June 27 - Luxor

OK, not much happened today except that Joe and I flew from Cairo to Luxor first thing in the morning. Luxor is on the site of the ancient Egyptian capital of Thebes, and consequently houses some amazing monuments and burial sites. More on this in coming blogs.

Probably the only interesting thing about today was going over to a place near to Karnak Temple called the Genesis English Pub to watch England get bounced 4-1 by Germany and then later see Argentina dismiss Mexico 3-1. The Genesis Pub was just a strange place in general. The sign outside promised Drink! Dancing! Food! Swimming! Inside, it was a dark, gloomy pub with an old, overheated Great Dane roaming around and a slow-moving and dry Ukrainian waitress serving the local beers. The food was decent; I had a pizza with an unusually thick and sweet crust and Joe had some grilled meat which turned out to be OK. Other than that, there was half-decent football and we were in Egypt. What else could anyone ask for?

June 26 - Pimped again and KFC/USA

I started the day off with a morning run. If you get going early enough in Cairo, the absolutely mental traffic is not so bad. My theory is that since everyone stays out until 3 or so at night that they must rest sometime, so 7AM is pretty quiet. It was a nice run in the cool-ish morning of Cairo, just before the evil Sun was to rise again to burn my ass all day.

One thing about running in Cairo, though. You know how I said a while back that people look at you like you have two heads if you go to Africa and don't go on safari? Well in Cairo, they look at you like you have FOUR heads (that is NOT a typo. Not two, not three, but FOUR heads) if you go out jogging downtown. In any case, I got back to the place just as it was becoming unbearable and we could then start the day.

Joe and I headed back to the bazaar, where we were sure we would avoid being pimped any more. Except we got pimped even harder this time. The man we encountered as we stepped out of the taxi recognized us from the day before, and insisted we come with him so he could show us the way to the mosque (he claimed to be on his way to pray!) and give us a quick tour. We declined, but he wasn't taking no for an answer, so we followed him to the mosque. Except the next thing you know, we were in a papyrus gallery. After some polite conversation with the owner, I was haggling for a papyrus I didn't come looking for. From 350 Egyptian Pounds, I got the price down to 260 (about $50), but I'm sure this could have been cheaper, probably even 150 Egyptian Pounds. The place was at least a legitimate papyrus place, so at least I came away with a decent piece of merchandise. Two things about shopping in Egypt: 90% of everything you see is complete crap and never, ever, ever enter into any haggling with a third party, or "tout" with you. Our friend the tout was sad to see us go, but then Joe and I continued into other parts of the bazaar and actually had some fun shopping and got some good stuff at good prices.

Later that night, the agenda was pretty simple: KFC and USA. Joe and I had both been craving KFC ever since we had seen an Arabic KFC ad in the Business Lounge at Cairo Airport on our way to South Africa. The ad starred the amazing Lionel Messi and featured beautiful dissolves between Messi playing football and playing the drums with KFC drumsticks. The splendor of the ad meant KFC had our business, at least in the Middle East. And after the Colonel's secret recipe, there would be nothing better to wash that down than a USA/Ghana round of 16 match.

It is not hard to find a KFC in Cairo. There were at least three within walking distance of our apartment. Joe and I chose the furthest but largest outlet, and walked over. The scene inside was typical Cairo: a mob of people pushing and shoving to get their order in first. We noticed there were a bunch of TVs inside and hoped we had killed 2 birds with 1 stone by coming to this location as we were hoping they would be showing the game. When we found out they would not (as they didn't have the right satellite package), we ordered hastily and ate our KFC the way it's meant to be eaten: fast. I can now personally attest to the consistency of KFC's product, be it in San Francisco or Cairo. KFC is KFC everywhere.

We now needed to hop in a cab and cross the Nile over to a place called Sports Café. Sports Café was almost like an American sports bar, with pictures of Michael Jordan, Joe Montana and Larry Bird along with soccer legends like Dennis Bergkamp and Thierry Henry. One thing that set it apart was the amount of clientele smoking "shisha" or what we know as hookah. But Sports Café had plenty of big-screen HD TVs, and that's all we needed to enjoy the World Cup.

