Egypt

I had hoped to make my first travel post after crossing the Egyptian border into Sudan, but for some reason it looks like Hermes has not willed it for me to cross over yet and instead I'm writing from Cairo.

The problem, as I had feared, is that getting a Sudanese visa is damn tricky and I'm striking out at every turn here. I've got no chance because of holiday here for the next week, so tomorrow I'll hopefully be off to Siwa, to the West. Staying for this extra time might be for the best, however, as Cairo (and Egypt as a whole) has grown on me in the extra time spent here and I've discovered a side of the country I would have otherwise missed.

When I first arrived, my first order of business in Egypt was to visit the pyramids, Nile, and National Museum, which I did in quick succession. Unfortunately, I quickly decided that the city fell below what were very insignificant expectations to begin with. It seemed that every cab driver tried to overcharge me, every shop keeper tried to sell me outrageously priced perfume, and every smile directed at me was fake. The city, I felt that and still feel, is essentially like Rome on blow - history every twelve feet and cats every ten feet (in what I can only imagine is a nod to it's ancient history of veneration towards cats), crazy traffic, and a lively population. But where I like Rome, I didn't like Cairo because these effects are multiplied ten-fold and the "bustleness" of the city is just plain crazy.

With many millions of people, the city is understandably cramped and the city suffers not only from human pollution but from the desert sands as well. In some areas I can see no more than a quarter mile because of the smog. And the traffic. God, the traffic.

You know how in some movies the good guy or bad guy will gain control of the traffic light system and then make all lights turn green at a traffic intersection? Of course what inevitably happens is that a dozen or so cars will crash into each other and the drivers will emerge shouting "Hey, what the hell's the matter with you?!?!" at each other. Well it's like that in Cairo, except nobody ever crashes! Seriously, I've been to some of the largest cities in the world and crossed streets in some pretty ridiculous traffic, but Cairo is the only city where I've truly had an adrenaline rush from navigating some of these streets. You don't think about it, you just dive into the traffic and cram into any wedge you can before you're struck by the honking cab drivers. Because they're always honking. Or shouting at each other.

So anyway, I decided Cairo was not for me. After failing in my initial attempts at a Sudanese visa I fled to the seaside town of Dahab on the west coast of the Sinai Peninsula. Still fretting about security from when Israel took control in 1967, security checks are frequent and I had to show my passport four times from the Suez Canal to Dahab and four times back.

Still, the hassle was worth it for the comfort that Dahab offers. It is billed, indeed it was built up for this reason, as a backpacking hot-spot in Sinai and has worked hard to keep itself into a low-key tourist location. Set along the Gulf of Aqaba, the Saudi Arabian mountains can be seen to the east across the channel and, at night, some lights from settlements across the way on the Arabian Peninsula. I was sorely tempted to cross the channel via fishing boat or head north to Jordan and Israel, but I figured that it was best to keep these destinations safe for another trip and instead keep to Africa.

To the west of Dahab lie crumbling granite and sandstone mountains, courtesy of the Great Rift Valley. They had no vegetation and were pure desert, so it seemed very appealing to check them out. After a brief day of snorkeling along the reefs of Dahab I put together my camping pack and set out with three gallons of water and some food to explore these hills.

In every spot it seemed the rocks are just ready to fall off and crumble to the canyons below, so it made me wary of climbing on top of the hills. Instead I stuck to the low points and crossed over ridges as little as possible. Heading north, I trekked along the coast keeping the water in site. There were times, when the gullies went straight down or house-size boulders blocked my path, that I was forced to climb the walls to find another path, and even though I know it probably wasn't the smartest thing to do I couldn't help myself. It's a great feeling having to navigate the rocks and boulders by my own wits. Even the feeling of fear, when I was edging around the cliffs as I felt a rock begin to crumble or break free beneath my hands, or worse, beneath my feet, was an emotion I hadn't felt in a good while and I took a certain perverse pleasure when it coursed through me.

But that feeling was luckily rare and I spent the great majority of my time simply trekking. Nights were spent sleeping beneath the beautiful desert stars. Sunsets were a great time, because while the sun would set in back of me, over the Sinai Mountains, the Arabian Mountains across the gulf always reflected the gorgeous colors. Their brown color would always turn red first with the setting sun. Then it would fade to a pink, next purple, and finally brown again as the sun finally went down. Then the stars would explode into the sky that was otherwise pure blackness.

