Ana_Cairo, Egypt

Day 1
We flew Miami - New York - Cairo. The flight was not that bad. We were a little worried when we checked in Miami with American Airlines because we realized we only had two hours exactly to get our luggage find the terminal to check-in with Egypt Air. Luckily we made it right on time. By the time we arrived at the gate people were already boarding. Being in the plane gave us a taste of how it was going to be. People were speaking Arabic already and the women were wearing the wraps around their head, not sure what they're called. The flight from New York to Cairo was around 10 hours.

We arrived around noon Cairo time, (6am Miami time). Our flight was full so the line in immigration was long. It seemed that a lot of people spoke English at least enough to get by. It took forever to get our luggage. My backpack came out first. We were worried that Tim's bag didn't make it. But it did. Once we got our luggage I imagined I had that terrified look. I was a little scared going out in the streets to get a taxi. I had Tim be the negotiator. To be honest I had this ignorant idea that as soon as I'd step out of the airport people will try to hurt us, maybe kidnapped us and kill us. I know I'm being dramatic but honest that what I was thinking. Of course we had several taxi drivers approached us. But they all seemed to be doubling the price according the guide book. We finally found a cheaper guy. Tim was thinking of taking the bus but at that point I didn't feel comfortable either way taxi or bus. We did go with the cheap taxi guy; Tim had a good feeling about him. So I said OK! Besides I was dealing with the super hot weather. If felt like 200 degrees. As we approached downtown Cairo we were able to see many people walking down streets. Cairo is huge! About 16 million people live here. I can see why they call it a Middle Eastern Manhattan! It's a very crowded city and buildings everywhere. The overall color the city is earthy, very desert-looking. Traffic is nuts here the rules are minimum, people hunk all the time and you easily go from three lanes to six lanes, people trying to get by even though there is traffic. People are very impatient driving. I sometimes had to close my eyes not to see ahead. We told our taxi driver to drop us off in Pension Roma, the hostel we had in mind which was in downtown. When we get to downtown he said "OK, downtown" and we were like um where is Pension Roma. We figured at that point he didn't know where it was and he wanted to drop us off in the turn-around in downtown. We were showing him the book and the map, but I told Tim I don't think he can read English. The taxi driver asked around to find this place and nobody seemed to know where it was. Finally Tim spotted another hostel listed in the book, he checked if they had any rooms available and they did. At this time we just wanted a place. It had been a long night. The lady at the reception was very friendly and she spoke decent English. We were offered a room with ac and another without. Of course I chose the one with ac. We lay down for few minutes, didn't want to fall asleep. It was so tempting with the ac. We decided to walk around the city and look for a place to eat. Also we wanted to look for a cheaper hostel. We felt this was a bit pricy, which was 100 Egyptian Pounds, like 18 USD. I know it's not bad, but for our budgets we can get way cheaper. The exchange rate here is 5.76 for 1 USD.

Walking down the streets was so refreshing and different. People we starred at us and we'd at them. Soon enough we saw people screaming as we walked "welcome, where are you from and hello!" They seemed very friendly, more than I thought. They'll smile from ear to ear. I also noticed that it was mainly men walking down the streets and working at the shops. Tim noticed them looking at me a lot. But you get use to it. I dress very different from the women here. I'm actually showing some skin. I'm sure in their eyes I'm naked. You can see my arms, even though to me I'm dressed normal. I see why the tell you to wear long sleeves. Even then you stand out becuase you look different.

After walking for 30 minutes we found a place to eat. Good thing they had the menu in English. We ordered a chicken sandwich to be safe. Pretty good! We also found a cheaper place to stay. It might be a half star hotel, but decent. We bought some fresh apricots and oranges. I didn't realize they had great fruits here, because of the Nile. I swear the best apricots ever, so sweet and cheap. You can buy a handful for about $.30.

We finished all the errands around 7ish pm and went back to the hostel. We felt asleep with the ac. We woke up around 9ish. We couldn't fall back asleep.



Day 2
We woke up early to checkout by 10am. We had the breakfast included, pretty decent - eggs, bread and hot tea. They're really big on hot tea. They called it the Egyptian whisky. It's really good, they sometimes add mint leaves.

We moved to the Dahab Hotel just down the street. We were told by the reception guy we can get our students id card so we can get discounts to all the major attractions in Egypt and indeed other places in the world. But we told them we were not students officially but they said no problem. It was only going to cost us like $12 USD each plus the taxi cab and $2 tip for the guy helping us. We got to the place and the first thing they asked us was for proof we were students and we said we don't have any. The woman started talking to the guy helping us, which I forgot his name. Then we started walking away and he told Tim to say he was a student in the states. We were a little confused since no one told us we needed to say that we were students abroad. So we went back and said "yes, we're students." In two minutes we had our international student card. Close call!

