Cairo, Day 2

Today was our last tour day, as we all leave tomorrow morning. Mom & Steven leave really early, and we leave a bit later.

Today was ancient stuff. First, we went to Memphis, which was the first capital of the united Egypt (before that, it was Upper and Lower Egypt), about 4,000 year ago. Memphis is in the rural part of Cairo, so we got to see some Egyptian countryside. Some of it was really beautiful. I have to say that Egypt has the prettiest fruit and vegetables I've ever seen. Cauliflower and cabbages the size of basketballs. Beautiful purple and orange carrots. So many oranges! And they're are everywhere. There are stands with a wide variety, there are little roadside areas with just one or two kinds, or there are donkey carts piled high with one kind. I have so many pictures of Egyptian fruits and vegetables, because the colors appealed to me so greatly.

Purple and orange carrots, with some radishes in between

Lots of veggies

A beautiful fruit stand

We also found out that most Egyptian beef is water buffalo, only a very small percentage is cow. So, we can now say we've eaten water buffalo. 

Then, there's the other side. Every place we went in Egypt was filthy. Literally piled with garbage. Our way  to Memphis, we drove by an irrigation canal for most of the way, and it was filled with trash. We actually watched a guy walk out of his house to the canal, dump out his bag of garbage over the bank of the canal, and walk back inside with the garbage bag. It was disgusting. I honestly don't think they have any sort of garbage collection services, because all of the overpasses without roads under them were also piled with garbage. There was one near our hotel that I really thought was an actual dump, until I saw that the whole city looked like that.

This is a canal filled with garbage

A huge pile of trash on the bank of a canal

Back to Memphis. Nothing remains of the city, as it was made of mud brick. Mud brick buildings don't generally last 4,000 years. But, they have a small outdoor museum of statuary from when Ramses II was pharaoh.

There is also one building, which contains what used to be a very large standing statue. His legs are missing below the knee now, so he's laying down. It was really cool, though, because we could see so much more detail than we could when the really big statues are standing.

Then, it was off to Saqqara, which was the necropolis for Memphis. Saqqara has what is said to be the first stone building ever built

as well as the first pyramid in Egypt, the Step Pyramid, built for Zoser. It's looking pretty run down, but they're doing a lot of restoration on it. It looks a lot better than the pyramids around it, though!

There used to be several of them in that area, but most of them are just piles now.

Saqqara was also the first place on the ground where we could see very clearly the dilineation between fertile land and desert. I had seen it on Google Maps, and we had seen it somewhat from the air, but this was the first time we could see it up close. On one side of the road, it was green, with houses, trees, and grazing goats. On the other side, it was sand. Just like that.

It was all like this, like there was some magical barrier beyond which life could not be supported

After Saqqara, we went to a carpet school. I knew it was going to be another shop, but oh, well. I told Tamer we weren't going to buy anything, but I guess he knew better, and he took us anyway.

The school is for kids to learn how to make carpets. I don't know how much of the speech was propaganda designed to get us to buy things, but the guy told us that it keeps the kids off the street by giving them a skill. He said there are whole families who make carpets at home, and then they can bring them back to the school, and the school will sell the carpets in their shop. It was Friday, so there wasn't any school that day, but he had a young man (maybe 17) come in to give us a demonstration of how to make the knotted carpets. This kid was so fast! It was amazing. Then, he asked if any of us wanted to give it a try, so I did. The whole time I was sitting next to him, the young man was muttering under his breath, "You give me money, OK?" I was completely out of small money, so he didn't get anything.

We then went up to the shop, where we were offered tea, and the man showed us around. He of course showed us the very expensive stuff. I told him I only had $20, and asked if he had something small I could get with that. He laughed at me and said, "Very small" He laughed at me to a passing carpet school worker, too. Whatever. He showed me the things I could get for $20. I got a little woven bag that was obviously made by a kid or a very unskilled adult. Mom got a nice small woven rug to hang on the wall.

After the carpet school, it was time for the highlight of  the city - the Giza Pyramids. The Giza Pyramids are the ones you think of when you think pyramids. The first thing that's shocking about them is how close they are to the city. When I think of the pyramids, I think of them as being way out in the middle of the desert. They aren't. They're seriously right next to the city.

We had to get out of the van to walk through the ticket area, and then we met our van again on the other side. We parked and walked up to the Great Pyramid.

