Tahrir Square and the Cairo Museum

January 4, 2012

A room with a view.

Ahhhh, broken English. It seems the concept of an international student I.D. Card, though commonly understood inside museums and sites, is outside the local lexicon. I asked the pension staff, who speak extremely good English and come in contact with hundreds of Westerners every month, where I could acquire one. They sent me to the Mogamma Building. It turned out to be in the heart of Tahrir Square. The square was quiet, except for a few sentinels in tents, keeping the inner circle, “occupied.”

3 Photos of Tahrir Square

Plain clothes police stopped me in the metro station to ask what my business was, I have to say they were very polite about it. The Mogamma building turned out to be a huge bureaucratic nightmare of bouncing from one window to the next handing me applications for student visas. I finally realized they were passing me around because they had no idea what I was actually after.



 I finally gave up and left for the Cairo Museum a couple of blocks away. It’s a magnificent 19^th century building and with a collection in desperate need of some TLC.

Cairo Museum

Why do the majority of tourists carry laptops on vacation? Not throw-away kindles or mini laptops, but full on Macs and high end PCs?! These devices are the equivalent to about 1 year's wages for the average Egyptian. My lack of an unabashedly opulent display of wealth is clearly behind the times...

I ended the day viewing a performance, (as in performative), by Egyptian whirling dervishes. VERY different from their Turkish counterparts, who move slowly and ethereally, these Sufis were jubilant and frenetic. It’s difficult to describe the dance. Since the performers are also devout practitioners of the faith; the lines become blurry. Even though they did not charge for attendance, the use of spotlight and stage, as well as the encouragement of applause certainly outweighed any religious value. It was an amazing spectacle of multi-color skirts whooshing in circles at breakneck speeds for 15 minutes or more between pauses. Certainly at times altered states of consciousness must be induced even for experienced performers, but this was a secularized context with the temple-turned-theater. Whatever, it was really cool.

Al-Tannoura at the Wikala of Al-Ghouri

Next up...Jews and Christians in Cairo!

Pyramids: A crash course

January 3, 2012

I had a date several months back. I told the guy I was in school to become an anthropologist and he told me of his love of ancient structures like temples and pyramids. He excitedly informed me of how the aliens provided the knowledge to build them. Somebody please play matchmaker for me, I'm clearly not cut out for the job. Anywho, I’m not an Egyptologist, but day 2 went a long way to bettering my understanding of how the aliens, I mean the Egyptians, acquired their knowledge…good old fashion “trial and error.” 

Me being a dork with the Great Pyramid of  Khufu (Cheops)

This is the entrance to the North Saqqara and the Step Pyramid complex.

The precursor to the pyramid was the mastaba- a mud brick, flat-topped platform which covered a tomb. King Zoser and his architect, Imhotep, decided to stack six of the platforms. I’m not down playing their accomplishment or the structure; I’m merely trying to stress its lack of otherworldliness. 

Step Pyramid under renovation

Less than 100 years later, at the beginning of a new dynasty, the Pharaoh Sneferu improved the design by encasing the step understructure with a limestone encasement giving the pyramid a smooth, gleaming white surface. The only problem is on the first attempt they got the angle wrong and ended up with a “Bent Pyramid.” 

"Bent Pyramid" NOTICE the change of angle.

They learned from this mistake and immediately built the “Red Pyramid” the first true pyramid we recognize as the quintessential Egyptian pyramid. Ta-da! 

I got to enter this amazing structure, hunched over, I traveled down the 139 steps (yes I counted, remember I’m a dork) to reach the inner chambers with step-arched ceilings. 

The smell of the innermost chamber was overwhelming. I’ve smelled plenty of bat shit, but this was like huffing fumes from a bottle of ammonia.

NOTICE the stepped ceiling arch of the inner most chamber. It bears a strong resemblance to the stepped arches of the Inca, clear proof of alien contact! 

Or maybe it's simply an easy way to build a strong arch.

I wonder what’s happening in Tahrir Square? Time to find out!

Sitting on the massive base stones at the Pyramid of Khafre

Cairo, 1st Night

Cairo

January 12, 2012

Pyramid of Mekaure, Giza plateau

It’s late and I’ve spent the previous 20 hours in airport lobbies and planes. Even sleep deprived and hungry, I already adore Egypt. Cairo is a chaotic mess. Traffic lights change but nobody cares and crowds crush around cash registers to pay without queuing. 20 million citizens jockey to go, whether it’s to walk, drive, or pay, when in this ceaseless game of “chicken.” You are the winner of the right of way when you are the force to be reckoned with. And somehow the city knows it’s your turn and yields.

Sunrise on the Nile, Cairo

I was eating at Gad, as recommended by the pension on my late night arrival. It turned out to be an Egyptian McDonalds, but E-g-y-p-t-i-a-n. So I fight to order a sandwich (still can’t tell you what it was), then I fight to pay, and somewhere I clumsily screw up the natural protocol. A grandmother coaxes me on with a smile and a tug of my shirt sleeve while she points to the correct server. I pantomime ‘thank you’ to her (I hadn’t learned shu kran, yet). A young man, reminiscent of the young men I’ve been seeing in the recent video footage of Tahrir Square, sneaks sideways glances of my unusualness; I catch him out of the corner of my eye. I grabbed my sandwich and decided to entertain us both by eating next to him.

Fishermen on Nile River, Cairo

There was not a trash can in sight and the counter was almost entirely covered in a foot high pile of sandwich wrappings and leftovers (no, that was not poetic license…12 inches high). The guy sees me approaching and shovels me a clear area. We eat in silence occasionally stealing shy glances. I noticed this skinny lad could eat, he had 3, maybe 4 sandwiches! A disheveled man came in begging. The boy offered him one of his sandwiches but the man turned it down. Their back and forth seemed kind and the refusal appeared to be more out of principle of not wanting to take sustenance from the young man.

The beginning...

I would like to welcome everyone to my new travel blog!

A few of you have been following my tales via emails since the beginning in1996, others have joined in over the years, and for some of you this may be an introduction.

The first journey to post will be my most recent trip to Egypt this January 2012, which none of you have read about yet.

After the Egyptian travel tales, I will start from my oldest entries working my way to the present. With a little luck and elbow grease, I'll have everyone current before my next big trip this summer.

If you enjoy the reading, please subscribe and share this blog with friends.

Thanks in advance for your patience while I work out the bugs.

- Paul