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Read my Travel Diary and other articles from a six week trip to Syria, Jordan & Egypt during October and November 1998

The Middle East

Si_lad
2004-03-26 20:27:02

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surprised with what I had seen in Cairo. Not as dirty or dangerous as some people say and in general a very pleasant city to spend a few days.

17th November 1998

We took a taxi to the Citadel. It’s a huge place with good views over Islamic Cairo. The mosque inside is of a Turkish style – a bit different from ones we had seen so far. The place was rammed full of schoolchildren on day trips and we got quite a lot of attention. As soon as I sat down I was mobbed by youngsters wanting to speak English, shake my hand or have their photo taken. One of the teachers asked me a question:

"In England you say you are ‘Sending someone to Coventry’. Why do you say this? Why Coventry? Is it a bad place or something?"

I didn’t know the answer, but agreed that it probably wasn’t the nicest of places. (What else could I say?)

After the Citadel we visited two huge mosques nearby. The huge 9th century Mausoleum of Imam ash-Shafi'i is one of the biggest in the world. We saw the tomb of The Shah of Iran after paying baksheesh to a guardian and soon realised that baksheesh was required for anything. Even the bloke who watched out shoes (you have to remove your shoes to enter mosques) wanted paying. It gets a bit too much sometimes.

We wandered back through Islamic Cairo. You can get a feeling how densely populated this city is when you walk around and it feels like people are crammed in so tightly that hardly any space is left unused. There are alleyways and small mud houses next to awkward looking tower blocks. Shops selling everything overflow onto the pavements and even donkeys and goats are used for moving things about. Some parts probably haven’t changed in centuries. Walking rather than taking a taxi or bus allows you to get a real feel for the place. I even managed to buy a mosque alarm clock (a mosque shaped clock which has the "call to prayer" as the alarm) – something I’d been looking for the entire trip. We walked for miles.

We briefly popped back into the souq for some last minute shopping, but soon got tired of the heat, the hassle and the sheer amount of people, so we jumped into a taxi and headed back for a siesta.

In the evening we returned to the Barrel Lounge where we proceeded to drink lots and lots of beer. It was our last night and we’d had a fantastic trip, so we were in the mood to celebrate. We talked about the trip and reminisced about past times. We talked about the future and we probably had a few more beers than we should of. We couldn’t even walk back to the hotel so we took a taxi. I just about managed to fit everything in my rucksack before hitting the sack.

18th November 1998

Got up early for our pre booked taxi to the airport. The airport was quiet. I wasted money on some awful food and read a recent edition of the Daily Mirror. The flight was fine and EgyptAir get the thumbs up from me.

We passed through customs easily and after a quick goodbye to Nick I jumped on the tube to St Pancras. I just made it in time for my train. It was cold and wet, but I was happy to be back.