Egypt

I took a trip to Egypt in August. Below are some of my favorite moments from the trip.


In this picture I'm not yet in Egypt, but I have started my trip. We took a marshrutka to Odessa where we would fly to Cairo. We had a little time and I decided to get a haircut (Egypt is HOT in August). We stumbled into this haircutting school. We were in a rush and told them we only had 15 minutes for the haircut, this is NOT enough time for a haircut in Ukraine. Usually it takes about half an hour from the time the barber picks up the scissors. They came up with an unusual solution that you can see above.


Here I'm at a cafe by the airport. You can see I had my hair cut shorter than usually. This is partly because we were expecting temperatures of 110 degrees and partly because it's difficult to communicate things like desired hair length in a foreign language. If you happen to know me well, you know that I don't typically wear camo. However, camo is pretty common in Ukraine and it helps me fit in. When Heather took this picture of me with my new haircut and camo t-shirt as we were preparing to board the plane we realized this might not be the image I wanted to present as an American in Egypt. This was the last time I wore this shirt for the rest of the trip.

Still not in Egypt. Our plane had a six hour layover in Prague. Heather spent time in Prague and knew the city well enough to show me all the major sights in a few hours. We rushed around town and then back to the airport in time to catch our plane. It was pretty awesome spending these hours in Prague because it is a completely different place than either Ukraine or Egypt. I'd love to go back someday.





If you're paying attention you can see this is not Prague. Here we're walking along an old Egyptian fortress.


We went to see some traditional Sufi dancing and music at a mosque near our hostel. The performance was incredible and it was completely free!

These guys were amazing! They just kept spinning and spinning, sometimes for 20 minutes or a half hour. For them it is a religious experience.





We made it to Giza and here is our obligatory pyramid picture. It wasn't easy getting to the pyramids! We were trying to minimize the amount we spent on taxis since we were on a strict budget. We took a local bus which would have gotten us there easily if a local hadn't offered to "show us the way." He showed us the way to his camel tourism business and tried to sell us a camel ride around the pyramids. We weren't interested and couldn't afford it. This wouldn't be a huge problem except now we didn't know where we were and had to find our own way to the pyramids. If you haven't been to Cairo before you'd think this would be easy, you just walk toward the huge pyramid looking things. Unfortunately, it wasn't so simple. The pyramids aren't way out in the desert, they're right on the edge of the city. But we did it! And it was worth it! And we got some falafel on the way!

It was really, really hot. You could probably figure that out for yourself, but to give you an idea of exactly how hot it was I couldn't walk more than a few blocks unless I had a bottle of water with me otherwise I'd start to feel dizzy. We took lots of breaks during the middle of the day, drank lots of cold water, and we did okay. The pyramids were tough though. Pyramids seem like a good idea, we think the Egyptians are so smart for thinking them up and building them. To be fair, they are incredible. But in our opinion they had one fatal flaw. Pyramids, because of their nature, are absolutely terrible at providing shade. Almost no matter where the sun is sitting in the sky you won't see any shade from a pyramid. Because there's nothing around but pyramids and sand there is really nothing to protect you from the sun. The sand, by the way, is white and reflects straight at you and was incredibly bright. You could barely see anything at all if you weren't wearing sunglasses. Lucky for us there was a shallow cave not very far from the path. We relaxed for a while and drank lots more water. Then we were energized to walk around and get a closer look.





Here is something we didn't expect to find. Hidden in the loose bricks and behind a small building this very sad looking donkey was tied up. He didn't have any water or anything and we felt bad for him.

We didn't have much water with us, but we still decided to share with him. He was very grateful.

These camels were tied up at the entrance to the pyramids. They're waiting for tourists which were surprisingly sparse.

After the pyramids we were ready to cool off. This is the entrance to the Egyptian museum which was just room after room of the most amazing artifacts. It's unbelievable how many things were left over, even after the British looted and sent home all the things they wanted. Unfortunately, pictures weren't allowed inside the museum.

Cairo was great and we thoroughly enjoyed it. While there are many ancient things in Cairo it is also a modern city. Very big, busy, spread out, and crazy. When it was time to go, we were ready. We headed to Luxor which is the place to go if you're interested in ancient Egypt. It's a smaller, more manageable city and there are temples all over the place!

There are also many feluccas!

We hired one to go for a ride on the Nile. We had to haggle for it (like you do for everything in in Egypt - food, bus fare, water), but we managed to get a really good deal since it was the off season. These two guys sailed us around for an hour for 20 Egyptian pounds which is about 4 dollars.



Most of the city is on the west bank of the Nile. This picture is of the east bank where you can see more of the natural environment.


Luxor is a popular place for balloon rides. It's been one of Heather's life goals to go on a hot air balloon ride, so I took her on one for her birthday.



They picked us up at 5:00 in the morning, but it was worth it! Here they are filling up our balloon with hot air and getting ready for the flight.

Here we are in the balloon, above Luxor. You can see the desert landscape behind us and contrast it with the lush vegetation directly next to the Nile. The Nile is life in Egypt.

This is the view from our hostel in Luxor.

On the top floor there's no roof!

This guys is pouring me some mango juice. It doesn't look that appetizing coming from a reused water bottle, but this is the most delicious juice I have ever had in my entire life. There is not one bit of exaggeration in that statement. If you are ever in Egypt during mango season try the fresh juice at one of these stands, you won't regret it!

This is a pretty typical example of the streets in Luxor. Lots of small shops, very small sidewalks, and everyone haggling for something.



Dates!

Falafel! He's making it fresh on the street, it was so good! One of my favorite things about Egypt was that wherever we went if I was hungry I could just grab a snack at a place like this very, very cheaply and take it with me. We didn't need to sit down and have a formal meal all day if we didn't want to. We could just snack our way through Egypt!


Luxor train station.

This is the entrance to Karnak temple, one of the highlights of our trip.





These columns were really big! And there were dozens of them!




Centuries old graffiti. It's interesting how when it's done, it's vandalism. Two hundred years later we preserve it and it's one of the sights because of its historical value. Sadly, people still write their names on the walls and columns of these ancient temples. Oh well, maybe in two hundred years that will be interesting to someone.






We were just crossing the street and there was a solitary chair in the median. What to do, but sit?
One of the things near the top of our to do list was to see Egyptian belly dancing. Surprisingly enough it was nearly impossible to find anywhere. This can only be because we were there during the off season. Nevertheless, our relentless efforts to find belly dancing in Luxor finally paid off. We were rewarded with quite a show!

This part was a little cheesy when they came out in the pharaoh outfits, but the rest was very authentic.






Heather even got called on stage to perform!

She did quite well!


This part was pretty amazing. While the girls were dancing this guy was standing on his little drum and was scooting all around the fountain doing a little dance of his own. It was a really good time!

Here I'm enjoying a traditional Egyptian dish called kushari. It's pasta, rice, beans, chick peas, fried onions, and maybe some other things served with a spicy tomato sauce. It was delicious!

Back in Cairo we were just walking on the street and we came across all these people marching. One of the difficulties of traveling in an Arabic speaking country is that you can't read ANYTHING! We had no clue why they were marching and we still don't, but it was interesting to watch.

The biggest falafel EVER! Every time we'd walk by this place I'd start drooling.


More of my friends selling fresh mango juice.

And this is where our trip ends, at Cairo airport. We were sad to leave but we were also ready. Egypt is an exhausting place! The heat and the haggling wore us out. We were happy to get back to Ukraine where things were easy and made sense to us. It's amazing how your perspective changes, I certainly never thought I'd say that. But it's true!