Cairo Day Two

Well. We had an interesting night. The window in the room didn’t really close all the way no matter how you fiddled with it and the ac unit was loud. Lol. Despite that, the city is up ALL night LONG! People screaming and taxis honking and babies crying. I’m thinking that the city doesn’t get going until the sun goes down. It’s too hot anyway. Anyway. We were a little tired when we woke up. We had some breakfast, and checked out. We had tried to stay another night, but it was no good. They didn’t have the room. So we went searching for a hostel. The building next door was a whole 13 story building of hotels, one on each floor. So we tried a few of those before we finally snagged one. It was a little nicer than the one before, and it was only like 3 dollars more a person to stay. Sweet! There was better ac, nicer beds and a nicer atmosphere though there was only one computer and it sucked. Lol. Anyway, now that we had a place to sleep, we needed to get our train tickets home for the next day. So off we went. We had heard that the station was close, so we decided to try to walk to it. What a mess. We had to ask a few people and go under some crazy bridge and still it took us forever to find it. When we did we realized our mistake. We had found the bus station. We wanted the train station. We were put off a bit, so we decided to just cab there. We figured they’d know better than us where it was. So we split up into two cabs. James, John, and me in one and the others in the other one. The others made it right there. We had some problems. Our cab driver dropped us off two blocks too earlier and then gave us atrocious directions on how to get there. We had to ask around AGAIN and go OVER some crazy bridge before we finally got there and then we had to find the others. Which we eventually did, after awhile. What a mess. Then we had to try and GET the tickets. Also a mess. There are different lines for different places and then there’s a woman’s side and a man’s side and the people freak out if you don’t figure that one out. Then you had to elbow your way to the front to finally get to the tickets, then you had to hope that they spoke English and could understand that you wanted tickets for tomorrow during the night. We finally got some, thank goodness. We saw a couple other kids trying to get home too. They were trying for that night, and unfortunately, all the tickets were sold out already. We had heard that they sold out fast. That’s why we went a day early to get them. Looks like we were lucky. Other people had to take buses home or stay an extra night. Unfortunate.
While we were there, we met up with three other girls who had been staying and travelling by themselves. Nuts just to start out with. We ended up taking them along with them for lunch and a little walking around. Lunch was another mess. We walked around for ages, starving to death. Lol. To top it off, the girls were total yatches. Hahahha. I feel like I’m complaining, and I don’t mean to. It was a lot of fun. We were just really surprised how mean they were after we took them under our wing. We found a restaurant that looked great, but they didn’t want it, so we walked around for another 45 minutes. Ah well. We eventually found a great restaurant and just settled. Afterwards, we went to the Egyptian Museum and found out that it closed in an hour and it cost thirty pounds. They were leaving early the next morning, so they went in. We did not. Man. What a relief. Hahahaha.
We ended up going into a papyrus shop right afterwards and met up with this guy Ali. Papyrus is something that Egypt is known for, but there are a lot of fakes around the streets that you can pick up for really cheap. Papyrus is basically soaked wood that is stripped to be really thin and then beaten and woven together to make paper. It was the first paper ever created and it’s pretty cool. Ali does paintings on his papyrus scrolls. Very nice. Anyway, it’s with him that our adventure really started up. Some how, some way, this guy convinces us that he has an uncle who does Nile cruises and for super cheap, he can take us around on one. We had done research on the price and it was a great price. So we said ok. We left with promises to meet back up with him later. So we went back to the hostel for a bit, hung out and then went back to the papyrus shop. We headed down to the Nile (which was right there), and eventually found a dock where there were lots of boats hanging out. After a first try that failed, we eventually got into a functioning boat complete with rap music and Celine Dione’s My Heart Will Go On played three times. We danced, we sang, we took pictures and we hung out on this huge boat that could fit fifty to sixty, just the six of us. Freaking cruising down the Nile….No big deal….It was awesome. It was beyond awesome. And beautiful too. We went during the sunset, so we were able to see the sun go down as we drove by.
Right before the tour ended (it was two hours), we ended up asking Ali about the Bazaars around town. He told us that the best one was a night one, and it was the biggest in Cairo. He said he’d take us there and help us bargain. We were totally down. He found us taxis and went with us to the night bazaar. That’s the thing about Cairo. It’s too dang hot in the day to do anything, so everything goes down at night. We went around the bazaar, using Ali as our bargainer. He got us some awesome prices. He’d tell us if the price was “disgraceful” or not, and whether to leave or stay. It was pretty great. Eventually we had him help us get our taxis back to his shop which was close to our hostel. All in all, we paid about 15 US dollars. For the whole thing. Unbelievable. Seriously. Ali was great too. I was scared for the first little while, and it was a little sketch. But it turned out to be awesome. We left him a great tip and then left for our hostel. After getting back we realized we were pretty hungry, so we walked a couple blocks to the main square. We had some fresh squeezed mango juice and had some shawerma, which is like a gyro sandwich with not as good meat. Lol. They’re pretty delicious though on their own. Not going to lie. We hung out for a bit and then decided to head home. We met a man from Sudan on our way while we were sipping on some mango juice who we talked to for a bit. I would have LOVED to talk to him for longer, but our group was leaving and I didn’t want us to have to go home alone. He gave us some fascinating info on Sudan and his ideals of American policy. I was sad to leave him.
The last night in the hostel was a bit better. Nicer AC, not as loud outside. A better night’s sleep though just as short. We figure we want to get the most out of Egypt. It’s worth it.