Spring Break start

So, I had my Spring Break adventure from Morocco to Cairo to Dahab to Cordoba to Grenada.


Here are some of the awesome highlights.

We took a red eye flight out of Casablanca to Cairo. We arrived, after a few hour delay, in Cairo and we walked off the plane in a daze at roughly 7 Am their time. From there, we had to buy a Egyptian visa and find our luggage (which was delayed :()
finally, we walked out of security and we saw some guy holding the all too familiar name of Ali on a sign. Now, Ali is a very common name in the Middle East, and Ali constantly gets asked if he is Arab/ if he is Muslim.

Of course, he always answers yes, his father is Iraqi. Of course, when asked if he was a practicing Muslim, he got skeptical looks when he did not say he was practicing Islam. He also always added an interesting dynamic to going through security. As I am a white American, I rarely have any trouble going through security. However, it is uncommon for Ali to not get additional questions regarding his whereabouts and his Iraqi lineage.

Well, back to the story. We were looking for a sign that read Erin as we were being picked up by representatives from the American Hostel in Cairo. So, we were confused when we saw a sign for Ali. However, we found the correct people from the Hostel and we were about to leave the airport when the guy that was holding the sign for Ali ran over to our guide to the Hostel. It turns out, the guy that was holding the Ali sign was looking for our Ali. The man’s name was Ahmed and he had his friend Nasser with him. It turns out, that Ahmed is the son of a friend of Ali’s father. Ahmed was instructed by his father to take care of Ali and his friends while they were in Egypt.

It was amazing! For a while, I was skeptical of Arab culture. However, this was it at its best. I found out that it is not uncommon to have your children take care of your friends children when the situation calls for it. Ahmed went as far as to purchase guides for us, bring us to dinner, and show us around Cairo. However, I did not mention that he is not from Cairo. That’s where Nasser came in. Ahmed came from around an hour a way to pick us up at the airport at 5 AM with his friend (and waited the extra 3 hrs that we were delayed getting out of the airport) and took care of us for our time in Cairo all because that is what is expected of a good Egyptian male. Imagine having this treatment in the USA…

Naturally, Ahmed and Nasser speak English. A little history… Egypt was under English control (but then again, who hasn’t been? Answer, a lot of countries) So, we saw the the Egyptian Museum with them and experienced Egyptian culture and food. Along the way, we met up with Nathaniel’s friend Dalia, who also contributed to our experience a bunch.

That night, the Americans Erin, Ali, Cindy, Rachel, Sarah, and myself went out to dinner with Dalia on the Nile. I was hoping to see Nathaniel’s old houseboat on our trip, but Dalia said that she couldn’t recognize it.
I can’t believe that Egyptians can live in that heat. The next day, we trekked to the pyramids and the Sphinx. Scratch that, we took a bus. Remember Ahmed (he brought along another Ahmed, too), well he found us a bus to take around Cairo. Side note, never drive in Cairo… While there is a larger presence of police than in Morocco, drivers are much more reckless due to larger roads to do drive crazily on. I didn’t know that driving would be worse than in Morocco, but it definitely is. So, we saw all the great sites of Cairo and we even went to a Papyrus museum with our guide Sameh.

We finished up our trip to Cairo and quickly saw the Christian areas of Cairo. However, viewing the Coptic areas will be for next visit. In winter… It is much too hot to go to Cairo. I can’t imagine living there all the time.

There are so many memories that are not coming to me now about Cairo, but it was such a great experience that I will never forget it all.

Reflecting quickly on Cairo. It is much more developed than all of Morocco. I was actually surprised by this, but then again it is a nation that the United States dumps money into. Additionally, it is historically much wealthier than Morocco. However, that is not to glorify the country, as there is a much more apparent sense of corruption in the country. The size of Cairo surprised me immensely, so I imagine there are very poor areas as well. As a side note, the GDP of Egypt is $425.5 billion for 80 million people. Morocco’s is $125 billion for 35 million people. However, I prefer the less wealthy country with cleaner air. The smog in Cairo and Giza is unbelievable.

Later that night, we flew to Sharm El Sheikh where we got picked up and brought to Dahab, where we would spend our next 4 days.

I will have to finish up the rest of my trip later