Cairo, Egypt

Arriving in Cairo is only the beginning of the adventure. There is one road leading to/from the airport and you learn immediately that every hour is rush hour in Cairo. We’ve heard stereotypes of driving in different parts of the world, but riding as a passenger is physically exhausting. The lane markers act hardly as guidelines as our taxi bobbed and wove through the streets of Cairo. Every car experience was like this. In several instances we were centimeters away from hitting or scrapping adjacent cars. When driving it is best not to look at the cars ahead or nearby, but just take in the amazing chaos of the Cairo streets. At one point we hit a pothole that seemed to swallowed the entire car – looking to the side was a bus (inches from the window) and two cars almost on top of the rear bumper. This was very typical.

Perhaps the only thing more gut wrenching then driving in Cairo is crossing the street. Greater Cairo has a population of nearly 20 million people. Greater Cairo has approximately 3 sidewalks and 0 pedestrian bridges or subways. This means crossing the street is a human version of “Frogger”. No joke! Throughout 5 days in Cairo there were multiple situations that forced us to cross the street and take this leap. Watching locals do this was magical. Picture a line of New Yorkers trying to cross 5th Avenue at Rush Hour while the stop lights are green. Native Egyptians make this passage with the utmost confidence and rarely get hurt. This does not just happen on the city streets but also the highways.

A thunderstorm blew in on Monday that brought high winds, sideways rain and gridlock traffic. They say that it only rains in Cairo 5 times a year, lucky for us.

The people of Cairo are extremely friendly, at least from what we saw. Often in travels any attempt of humor with someone speaking their 2nd language will lose its affect – not the case here. Many encounters throughout Cairo brought not only warm conversations, but some solid humor with great punch lines. For instance, when our taxi driver to the pyramids picked up that we were talking about how insane driving is in Cairo, he deadpanned “well, why don’t you drive us back after the pyramids”. Great delivery. Our trip highlight was probably a local family hosting us for a home cooked meal. Getting out of the hotel and tourist areas gave us a real flavor for what family life is like in Egypt.

They say no trip to Cairo is complete without a trip to the Pyramids. On the approach to Giza, you can easily see why. The pyramids dominate the skyline and the outskirts houses a community that thrives on tourists visiting the Great Wonders.

We saw some classic examples of capitalism in full force here:

1) Being asked by a guide if we wanted to go to the “Papyrus Museum”. In the museum they demonstrate how papyrus was made 5,000 years ago. The presentation is very cool, but you’ll quickly be escorted around the “museum” where you can pick out your papyrus art. There was no question the guide got a nice commission for the business he brought in to the shop.
2) Constant harassment to purchase souvenirs or take tours of the Pyramids on camels, horses or buggies. We saw dozens of smooth operators literally putting souvenirs on tourists and then trying to charge them for it.

We finally caved into the buggy/horse guides. There were three of us at the time, so the girls were in the buggy and D was on the horse (see video above). A price was agreed upon at the beginning for the tour. After 30 seconds on the horse the guide handed me the reins and said ‘you’ll be ok”. GREAT! The girls were way ahead now in the comfort of a buggy and here I am in the middle of a desert barebacking 500 yards behind them. The guide started having fun with us and speeding the horse up shaking up the insides of my stomach. Every local we passed was just laughing (at me) or smiling (at the girls). Glad we could provide the days entertainment. We had opted for the medium tour which brought us outside the gate complex of the pyramids and sphinx. The girls in the buggy took off down small streets through the village in quite a hurry. D was quickly no where to be seen, it turns out he was taken through the make shift dump rather than the small streets. D's guide thought the dump would be a good place to ask for a tip. After a long bumpy road through small streets the girls ended up at the main entrance of the pyramids. They were asked to pay to re enter or show our tickets. Finally D emerged and we are all reunited at the main ticket gate. At this point we have all lost our patience with our insides all mixed up. We find our driver and happily prepare for a long ride to the airport. Our guide gave D the bird for his apparent displeasure with the tip! Apparently #1 translates in Arabic as well... :)

We would do this again in a heart beat! In the future we will hire a guide from the hotel. For some more pictures from Cairo, please come back soon...