Walk Like an Egyptian

Well Egypt was quite the adventure. Our hostel was great, especially when we could run to it after being chased by 1500 Egyptian men. Within two hours of arriving in Egypt, we were out on the Nile River on a small tiny boat they played the same Lil Jon song over and over and over again. Before we could get on the boat tho, we had to cross several highways. I'm talking Cairo's versions of the Long Island Expressway....with ten American girls running across shrieking at the top of their lungs. Insane. All in all, I witnessed three car accidents in my 3 days, including a car hitting a horse drawn carriage.

Saturday we spent seeing the Pyramids and surrounding sites. I lot of very very old and very very large statues. I hopped up on a camel to see Giza...which was as amazing as you would expect. Even got to speak some Arabic to the camel guy. Our guide was a little crazy, and liked to inform us that women only follow their heart, and men use their heads, and therefore this is why women are terrible leaders. Maybe this is why Hillary is losing...should set her up with this guy.

Unfortunately our tour guide neglected to bring us anywhere we could eat lunch, and by the night we were an awful, miserable group of girls. We went on a Nile Dinner Cruise (we felt that being absolute tourists would be fantastic for the weekend), and just glared at each other, glared at our waiters, and glared at the happy couple behind us that was celebrating both a birthday and their new engagement. At one point I was certain that this would be the end of Maro House Two and we would hate each other from then on. Luckily, we were given food eventually, and started liking one another, and life, yet again.

Sunday we spent at Alexandria. It's not the most interesting of cities, but it was a nice change of pace. It set us up well for the evening to follow. Even got lunch this time, and we were much more of an enjoyable group.

Sunday was also the night of the Africa Cup. Egypt just happened to be playing against Cameroon in the final. Four of us went with our tour guide, and watched the match in a somewhat sketchy alleyway in the center of Cairo. Fantastic fun as we were surrounded by tons of people waiting for Egypt to win. Egypt won 1-0, and I was awarded with roses and a new head wrap for my hair. The streets filled with every Egyptian in the nation all screaming, clapping, playing drums, lighting torches, and all honking their horns in a synchronized rhythm. It was probably one of the most amazing experiences of my life, running through Cairo cheering for everyone. The four of us thought it was the coolest thing ever...the Egyptian men thought taking pictures with American girls was the coolest and therefore about 100 different men have a picture of me on their phones.

It was great and fabulous, but we decided to go back to the hostel to meet up with the other girls. Once everyone was back, we decided that we would go back out. Turned out to be a poor decision, as we all ended up running through the streets of Cairo being chased by several hundred Egyptian men. Luckily we had three bodyguards to take on our cause- one of them went down with a bloody face unfortunately. Not the greatest experience...but a great story at the end of it. Never again do I ever want to spring that much in my life...ever ever again. I thought walking up the flights of stairs in our hostel was hard- outright sprinting was nearly impossible.

Nothing could top the intensity of the night....but I did get to haggle in Arabic at the market (to no avail, sadly), and went into a beautiful mosque in the center of Old Cairo before we left on Monday afternoon.

Enjoy the pictures!