Part One of Egypt

Egypt was a great adventure. I wanted to put together down some of my insights. First I need to say this is my first visit to a country where I did not have any workable understanding of the language. Scotland, while they spoke with a heavy accent, I was able to understand what was being said. In Mexico I am able to understand a lot, and speak enough to get what is necessary. While I did have some basic greetings in Arabic, communication with locals was basically impossible.

My roommate, Hamdy, was born and raised in Egypt and runs a travel agency in Florida. He was on the trip, not as our guide, as a tour operator to be sure that we enjoyed our trip. Hamdy and I spent several evenings with his friends, while others stayed at the Hotel. I quickly let each of his friends that I was the visitor, and hoped they wouldn’t feel that they had to speak in English or translate their conversations for me. This worked out very well. I told them that I had spent years in a place where English was not the first language and had long ago learned that when someone is speaking their Native language, they aren’t talking about me. They understood, laughed, and everyone was very comfortable. They taught me so much about living in Egypt.

One of my concerns was not coming off as the Ugly American. I was talking to Valeed about this. Although he also does tours, he didn’t understand the phrase. After explaining it, he laughed. He then told me that he has seen those kinds of travelers from France, Japan, Germany, America and Italy. He then told me that he when he sees those kinds of people, he just says, to himself, ‘this person is not ready to travel.’ No animosity. No real stereotyping. Just a person not ready to travel. A great concept.

Near the end of the trip, Hamdy asked me what I thought of Egypt. I talked about the amazing culture of the past, and the great people we had met on the trip. Amazing trip. He told me that I was always welcome back to his home. He said that I had come to Egypt as a tourist, and was leaving as a friend. Later, in his final bus talk, he told the group he hoped they too had come as tourists and were leaving as friends.

Our first stop in Cairo, was the Hotel, with a view of the Pyramids at Giza. After freshening up after the 8-1/2 hour plane ride from JFK, we headed out to see the city. Our first stop was at Sadat’s memorial. It is directly across the street from where he was assassinated in 1981. It is beautiful and guarded 24/7. His leadership and the famous peace treaty with Begin, Carter, and Sadat are very revered in Egypt. His basic belief seemed to be that the Holy Land is just that Holy Land, and should not be controlled by Christians, Jews, or Muslims. It is Holy. This didn’t set well with many around the world. It reminded me of the San Francisco Peaks controversy right here in Flagstaff. No one should attempt to own Holy Land.

Sadat Memorial

Occupiers helped form much of Egypt’s modern history. The French and the British influence are still prevalent. The military style uniforms including hats, the dark suit and tie to show importance, are everywhere. Somehow, Cairo never took hold of traffic movement. There are no traffic lights or stop signs. It seems that some roads are very busy part of the day, and not busy other parts. Traffic lights and stop signs would unnecessarily slow traffic at slow times. So all of Cairo roads seemed really chaotic—drive, swerve, honk, honk some more, and just keep moving. We didn’t see any accidents, but I would never attempt to drive in Cairo. It sure seems to work for them. Luxor and other areas did get the traffic control thing from the occupiers and were much calmer with no horns. One evening, after a great dinner at a local restaurant, four of us took a 2 mile walk around the Nile in Cairo. To get to the bridge we had to cross five lanes of traffic—three lanes one way, a median, and two the other way. It took us a good 15 minutes, at 10pm on a week night, to get across the street. Traffic doesn’t slow for pedestrians, there are no crosswalks and you wait until traffic stops in one direction, run to the median and then wait for another stop in traffic. A real adventure. The two bridges did have pedestrian walkways, but the off ramps just had a raised curb with a wall right next to the curb. The curb was barely wide enough for one person and the traffic just rushed by. I guess it would have been better if I was 20, instead of 60. But the walk was great. Nothing bad happened. We had a great walk and again I learned a lot about Egypt while wondering if I would live to tell anyone about it.

Cairo highway

The great thing about Focus Travel Club, is that we travel to the main tourist places, but also have time to be with locals. Tourism is a big part of the Egyptian economy, and while our money was important, our group did travel everywhere with ‘undercover security guards’ who wore FBI suits, shiny shoes, and carried loaded guns. We also had tourist police with us and when we went where tourist don’t usually go, we had several army vehicles with at least 6 soldiers carrying AK’s. Maybe for show, maybe not. We had no incidents, so I will never know and will wonder if their presence had protected us or made us a very visible target. My evenings with Hamdy and his friends were done without all the security stuff and

had a great time with no incidents.