The mountains weren't safe for mules or camels because of their make-up, and the Bedouins seemed to largely avoid traveling in them as well, so I never saw anyone my entire time there save for a lone bird my second day. If there is a use for the word serene, it is within these mountains.

Eventually I made my way to a road on the coast and followed that back to Dahab. I had forgotten my passport back in the hostel and my trekking had unknowingly put me on the wrong side of a security checkpoint, but after some good natured gesturing with their unnecessarily large automatics, they decided to let me through anyway. Walking back, a man in a shop gestured me over and asked if I was hungry. As I had run our of both food and water the day before, I emphatically told him I was and he invited me in to share his lunch in a most welcoming gesture of Bedouin hospitality. I am told that this is a common occurrence in the next country on my list, Sudan, but still it came as a wonderful shock to me. Especially considering how much I love eating and think of every morsel of food as a wonderful gift from the Gods, having a stranger share their food with me for no other reason than to be nice is incredibly impressive.

I returned to Cairo to wander around the city a bit but quickly became as annoyed as before, especially around the tourist areas where the shop keepers have some pretty well thought out plans to get you to buy stuff. I fled once again and decided to get a train ticket down the Nile to Aswan.

After walking into the train station to buy the ticket with my head down, I was mortified to realize that I had actually walked into what turned out to be one of the largest mosques in Cairo during prayer time. Now, I gotta say, if you ever want to feel like a complete idiot, nothing, nothing, not even setting yourself on fire, makes you feel as stupid as doing something like that. There is no way to get extract yourself gracefully. I thought about kneeling down to pray and hope they didn't notice I had no idea what I was doing, but I decided that the best thing to do would be to cut my losses and flee the area before I did anything dumber. As it was, not many people saw me as I walked in the back way, but still . . . whew.

After failing to a get a visa down in Aswan I quickly came back up to Cairo. I say quickly because I didn't want to get in transit during Eid ul-Adha, the huge Muslim holiday that celebrates Abraham's willingness to sacrifice his son to God (who, it turns out, was just yanking Abraham's chain, the jokester!). Eid ul-Adha is a four day long festival in Muslim countries (which is actually far longer) that I was hoping to experience in Sudan, but that obviously isn't happening, so Egypt it is.

Anyway, these last few days I've spent wandering the streets of Old Cairo, a section of town that I have grown to love. The buildings here, which appear as old as Egypt itself, are in a cramped section of town where the roads are more alleys than anything else and have no sense or purpose, the trash has piled up, and the people look at your strangely not because you represent money but because it's just weird that you're there. It was here that for the first time in ages I got my first whiff of burning rubbish, a smell that any traveler of a third-world country should be familiar with and maybe even welcome.

Chickens, goats, mules, and the occasional cow wander the streets and children usually do one of three things - wave and say "hello," just stare, or run up asking for money. Oddly enough, even the asking for money is enduring. I never give it, but they never really seem to care that much. They just think it's hilarious that I'm as tall as I am.

The first couple times I asked the locals where a good place to eat was, and both times I was motioned to sit. They then went of and brought back my lunch and adamantly refused payment because "I am like a brother." I felt bad at this treatment and today vowed to find food myself. So for lunch I walked into a cafe for some falafels and almost jumped out of my skin when I walked into a huge pool of blood that was forming from the GIANT GODDAMN COW THEY HAD JUST SLAUGHTERED RIGHT THERE IN THE MIDDLE OF THE DINING AREA.

Seriously, the cow, no doubt slaughtered for Eid ul-Adha which starts tomorrow, must have been alive and kicking only seconds before I entered, because the puddle was still rapidly forming. The head was about half off, and thing thing took up maybe a third of the room that was available in the tiny cafe. At this I decided I was no longer hungry and existed the cafe as graciously and quickly as I could.

So, ridiculous cow slaughters aside, Old Cairo has become a favorite place of mine. I realize that my initial disappointment with Cairo was in it's tourist hot-spots because it's natural to try to get money off of unsuspecting tourists. I've always known this, yet for some reason I forgot it here and at first thought of Cairo only by those who represent it's tourism. Bad mistake.

So anyway right now I'm about to have a seizure because it's so difficult to get a Sudanese visa, but besides that all is well. That's all I got for now, I'll try to post when (if) I cross the border before I head into nothingness.


p.s. All of the computers here have pirated copies of Windows . . . XP. I have yet to see Vista. Suck it, Microsoft.