"Walk Like an Egyptian"

Night 1: We arrived in Egypt around 10PM and the customs line was a nightmare. Us confused tourists didn’t get our visa, first, so after waiting 45 minutes in a freaking long line that took forever, we got turned back. Who knew that you get the visa at the Bank of Alexandria? Anyway, we were a couple hours late for our driver to take us back to the hostel. Alhamdo Llelah (Thanks be to God) that he was patiently waiting for us with his sign. Since we were traveling during a Muslim holiday (Eid al-Fitr), celebrating the end of Ramadan and fasting during the day, the streets were crowded with cars and people. Talk about a nightlife. A ride that should have taken 30 minutes turned into an hour. I’m sure if people actually followed the concept of staying in lanes, using traffic lights, and having crosswalks for pedestrians, traffic would’ve flowed more smoothly.

We finally arrived at our hostel. Of course, our room looked nothing like the picture. But our room was very clean and contained 3 bunk beds with cartoon bed sheets. I thought it was cute. The hostel owner was nice, which was important. But the bathroom was another story. When I first turned on the faucet, the water was brown. So I’m thinking, “We definitely got our $4 worth.” Then the faucet wouldn’t turn off. So brown water was quickly filling a clogged sink. After having a hard time opening the door, I managed to get out and get some help. Even the owner had a hard time, and had to stop the pipeline or something. I just walked away wondering how I was going to survive the week.

Day 1: We decided to venture Cairo for the day and do souvenir shopping. It was me, 2 other girls and one of their host brothers. Since he’s Jordanian, he knew Arabic. So he haggled for us since Egyptians think that all Americans are rich and bump up the prices. The freakin’ camel guys probably earn more money than I did over the summer in America by cleaning an office. We would show him what we liked, walk away so the shop owners didn’t associate him with us “rich Americans”, and he would do his haggling. Alhamdo Llelah (Thanks be to God) for him, especially, when it came to taxi drivers and boys who harassed us. At night, we hung out at a restaurant right on the Nile while refreshments. Egypt was off to a good start.

Day 2: Giza meant hanging out with the pyramids and the Sphinx. It was quite a site to see the pyramids peek out behind the city building of Cairo. It’s amazing to see these ancient (and I mean ancient) structures stand beside modern-day buildings. As I walked closer to the pyramids, they seemed to grow. From a distance, their sides look smooth and I found it crazy every time someone said they wanted to climb the pyramids. But the blocks were so huge and different-shaped, that they made natural steps.

We definitely trekked the desert around the pyramids Moses style looking for the Sphinx. We were hot, whiny, wanted water, and looking for something we couldn’t see for about an hour. Only Moses had to deal with thousands of people. The Sphinx wasn’t as big as I expected, but still worth it. I love the feeling of being in the same presence as something that’s been around for thousands of years. If only they had eyes, they could’ve seen the changes of Cairo. After dealing with annoying camel owners begging us to ride their camels at a ridiculous rate and punk kids almost run us over on their horses, the pyramids is a must-have experience, along with the Sphinx.

Day 2: This day was another fun day of just hanging out. First we went to Al-Ahzar Park where a bunch of children, teenagers, and families spent the day since it was Eid al-Fitr holiday. There was a delicious French café we ate at that overlooked the park and Cairo. We sat and talked for a couple of hours. It wasn’t really fun trying to get out since Egyptian kids are rude about keeping their fascination of foreigners to themselves. They seriously were punks, but I guess Cairo wouldn’t be Cairo without them…

We arrived at Al-Ahzar mosque during prayer so we had to wait outside for a little bit. While we did, our Muslim friend, Sa’ad, went inside to pray and I found some souvenirs in the meantime. When we went inside, it was my safe-haven—quietness and no harassment from the locals. Sa’ad led us into a room where people pray in. We sat and talked about Jordanian customs, religion, movies, and just had a nice time getting to know each other. Who knew, as a Christian, I’d be chillin’ in a mosque with people of different faiths and have a fun conversation. It was pretty cool.

Day 3: Alexandria was a beautiful break from Cairo. It was much cleaner, less crowded in the streets, and had the view of the Mediterranean Sea. In order to avoid harassment from the young locals, we walked around to ask a few hotels if we could pay to use their marked-off beaches. But they decided to be booked up, even though we saw no one was on the beach. I’m thinking if they really want tourists to come back, at least help them aka us! After walking around finding a hotel, we decided to eat at a wonderful American restaurant known as Chiles. Yesss…American food in an American atmosphere with football and country music playing in the background. Good times. Afterwards, we walked a little ways from Chiles and, again, found a similar American name—The Sheraton. Right when when we walked inside, we were immediately helped by workers with friendly smiles. The best part was that they were more than happy to let us know that we could use their beach for 200 Egyptian pounds with 50 pounds included for a meal. Pretty good deal. They even walked us across the street and made sure we found a good spot. I knew we could count on a Western hotel to help us. The water was perfect, we had fun soaking up some sun, hangin’ out until dinner that was perfectly timed by being served at sunset. Who could ask for a better day? Well, the train ride back to Cairo was freakin’ crazy, it wasn’t even funny. Of course, this would be the train back to crazy Cairo.

Day 4: This was our last day in Egypt and we spent it at the Egyptian Museum. It was very interesting, except it seemed the artifacts seemed a bit repetitive and the mummy was extra even though we were already in the museum. In the evening, we finally went to a restaurant that served Egyptian food. So now I could say that I’ve tasted food from Egypt. Afterwards, we visited another Sheraton and chilled in a restaurant until it closed. Then we decided to stay up all night talking and enjoying our last hours of Egypt before heading back to the airport.

Overall, Egypt was a good experience. I definitely learned some street smarts and feel much more comfortable walking the streets of Amman. If you could survive Egypt, anything else will be easy to deal with. The punk teenage guys were probably the worst part of the trip. The way they dressed was like going back to the 50’s, but in technicolor because of their extremely gelled hair and bright-colored clothing with some sort of bling bling on it. My friend compared them to a pack of wolves because they walked around in groups with arms around each other. I compared them to ants because they would appear out of EVERY nook and cranny. Great descriptions, huh? HaHa. At times, we were tempted to buy a burka so all they could see is our eyes and not know that we’re Westerners. But we put up with them. Our hostel owner was very nice and down-to-earth. He even fixed up the bathroom so it greatly improved from my first night’s experience. But Chuck and Larry will be missed (cocoroaches).

In Egypt, I got a little taste of the importance an Arab community. At the pyramids, us Western tourists had to pay 30 Egyptian pounds ($6) to get in, while our friend Sa’ad paid 1 dinar (.75) since he’s Arab and/or Jordanian. Arabs share the same sense of history and struggles, so the Arab community seems to be big on being providing ways to unite with each other, which is pretty cool. I'm beginning to learn about all this in my classes, which is interesting.

Oh, here's a funny story...one time our cab driver took us to some 5 star hotel called The Four Seasons since it was a place to use an ATM. When we walked in, we were in awe because it was clean, beautiful, quiet, and did I mention beautiful? Our inside joke was that we would go to that hotel just to hang out in the bathroom. Heck, we would even sleep in it if we could get away. HaHa. The best part is that it turns out one of the girls' dad's best friend is the owner of The Four Season chain in the Middle East so we could have totally gotten a room there. Good times.