Chaos. Complete chaos. And yet with some kind of unspoken rule and unexpected courtesy. It’s the only way I can begin to describe driving around Cairo.
There are no lane markings on the roads – why bother when nobody is likely to take any notice? It’s more like a mass of angled, battered dodgem cars, ducking and weaving; no indicators, only waving hands and tooting horns which have a language of their own: one toot, three toots, a long blast. I couldn’t work out the translations apart from: ‘Coming through,’ which seemed to apply to most of them.
Cairo: Coming Through!
Motorbikes carrying three people – often one a baby in arms – wove through the heaving mess of cars; buses and vans full of people stopped and started as people jumped on and off through the wide open doors, Combi vans chugged along, suspension shot and their rear bonnets open to keep the engine cool. And in the middle of it all, donkeys pulled carts loaded with carrots, melons, furniture. Flocks of sheep huddled amongst the parked cars, tempting buyers looking to break the family’s Ramadan fast in style.
Not that I was actually behind the wheel. Are you kidding? I left that up to our Egyptian driver. Apart from the high probability of an accident if I were driving in that melee, I saw very few women in the driver’s seat: Egypt is a male-dominated culture.
Cairo is one of the most alive places I have ever been. The sheer mass of people, the noise, the heat, the traffic, the yelling in the market, the foul tempered camels, the squeezing through impossibly narrow streets by wheezing tour buses, insulating their nervous occupants from the reality of it all, the dust, the sweat, the swirling voices calling out: ‘How can I take your money?’
Yes, in the Khan el Khalili market stallholders really do say that. In fact it’s their opening line: “How can I take your money?” So honest; I loved it. Sometimes it was followed by: “I do not want anything from you, I am married. I just want your money.”
Cairo: How can I take your money?
Once it was replaced with an offer of six camels to Steve in exchange for me and Violet – his two wives. Travelling with two women gave him a lot of kudos and us some protection. Selling me some fabulous red pointy, curly toed leather shoes (”smell them: leather”, as they were thrust again and again into my face), I was asked whether Steve was really my husband. I felt it safest to say yes, to discover that my shoe man was heartbroken as “already I love you.”
I got the shoes for a bargain price.
We intended to go to the market for an hour or so; we were there for about three and only went down a few streets. What with the backgammon seller firing up a cigarette lighter to show us the counters were real camel bone not plastic, the shoe man sending his younger brother running all over the market to find my size, and our search for a place to have lunch (everything was closed for Ramadam, stupid Western tourists that we were), it all took some time. I haven’t laughed so much or felt so involved in street theatrics and hardcore commerce for a long time. Then, turning a corner, there would suddenly be a wonderful mosque, or a man carrying a hundred loaves of bread in a basket on his head, or a desperate man carrying a few footstools for sale in an effort to support his family.
Finally, we found our way out of the place, and relocated our patient driver. He was on the phone and explained politely he was calling the hotel to organise another driver because we were so long he had to return to his family to break the Ramadan fast at sundown; his wife had been on the phone. He drove us back to the hotel waving away our embarrassed apologies and explaining it was okay because driving is his business and business is important. We realised we should have been more aware of Ramadan, what it meant and how it worked.
Returning to the hotel well after sundown, we headed for our guidebook and the section on cultural sensitivities. I thought I’d been doing a good job by wearing long skirts, concealing tops – unlike many of the singleted and skimpy sun-frocked tourists I saw – but that was just the beginning.
We discovered that in Egypt it is rude to blow your nose at the dining table – oops, but I blame all that sand; that a woman should not sit next to a man not her husband – luckily they all thought Steve was; and that women should allow men to do the negotiating and arranging – oops again. In the three short days we were there – not nearly long enough but all the time we had – we really only went to tourist places: the Egyptian Museum, the Pyramids & the market (known to be the tourist market), and to our wonderful, ex-royal hunting palace but now very western hotel. I’m sure the people we encountered had endured less sensitive behaviour than ours, but it made me aware of how cloistered a lot of my travel has been, centered mainly in Europe, and the need to read up before going to places like Egypt. It’s not only for politeness, sometimes it can be for safety as well, especially as a woman. I am glad I had no preconceived visions of the market, or the driving – they surprised and delighted me - but I wish I had known more about the cultural etiquette.
Disrupting his life aside, we had a great time with our driver who has been driving visitors around for 25 years. He pointed out the major buildings, the zoo, the universities, the mosques. He took us past the Citadel and showed us where the stone for the pyramids was quarried – miles and miles and across the river from where they were built; it is hard to grasp the sheer work and ingenuity that went into creating them. He also took us past the City of the Dead, the huge cemetery, explaining that some living people actually reside in there, usually the homeless who are taken in by families and given a room to live in by the family crypt in exchange for watching over it.
The pyramids of Giza
Driving out to Giza, where our hotel was, we passed miles upon mile of new apartment buildings, half finished, surrounded by the fertile green agricultural land next to the river and fringed by desert. He explained that many farming families have now built on their land, leaving the apartments without windows and doors to prevent paying taxes; these homes are their children’s inheritance. Stopping at the side of the freeway to look at this landscape and, inevitably, photograph the distant pyramids, a woman walking on the road below called out to us in Spanish. We replied in English and she waved and called out ‘Welcome.’ Everywhere we went, the Egyptian people were this friendly.
Next day, one of our burning desires was to go down the Nile River on a felucca. But, trap for young players, not all these boats are the romantic sort with sails. We found ourselves offered only a large motor-powered boat. Disappointment seized us but with no other option we slouched on board, settling onto the deep red, quite hard cushions. But once on the water, our spirits lifted. It really is a mighty, mighty river, teeming with history and full of the famous, life-sustaining silt (although it no longer floods; if it did, most of the luxury hotels in Cairo would be in big trouble).
This is certainly a city built for use rather than aesthetics. It’s not pretty, but there are some startling buildings and the spires of the many mosques add beauty. In parts of the river, bulrushes and palm trees survive, taking you back to the Egypt of ancient history and mythology.
When we stepped off the boat at the dock (between a boat doubling as a fish market and another housing TGI Fridays), all was forgiven. We were smiling widely, much to the relief of our driver who had brought us there.
Driving back to our hotel – well before sunset this time - we passed through the area of Giza known as Pyramids. Full of carpet merchants, oil sellers and papyrus factories, it is a messy, dusty, chaotic area. The traffic ducked and weaved as usual and kids of about seven darted between cars to cross the road – clearly they knew what they were doing, had grown up with this traffic and were not so overprotected as to be in mortal danger when out of their parents’ sight. I got the sense of children being raised by a village.
We reached one particularly crazy intersection where battered cars sat at right angles to each other in gridlock. An old man stepped into the middle, waved his arms around, took control. We got moving. And then into the middle of it all rode a man on a donkey. Our driver told us no one walks in Pyramids: ‘if they don’t have a car, they ride - camel, horse, donkey.’
Back at our hotel, we collapsed in its calm oasis. Wrapped ourselves around cool drinks. Tried to process the city we’d just thrown ourselves into. Thanked any god we could for the protective presence of our driver guide.
Then I pulled out my new red shoes and sniffed them: ah, real leather.
–Philippa Burne
Planning a trip? Browse Viator’s things to do in Egypt and Cairo tours. Also have a look at traveler photos of Egypt over on the Viator Flickr site.
Source: Cairo, Fabulous Chaos
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