Things we learned:

Currency: Pounds (5.5 Egyptian Pounds=$1 USD)

Cities Visited: Cairo, Luxor, St. Katherine

It is well worth it to visit Old Cairo behind the subway station at the Coptic Museum.

Bathrooms are called “W.C.” and you will most likely be asked to pay for using them.  There will be no toilet paper and the toilet will have a spout installed in the bowl that serves as a bidet.  Public toilets are few and far between; you will not find them in restaurants so keep this in mind when heading out the door.

Baksheesh or “tip” is heavily demanded from foreigners here. People will ask for baksheesh when they perform a service that you did not ask for. Children will accompany you on the street and then ask for baksheesh because they “showed you the way”. Cops will stop traffic to “help” you cross the street with the same expectation. Do not give baksheesh, it only makes the situation worse.

As a foreign woman, you will be constantly stared at and called to regardless of whether your husband is with you or not. Dress modestly and wear a “wedding ring” to draw less attention.  Additionally, be observant of the establishments you would like to eat or drink tea at as they may be “men-only”.

Instead of food, candy, or money, children in Egypt will beg you for pens.

Learn the art of HAGGLING!

Scams

As much as we love Egypt and we know you will come to love it, beware of the scams. This is the place where you actually do need to exercise caution when approached by anyone and you must always think twice before forking over your cash. The best thing to do is to be prepared because people will be pretty aggressive when it comes to getting your money. Some scams to look out for include:

1. Anyone involved in the transportation industry has ties to something and will try to take you to their place of commission – tell these people upfront that if they take you to a shop, you will pay half of the fare.

2. At the pyramids, people will do everything in their power to lead you in the direction towards their camels or horse carts away from the entrance. They will tell you that the pyramid entrance is closed, etc. Do not listen to them and proceed towards the entrance.

3. When at the pyramids, be warned that if you want to have a camel or horse cart ride, the handlers will demand baksheesh and may not allow you to get off the animal until you pay them more money. They will also try to get more money from you if you want to take a picture with these animals.  We had one camel handler asking us for 10-15 dollars for a photo and then getting angry when we did not give him this amount.

4. Some shop owners people will state you the “foreigner” price for things which is why it helps to know how to identify Arabic numbers.

5. In restaurants, if you are served something more than you ordered (i.e. salad or water), it is not free. Decline it because if it is put on your table, they will charge you for it regardless of whether you consume it or not.

Even with all the scams, it will not be horrible to lose out on some money because Egypt is incredibly cheap.  Additionally, do not lose your cool and scream at the Egyptians as it will only make you look bad.

Sites:

You can go inside the Pyramids for an additional fee. The Great Pyramid is the most expensive and the other ones are less expensive. If you are curious about seeing the inside, but don’t want to fork over the money, we would recommend doing the small pyramid.  For all of the Pyramids, you can not take pictures inside and you will most likely have to pay baksheesh to get your camera back.

At Mount Sinai, you will be forced to get a tour guide for a large fee.  If you don’t want to pay for a tour guide, go up the mountain on a day when the monastery is open because the security guards will have a harder time picking you out from the monastery crowds.  Remember to bring a torch/flashlight up with you as it gets tricky to climb down in the dark.

The Egyptian Museum in Cairo is ENORMOUS and you will need more than a day to see everything inside.  In Luxor, do not go to the Mummy Museum because it is overpriced and overrated.

You are not allowed to have cameras at the Valley of the Kings in Luxor and if you are seen using them, you may have to pay.

If you want to go to the sites across the river (in Luxor), it is better to split a taxi with a group of people on the other side.  You can also negotiate the price of a min-bus as soon as you arrive on the other side, but they will not be allowed to park at these sites.  The process then becomes complicated to get from site to site as you may only have to depend on cabs who are allowed to wait in the parking lot and will overcharge. If you get an early start and don’t mind a bit of exercise, renting a bike might be the best way to get from place to place.

Winter is one of the best seasons to visit as the weather is cool and the sites are not as packed. You can also get discounts on hotel rooms.

Transportation

Cairo traffic is quite crazy and pedestrian lights mean nothing to drivers.  The best thing to do is to cross with the locals…move when they move.

