Crazy Crowded Cairo

Arriving at Cairo airport was an incredibly overwhelming experience. After reading about every scam in the book, I was still nearly swindled by a smiley and helpful airport employee, who led us directly to his friends' money exchange booth. Luckily Ben knew right away not to trust anything and took us to an ATM instead. That was just the first of a whole slew of similar experiences.

As some of you know, it is nearing the end of Ramadan, which made it very hard to find any food from dawn to dusk, and in turn also made it very loud and crowded from dusk to dawn. Because of this, and a rough adjustment to certain foods here, I regret to say that I indulged in a McFish burger after nearly a ten year boycott. However, since this incident I have become quite accustomed and even fond of many foods over here: hommus, falafel, and apple moussaka!

We let our hotel plan a trip to the pyramids for us, for an extra fee (everything in Egypt has an extra fee). We had a driver take us to all three pyramid sites: Dashur, Sakkara, and the main site Giza. During this trip we saw many of the "in between" parts of Cairo you would only want to see through a car window. At Sakkara, we were happy to have avoided almost all the "extra fee scams" (it seems the locals are allowed into all the sites for free and try to trick you into just about anything). We were duped by an official "Tourist Police", (yes a government employee) who told Ben to go up a staircase for a better view. We thought he was directing us the proper way until Ben got too far and the guard started yelling for him to get down, and then wanted a tip?!?! This was the point I realized that NOBODY was here to actually help us, not even the millions of tourist police you see on every corner, every site... who can you trust? Welcome to Egypt!

With that said, once we figured out just how things work here (or don't work, rather) we started to get by alright. Walking slightly faster through the narrow souks and streets, avoiding eye contact, and basically flat out ignoring locals (as rude and wrong as that sounds and feels) will really help out in crowded Cairo. "Hey you" Where from?" Hey Canada!" "You like?" And my favorite, "How can I take your money?" (which was only funny the first time)

The Egyptian Museum was interesting, overflowing with artifacts, but dry on information (unless you want to buy a guide for an extra fee) I think it would go a long way to put about half of the statues and findings away and organize the rest with a bit more flow and structure... But maybe I should put my criticism aside now.

The pyramids were great, we did a camel ride all around them which I feel was well worth it for the experience. We also walked around "Islamic Cairo" and "Old Cairo" both with their unique charm.

For anyone thinking of one day visiting Cairo, I would be very obliged to say it is the first (and so far the only) place I would recommend doing as part of an organized group.