As I step out of the plane, sensations are immediately assaulted: is that a khamsin, a sandstorm, I’m walking out into? Whatever it’s called, wind blows in every direction carrying with it sand that blankets our surroundings with a brownish-grey veil. All I can make out in the fading brightness of the day are shapes of buildings and blinking lights.
A young Egyptian man, an airport employee who’s welcoming visitors, laughs kindly as I make my way down the plane rather clumsily. That playful laugh – my first encounter with a charming demeanor I will come across several times in the next few days.
When my sister and I get to Pension Roma, a popular budget hotel in downtown Cairo, the stiff and ill-disposed clerk informs us that our reservation has been given to someone else and no other room is available. I made the mistake of starting the reservation on the day of our flight departure and not that of our arrival in Egypt.
Remind me to include this in a traveler top ten list of stupid mistakes.
But for every stupid mistake, there is a simple solution. At least, that’s what I’m hoping for as we are sent back to the after-dark streets of Cairo with our luggage and a Lonely Planet guide in hand.
As far as we are able to tell, we start to walk in the direction of another hotel listed in the guide. The intensely crowded streets are a lively and frenzied scene where people and traffic move about in a scattered and hypnotizing fashion. Even while surrounded by filth and commotion, Egyptians appear graceful and seductive with their large dark eyes and proud bodies.
As I will notice over the following week, Cairo by day may be hectic and busy, but the real action takes place when the feverish sun lowers over the horizon – and if the ancient Egyptians stayed up late to take notice of the stars, today’s crowd pays tribute to lights that shine much closer to the ground.
Surrounded by manmade glows, my sister and I pass by countless dazzling shops that will stay open past midnight (especially shoe shops, much to her distracted and delayed delight). After walking a while, I am amazed at how safe the area feels and how little of an attraction we constitute to the locals who go about their business.
With little bargaining power as the evening advances, we end up getting a comfortable if costly room in a nearby hotel. We don’t know it yet, but this is just the beginning of a concerted plundering operation – we’ll get used to be on the losing end of financial negotiations in no time.
When we are done relocating to a more suitable hotel the next morning, we set out to explore our surroundings. The Friday morning streets are quiet and atmospheric as prayers take place all over the city on this Muslim day of worship.
But not everyone is praying. Touts loose no time honing in on us.
A little more than twelve hours into the country (seven of which were spent sleeping), we’ve already dodged a visa scam at the airport, fallen prey to the outrageous price of a taxi driver and rebuffed a few crappy-hotel touts on the hunt. The day, the week, will keep them coming like baseballs you have to hit.
Long before we learn how to swing and hit homeruns, we meet Abu at Midan Talaat Harb – a downtown roundabout that will be the stage for much hassle. The middle-aged man charmingly lures us into his shop, sells me a Bedouin scarf to wear over my shaved head and then manages to trap us into his perfume palace just next door. We are now, it seems, friends.
No time is lost inviting us to sit on cushioned banquettes as we enter the small ornate room. Hundreds of bottles of essential oils and pretty perfume flasks are lined-up on each of the mirrored walls. Bourgogne velvety fabrics make for an Arabian-style tented ceiling. Somewhere, a cheap radio plays solitary Arab music at low volume. It all works to great effect: I’m charmed as I take in the old-world bric-a-brac ambiance.
Meanwhile, Abu deploys his arsenal: a whole mythology of his family’s involvement in the creation of the perfumes is provided (supplemented with large black and white photographs), obligatory mint tea is prepared and bottles of scents are opened and applied on our skin.
It hardly matters that we politely decline his many offers to buy the fragrances, Abu remains undeterred. Fifteen minutes later he’s pouring papyrus oil into a small bottle, nearly puts it into my bag himself and conjures fifty pounds from my wallet. My sister resists better than I this time but a day later she will get screwed into buying papyrus murals at a bad price.
The perfume episode will repeat itself no less than four times in four different shops in the perimeter of one block over the next 48 hours. The same stories will be told, the same tactics deployed. Abu’s spell will lose a little bit of its charm as we quickly close ourselves off to the sound of Hello, my friend!
After a day of wandering around, we gratefully take refuge in our room with mixed feelings about the Egyptians’ blend of friendly and predatory behaviour. It can be hard to remain enthusiastic about somebody’s kindness when money is so unabashedly involved – yet I suspect the Egyptian psyche capable of harmonizing the two without invalidating the camaraderie altogether. At the very least, if no friendships are made in the five weeks ahead, psychological self-defense skills will be developed.
As we go to bed in our air-conditioned room, the loud prayers that have been reverberating through speakers across the city suddenly end. For a minute, only the substantial sound of traffic is heard. Then, club music begins to play at high volume in the building in front of ours. After duty comes pleasure.
Half asleep, I ponder that while many foreigners come to Egypt to take in all they can of the country’s pharaonic past, Egyptians take all they can from foreigners – their needs very much belonging to the present. A drive through poorer areas of Cairo a few days later will make this plainly apparent.
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