We headed to the Egyptian Museum and we paid half the price with the student card. The museum is huge. To really see everything in detail would take months. Everything is so cramped and it’s not very organized. We had our guidebook and try to see the highlights only. Beautiful stuff! As you walk down you ask yourself how they managed to build all this more than 4,000 thousand years ago. Crazy to thing they were so artistic. I specially loved to see all the jewelry and the mask of Tutankhamen, pure gold. Awesome to see!!!

After four hours in the museum we decided to go to the train station to buy our tickets to Luxor, which we wanted to leave the following day at night. According to the guy from our hotel he said that it was better if he called for us since nobody speaks English at the station, but of course it would cost 10 pounds each for him to do so. It's no much but it's the principle. I told Tim that I didn't believe him so we went to the train station to buy the tickets ourselves. What a mad house. The station was huge and crowded. In our book it said to go to platform 11 to buy the tickets. After asking around we finally got there and we bought the tickets. And yes they speak a little bit of English, enough to buy your tickets. We took a taxi back to the hotel. The taxi guy we had was really cool, Asam. He just seemed really nice. He was nice enough that we hired him for the next, Sunday, to take us to the local pyramids of Giza, Saqqara and Memphis. So for like $25 USD he was going to drive us around for the whole day. Pretty sweet!

It was dinner time again. We tried a local place Felfale something like that. It's like Egyptian fast food. Really good. The falafels are better than I thought it would taste like. I had a steak sandwich, good too. I loved being there because it was a local hangout. I even saw a lady that was covered from head to toe and all you can see was her eyes. And to eat she'd lift the head wrap with one hand and eat with the other. Very interesting! I was trying not to stare but it was hard not to notice something so different.

Walking back to the hotel it's always interesting you get attention like crazy. Some people trying to sell you stuff other just saying "hello". You have some of the young boys blowing you kisses, of course to me only not Tim, the guards winking at you, you name it. Very friendly! People might be aggressive selling you stuff in a nice way and they respect when nicely say "no. thank you," at least 95% of the time.



Day 3
Woke up around 5am to wait for Asam who picked us up at 5:30am. Indeed he was right on time. The idea was to be in Giza by 6am to ride on a camel to see the sunrise before going to the pyramids. He took us to a guy he knew, Alex. Quite a character this guy. First thing it was to negotiate the price according to the guide it shouldn't be more than $20 an hour. But of course he wanted more. After 20 minutes of negotiating we agreed on a price. It was like pulling teeth. Tim rode on the camel first and I was on horse. There was a young boy walking the camel. Tim getting on the camel was pretty darn funny. Since the camel first gets up with the front legs and then with the back legs, it looks like it's going to break. Off we went riding around the pyramids. The horse I had was really mellow, which I liked I don't like fast horses. To get to the pyramids we had to go through the neighborhood nearby. Other locals were riding horses too. It took like 30 minutes to actually see the pyramids. It was quite magical to see the pyramids from far away in the middle of the desert. We followed by an older man riding a donkey, that when we stopped he opened to cokes for us and we didn't even ask for them. I refused! For me it was the whole principal. He was trying to sell us something we didn't ask for and then he had the nerve to say it was free. Free my butt!

I saw Alex pay the guards watching the pyramids. I took it that we were not supposed to be there. Anyhow I was trying not to let those sneaky things get me. It was really beautiful to see the pyramids from far away and we were the only ones there. After a while we switched, I had a chance to ride on the camel. Man the camel had tons of flies around his head and I think he was tired; he kept making a lot of noise. Tim got a QuickTime of me getting down. He kept telling me hold on. Riding it was really neat. They walk pretty slowly and the motion is back and forth unlike the horse up and down. The last thing we saw was the sphinx. We couldn't get to close because it was gated and we had more guards yell at Alex. I think he gave the more money. Before we went back, three hours later, Alex asked for some baksheesh(tip). I'm sorry you don't ask for tip. At this time I was really annoyed by him. Oh, well part of the fun. Overall it was an awesome experience.

