Cairo - Day 1 and 2

After our little day trip/layover in New York we flew to Cairo, Egypt.  We got to see the pyramids when we flew in which was really cool.

 From the airport we shared a taxi with another lady to the Marriott. Upon talking to her, we found out she is also a non-rev passenger and works for Delta in the Tucson, Arizona airport. She grew up in Bolivia, but lives in AZ now, and her name is Catherine. She flew there alone and didn't even have hotel reservations! So we got her a room at the associate rate at the Marriott since I'm allowed 2 rooms at that rate.  She ended up being very fun and we did all of our activities together for the next couple days.

Our room at the Marriott was fabulous, as always, with a beautiful view of the Nile River which our hotel was right next to.

That evening we took a walk downtown to find some food.  It was a little weird because the shops and everything were closed and we didn't know why.  Finally, a local stopped us on the street and ask us what we were looking for.  We told him we just wanted food and he explained that it is Ramadan and none of the shops would be open for another hour or so.  He then took us to his friends shop where we got to see a papyrus making demonstration as well as some beautiful papyrus paintings.  We finally found a little shop open that had some of the street tacos, so we got some of those. We relaxed that evening in the pool/sauna/hot tub at the hotel. 

This is the view of the Nile from the downtown area. All the lit up boats give river cruises.

The next day we decided to cram it all in, so we got up early and went to the Egyptian Museum.  On the way there we met a kid named Osama (hahaha, makes me laugh every time) who was a local and spoke Spanish as well as Arabic. Him and Catherine started talking and he came to the museum with us and was kind of a tour guide. The museum is where they hold all of the artifacts, mummies, chariots, gold, huge statues, etc... that they have taken out of all the different tombs.  This place was HUGE! There was so much stuff in there. Unfortunately no pictures were allowed, but the mummies were our very favorite part.  On one of the mummies, the toe part had come unraveled slightly and we could see the toes!!! They were black and curled up, it was disgusting.

We went back to the hotel to grab our Camelbacks to take with us to the pyramids, then headed out.  Osama was still with us since Catherine had invited him to come with us to the pyramids as well.  He found us a taxi for about $4 that took us all to the pyramids, it was about a 15 minute drive from the hotel.  It cost us $10 each to get in to see them.... Oh and Brett brought his Student I.D. card so it was only $5 for him. So ridiculously cheap!

Notice the guard sleeping in the shade toward the bottom of the pyramid... hahaha

At the pyramids, you can just wander around and look at them all you want.  To go inside the great pyramid you have to pay extra, and get there early because they only let in 100 people a day and it is first come first serve.  So.... we just viewed them from the outside.  Normally you can go inside the smallest pyramid for free, anytime, but it happened to be shut down and under construction when we were there.  Sad.  We walked all the way out to it, died of heat, and then it was closed. We were very disappointed.

 The whole troop. Catherine, Osama, Brett, and Me

We made our way to the Sphinx finally, red faced and worn-out, but it was worth it because it was really neat.

At this point, we were starving and really wanted to find a great local place to eat some food.  Up to this point Osama had been great.  He was really funny, helpful when taking pictures, saved us a lot of money with taxis and snacks (they always charge tourists more), and we were really greatful for him.  We planned on giving him a big tip when we got home because he had saved us a lot.  If it weren't for him we were going to just take a tour from the hotel to the pyramids, which was about $75 a person, because we were too nervous to take a taxi and the bus system was completely innavigable.  There were no bus routes, no bus maps, the buses didn't have numbers, etc... We would ask people and they would just nod and say yes, yes, yes, yes.  But after we finished with the pyramids Osama started acting a little different.

We were sitting down at a little shop drinking juic/pepsi/water that we had just bought when this little buggy thing came by.  Osama insisted that we take a ride in it.  We really didn't want to and told him no, we just wanted to eat somewhere.  He kept insisting and insisting and we kept saying no.  Then he said he would pay for it, so we finally agreed.  (Egyptians are SUPER pushy and do not give up. I'm used to having to say no 2 or 3 times before people leave you alone, like in South America. But, for example, Egyptian taxis will follow you for miles and you have to say no a good 20 times and eventually just start ignoring them completely.)  Anyway, we ride in the little buggy and get out and Osama tells us we can get food in this little shop.  We enter the shop and it is a clothing shop.  We are a little annoyed, but don't want to be rude, so we looked around for a bit, didn't buy anything and left.  Catherine tells him again that we really just want food, so he takes us to another shop, we go in, and lone behold, no food. Just perfumes and more of his friends.  Once again, to be polite, we cooperated. We listened to a little presentation on all the different oils and perfumes which would have been quite interesting if he hadn't lied to us and we weren't so hungry!

We finally got out of there and demanded that he take us to a place with food.  We walked a few blocks and he actually took us to a restaurant this time, finally.  They seated us and we asked for menus.  He said they don't have menus they just serve the best chicken in Cairo.  As he described the food to us, it all sounded very American and expensive, which isn't what we wanted. We wanted local food.  We asked him the prices and he wouldn't really give us a definitive answer.  We were not down with that, so we left, to his irritation.  We decided at this point that he was probably trying to make commission off us somehow to make his day worth it, since he was starting to act shady.

We told him we wanted to get a cab home and he said we couldn't catch a cheap one there we need to walk a few blocks down the street with him.  Once again, we were way uncomfortable with him at this point and what he was saying didn't make any sense.  As Catherine was trying to tell him that what he was saying was unreasonable, he started getting angry and said that we didn't have confidence in him and we could try and catch a taxi, but we would see that he was right.  As all this was going on, Brett flagged a couple taxis down, negotiated prices, and got us back for the exact same amount we got there for.  Osama didn't come with us because he was upset.

One of the mosques we saw on the drive back to the Marriott after our long day

The whole situation really was too bad, because we were planning on giving him a great tip at the end of the day for all he had done.  But instead, he decided to try and make money off us in a shady way, which made us mad, so he got nothing!

By the time we got back to the Marriott we were beat and just super glad to be back safe and in one piece!  We relaxed for a while then went back out to find some dinner.  We walked down a new street by our hotel and once again it was Ramadan. They fast all day long.. and then there are tables setup all over the city, down alley ways, right in streets, on sidewalks, everywhere.  And at approximately 6:00pm all the shops close down so everyone can prepare for their "breakfast". At about 7:00pm all the food starts coming out and everyone eats.  We were walking by a table right at this time when they invited us to eat with them.  We tried to pay, they said no, and we decided to go for it.  It was the local food we had been looking for all day.  It was super good! Rice, with a tomato based sauce, cilantro, shredded lamb, potatoes, and flat bread.  They even got us each a bottle of coca-cola.  We tried to pay them 2 or 3 times more, but they said it was a Ramadan Celebration so we could not pay.  The first free thing in Egypt and it was something we expected to pay for! Haha. We found a yummy dessert shop nearby and got some cake.

 Ramadan on the street with the locals. The best food we had eaten the whole trip!

The dessert shop. This was the first shop we found that looked clean like you would expect a shop serving food to appear. It reminded me of any bakery you would find in the states and the desserts were delicious!