Hash Dealers, Casinos, and Mosques

I was once and Arab in a past life; the culture fits like some familiar t-shirt--the hospitality and smiles, the unspoken expectations behind them, the kebabs and meat, the racing traffic and meandering bazaars, the mangoes, the grapes, the coffee, tea and hookah--these are things that come together in dusty crooked streets in the shadows of mosques.  Egypt is somewhere I will come again.

Sarah and I walked across the Israeli border into Egypt and took a Bedouin taxi to cario--a seven hour drive punctuated by frequent stops because our driver, who has driven the route daily for twenty-five years, was a man with many friends.  He was also a part-time hash dealer.  At one point he stopped and there was a yelling match between him and some men on the side of the road--about what we couldn't tell--and I had flashbacks of Mongolia.  But flaring tempers are something you become accustomed to in Egypt--and our driver bought us all mangoes from a roadside stand so I was a happy camper.

I find my city soulmate

We made our way to the Sheraton Cairo, built up in gilt and white marble on the banks of the nile (the nile has several branches flowing through the city).  My friend and fellow SigEp Anant was doing work on Hepatitis C education and he had a grant that allowed him nice accommodations, and he graciously let us stay with him.  First night in and Anant was intent on clubbing, so we went out to some clubs that night--and I caught myself thinking that the woman behind the bar looked scantily clad in her knee-length skirt--this is what happens when most women wear headscarves and many wear full veils with only their eyes (and then only sometimes) showing.  There is an eerie beauty in seeing two women glide by in full black veils, under an overpass, slipping through Cairo traffic at three am.  But if meeting girls in clubs is your deal, look beyond Cairo.  Alcohol in this muslim country is expensive--about ten bucks for a half shot of something, and after a while I stopped trying.  Yes, even the beer love got beaten out of me for a while, in deference to high prices and dubious quality.

Post clubbing we took to the streets--Saudi Arabia and Iraq had advanced to the Asia Cup finals and fireworks were being thrown from horse-drawn carriages, pulling full families waving flags, lining the bridges over Cairo, while cars honked and came to a standstill.  Anant and I were advised to check out a local club by some Egyptian kids--called only Alley Club--but we never found it, likely for the better.  Instead, restless and strangely hungering for more adventure despite the early morning time, we went to the Sheraton Casino.  They take only dollars, and after changing pounds into dollars, and ordeal in itself, we sat down and played a game we didn't know how to play--we called it Sheraton poker, we beat the house again and again, and turned our collective forty dollars into a collective hundred.  This was plenty for us, though the company at our table was dropping almost a thousand dollars on every hand.  Egyptians can't gamble, so these were magnets and businessmen from other Arab countries.

Not a bad start--music and drinks with a friend, a nice hotel room for free. Hot, crazy, bustling, Cairo was a place for me.