Honk honk

I'm here! Successfully met up with S at the airport, after dodging offers from "helpful" people (need a driver? need a hotel?). The first thing I noticed about Cairo, which I'd been warned about a lot, is the noise. Drivers here honk their horns constantly, like they're just letting all the other drivers know that they're there. There are lines painted on the road to denote lanes, but that's just a technicality. Cars randomly float around the road and are totally comfortable squeezing between two actual lanes while pedestrians walk through the middle of five-lane roads to get where they're going.

The city itself is a strange mix of loads and loads of sketchy-looking apartment buildings, complete with shantytowns on the rooftops, and beautiful universities, international schools, mosques and museums. Cigarette smoke is everywhere, and this morning I smelled charcoal cooking again. It smelled like Rwanda too me, just like the diesel trucks at the Cairo airport. There are SO many people on the sidewalks, all the time. Most of the women wear hijabs, and some wear niqabs, which cover the upper body and leave only a thin opening for the eyes. But all the women are stylishly-dressed, and most have great shoes. S said he noticed the same thing in Kandahar, where most women still wear burqas but accessorize with high heels.

It does make for a noisy city, especially at night. With all the people on the streets and the honking, even in our 12th-floor hotel room we had a hard time sleeping. The call to prayer woke us up before 6am this morning, but I had been so excited about hearing it that I didn't mind.

So far Cairo has been a real trip for the senses. It's great for a stimulation junkie like me, who is often reading the paper, watching tv and online chatting at the same time. But I can see how it would be tiring on days where you've got a headache, or are having a bad time, or just needing some quiet. We have only explored a tiny section of the city but have yet to find any calm or tranquility.

To fully appreciate Egypt, you also need to know what it's like trying to book anything in advance. So S will join us as a guest blogger in the near future to tell us about his trip to pick me up at the airport.