Cairo

Cairo is a massive, dirty, loud, crowded, chaotic city.  At first it is difficult to see how it could be the capital of the Arab world.  We only had two days to spend in the city before our flight, which is surely not enough time to fully appreciate the city, let alone Egypt.  The hostel we arrived at late at night was booked the following night, so we had to wake up in the morning, switch to a different hostel, and go back to sleep.  In the afternoon, we walked to the nearby Egyptian Museum, a must-see for anyone visiting Cairo.  We stayed until closing time, over four hours, yet I felt as though we had just scratched the surface.  The museum is set in a huge, beautiful complex, and it is filled with more Egyptian artifacts than one can possibly imagine.  There are literally hundreds of thousands of individual items on display: mummies, sarcophaguses, weapons, jewelry, statues, and everything else that has been plundered from the pyramids and tombs of Egypt.  At most of the pyramids themselves, there is very little to see inside!  The section dedicated to the relics of King Tut’s tomb was most impressive.  We skipped the Royal Mummy room as the fee to enter that room was more than double the fee to enter the museum and we already had plenty to see, including other mummies.

We walked a bit through downtown Cairo after the museum.  One of the first things we noticed is the complete lack of any Western-looking tourists.  Perhaps that was because the city is just so huge they tend to get lost in the crowds.  It also occurred to me that Cairo is the biggest city I have ever been to, 16 million people!  Crossing the street can be quite an adventure and takes some practice.  The drivers are horrible, there are rarely stoplights or crosswalks, and when there are they don’t mean much.  You basically have to just wait for the right time and move quickly.  It requires equal amounts of patience and bravery.  Often you get stuck in the middle of a 6-lane road for a few seconds, pray for your life to Allah or whoever, and then make a mad dash for the other side.  It helps to find a local person and follow their lead, using them as a human shield.  The smog and noise of the city are both intense.  Another thing we noticed is the high proportion of men to women walking the streets.  This is true during the daytime, but is most noticeable at night.  When we first walked to our hostel at 4 AM, there were still lots of people walking around and hanging out along the streets, but hardly a woman could be seen.  Poor, little Maren felt very out of place and uncomfortable with the unwanted attention.

For dinner, we went to a hugely popular Egyptian ‘fast-food’ style restaurant.  You first pay for what you want and get a ticket, then take it to the station that is making that type of food.  They had everything from grilled meat and fish to stuffed pitas, baked pastas, wrapped grape leaves, pizza, and crepes.  After trying to decipher the menu and getting help from a guy working there, we ordered several things to go and took them back to our place.  It was a huge meal and very delicious!

Despite a morning start out to the pyramids of Giza the following day, we didn’t arrive until after noon.  The public transportation from Cairo was quite inefficient, and an organized bus tour might have been a better option.  Giza is a suburb of Cairo, though nearly as chaotic, and it is disturbing to see the pyramids basically in the middle of a city.  We rode the bus with a friendly and chatty Egyptian man who was on his way home to Giza.  We transferred to a small mini-bus, in which the man paid for both of us saying he was ‘inviting.’  We got especially nervous when we flew past the pyramids and were dropped off down an alley.  The friendly man took us to a friendly camel-tour man who proposed a friendly 600 Egyptian Pound offer, which we obviously declined.  We quickly said goodbye to our ‘friend’ (who then asked for foreign money for ‘souvenirs’ for his children) and walked about 3 km back to the entrance to the pyramids. 

The inside of the pyramid complex was filled with tourists, camels, horses, and hustlers.  The Sphinx and the three huge pyramids themselves were impressive, of course, but the entire experience was clouded by the environment.  I don’t just mean the noise, pollution, commercialization, and annoying people constantly hounding us for a camel ride.  Watching the way the camels and horses were being treated by their ‘drivers’ (not to mention overweight tourists) was really depressing to see.  Little Egyptian kids were laughing and whipping the camels for no apparent reason.  The horses had to go up and down steep paved hills that had no traction so they kept slipping.  It’s not easy to walk on your own around the pyramids, despite them being very close to each other.  People were bothering us the whole time, telling us the other pyramid was closed or we could only go on a camel or some other conniving story to try to make us part with our money.  I think the only way to not get hounded is to go on a big tour bus.  The pyramids themselves are remarkably big and it is amazing to imagine them being built.  As we were leaving, however, I felt jaded by the whole spectacle and wish we had skipped Giza and gone to some other, more authentic pyramids.

As I mentioned before, neither Maren nor I felt we had a ‘complete’ Egyptian experience.  We both wished we had the 5 days we had originally planned instead of 2, but hopefully we will go back another time.  We ate a dinner of Egyptian pizza, pancakes, and fresh fruit, and then left for the airport first thing in the morning.  It was a mostly uneventful flight, and after a six hour stop in Bahrain, we landed in the morning in Delhi, India.  Our original flight was to Mumbai, but when we rebooked our flight from Cairo, we changed the destination to Delhi.  Our two weeks in India, from Delhi to Kolkata (where we arrived the morning I am writing this) coming up in the next couple of blogs!

By the way, Maren is now the editor-in chief of this blog, to make sure I don’t leave out any important details, and also to provide her commentary when appropriate;)

I am now finally posting this from beautiful Koh Tao, Thailand!  First trip pictures are up on Picasa.  Facebook will take a bit longer...