Sadly, the Egyptian support that the USA enjoyed when playing Egypt's bitter rivals Algeria had almost entirely dried up for this match with Ghana, the lone remaining African World Cup representative. Almost all of the fans at Sports Café minus Joe and myself were cheering vigorously for Ghana. Hell, if they're going to be that fickle, we don't need the Egyptians on board anyway! After a hard fought match and some typical missed chances by the USA, a great goal by Ghana's Asamoah Gyan put Ghana ahead for good in injury time. Losing to a great goal is, for me, much better than losing to a bad refereeing decision or a really egregious error by your team (although USA defender Steve Cherundulo could have done way better on the winning goal). After the match, some friendly Egyptians consoled Joe and I, and we said we hoped USA and Egypt would both qualify in four years. Getting out of the group stage was nice, but on balance this was not a highly positive result for our guys, and I'm just hoping for entertainment from here on out. Until next time...

June 25 - A bazaar day

OK, so today I celebrated my 32nd birthday by NOT going for a run at 7AM like I had planned the night before. It was Friday, and I guess the weekends here are Friday/Saturday, so it was very quiet (something I honestly did not think possible in Cairo) when the Dan, Emily, Joe and I stepped out to go to the local coffee shop that was open. The coffee shop was buried in a decrepit but somehow cool tunneled out area below some tall buildings across the street from us. I'm no theologian, but Emily pointed out that there was Christian art in this little shop with outdoor tables, so perhaps that is why it could be open so early on the Muslim holy day of Friday. We all ordered Egyptian coffee, which is actually Turkish coffee, where the beans are ground up in the glass that you are drinking from before they settle to the bottom.

Next, we wanted to go shopping, so we headed to the Khan al Khalili Bazaar. Upon arriving in a taxi, we were a bit disoriented, so of course a friendly Egyptian offered to show us around. His name was Hashim, and he told us: "Welcome to the land of confusion, welcome to Alaska." This was only one of four or five times I'd heard an Egyptian refer to Egypt as Alaska. In any case, he assured us he had lots of money (by showing us a huge wad of cash) and that he needed no "baksheesh" for his troubles. This was a sure sign that he was a guy looking for baksheesh, but not from us, from the merchants he was going to bring us by. Hashim was what I like to call a personal shopping pimp. It was not the last time we would encounter one of these guys. He implored us to come with him to the "Egyptian" side of the Khan al Khalili, as opposed to the "tourist" side. On the Egyptian side, we walked through a maze of alleys of tiny shops, with stagnant puddles, trash, and cats eating large piles of animal innards everywhere. That is not to say there wasn't interesting merchandise to be had over there, but it was the kind of place you might think you'd made a wrong turn into if you didn't know better.

In any case, we managed to shake him off after looking for a while at some substandard inlaid boxes, and we continued over to the tourist side of the bazaar. Except we made a wrong turn somewhere. And we ended up in one of the most frenetic, wild, full of crappy goods, crowded and local markets I can imagine. We walked around this tightly packed maze of streets for about a half an hour until we escaped. At the end of the street, a man was leading some kind of chant as people around him ripped open t-shirts out of plastic bags and tossed them around like some kind of t-shirt stock exchange. http://www.facebook.com/seanlarrett?v=app_2392950137#!/video/video.php?v=10150228828585057 People were trying to sell us shirts for less than 20 cents US.

After all that, we were naturally hungry, so we started looking for food. The guidebook recommended a restaurant called Gad, so with the help of some almost exclusively Arabic speaking locals, we set out to find it. After walking in circles for maybe twenty minutes, a nice man led us to a local spot based on the one word I told him: koshary. Koshary is a dish that contains macaroni, rice, lentils, garbanzo beans, fried onions and tomato sauce, and may include some meat. We never found Gad, but our new friend took us to a typical koshary restaurant, where they serve koshary and nothing else. He refused baksheesh. We sat down, didn't order, and instantly there was a tin, army-style bowl of koshary in front of us. The place had good koshary, and after eating it, we paid about $2.50 for four big bowls and left. It was a great experience, and there were nothing but locals inside, which made for an interesting eating experience for us and them, I'm sure.

After all of that, Dan and Emily departed Joe and I to go south up the Nile and take a boat cruise. After that, as this is nominally a World Cup blog, Joe and I wandered downtown to watch Spain beat Chile 2-1 to secure passage to the next round. Until next time...

