Day 14: Third Day in Cairo

Friday, April 28, 2017

          Today is our last day in Cairo, which makes me sad and glad. Sad because Egypt is a cool place to be and I've made a lot of memories here, but glad because we are going to a new place, and because some of the memories aren't exactly what I would call pleasant. But I made sure I made the most of it. We did a lot today, and there are definitely some great highlights worth sharing.
          This morning we were out by 7am (after a very good breakfast) on our way to the Giza Pyramids. It was not as far as Alexandria, which was nice. We were given this guide and we went all around Giza for a good 2 1/2 hours. I got to ride a camel for the first time!!!! It was super cool and fun to do. It was definitely harder than riding a horse, just because they are more lumpy I guess. It was totally amazing to see the pyramids!! They were HUGE!!!! We saw the 3 main pyramids and the sphinx. All of them were amazing and I was so happy and grateful I got to see these things. This scavenge was definitely my highlight of Cairo. I enjoyed myself, and it was an amazing experience I learned so much and got so much out of it.

          After we finished Giza we went to Step and Bent, the two other places with pyramids. It was very very hot, but it was dry not humid so it was better than Sri Lanka weather. The heat does make you feel more drowsy though, so by the time we got to the red Pyramid I was pretty close to exhausted. We climbed stairs to get to the entrance of the pyramid, then we went down a ladder into the pyramid. My body is still sore so I stayed in one of the rooms while my dad went up two flights of stairs to go into the only other room in the whole pyramid, which was empty. Once we were done we had to climb up the ladder again to the exit then go down the stairs again to get to the bottom of the pyramid. This event was probably not as fun as the other things we had done today.
         After all of this we went back to the hotel to shower and just relax a little bit before Mohammad picked us up to take us to his home to have dinner with him and his family. His village is right by the pyramids, and when we got to his village we had to take a tuk tuk to actually get into the village. His village is blocked off by the military and tourists are not allowed into it, so us getting in was very very special and something that really doesn't happen often.
         As we were getting into the village, people see you in the tuk tuk, and they just stop what they're doing and just stare. And it's very direct; it was like we were aliens from another planet. Mohammad said that this village is small enough to where everyone knows everyone, and they are all family to each other. The tuk tuk driver we had looked 15 or 16, and it made me a little sad to see someone my age driving a tuk tuk. Someone else, who was Mohammad's friend hopped into the tuk tuk and when we got off he came with us to see the sun set.
         Mohammad introduced us to him. He is 25, and his name is Mohammad. He doesn't speak English, but he came with us anyways. We walked across these sand dunes that were covered with rocks, trash, clothes, and tons of kids playing. By kids I mean boys. Mohammad said there are so many more boys than girls because boys here can do anything, and girls are very limited. They were flying kites, rough housing, running, and staring at us again. The amount of people that stared at us as we were sitting on the ground there was crazy. The kids all know how to say hello, so they all just ran by and waved and said hello any chance they could get. Mohammad and Mohammad would kick at them and throw rocks at them to get them to leave. I guess that's how they do it in Egypt. These kids were so unbelievably cute and they kept trying to high five me and say hi. When we were walking to Mohammad's house there were probably close to 100 kids just following us waving and yelling hello. It was so much fun and they were just so sweet and I wanted to give all of them hugs!!! It made me really sad to see the Mohammads chase them away and scold them, but I just had to walk to the house because it was taking us a really long time just to get to his house. It took us almost 30 minutes just to get to his house. They told me I had to stop waving and responding to them because they weren't leaving, that also made me feel really bad. I loved the kids so much, and they were all just so curious and they were so kind and sweet. When they were being scolded they started a chant and they were apparently saying, "We're not going home." This made me so happy but at the same time broke my heart. Seeing all of the kids scolded was really really upsetting, but I had to get over it or we were never going to get to where we needed to go.
         Once we finally got to Mohammad's house, his family was there eating, and we went upstairs where we were going to eat dinner. While Mohammad was throwing water at the kids, (because they stayed and were chanting) Mohammad set up places for us to sit. He doesn't speak English, but he listens to some American music, so we all bonded over that. The food that was made was very very authentic. Everything was homemade, even the bread and cheese. We also ate camel for the first time. So we rode a camel in the morning, ate one at night. This did make me a little uncomfortable.
          While we were eating Mohammad's friend showed up to join us. Because everyone is like family, everyone is also named Mohammad. The Mohammad's were 28, 25, and 20. None of them are related, but they are all like family. The 20 year old Mohammad is starting in the army tomorrow morning for 3 years. He is going from studying drama and film making to joining the army, this made me feel bad for him. Especially because this was not his choice. We met the 28 year old Mohammad's family also. We met his wife and his kids. He has 3 so far, and they are 7, 5, and 2. Age norms around marriage and kids are a little bit different here. Everyone had at least 3 kids, and many people are married in their early 20s.
          The dinner was very good, and by that time we had to head back to the hotel to meet up with everyone. On the way out we stopped at 25 year old Mohammad's house to meet his family. His youngest sibling is 4 years old, and he is 25. Everyone here also has multiple siblings. At this point it was very obvious the adults don't see many tourists either because he decided to show his whole family our camera and the photos of us on it.
          Overall, Cairo was a mix of good and not as good. The goods were very very fun and great, while the not so goods were very uncomfortable for me. I definitely made a lot of memories here, met a lot of people, and got a lot of different impressions of the age groups for people here. But all in all, Cairo was a lot of fun. We have a 7am bus to catch tomorrow, which is actually later than normal, so until next time!! ;)

