Day 124: First Day in Cairo — Egyptian Museum and Strolling Old Cairo’s Bazaar
This morning we were greeted at our hotel at 9 am by Abeer, our Egyptologist. Abeer is a veteran tour guide on the job since 1988 — and a woman! Yes, she told us later, she had to be doubly tough and smart over the years to be taken seriously and respected in this field. We liked her right away.
We spent the morning at the Egyptian Museum, which we drove to despite it being 200 feet away. Traffic is insane here and there’s very little regard for rules or pedestrians (Abeer said crosswalks are “a waste of paint” and traffic lights a waste of electricity). Safer to just drive.
I’d say Teddy and I were 20% looking forward to this museum expedition and 80% dreading it/wishing we could get out of it. With Petra and travel and a late night behind us, the kids were exhausted. Staring down a guided tour in a crowded museum with a lot of “boring grownup talk” for three hours seemed like a recipe for disaster.
Sure enough, they weren’t great. We brought the stroller hoping James would pass out, but he didn’t, and Willa wanted to be picked up (!) when the explanations went on too long. BUT, Willa did get excited about the mummies and some of the artifacts. She’s been reading a bunch of Egypt stuff so she had the context and got into it.
She even asked Abeer about a board game she’d read King Tut had been buried with, and we got to see it (Senet) for ourselves. Very cool.
So, her excitement and James’s being somewhat contained in the stroller allowed us to partially enjoy this experience. Egyptian ingenuity — all of it four thousand years ago — leaves you speechless, no matter how annoying your kids are.
The science of mummification alone is fascinating. The fact that you can look at a giant un-decayed crocodile from thousands of years before Christ boggles the mind.
Dung beetle coffins
At one point in the tour I was off alone with James in a quiet area of the museum looking at mummies. A random 30-something Middle Eastern tourist walked up to us and asked if he could have a selfie with James. They hammed for the camera, then the guy was shaking James’s hand, asking his name, etc. Again, not creepy, just genuinely amused by James. What is it??
After the museum we thought we were going to lunch but we made a pit stop at a place that uses the traditional ancient papyrus paper-making method to create frameable art. We politely watched a demonstration — genuinely interesting — then suffered through a sales pitch of tacky art before we could bail. At one point I wandered off, uninterested in the history lesson/sales pitch and the lady yelled “Lady, you listen to the story!!” so I had to come back. Ha!!
Finally, lunch. We ate at the Naguib Mahfouz restaurant in Old Cairo’s Khan El Khalili bazaar.
We’ve talked about how much it annoys us when travel guides hold our hands too much? We call it butt wiping — as in, they’re doing everything for you that it almost seems like they’ll wipe your butt too.
Well our guide Abeer stood over our table and walked us through the menu — which was entirely in English complete with English-language descriptions of each item — and ordered for us.
I don’t blame Abeer one bit. She simply works for an operator, Abercrombie & Kent, who requires her to do this kind of thing. She probably knows it’s absurd too. Our assumption is just that A&K clients are older and richer and maybe not very adventurous/self-sufficent and expect to be taken care of and butt-wiped to death. But Jesus! Come on! The infantilization is insulting!
After lunch we wandered a bit around the bazaar and out along the El Moez street, which has some beautiful old buildings.
The energy in the streets was palpable. The break-fast is around 6:15 and by now (around 3:30) people were putting out food stalls and doing their shopping. Abeer was eager to get us out of the area before that point, because it gets shoulder to shoulder.
After we returned to the hotel, Teddy took the kids to go swimming while my mom, dad and I went back out on foot just to wander around the Tahrir Square neighborhood.
Tahrir Square is huge, but empty — protected by a moat of a traffic-y roundabout that would be suicide to try to cross. Apparently it was a flat wasteland before the Arab Spring, but afterward the government cleaned it up, added security and made it more aesthetically pleasing.
We didn’t see much except retail shops, which were closing up early because of the break-fast. Interesting to wander around though. Also, because of I assume my whiteness and blond hair I got lots of stares — it was like being 25 again!!
We decided that after such a big day of touring and so much food at lunch that we’d just retire early. We ordered the kids room service and had them asleep by 745. We weren’t far behind them. Tomorrow: Pyramids!!!
Misc:
One funny misunderstanding between Grammie and Willa from back at Petra that I forgot to add: Grammie heard Willa ask, “Have you read Little Women?” in response to which Grammie went into great detail about her personal history with this book. Blank stare from Willa. Willa had only asked her, “Can I have your lemon?” referring to the wedge in Grammie’s sparkling water. So funny – the idea that Willa would ask my mom if she’s read Little Women. Hahahahaha.
At one point while we were driving along in our van, James looked out the window and said, “I wish airplanes could be like this.” I asked him what he meant, and he goes, “This is just so PEACEFUL. Not like airplanes where it’s like [doing a nasally loudspeaker voice]: ‘Everyone in seat 63 go to the gate!’” Hahaha.
I had my mom bring several packs of Bubble Yum — good old American bubble gum is not something you can find anywhere! — and have been doling out half pieces as rewards aka bribes to get the kids through this experience in one piece.
At a red light today, we spotted this guy wearing an Orioles hat!! He smiled and waved at James. Funny.