June 24 - the Pyramids

If you're in Cairo, you've got to go see the Pyramids and the Sphinx. People will look at you like you have two heads if you come back from here without seeing them. I personally had no interest in safari adventures, but was persuaded to go on one because of the "people looking at you like you have two heads when you tel them you've been to Africa without going on safari" rule. So today we went to the Pyramids in Giza (which did interest me all along).

Giza is about 20-25 minutes southwest of Cairo by air-conditioned minivan, which is how we got there after our new best friend Youssiri arranged a driver and tour guide for us. We left at 7AM, which was great because that helped us avoid some of the heat associated with being out in the middle of the desert in the summer. We also made sure to be there early because access to the Pyramids is limited and it pays to beat the crowds, as you can get turned away if you're not early enough (or so I was told).

As you approach the Pyramids of Giza, you are in the town of Giza, which is basically a part of the sprawl of the city of Cairo itself. There is development to the east of the Pyramids, creeping right up as close as it can come. To the west, there is nothing but sand. The Pyramids grow in their magnificence with every step closer that you take. After paying the entrance fees (there are separate fees to go inside the two greatest Pyramids), we finally were close enough to walk next to, touch, and climb on the Pyramids. It's a bit strange to walk all over these amazing monuments, but much worse has been done to them in the over 4,500 years since they were built and I don't think they're going anywhere, so what the hey.

climbing around on the Great Pyramid of Cheops

There is of course a vast horde of people trying to squeeze every dollar and Egyptian Pound out of you that they can. I can't blame them, as I am relatively very wealthy compared to many of the people hustling away at the 'mids. The most common M.O. of these guys was to literally force a "gift" into your hand, saying it's for free and good luck and then to demand a tip. I appreciated their hustle, but I was not interested, finally letting anything they tried to give me fall to the ground, which they assured me was very bad luck.

Our tour guide Mohamed had the driver speak to some of the camel wranglers to get us a good price on a camel ride (I know, cheesy tourist, but when will I ever get to ride a camel again?) and we set out with some camel wranglers to experience the thrill of loping along on one of these giant beasts. The hardest part of the ride was the camel getting up from its seated position as it rocked forward and backwards as it extended first its back and then its front legs. I nearly fell off, as no one told me to lean back as it started to get up. The other challenging part of the ride was dealing with the incessant prodding for tips from the camel wranglers. "I take care of you, you take care of me," "Give me something and it is our secret between God," and "Good camel makes good tip," were some things I heard about 1000 times in the five minute experience. I will have to say that the raised perspective of being on the camel made for an amazing experience while exploring the area around the pyramids, and it was well worth the $12 or so I spent on the entire experience. After we paid our tips and got off the camels, we still had to pay the original fee to the guys who I'll call the "camel pimps," who ran the show. These guys were hassling us for even more tips. I say this not to complain, it's just an observation on how the guys we met at the pyramids were the most brazen hustlers I've ever met in all my travels to any tourist landmark. Good for them, as they are just trying to get a buck in this lifetime just like me.

Emily, Dan, myself, and Joe in front of the Pyramid of Khafre

After departing from the camels, we made our way over to the Sphinx. It was smaller than I had imagined it, but very captivating, especially considering the massive pyramids that provided the background for it. Our tour guide told us that the Sphinx had been buried in sand up to the neck until 1937, so the Sphinx that Mark Twain and Gustave Flaubert gushed about in their writing was merely a head sticking out of the sand.

the beautiful and mysterious Sphinx

We were back by 12:30, and on a day like this you could sleep the rest of the day and not feel guilty, but we did go out exploring and we learned a couple more things:
1. the reason there are so many police hanging around our building constantly is that we are right next to a synagogue that has been targeted for terrorist attacks.
2. the men's bathroom in the Ramses train station (according to Joe) is something that has to be seen to be believed. He couldn't even describe it. I never saw it, so I have to go back.

And that's it, my reason to come back to Cairo: the men's room in the Ramses train station. All for now.

June 23 - CAIRO!!!