Daddy's View:

Today is another example of what makes the GSH such a special environment.  For the last couple of legs, there has been a scavenge goal of having dinner in the home of a native.  It's worth a pretty sizable number of points, so it's a good goal to have.

Now sit back and think about that.  How would you even do that?  It's a bit cringe-worthy, right?  "Hi I'm so and so, let's have dinner at YOUR PLACE!"  You don't even need to have seen any Hitchcock movies or Dexter episodes to be creeped out by that.  Really, under no other circumstances except that we are in a competition to build cultural bridges would I even consider this, and then to actually try to close the deal and do it?  Really, as a middle-aged man traveling with his daughter... this would never happen.

So in Cairo we met the young nephew working the store of an art dealer where we bought some prints, souvenirs, etc.  He was super high energy, friendly, spoke great english, just a terrific guy.  He gets really interested in the scavenger hunt, and is all about helping us figure stuff out. I'm just reading off the possible tasks, and he says "OK, my mother will make dinner.  Friday."

And so that was this evening.  It was the VERY LAST scavenge we were going to do for Cairo.  He picked us up at the hotel at 5p.  We go by taxi, then tuk tuk, then walking, into what looks and feels like a documentary background village for an Angelina Jolie save-the-world visit.

Here's the first thing our tuk tuk had to navigate in the village:

We walked through the village, out the back, where hundreds of kids are playing.  The back of the village opens up into the desert, and it is positioned between the Giza and Djoser pyramids. It is off-limits to tourists, but Mohamed knows all the security guys and they let us in - we of course didn't know this until we were already sitting and enjoying the sunset:

They take us through the village and there is a full-on kids riot with dozens trailing us, chanting things in arabic and english.  They were wanting to see us and touch us and hug us and interact with us.  It was like we were movie stars.  Let's be totally honest here:  they all wanted to see Sydney, and I was the oaf-ish bouncer entourage guy.

Mohamed has 7 (SEVEN!) sisters, and he lives with his parents.  We go to his home to meet his family.  Here is his living room:

Here is his family room:

Here is his family - his father is 77, his mother is a fireplug (she has to be with 8 kids and... wait for it... 34 grandkids).  He has three sisters eating there with his parents, a brother in law, and 5 nephews.  Everyone sits on the floor to eat in Egypt.  There's one huge platter and everyone eats off of it with bread and spoons.  In fact, there are no tables in the house.  Here's the extended family.

Mohamed is 28 yrs old - his wife of 8 yrs comes home with his three kids, 7, 4, and 2.  He calls over two buddies (cousins - he has over 100 relatives in the village), and we all sit around and eat camel and chicken and bread and dora (big flat bread cracker) and veggies and pasta and homemade buffalo cheese.

His kids are just like kids anywhere else, mischievous, cute, shy.  There's no communication barrier with them - they all want to sit on Sydney's lap.

We then get taken around to meet his friends' families throughout the village.  We have to drink something in every home - families would send kids scurrying down to the store to pick up a big jug of fanta when we arrived - we were like visiting dignitaries.  Everyone wants a picture.  

They want Sydney to hold babies.  

Parents force unwilling children to come meet us.

People want pictures to put on their walls, along with those of Rinaldo and Messi and Adele. 

I received a copper plate of the pharoah as a gift.  I'm pretty sure it was an offer for Sydney.  After four hours we finally call it an evening, bellies hurting from being full and laughing so hard, not at cleverness of words but universal human body language and smiles.

We're off to Belgium tomorrow, but it will be hard to top this.  Of course, I've been saying that every leg now.