rockym93 dot net

archive · tags · feed

[Entry 13] Egypt summary type thing.

13 December 201001:42PMepic-triptravel

Hey! This post is really old. You should take it with a grain of salt.

I'm sitting in a Starbucks-wannabe in Cairo airport. It's 3:30 AM and our flight to Florence leaves in about an hour and a half. Normally I'd be trying to hurry dad up and get through as early as possible, but we're literally outside the gate and there's still a delayed flight to Casablanca waiting there, I don't even think our flight has landed yet. Our drive across the city at 1am is the nicest I've ever seen Cairo. It was a clear night, and I mean totally clear, which is impossible for the Cairo I've seen, especially considering that there was a massive dust storm yesterday. The city is actually beautiful at night. The dark hides all the grime and junk, and they light up all the monuments like the mosque in the citadel (and actually a lot of the other mosques in the city) and the effect is really pretty.

So now that I'm back in the shapeless uniformity of airportland, I thought I'd reflect on Egypt a bit, specifically a few anecdotes I forgot in the day log thingies. You know the good stories are the ones you want to tell someone when you call home, and talking to Matt the other night made me write down a couple.

• While we were on the boat, we developed a sort of game which we played on the sun deck. Dad came up with it. We call it 'whale watching'. The aim of the game is to get the least flattering photo possible of fat Germans sunbathing (not too difficult) without them noticing (also not too difficult, as there are cameras everywhere - all you have to do is get your fellow game player to pose next to the Nile and then 'miss' with the camera). Dad put together a collage of all our photos, which he wants me to put up, but I don't really think you want to see it that badly. It's not pretty.
• This is probably a fairly common occurrence in bazaar type places, but the extent of this one was funny. I was looking at [not telling] as presents for mum, and the guy asked some exorbitant price for it. Dad promptly did his thing and walked away after his ridiculously low counter-offer was turned down. So of course, the guy follows us. Usually they don't follow you far, but this guy followed us about 200m down the bazaar, and when he turned back, sent his son to follow us even further to keep lowering the price. Eventually he actually met dad's original offer, so I ran back to grab the [not telling], at which point the guy hiked his price by another 50 pounds. I almost paid it, too, until dad turned up and we walked away again. Then the guy sent his son after us again, saying 'okay, okay, okay okay'. We gave him the money and almost expected him to keep following us, but he just disappeared back into the depths of the bazaar. Like I said, it probably happens all the time, but the lengths this guy would go to to get us to buy his thing even after we've walked was just crazy.
• Every hotel here seems to have exactly the same muzak tape playing in their lobby, and it seems to be from the 80s or something (it probably is). I can't count the number of times I've heard Strangers In The Night. And then there's the kareoke guy. At the first hotel we stayed in, they had a guy, sometimes a girl, singing every night to a tinny keyboard rendition of classics such as Strangers in the Night, Guantanamera, Wooden Heart, and other oldies... the same six or so, every night. That was just annoying. The heartwarming part is when all the old people got up and danced.
• They don't normally let guides into temples and tombs, because they'd stop and hold everyone up. This means that there's a market for illegal guides, who come up and point a few things out then ask for a tip, and do this as often as possible before the tourism police turf them out. We saw one of these guys climbing over the wall of the Temple of Hatshepsut. I don't know he did it though- the wall is about 10 metres high and totally sheer. He was clearly in the wrong profession, he should be cat-burgling, not illegal tourist guiding.
• While we were at Abu Simbel, our guide pulled dad aside and told him he owed the boat 50 pounds. You see, the previous night, dad was still packing and I was done and wanted to sleep (funny, the same thing happened last night too...), so he put a towel over the lamp. When we left the next morning, he forgot it was on there and we left the lights on. Turns out when the housekeeping guy went in the room was full of smoke and the towel was totally black. We owed them 50 pounds for a new towel... it could have been a new boat though, so that was probably a lucky break. The moral of this story is to always double-check the room before you leave.
• On the train from Aswan to Cairo, dad started complaining about the toothpaste I lent him (he hadn't brought his own, naturally). Then he realised it was tinea cream.
• The guide we had around Karnak and the Valley of the Kings was a real joker. He'd obviously had a group of Australians before who'd told him we all make fun of Tasmanians, so he made weird references to them all the time (saying the aliens who built the pyramids came from Tasmania, for example). He'd also do this thing where he'd be telling us the 'secrets' of a temple's construction or something, and when another group came past, start loudly talking about the colour of the paint. He a was really great guide though. Anyway, for the rest of the trip, whenever someone asked us where we were from, we'd say Tasmania (they ask this all the time, usually to lure you into a conversation and thus buying something.), and they'd go, 'Oh.', because they didn't know where it was. This, combined with Judy's 'chinese' (meaningless gabble at high speed- which worked, up until she cracked up laughing) managed to keep most of the hawkers at bay.

So that's that. The tour group we were on was really great. I'll stick this photo in again, and label it.

So, from left to right:

• Jeff: Token old guy, resident worrier, and serial traveller. This guy's been everywhere, from Machu Pichu to Libya, and he's in his 70s. Everyone whinged a bit about his tendency to worry over details, but I think travelling as widely as he had, caution is probably a natural reaction.
• Liam and Grant: The other father and son duo. Possibly some kind of freaky clones of us, at least remarkably similar in terms of interests, broadly. Liam didn't like Doctor Who though, so we couldn't be friends.
• Judy: The talkative one. Every guide we had jokingly told her to stop asking questions. They were usually good questions though (she was the one who asked how they knew how to pronounce hieroglyphs, for example). Also an avid shopper, but usually needed dad's help to bargain at all.
• Yours truly and his dad. By far the best looking on the trip, I'm sure you'll agree.

Also, my mum emailed me the other day asking what koshari was. So because our flight still isn't boarding, I'm going to do a little sort of glossary.

Koshari is An Egyptian dish. Very common, and very cheap - 2-5 pounds (40c-$1) in a local restaurant. Enjoyed by poor people and rich people alike. It's a mix of rice, pasta, fried onions, beans and lentils, covered in tomato sauce. If you're at a fancy restaurant they'll bring out (very very) hot sauce, vinegar, salt and pepper. If you're in a street restaurant they'll have exactly the same thing but in grimy old tin jugs and bowls, instead of bottles. Delicious. Baksheesh is a cross between a tip and a bribe. You generally have to baksheesh if you want to get anything done in Egypt, and often even if you don't want anything done. Everything from taking someone's photo to using the toilet has baksheesh associated with it.

Okay, flight's boarding. Glossary over. In fact, post over. In fact, Egypt over.