Awkward...
It turns out that on the Cairo metro there are cars specifically for women. It also turns out that although they may be labeled, they do not have an English label that jumps out at the person about to get on for the first time. The women on those cars will allow an errant male passenger a moment to take a look around and notice they are the only male on the car before looking at each other and giggling knowingly while said passenger briefly panics and then shamefully resigns himself towards keeping a distance from all parties until the next stop when he can frantically change cars and pretend none of this ever happened. This information is provided as a public service announcement to any intrepid male travelers who may find themselves in a similar situation one day.
Some people I have met:
Mohammed was a student who timidly accosted me as I was contemplating crossing 10 lanes of moving traffic with no streetlight and asked if he could practice his English with me. This happened quite often in China and I always enjoy these sorts of interactions, so I happily obliged. He was studying Economics at the American University of Cairo which I'm told is a very highly-regarded and exclusive school and he did in fact speak English quite well if a bit shyly, especially given that he had only been taking English classes there for 3 months.
Yousef was one of many touts in Midan Talat al-Harb, a large square relatively close to my hotel in downtown Cairo central to many budget hotels and therefore a popular place to approach foreigners for all purposes. We chatted amicably for a while as I had decided to indulge all who approached me with a smile and my best Arabic banter. He was actually an interesting guy who grow up in Saqqara village, a village adjacent to one of the more significant groups of Pyramids just south of the most famous Giza site. He showed me pictures on his cellphone of his home village before asking me to come into his family's perfume shop to receive his business card. I politely declined with an explanation of lack of desire to disrespect or offend him which has seemed to work on all the people I have met lately and we shook hands and parted ways. His family also owns a hostel and a cotton shop.
Achmed was just down the street from Yousef and wasn't a tout in the same way. He was just a guy who stands out on the street outside of a clothing store and yells at passer-bys, primarily Egyptian, about what clothing and what great deals can be found inside. He looked at me and said "CLOSES!" "CLOSES!" so I stopped and told him "Clothes?" "Clothes." He repeated. Then he said "T-shirts?" ... "T-shirts." ... "Jeanies?" "Jeans!" After this he decided he wanted to shake my hand and we spoke for a few minutes and he laughed when after he said "Nice to meet you" I responded in kind in Arabic.
There was another Bedouin guy outside of a perfume shop near the museum who wanted to chat for a while with the ultimate goal of getting me into his shop, but when it became clear that I would not go inside, he remained extremely sociable nonetheless. I would say the lesson I have learned is that the best way I can react to the numerous people approaching me to sell me something is to be friendly, to speak Arabic so they think I am at least not too-foolish of a tourist, and to not take it personally and not let them get to me. This may sound obvious but when people approach you every few minutes, it's hard not to get frustrated as I learned my first day at Giza and I am determined to not be rude and to not ignore someone who wants to shake my hand. Yesterday I would say it worked well for me and I did not feel exhausted by the attention as I did the previous day.
I also met the manager of the American University of Cairo bookstore which is a large English-language bookstore near the University's campus. He was born in Cuba, grew up in Miami, and spent the last 4 years living here in Cairo. He said one of the things he loves about it is the opportunity for travel, which I understand, since so many interesting places are with an arm's throw and a cheap ticket from here. He said that he thinks he gets along well here because Cubans and Egyptians are similar people, which I thought was really interesting. He also gave me a lot of good advice about Cairo in general, not the least of which was enlightening me to the existence of a popular local dish which is a sandwich filled with french fries. Let me repeat that. There is a popular dish here which is a sandwich filled with french fries.
I will not write too much about the food for now. I did have an amazing sandwich last night which was Falafel, here called Taamiya but basically the same deal, and in the Alexandria style which has chilis all over it or in it. I have also eaten Koshary three times which is another national dish consisting of rice, lentils, two kinds of pasta, tomato sauce, hot sauce, and fried onions. My meals have always costed approximately $1 USD.
Yesterday I took a break from the sun for a chunk of the day and visited the Egyptian Musuem of Antiquities. It looks like the sort of place Indiana Jones might work. Imagine if the Egyptian section of the Metropolitan Museum of Art was the entire size of the Met. Then imagine there was basically no air-condioning and 3 light bulbs. It's not really as big as the Met, but the number of items in it is staggering. Apparently they have way more in the basement and it has sat there in crates for so long that it has sunk into the ground and they actually had to excavate in the basement of the museum to get at everything. There were a lot of cool things in there, but one thing that blew me away was on the floor filled with King Tutankhamun's treasures. Imagine a bedroom made entirely of gold and ornately inscribed on all sides. Now imagine four of them, each slightly smaller than the previous, and that they fit inside each other like Russian dolls. They had each room in a glass case adjacent to the other. I guess Tutankhamun figured being buried in one gold room was for suckers.
