I arrived in Cairo the previous night and got a good night's sleep in before exploring the city of Cairo. I was expecting an empty flight due to Covid, however, it was rammed. It seemed that the wealthy young Egyptians had been spending time in London before heading home - wealthy, as I've never seen such a high concentration of Yeezys and Rolexes on a flight in economy!
I was staying in the Holy Sheet Hostel. There is not much of a hostel scene in Egypt, this place was more like a small guesthouse. My room had three beds for some reason, and there was only a handful of other guests in the hostel.
The first task was to get some Egyptian Pounds. I left the hostel wearing shorts and a t-shirt and attracted more attention than usual. To be fair, it is mid-winter in Egypt and people must have thought I was crazy. EGP in hand, I walked to the Egyptian Museum - something I was very much looking forward to pre-trip.
The museum was much like the rest of Cairo - chaotic. There was an overwhelming number of items in the museum, in different nooks and crannies. The bulk of the items are being moved into the newly built Grand Egyptian Museum, due to open in 2021. Therefore, there were pallets, crates and empty spots dotted around the museum. This by no means took away from the awe of the museum and added a certain Egyptian character.
I spent a good few hours wandering around, trying to take everything in.
The Hall of Mummies had already departed for pastures new, however, there were still a couple of mummies to be found. The detail of the body is amazing, considering this mummy died 4,000 year ago.
There was a whole section dedicated to King Tutankhamun. An insignificant ruler of Ancient Egypt, yet famous in modern history as being the only full preserved pharaonic temple found (to date). The image below is Tut's burial chamber found within his tomb in Lyxor. I attempted to take a photo of King Tut's iconic funeral mask, but got shouted at in Egyptian - I seemingly didn't notice all of the no photo signs:
During my wandering, an Egyptian chap asked me for my Facebook details so he could practice his English. I obliged and then received the following message from him: 'I need learn English. What do I do?' A very good question.
After leaving the museum, I decided to take a lunch time stroll across the Nile. On my walk, a friendly young Egyptian struck up conversation. He worked as an artist in the Opera House, he had a friend who lived in Camden, he knew of Yorkshire. He asked where I was going and told me that there was a better route to walk. I followed him down a few streets as he directed me and then the inevitable happened. 'Ahh this is my brother's shop'. What a coincidence. 'Please come inside and have a look'. At this point, I knew the scam was on. I was inside the shop, sat down, Egyptian tea in hand and about 20 papyrus art pieces placed on the floor - presumably to prevent me from leaving. The guy then attempted to talk through each piece, picked one up, wrote some Arabic on it and then presented it to me. 'Take it free of charge, Egyptian hospitality'. I knew full well it wasn't free, I finished my tea and then attempted to leave. 'You can pay what you want, it's my sister's wedding tomorrow. Money is good luck'. At this point I started making my excuses (was far too nice in this situation, I'll blame it on being too fresh in Cairo). He then showed me the prices of each crappy papyrus art (1500EGP!). At this point I was done and certainly wasn't handing over any more. I dropped the nicely wrapped papyrus and left.
About two minutes after I left, an old man started talking to me. He had a friend who lived in Camden, he knew of Yorkshire - hang on second. A carbon copy story, except this chap had a daughter getting married tomorrow and not a sister. I brushed this chap off and set out to find lunch. I ended up at Cafe Riche and had the most bang average lunch of Kofta Kebabs and bread. Unbeknownst to me, this place had some serious history - a historical meeting point of Cairo's intellectuals and even a presidential assassination. Today the only intellectual was me, this place has clearly seen better times.
Having been nearly been scammed for papyrus, and actually scammed for bang average food I head back despondently to the hostel to plan for tomorrow.
Evening time was market time, I was to head to Khan Al-Khalili market. I decided to take the walk, some 20 minutes away, in incognito mode - I wore jeans and a hoodie to try to fit in more. This actually worked. After 20 minutes of walking through local back alleys, past the lighting street and the furniture street I hit a major intersection, a stalemate of traffic. People were crossing the road in every possible direction. The azan was blaring out from at least 3 different mosques. The best word to describe this was chaotic, and somewhat overwhelming. I kept on walking until I came to the point of no return - local Cairenes jowl to jowl, jostling past one another as the streets turned into an unpassable funnel of limbs. The constant coughing all around was also unsettling.
At this point I headed back. Had Cairo beaten me today? I think it had.
At the hostel, I gathered the energy for one last outing. For dinner I headed to a local Koshari restaurant (the national Egyptian fast food dish). After a swift walk I was at Abou Tarek's:
I was super glad to have made it, rather than taking the easy option of ordering in food or finding an ever reliable western fast food place. About Tarek's only sold Koshari and it was ready in an instant. A mixture of spaghetti, macaroni and lentils topped with a tomato sauce, garlic vinegar, chick peas and crispy onions. It feels like a student meal of throwing a bit of everything into a dish. It was outrageously filling and cost a grand total of 40EGP (around £2).
Absolutely stuffed, I took a walk over the Nile that I attempted earlier. This time no one kidnapped me into a papyrus store.
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