Nick's Rotary Year: One Day in the life of a tourist in Cairo

We stepped from the coolness of the marble-floored foyer into the sunlight of the late morning and made our way toward the heavy of the traffic of Talat Hareb Square, hopped into a cab (without seat-belts like all other taxis in this city), and sped South along the Nile passing some of the lesser hotels and a beautiful white mosque with a giant neon green sign in Arabic. We weaved through throngs of pedestrians, laborers of some sort, as we veered from the Nile and into the depth of the city, the streets becoming narrower, and the crowds more plentiful. I wondered how many traffic deaths occur here each year after narrowly missing a pregnant woman in a head to toe robe complete with a mask to cover her face. After several minutes of standstill traffic we eased onto a large palm-tree lined boulevard which would have been a beautiful view into the distance except for all of the smog which prevents seeing any more than a kilometer or so. After a particularly harrowing bit of driving which seemed much too fast for maneuvering in and out of unmarked lanes, amongst lorries, cars and buses of all types and sizes, and just missing pedestrians hurrying across the street, the first pyramid rises out of nowhere. It is hidden by a particularly shabby apartment building until you are almost on it and then it is impossible to avert your eyes. We exited the taxi, dropped the money on the passenger seat as is the Cairo custom and walked quickly the other way while the driver yelled after us. And then came the tourists, the Westerners, and lines and photographs and litter, sand, the desert and sun while the pyramids, patient as ever, are unmoved by all of the hubbub at their feet. The Sphinx, their guardian, watches a putrid Giza, full of more tourists, and more venders, and litter and photographs, surely wary of what has happened over the last 50 years. This city of 20 million has spread out and drawn in the population from the countryside as the rural lifestyle is no longer sustainable and people from every corner of this country come here to find a way to live. The day will come soon when the ancient pyramids are surrounded on all sides by Cairo and at last lose their link to the desert.

Two English teenage girls wearing miniskirts and sports bras pass and I think they seem even more out of place than the pyramids. Almost all women wear a head scarf and many have chosen or are forced to put on the restrictive burqa. We lunched at a buffet restaurant with hundreds of Italian retirees and for a moment the power comes on and the air conditioners begint to whir above us--heaven. It is hard to think how this place is bearable in summer. We haggle over the price of a horse and camel ride, threatening to walk out, the price comes down, threaten again, lower, and it seems to me like a ridiculous script that each has memorized the words to but must recite in order to get to the same conclusion every time. Finally, riding into the desert, trotting then galloping so fast I feel a little crazy with adrenaline and on the top of the ridge overlooking the pyramids, the city and the sliver of desert remaining to the South there is silence--no cars, no tourists, no buses, just a few moments of calm before the call to prayer beckons us back into the city. This time, I'm on the camel, with the boy, our guide, riding through a poverty-stricken neighborhood, whole families sitting on the doorstep. Mothers cover their faces as we pass and I see three boys looking at a comic book, pointing at the pictures and an old woman, her feet too swollen to walk on a mat proferring a hookah for passersby. The old Giza cemetary is behind her, waiting, and the pyramids in the distance but she smiles at us anyway. Maybe because he is just a boy but the tour guide hides nothing and rides this path daily for all to see and just like the rest of this city is unashamed. Cairo is nothing if it is not open and honest.

Another cab and more traffic, a golden mosque opposite a canal with sewage and little boys on a motorbike waving and smiling, riding on the sidewalk. Then we turn onto the highway and pass the largest housing development I have ever seen. Red brick buildings for miles on end where millions must live and each is still under development, one story on top of another, then along the Nile again, the Marriot, Four Seasons, and Hyatt rising elegantly if not somewhat ridiculously beside the squalid buildings to their left and right. Along the waterfront, young couples canoodle out the view of their parents and neighborhoods, never kissing, but always talking closely, leaning on each other and touching hands. Then turning away from the river we move into the neighborhoods of metalworkers, steel and scrap everywhere, men with black hands and faces, sitting outside enjoying the cool moments at the end of the day, sipping tea, smoking cigarettes. The woodworkers come next, raw lumber protruding onto the street, tables and chairs, cabinets waiting for delivering and thoughts of my Father enter my mind. A girl, unscarfed, flies a golden kite in a busy square, her hair whipping in the wind. Finally, the shoe district and store after store for blocks of shoes of all colors, types and sizes all displayed for everyone to see. There are many shoppers. Close to home now, and we pass one of the many policemen, black uniformed, we have seen on our corner, on every corner, sitting, standing, waiting, praying, smoking, then the marble floor, the rickety elevator, the nostalgic paintings of Arabian days and nights long gone, key in keyhole, head on pillow.