OK, so I arrived in Cairo today. I could tell right away I was in for a special experience. The taxi driver who was bringing me to my apartment smack dab in the middle of downtown spoke no English whatsoever. I couldn't even get him to explain to me how to say "thank you." He took me through the busiest, most bewildering and unregulated stream of traffic, weaving through pedestrians all the way, to the wrong address. That was only because there are 2 buildings called 19 Sharia Adly, each on one side of the Banque du Caire.

There I was met by Youssiri, a man who wanted to be intimately involved in all aspects of my life. He was there on behalf of the lady I was renting the apartment from, to let me in and so forth. He at once began badgering me about when I wanted to visit the Pyramids, Luxor and all the other attractions in Egypt. He also wanted to be my personal valet for everything I needed food-wise in the apartment. "You want I get fruit? Sandwich? You give me money, I go," he said.

Having shaken him off, I waited with my friends Dan and Emily for Joe to arrive. When he arrived, we swung into action right away and headed for Coptic Cairo, an historical stronghold of Christianity in an otherwise very Muslim place. Coptic Cairo had some cool stuff, but my favorite was Saint George's Church. Saint George must have been a dragon-slayer, because everywhere there were almost completely identical reproductions of a piece of art depicting a knight slaying a dragon. There were paintings, velvet paintings, wood carvings, plastic models, neon banners, and vanity mirror reproductions of the sculpture on the façade of the church. I've provided a couple of photographs, but it's hard to describe the variety of styles of this same motif and the ubiquitousness of it in the church.

there were so many examples of this art motif, and they all looked like they were produced in the 1970s.

We also stepped into an underground prayer room that suffered from the kind of stuffiness that comes from not only being in Cairo in the middle of Summer, but also from having lots of sweaty tourists trapped in a tiny room underground.

Making our escape from there, we went to the Mosque of Amr ibn al-As, the first mosque ever built in Egypt. I guess it's kind of like visiting the first grain of sand on a beach, because Egypt is lousy with mosques now. I was impressed at how cool it was under the canopied areas in the mosque (the ceiling fans were probably added after 642 AD).

in the courtyard of the mosque of Amr ibn al-As, the first mosque built in Egypt

Later that evening, we went to watch the USA face Algeria in a must-win World Cup game. Finding a place to watch it was much harder than you would think for being downtown in an intensely crowded city in a country obsessed with football. For one thing, they don't really have bars here, or at least the ones they do have don't advertise it very much. For another, TVs are harder to find than you might think. We finally stumbled across a street with some TVs and tables right before halftime of the match, and sat down to watch.

Seated just next to us was the only person we could find that was supporting Algeria. Egypt and Algeria have had a very contentious footballing relationship in the recent past, and nearly all the Egyptians in the viewing area were cheering vigorously for the USA on every crunching tackle, towering header, and missed opportunity. Our friend who was rooting for Algeria was sticking to some sort of fundamental Arabic pride linking Egypt and Algeria, but he was polite nonetheless. The USA needed a win to secure certain passage to the next round of the tournament.

We had to wait for what seemed like an eternity as the USA missed an endless string of opportunities, until finally Landon Donovan put us ahead 1-0 deep into second half injury time. The patrons of the outdoor cafés seated around us erupted like Egypt had just won the World Cup (well, nothing like that, but at least the reaction of a sports bar celebrating the local baseball team hitting a go-ahead home run). As the USA held on for the win, the guy who ran the place we were at came over to congratulate us, and offered the nearby Algeria supporter the lovely sentiment of "fuck off Algeria!"


Egyptian fans celebrating the USA's win over Algeria. The man that walks into the frame was the restaurant owner. He drops in a "fuck off Algeria" if you listen closely

One thing I haven't mentioned enough is that Cairo is absolutely the most crazy city I have ever been to in terms of noises, improvisational businesses in dilapidated buildings, traffic chaos, overly friendly people, overly aggressive salesmanship, heat, dust, old crappy cars, people carrying tons of stuff, horn honking, driving with no headlights (I can't tell you how normal this is), and just general bedlam. I am always looking for a more pulsating and energetic city experience, and Cairo by far takes the cake as far as what I've seen. More to come...

