middle east 6/6/09: greetings from nuweiba, egypt

Hi everyone,

Sara: The Lonely Planet implied that Nuweiba was somewhat 'off the beaten track' and until now, I thought of places like....Nice, France, perhaps....as being off the beaten track. But after being here for four hours, we've seen precisely three other vacationers, and maybe nine townspeople. My interpretation has changed somewhat.

On the other hand, it feels very African and third-world-ish, so that's kind of cool. Lots of camels and goats wandering around. We're sleeping in these huts literally right on the beach, and we can see the mountains of Saudi Arabia right across the Red Sea. We're only here for about 24 hours, so for now, we're enjoying the sun and we'll hopefully get in some good snorkeling this afternoon.

On a more exciting note, we're writing after spending about 3 days in Cairo. Woot! Cairo was very cool, though I'm a bit relieved to have some downtime, now. There's so much energy in that city! It was difficult to hide our 'tourist' status there (Leah is blonde, for instance) so whenever we went out, there was a sort of caucophonous symphony of dozens of Egyptians saying, "hello hello!" and "Welcome to Egypt!" (or occasionally, "Welcome to Alaska!")

Cairo traffic is notoriously insane, but I think we all kind of loved it. Some of you might have seen my facebook status that I'd been hit by a bicycle. I totally had the green walking man, but to be fair, I was a bit distracted. Elisa said that my experience was "authentic." (I think the cat with one eye that tried to steal my shwarma at the hostel was authentic, too.) But basically, with the traffic-- all things to the Cairo driver are merely suggestions. Painted lane indicators? Signals? Speed limits? Pedestrians? All things to keep loosely in mind. It was hysterical. I think our average life expectencies probably dropped about five years each time we got in a cab.
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Amy: One of the highlights of Cairo was going to the Egyptian Museum, which was walking distance from our hostel. None of the exhibits were very organized. The lighting was poor. Most of the rooms were way too hot. But it was still, somehow, incredible. We visited King Tut's tomb, and gazed and the beautiful jewelery, most of which I decided I would still wear, even today. Jared said "I think the museum would really benefit by making the experience more interactive and having mummies jump out from behind corners," and that made us all laugh. It's mind-boggling to think about how good the Egyptians were at preservation... everything from the ancient city, to the ancient pyramids, down to the very bodies of ancient Egyptians, have survived centuries. It's downright crazy.
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Sara: There were definitely aspects of Egypt that felt like they were out of an entirely different century, or even an entirely different millenia. The elevator at the hostel was straight out of the early 1900's, and SO cool. Basically, picture the elevator in the movie Titanic-- you know, metal bars for doors, and a lever indicating which floor to go to. This is a start. Now, let's add that the elevator fit perhaps five people in a pinch, and imagine that the setting is the
entryway for the Tower of Terror or perhaps the Haunted Mansion-- dusty, dimly lit. Now add that the elevator itself had small wooden doors with glass windows, and these wooden doors needed to be fully shut for the elevator to go-- in other words, you could be between floors, open the doors, and the elevator would stop. Add all this to
the fact that there wasn't really an enclosed elevator chute, more just a stairwell with an interior rail surrounding it. This was our elevator, and it broke down about twice daily.

Meanwhile, Khan al-Khalili (the marketplace) could have been from a different millenium, and reminded me strongly of the scene at the marketplace in Aladdin. We happened to go on the 4th, the day Obama spoke at Cairo University, and the following conversation ensued with basically every salesman in the market:

Merchant: "Where you from?"
Us: "America."
Merchant: "Oh! Obama..." *excited mix of Arabic and English*
Us: *cheerful* "Obama!"

Needless to say, he's quite popular here, and I think he's probably part of the reason most of the locals we've met have seemed thrilled to meet us. I imagine this is kind of what being a celebrity feels like.
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Amy: We woke up early--really early--yesterday morning to catch a cab and head over to the pyramids. They were only about twenty minutes away from the hostel we were staying at, and we arrived before the ticket stands were even open. To pass the time until 8:30 rolled around, we explored the area a little bit and stumbled upon a
golf course. I don't like golfing, but I would have LOVED to have played a round or two there. The pyramids were tall in the near background, and it was way cleaner than pretty much anywhere else in Cairo. After taking pictures of us pretending to putt, we walked over to the entrance of the pyramids. We decided to have a horse-drawn carriage tour, which turned out to be a fabulous idea! Our guide even let us climb up one of the pyramids...we were only allowed to venture up a few stones, but it was totally cool nonetheless. I got a profile shot of myself "kissing" the Sphinx and Sara and I took another picture that looks like both of our hands are touching the tip of one of the pyramids. Because of the morning light, the shadows cast by the pyramids gave us some amazing photographs. We spent a total of an hour there, which was completely satisfying, and then we made a beeline to McDonald's. Silly American tourists and their comfort food...

Shockingly, our stomachs have been handling the food in Egypt just swimmingly (knock on wood), thanks to good advice from Sam and Audrey: Don't eat food that isn't cooked. Felafels have been my own personal cooked food of choice. I think I've already had about ten of them, and this is only day four in Egypt. They're so delish!

Hope everyone's doing well back at home,
Amy and Sara

*photos in this entry are courtesy of Elisa Law.