Here's a cherry picked translation of a mid-term that I took a couple weeks ago. The test was 42.5 % multiple choice, 37.5% true and false, and 20% long essay.
True or False Portion (with the teacher's answers)
10) الدين الإسلامي يشجع العمليات الإرهابية - The Islamic religion encourages terrorist works. (T)
12) الفراغ الديني مسؤول عن انتشار الإرهاب - The religious emptiness is responsible for the establishment of terrorists (F)
13) الإسلام هو الحل - Islam is the solution (F)
14) التنمية و العلم و الدميقراطية هي الحل Development, science, and democracy are the solutions. (T)
It's hard to teach Islamic Politics without getting too political, but I think you can see the professor's political leanings from these four questions. A more typical Egyptian answer would have been the exact opposite (although most people in Egypt believe that you need a combination of 13 and 14).
It was interesting to see the liberal side of Egyptian culture take on the same mannerisms of the conservative side. Those mannerisms can be summed up in the words wrong (ghalet), forbidden (harem), the not allowed (mumnooa). Just as the previously mentioned true and false questions gave no room for discussion or ambiguity, many ideas are often simply labeled wrong and not given a second consideration.
Here are a few anecdotes:
I wore a funny t-shirt showing a chimpanzee evolving to a human who devolves to a computer geek. The response: Darwin is a donkey. Of course, that's wrong. And then, we watched a video of Adam and Eve as evidence that creationism is how man came to be.
I was debating gay marriage with another American and Egyptian when another one of our hall mates overheard our discussion. He replied, Of course, that's wrong. (the Arabic phrase for of course, that's wrong is only two words, so it sounds a lot more coarse like CLEARLY WRONG).
A taxi driver called an Egyptian girl not wearing a hijab during Ramadan was called haram (forbidden by the Quran).
I want to enter a museum or certain path or some other thing. The response: not allowed. My response: Can you tell me when it's open or how else I can do this etc. The response: not allowed.
There's no idea of political correctness here. Calling someone Indian means idiot. An underdeveloped country is called a retarded country. Egyptians drop the n-bomb all the time when talking about Obama.
These black and white responses rejecting nuance or any tinge of ambiguity are part of the culture. And, it comes from both sides: liberal and conservative. But wait, what is liberal and conservative. Well, that's a subject for another time, but it doesn't mean prius driving, hippy, pro-choice, big government liberals vs. pickup driving, red blooded, pro-death penalty, small government conservatives. The line is cut in a much different way. But the point here is that discourse often starts off in a much more confrontational manner.
So there's some Egyptian culture from a 20-year-old American's point of view. Someone else would probably explain it to you differently, but if they did I would simply say, "clearly wrong."
Now, we might ask, what might lead people to a black and white world view? And, I'll refrain from answering that now because it's what we say is a "loaded" question.