June 22 - Soweto and red eye to Cairo

So on June 22, we set up a tour of the city of Soweto. Soweto lies just to the Southwest of Johannesburg, hence the name: So(outh)we(stern) to(wnship). It is sort of a living monument in itself to apartheid and racial segregation in South Africa. The main reason we used a tour was not because of safety concerns (I've been assured that Soweto is safe, especially during daylight) but because we had no idea where anything was in this place and we could use the history lesson that a tour guide provides.

Our tour guide was a man who went by the name Sunny Boy. He said he is called that because he always like to hang out in the sun as a child. Regrettably, I didn't take a picture with Sunny Boy, as we had to part ways very hastily so Joe could make his flight. One of the first places we stopped was the Elias Motsoaledi informal settlement. The man for whom the informal settlement was named was one of the eight defendants who were sentenced to life imprisonment (including Nelson Mandela) in the Rivonia Trial in 1963 and 1964. During the trip to the informal settlement, we had another guide, a man who called himself "B." B showed us some of the harsh living conditions people have to endure in these informal settlements. We were instructed by both B and Sunny Boy not to give the little kids money, and they were very persistent in pursuing it. I did not give any of the kids money, but some of their stories and pleas were very heart-rending.

Moving on, we rushed by a few of the major landmarks of Soweto before stopping at Vilakazi Street, home to (among other things) Nelson Mandela's former house and Orlando West High School. Orlando West High School was the epicenter of one of the earliest major incidents in the 1976 Soweto Uprising against apartheid. In a planned march from Orlando West High School to Orlando East Police Station to protest the teaching of Afrikaans in black schools, police shot and killed 13 year old Hector Pieterson, the first death in a bloody year that saw over 600 students killed in protests of apartheid. We also visited the museum built in Hector Pieterson's name, which commemorated the events of the Soweto Uprising.

Nelson Mandela's former house in Orlando West, Soweto

Orlando West High School in Soweto

After Sunny Boy dropped us off, we booked off for our respective flights, but not before watching South Africa give qualification for the second round a run for the money as they threatened to beat the woeful France by the required margin to advance. There was palpable excitement about it in the air as residents were blowing their vuvuzelas as it looked like this impossible dream may come true. It was not to be, however, and South Africa crashed out.

I would just like to thank everyone in South Africa for all their hospitality and good will while I was there. It was a truly fantastic experience meeting all the lovely people I got to cross paths with, and I hope their country keeps getting better and better. On another note, I saw many people in South Africa who have to struggle so hard just to get what I might consider a little reward in their lives. It is just another reason to be thankful for what I've got and what massive material wealth has been given to me all my life, most of the time without me even realizing it. For while I may not be wealthy in my country, there are a great deal of South Africans who can only dream of the opportunities I've had in my life.

OK, enough waxing philosophical, it's off for my favorite thing: another red eye. This time, I'll be in Cairo when I wake...

June 21 - Spain v. Honduras

Hello. I had to take a few days off from blogging between rushing around Johannesburg going to games and whatnot and traveling to Cairo, which must be by far the most busy, crowded, chaotic, noisy, polluted and crazy city I have ever been to. My kind of town, for sure!

So on Monday, June 21, we did next to nothing all day except for make our last arduous trek out to a World Cup match, this time to Ellis Park to watch Spain play Honduras. There are only a couple things I can now recall from this trip:

-Lars (and later I as well) ate something called "bunny chow" on the way to the match. It was being sold by a street vendor that was also selling stuff I typically associate with Indian cuisine, such as samosas and roti. The bunny chow consisted of five or so inches of the butt end of a loaf of white bread hollowed out and stuffed with curried chicken, carrots and potatoes. It was very tasty. I was later assured that there are different versions of bunny chow, this being the Indian variety. I added some of the homemade (and very spicy) chili paste that the vendor was offering to the effect of even greater delight.

enjoying a "bunny chow"

Then we watched Spain kick the crap out of Honduras 2-0. It could have been 5-0 or 6-0 all too easily. We had great seats to watch the match and it was fun to watch the great Spain power around all day. We got back early, as the next day promised to be a long one.

our seats to watch Spain play Honduras, probably the best we had in the eight games we attended

So, after all the matches, we saw in person:
8 matches
4 stadiums
22 goals (2.75 per match)
2 own goals (3 if you count Robert Green's hilarious error to give the USA a goal)
6 parking locations

OK, television, it's over to you to keep me watching in the 2010 World Cup.