In Luxor, when you take the ferry across Nile to other side, it is not necessary to buy a round trip ticket even if the teller encourages you to do so.

There is only one bus from Cairo to St. Katherine City at 11 a.m. There are no buses from St. Katherine to Dahab, just minibuses. (February 2010)

If you want to ride the trains affordably and you don’t mind 2^nd class, get an Egyptian to buy your ticket. Ticket sellers will refuse to sell you a ticket and make up excuses (i.e. the computer isn’t working) to prevent foreigners from getting cheap fares.  They may offer an option for you to get on the train without a ticket, but this just means that you will pay more while you are on and you won’t have a seat (which can be quite uncomfortable on a ten hour train ride).

The Real Prices of Things

We learned quickly that if you don’t know the real price of everything, you may end up getting charged up to 5 times more.

Water: 2 Pounds

Kushari: 5 Pounds (large size to go)

Sandwich: (with foul or falafel) 1 Pound

Post Card: 1.5-2 Pounds

Taxi in Cairo: 5 Pounds

Horse Cart Ride in Luxor: 5 Pounds

Egyptian Bread: 5 Piastras

Hotel: 40 Pounds for a double room with bathroom, including breakfast, but you could probably go lower depending on season

Things we liked:

Deenaree´s list…

• Food: Kushari (Mmmmmm!!!)
• Experience: I loved Old Cairo!
• Something to remember: Marveling at the sheer size of structures left by ancient civilizations from 4,000 years ago

Ben´s list…

• Food: Kushari
• Experience: Seeing the Pyramids for the first time on top of the Cairo Tower
• Something(s) to remember: Dodging endless lanes of crazy Egyptian drivers in Cairo

As soon as we arrived to Cairo, our Couchsurfing guides, Mohey and Mahmoud, invited us and our host, Dawn, to the wedding of Mahmoud’s cousin. We had not quite recovered from our flight from South Africa to Cairo, but we agreed to attend because I love weddings, especially those in other countries.

When evening came, we met up with more of Mohey and Mahmoud’s friends at the edge of Old Cairo and crowded into a couple of cabs. The cabs dropped us off in a neighborhood full of food stalls and vegetable carts. With a bit of maneuvering, we arrived to our destination – a partitioned off street with tables set up for guests, a stage for the bride and groom, and giant speakers for dancing. To add a bit of flair and romantic atmosphere, lines of lights were strung all around. The guests were divided with women grouped together in seats near the stage and men sitting at tables in the back.

The bride and groom were not set to arrive until later because they were completing their ceremony elsewhere so Mahmoud introduced us to his friends and family. We noticed immediately that we were the only foreigners at the wedding and attracted a lot of attention because of this. It was almost as if we were the newly married couple that the guests were coming to see. Some covered women even approached me with cameras and took pictures. Using this opportunity, I also took a picture in return.  Once the introductions were finished, Ben and I followed Dawn, Mahmoud, and Mohey to the men’s section to sit at the chairs provided.

We were served cracker sticks with a strong, bitter cheese spread while we chatted with the people around us. To my surprise, many of the young men danced together as we all waited for the couple. I learned that in Egypt, it is not unusual for men to dance together. It has nothing to do with being attracted to each other, but rather it has to do with Egyptian culture. Dancing with women is not an option. Additionally, women do not dance with each other if men are around. Dancing is one of the many differences we noticed between men and women in Egypt. Another difference was that Egyptian women are not allowed to smoke and drink, but their husbands are. Many of our conversations at the wedding were with Dawn, who had moved from London to Egypt several years ago and experienced the differences first-hand. As a foreign woman, it seemed as if we were exempt from these rules because we were asked several times to dance.

Eventually, all eyes turned towards the bride and groom who had just arrived with a big procession of additional family members and photographers. As you can see from the pictures, the couple wore Western attire apart from the fact that the bride had additional layers to cover her arms, chest, and hair, and both had henna on their hands.  Their final destination was the stage where more pictures were taken with every guest in attendance. I was happy to snap a few close photos with the help of Mahmoud’s mother, who pulled me to the stage and put in a request.

