Cafe in Medan Talet Harb for the most interesting practice of my Arabic skills to date. Between the two of them, they have had nine years of English training but their English skills were very poor, virtually non-existent, which made null and void my conversational charm that typifies my interactions with members of the opposite sex. In all seriousness, this was a chance for me to woo these girls in Arabic, so my usual fumbling for words could be passed off as a cute foreigner struggling with a new language.
Yes, this cultural encounter truly defied all of my preconceived notions of dating from which I extrapolated a number of truths. Firstly, flirtatiousness is a universal language that transcends even the most tenuous communicative scenarios.
Nora began the conversation by quizzing me on Arabic words found in my borrowed Egyptian Arabic phrasebook but after some time the novelty of such practice wore off. And so we seemed at an impasse: I had exhausted my limited vocabulary of Ammaya (Egyptian Colloquial Arabic) and the girls began to seem frustrated with the lack of steady communication. At this moment, when it seemed this evening was about to be filed into one of the over-flowing cabinets in my brain labeled 'failed attempts', just went I thought the night was about to come to an abrupt end, I began to smile.
Truth number two: never underestimate the power of a smile.
I smiled, musing this date marked my third Friday in Cairo and I was already having dinner with two Egyptian girls. I smiled because in three weeks I have made numerous potentially lifelong friends, Egyptian, European, and American. I smiled because Egypt is beautiful and I was sitting across from two beautiful young Egyptian women. And then something wonderful happened...they smiled back.
These weren't run-of-the-mill, everyday smiles. No, They weren't even the typical Egyptian smiles, pleasant and inviting, which accompany everyone who returns your salutation. No. These smiles conveyed a feeling of contentment and happiness that, had we the words in any language, would fail description. They were filled with warmth and beauty. A truly wonderful smile is not just a few muscles in the mouth contorting to a pleasing form but rather it is a body language of infinite expression involving the entire face, eyes, and posture. These smiles spoke volumes.
And, with my confidence renewed, I switched to speaking foos'ha, a bit archaic to their ears, I'm sure, as it is not a spoken language but rather the written language for Quranic studies. It was, nonetheless, discernible to their ears and a way to further the conversation. As we continued chatting we came to the subject of religion. Perhaps they were using very simple sentence constructions to facilitate my understanding or perhaps it is just a common question but they asked “do you know Mohammad?” Being the cheeky bastard that I am, I replied in good smart-ass fashion, “I know many Muhammads” (because the name Muhammad is so prevalent, there is a common joke among Egyptians that, if you call for Muhammad down a crowded street, everyone will turn around). But after seeing their confused and disconcerted expressions they repeated the question, this time using the definite article 'the' to make their point clear (a bit redundant because Muhammad is a proper noun, definite by nature). I then, more tactfully replied, “Yes, I know the Muhammad.” They then asked if I loved Muhammad and it was here that I was really at a loss as to the proper response. On the one hand I could say yes, knowing full well that the connotation of such love conveyed a religious affiliation and I would be expected to act accordingly. (It is also of note that to the everyday Egyptian, the first reason a Westerner, especially an American, would learn Arabic is because they are a Muslim.) Yet saying I didn't love Muhammad would have brought a most certain premature end to what had thus far been a wonderful evening. So, in one of my more brilliant moments (few and far between though they may be) I reached for the Arabic phrasebook and rifled through the pages to spit out quickly “I am Christian.” In my haste to find the word I butchered the pronunciation, so I pointed to the Arabic script on the page. They let out a long “ah” of approval, then saying, “so, you love the Messiah.”
“Yes, I love the Messiah.”
Crisis averted.
The next fifteen minutes of the conversation were spent trying to decipher a phrase that I had not yet come into contact with. After much struggling I reluctantly reached again for the Arabic dictionary. They were using the future tense, with which I am not familiar. I frantically scoured the book to find their meaning. At last, the word they were using I translated to mean “next meeting.” She was asking for another date.
And the saga continues...