They very smartly have made an area that you can climb on. They've carved some steps into the side of the pyramid, and have blocked off a climbing zone. I think it's brilliant, since you know people are going to climb it anyway.

The Great Pyramid was built for Khufu (aka Cheops).

Taken from the Great Pyramid. See how close the city is?

After we took all of our pictures and fended off millions of people trying to sell us camel rides and doodads, we hopped back in the van. We drove past the second pyramid, which is the only one that still has part of it's original limestone coating. Originally, all of the pyramids had a smooth layer on the outside, but most of it was taken away in ancient times to build other things. The second pyramid was built for Khafre, Khufu's son.

We then went past the third pyramid, which was built for Menkaure, Kafre's son.

We had tickets to go inside the third pyramid, but we were going to the viewpoint first, where you can see all three pyramids in a row. It is, of course, covered in people trying to sell camel rides and knickknacks. We took our pictures and headed back to the third pyramid.

Again, camels and geegaws. I did get kind of used to being called "Pretty American," though. I like that. Tamer had told us that it wasn't worth the money to go in the pyramids. That there isn't anything to see, and it's hot and uncomfortable, because you have to bend down while walking down a steep ramp. I wanted to do it anyway. How can you not take the opportunity to go in a pyramid? You can go in the Great Pyramid, but it's 100LE per ticket (about $20), and they only sell 150 a day, so you have to get there really early. The third pyramid is only 30LE (about $5), and they sell tickets all day. Since there isn't anything to actually see in either pyramid, we chose the cheap one. Tamer was right, there's nothing to see. You walk down a very steep ramp into a stuffy room, which has a stuffy hall, which leads into some more stuffy rooms. They're all blank. No paintings or anything. But, hey, we were in a freakin' pyramid! How cool is that?!?!

After the pyramids, we went to see the Sphinx.

Guess what they were selling there? This time, it was actually gimcracks and camel rides, not the other way around.You can no longer go right up to the Sphinx, because it has some pretty serious erosion problems. But, they have a spot on one of the retaining walls that you can stand on. There were kids there showing us how to get trick photos with the Sphinx. We told them we had no money, but they showed us anyway. One kid tried to get me to give him my camera so he could take my picture, but I said no thank you. Perhaps he was honest and helpful, or perhaps he wanted to steal my camera. I guess we'll never know.

We were again done with our day earlier than expected. But, we had enjoyed our relaxing afternoon yesterday, so we were fine with another one. Tamer suggested that we might like to try Egyptian pancakes for lunch today. He said they aren't like our pancakes, they're huge stuffed things. So, we said sure. We decided to get enough food for both lunch and dinner, though, because we had fridges in the rooms, and didn't want to try and find dinner near the hotel. So, we got a savory pancake and a sweet one, as well as our regular schwarma and felafel.

Savory

I went inside with Tamer to get lunch this time. I have to say, I am really glad that we had been eating Egyptian food without getting sick for the past few days, because if I had seen them making the food when we first got here, I would have been eating the granola bars we brought since then. The pancakes were seriously cool to watch, despite the fact that nothing was refrigerated and he didn't wash anything - neither hands nor tools. First, he took a ball of dough and rolled it out a little. Then he flipped it around kind of like making a pizza, but he slapped it on the counter as he flipped it. When it was really big, he stretched it out to cover the whole counter, then he folded up the top and bottom. He then poured on the toppings. For the savory one, there were red peppers, olives, tomatoes, some sort of sausage I didn't like, some unidentified meat that looked like beef, and something that looked like it may have been grilled chicken and onions. And cheese. For the sweet one, it was custard, coconut, golden raisins, and I think perhaps honey. I reiterate, none of it was refrigerated. Then, he folded in the other sides and baked them. They were absolutely delicious. I ended up picking out quite a bit from the savory one (I don't like tomatoes, peppers, or olives), but what was left was very good!

We ate our food, watched some movies, played some games, and just relaxed and hung out, enjoying our last day together.

Emma says - Today was probably the coolest day. We got to see so much stuff that people only dream about seeing. It was pretty cool to see the first stone building ever built and the first pyramid in Egypt. I feel sort of awesome now. The Giza Pyramids were super cool. Seeing the last surviving wonders of the ancient world made me feel really cool.