Anyway, off to the Citadel of Salah al-din and meeting a Couchsurfer tonight for Iftar, the fast-breaking meal at 6:30pm. I gotta get going. It's almost 8am.
Some people I have met:
Mohammed was a student who timidly accosted me as I was contemplating crossing 10 lanes of moving traffic with no streetlight and asked if he could practice his English with me. This happened quite often in China and I always enjoy these sorts of interactions, so I happily obliged. He was studying Economics at the American University of Cairo which I'm told is a very highly-regarded and exclusive school and he did in fact speak English quite well if a bit shyly, especially given that he had only been taking English classes there for 3 months.
Yousef was one of many touts in Midan Talat al-Harb, a large square relatively close to my hotel in downtown Cairo central to many budget hotels and therefore a popular place to approach foreigners for all purposes. We chatted amicably for a while as I had decided to indulge all who approached me with a smile and my best Arabic banter. He was actually an interesting guy who grow up in Saqqara village, a village adjacent to one of the more significant groups of Pyramids just south of the most famous Giza site. He showed me pictures on his cellphone of his home village before asking me to come into his family's perfume shop to receive his business card. I politely declined with an explanation of lack of desire to disrespect or offend him which has seemed to work on all the people I have met lately and we shook hands and parted ways. His family also owns a hostel and a cotton shop.
Achmed was just down the street from Yousef and wasn't a tout in the same way. He was just a guy who stands out on the street outside of a clothing store and yells at passer-bys, primarily Egyptian, about what clothing and what great deals can be found inside. He looked at me and said "CLOSES!" "CLOSES!" so I stopped and told him "Clothes?" "Clothes." He repeated. Then he said "T-shirts?" ... "T-shirts." ... "Jeanies?" "Jeans!" After this he decided he wanted to shake my hand and we spoke for a few minutes and he laughed when after he said "Nice to meet you" I responded in kind in Arabic.
There was another Bedouin guy outside of a perfume shop near the museum who wanted to chat for a while with the ultimate goal of getting me into his shop, but when it became clear that I would not go inside, he remained extremely sociable nonetheless. I would say the lesson I have learned is that the best way I can react to the numerous people approaching me to sell me something is to be friendly, to speak Arabic so they think I am at least not too-foolish of a tourist, and to not take it personally and not let them get to me. This may sound obvious but when people approach you every few minutes, it's hard not to get frustrated as I learned my first day at Giza and I am determined to not be rude and to not ignore someone who wants to shake my hand. Yesterday I would say it worked well for me and I did not feel exhausted by the attention as I did the previous day.
I also met the manager of the American University of Cairo bookstore which is a large English-language bookstore near the University's campus. He was born in Cuba, grew up in Miami, and spent the last 4 years living here in Cairo. He said one of the things he loves about it is the opportunity for travel, which I understand, since so many interesting places are with an arm's throw and a cheap ticket from here. He said that he thinks he gets along well here because Cubans and Egyptians are similar people, which I thought was really interesting. He also gave me a lot of good advice about Cairo in general, not the least of which was enlightening me to the existence of a popular local dish which is a sandwich filled with french fries. Let me repeat that. There is a popular dish here which is a sandwich filled with french fries.
I will not write too much about the food for now. I did have an amazing sandwich last night which was Falafel, here called Taamiya but basically the same deal, and in the Alexandria style which has chilis all over it or in it. I have also eaten Koshary three times which is another national dish consisting of rice, lentils, two kinds of pasta, tomato sauce, hot sauce, and fried onions. My meals have always costed approximately $1 USD.
Yesterday I took a break from the sun for a chunk of the day and visited the Egyptian Musuem of Antiquities. It looks like the sort of place Indiana Jones might work. Imagine if the Egyptian section of the Metropolitan Museum of Art was the entire size of the Met. Then imagine there was basically no air-condioning and 3 light bulbs. It's not really as big as the Met, but the number of items in it is staggering. Apparently they have way more in the basement and it has sat there in crates for so long that it has sunk into the ground and they actually had to excavate in the basement of the museum to get at everything. There were a lot of cool things in there, but one thing that blew me away was on the floor filled with King Tutankhamun's treasures. Imagine a bedroom made entirely of gold and ornately inscribed on all sides. Now imagine four of them, each slightly smaller than the previous, and that they fit inside each other like Russian dolls. They had each room in a glass case adjacent to the other. I guess Tutankhamun figured being buried in one gold room was for suckers.
Anyway, off to the Citadel of Salah al-din and meeting a Couchsurfer tonight for Iftar, the fast-breaking meal at 6:30pm. I gotta get going. It's almost 8am.
posted by Dan at 10:49 PM
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