After pictures, we celebrated with a bit of cake as we would have at an American wedding and we watched the groom join the men in dancing while his bride posed for more pictures. When our exhaustion set in, we made our way back in crowded city minibuses to our comfy beds in Dawn’s apartment. Like our Panamanian wedding experience, we were very grateful to have had a glimpse of a cultural rite of passage that is similar and yet very different in each country.

]]> http://travelstainedlife.com/2010/03/30/egyptian-wedding/feed/ 0 http://travelstainedlife.com/2010/03/23/finding-magic-in-egyptian-cities/ http://travelstainedlife.com/2010/03/23/finding-magic-in-egyptian-cities/#comments Tue, 23 Mar 2010 22:50:34 +0000 Deenaree http://travelstainedlife.com/?p=1351 Continue reading →]]> Somewhere in the middle of the chaotic city of Cairo lies a series of side streets and dusty alleyways known as “Old Cairo“.  Although located right behind the busy subway stop to the tourist frequented Coptic museum, one would never guess that this quiet area was related in any way to the urban sprawl outside its doors.  Instead, Old Cairo has the personality of a small Middle Eastern village stuck in an ancient time.  We are in love with Old Cairo and find magic in every street we stroll down, in every corner we turn, and in every person we see.

In the early morning hours, we emerge from Dawn’s apartment to be greeted by the beginning of a new day and the sounds of a “village” on the verge of waking up.  Rays of sunlight make their way down past rickety buildings and through clothes-filled laundry lines to streets of whirling dust.  It is not a pretty area – piles of garbage filled with groups of mangy, scavenging cats bring it to eyesore status – but there is nothing in the world like those rays of sunlight and the way they reflect off old facades.

Bearded men who sell vegetables and other goods from donkey carts can be heard yelling out in sing-song voices while robed women lower baskets from third floor balconies to purchase their wares.  Handfuls of uniformed children overcome with curiosity trip over each other to get a better look at us and practice their English in loud, distracting tones.  We hear “Hello! What’s your name?” followed by pointing fingers, whispers, and giggles.  Covered women scurry past with furtive glances and old men in local cafes pause their sheesha smoking and tea drinking to stare.  Some ask where we are from and when we answer, they smile and say, “America? Obama!” or “America, best country in the world.”

For breakfast, we wander over to our favorite hole-in-the-wall shop where foul or falafel and pickled vegetables are stuffed into pockets of flat Egyptian bread for 1 Egyptian pound. Crowds of locals usually gather here in front of the cigarette smoking falafel fryer and it can be hard to catch a glimpse of his other comrades who prepare the sandwiches, but we know they are back there because they pop their heads above the piles of eggplant and tomato salads as soon as they get word of our presence.  When we place our orders, they go the extra mile to help us first, even if impatient locals are thrusting money in their faces.  Our sandwiches are made with care – placed on plates instead of paper wrapped – and the cashier’s chair is donated so that we can sit at the small curbside table across the shop.  Many a breakfast were consumed at this table while curious onlookers observed our every bite.

With hunger satiated and purpose in our step, we head towards the subway.  At this time in the morning, I always insist on going the long way down a road I have nicknamed “market street”.  Here, we must make a conscientious effort to stick together as we weave through the masses who choose this street to make their daily purchases.  We see sellers proudly exhibiting their colorful selection of fruits and vegetables on wooden carts and truck beds.  Groups of women gather and haggle over live fish that flop impatiently in tubs while children cling to their legs.  We walk past piles of giant cabbage and cauliflower that reach Ben’s height and donkeys lazily chewing on tall stalks of grass on our way to the subway stop.  Everyone around us seems to have important things to attend to and we are happy to be the curious onlookers observing this time.  Walking down market street is like going back in time and it’s easy to imagine what life may have been like a century ago.  It is my favorite street in all of Cairo and I can never get enough of the sights, smells and sounds of it.

For us, the subway marks the point where the city begins.  Already, we hear the honking of passing cars and calls of obnoxious touts.  We spend our afternoons diving deep into this crazy world and emerge in the evenings feeling exhausted and disenchanted.  But, when we find ourselves back in Old Cairo after a very long and tiring day, everything in the world seems right, peaceful, and simple once again.