We met Asam and told we wanted to actual go to the entrance of the pyramids, otherwise we wouldn't get to see the pyramids up close. We had to pay additional to enter, but it was worth it, plus we had our student cards. The first thing you see was the sphinx. Pretty impressive. It was built to guard the 3 pyramids and scare people away. These pyramids are huge! They're important because they were the most elaborate and tallest pyramids ever. I can't believe they did so much work for one tomb. This king was very powerful. I mean you feel tiny next to them. You look up and you don't understand how they did this. They say it took like 30 years to build the tallest pyramid, which is a lot of years.

By around 10ish the sun was beaming like crazy and the site was crowded with tour buses. As we walked we got bombarded by vendors. It cracked me up; they all had the same line. They approached with a big smile and welcoming you and sometimes they'd say "welcome to Alaska," trying to be funny. After they'd say "where are you from?" and Tim would say "Canada," their response "Canada dry, never dries." Muy funny but after the fifth person saying the same thing it sounds like a broken record. Another line they used was "you're a lucky man," to Tim. OK, it did make feel like a princess but after while it got old too. They kept asking where I was from and to through them off I'd say I'm from different parts of Central America and South America. Sometimes I'd say from Panama, Nicaragua, Mexico, Guatemala, and Uruguay. The look on their faces was precious. They couldn't pronounce it. Most of the time they didn't know where it was. But they knew you I spoke Spanish so they'd say "Hola Pepsicola" or "Hasta luego Senorita." I got it give to them; they managed to learn enough of different languages to speak to the tourist. You'd hear them speak Japanese, French, English of course, Spanish, Italian and German.

We finished touring the site around lunch time around 11:30ish. We told Asam we wanted something to eat before going to the next site, Saqqara. We asked Asam to eat with us; we went to a place just outside the pyramids. Talking with Asam was really cool. He seemed to be a really honest and sweet guy. At first I thought he didn't like me because he'd only speak to Tim. But I started to talk with him more and asked him questions about the culture and he opened up. I had to ask about the women wearing the wraps, that I've seen different styles and some women don't wear them. He said it was very open. Even though 80% of the population is Muslim you don't have to dress with the wraps. He said it depends on the family. And the women who are dressed all in black, covered from head to toe and only have a small opening to see, are from Saudi Arabia or other Middle Eastern countries. He said there is lot of immigrants from nearby countries. I also asked him about the voices you hear on the speaker around the town. He said it's a call to prayer and it happens 5 times a day. You hear them all around the city the first one starts around 5 am, then 1pm, 4pm, 7pm and last one at 9pm. After a few days it's pretty neat to hear, you know what time a day it is. It's a very peaceful sound!

We got to Saqqara around 1pm. Can you say HOT! Here we saw the first and the oldest pyramid. It's more than 5,000 years old. You can see they tried to make it a step pyramid and some pieces have fallen off. You'd think after thousands of years. We were approached to ride on an "Egyptian Cadillac" (aka donkey), to view the site. No thank you. =) I still can imagine building something that massive under the heat. I'm sure it took forever. I'm sure a lot of people worked on this structure. I can remember the king's name but for sure he was powerful and smart to think of this. He had the first pyramid ever.

Our final stop was in Memphis, the oldest town in Egypt. It used to be the capital of Egypt in the Old Kingdom. The highlight here was the huge statue of Ramses II. It was on the ground since it was missing half of the legs. It was still MASSIVE. This king has around 60 statue of himself in Egypt. He was one of the most powerful pharaohs ever. Another interesting fact is that he had 96 sons and 105 daughters. He had several wives’s including four of his daughter, but only one royal queen, Nefertiri. Busy guy! For sure no TV!!!!

After visiting the site we went to meet Asam. He was waiting for under the shade, hanging out with a friend. They were smoking Egyptian tobacco with a sheesha (water pipe). They asked us to sit down and relax. The idea was pretty nice just to relax, after the all day going around the sites feeling being in the super hot sun. We had some cold Pepsi, very refreshing. They asked Tim to try the sheesha, he did. He said it’s more than just tobacco. He felt a bit light headed and instant relaxation. We just sat there for a while hanging out and just talking about life. I got present to how lucky we are traveling around the world and you can predict the people you’ll meet along the way, that would touch you live forever. The other man we were hanging out with Ahmed, asked me if I was always like this and he kept making hand gestures. I asked like how – ANIMATED? And he said yes! I responded - - unfortunately I’m not even trying and indeed I’m very animated all the time. He said it was good and that I should keep it that way. I kept making he laugh the rest of the afternoon. Around 4pm we went back to the hotel. We had to take a nap before taking our overnight train to Luxor. Long night!!!!