Leaving Cairo
Tonight Reham and Ghazi and I head to the Mubarak Train Station where we'll board the Abela Sleeping Train. If all goes according to plan, we'll wake up at 5:00 am tomorrow (Thursday June 8th) in Luxor, where we are really gonna get Egyptian.
Over the last couple of days, I've visited as many places as I can in medieval Cairo, including the Mosque of Ibn Tulun, pictured below:
Early this morning, before it got hot, we took a little side trip through villages and farmland to see some of the less frequently visited pyramids, including this one, which is apparently the oldest stone monument in the world, and actually an ancestor structure to the real pyramids. I'll write something more learned when I have time to polish this post:
Of course we also did the mandatory shopping in Cairo's (in)famous Khan el khalili, a vast network of alleyways all filled with entrepreneurs. We enjoyed sitting at Fishawi's, which is apparently the most famous of the Khan's coffee shops, frequented by writers, journalists, students, and those drawn to its mystique.
Yesterday, among the Fishawe's guests, we espied a young man who, by his features, could have been Arab, but who by his Oriental attire -- white turban, loose-fitting white shirt, 19th-century vest, everything except the Ali Baba slippers -- seemed more likely to be a graduate student at, I dunno, Berkeley. As Reham and I watched him assessing the foreign female clientele of the cafe and overheard his familiar conversation in Arabic with the head waiter, the precise nature of his entrepreneurship occurred to us. As elsewhere in the souq, the customers are served according to their fantasies.
Which brings me to a couple of other striking occupations I have observed here. There is the Parking Consultant and Space Maximizer, who pushes parked cars (neutrally parked, it seems) closer together so as to maximize the number of cars that can fit onto the street, and who leaps up to help new arrivals position themselves, a service for which they express their material gratitude.
One of the most arresting scenes I have witnessed here was the daily commute of a woman whose occupation I at first could not figure out. She was pedaling down the insanely street, her conveyance a cart mounted on a bike frame. With her left hand, she held steady a one-year old who was straddling her left shoulder. On either side of the cart were two very young boys, running alonside the mother and pushing the cart. I happened to witness the return trip another day, when the traffic was even worse. Yesterday, by chance, I discovered that she arrives early in the morning to a favorite spot in an alley downtown, fries up felefel and french fries, then sells a quick cheap lunch to local kids. Her children sit politely near her. I bought a sandwich, and went back today looking for a pretext to buy a dozen. But she was gone.
Well, time to head to the train. More from the Valley of the Kings, insha'allah, in a couple of days.
Over the last couple of days, I've visited as many places as I can in medieval Cairo, including the Mosque of Ibn Tulun, pictured below:
Early this morning, before it got hot, we took a little side trip through villages and farmland to see some of the less frequently visited pyramids, including this one, which is apparently the oldest stone monument in the world, and actually an ancestor structure to the real pyramids. I'll write something more learned when I have time to polish this post:
Of course we also did the mandatory shopping in Cairo's (in)famous Khan el khalili, a vast network of alleyways all filled with entrepreneurs. We enjoyed sitting at Fishawi's, which is apparently the most famous of the Khan's coffee shops, frequented by writers, journalists, students, and those drawn to its mystique.
Yesterday, among the Fishawe's guests, we espied a young man who, by his features, could have been Arab, but who by his Oriental attire -- white turban, loose-fitting white shirt, 19th-century vest, everything except the Ali Baba slippers -- seemed more likely to be a graduate student at, I dunno, Berkeley. As Reham and I watched him assessing the foreign female clientele of the cafe and overheard his familiar conversation in Arabic with the head waiter, the precise nature of his entrepreneurship occurred to us. As elsewhere in the souq, the customers are served according to their fantasies.
Which brings me to a couple of other striking occupations I have observed here. There is the Parking Consultant and Space Maximizer, who pushes parked cars (neutrally parked, it seems) closer together so as to maximize the number of cars that can fit onto the street, and who leaps up to help new arrivals position themselves, a service for which they express their material gratitude.
One of the most arresting scenes I have witnessed here was the daily commute of a woman whose occupation I at first could not figure out. She was pedaling down the insanely street, her conveyance a cart mounted on a bike frame. With her left hand, she held steady a one-year old who was straddling her left shoulder. On either side of the cart were two very young boys, running alonside the mother and pushing the cart. I happened to witness the return trip another day, when the traffic was even worse. Yesterday, by chance, I discovered that she arrives early in the morning to a favorite spot in an alley downtown, fries up felefel and french fries, then sells a quick cheap lunch to local kids. Her children sit politely near her. I bought a sandwich, and went back today looking for a pretext to buy a dozen. But she was gone.
Well, time to head to the train. More from the Valley of the Kings, insha'allah, in a couple of days.
posted by amerune at 10:32 AM
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