Here's me saying goodbye to Ahmed after we got back to my hotel around 4pm! This guy was the best! Despite only knowing a few words in each others' language, we managed to talk all day for an eight-hour road trip. Thanks again for driving, Ahmed!
Bad ass. Ahmed and I had spent the hour-drive down doing our best to get to know each other. Despite the language barrier, we'd managed pretty well and I learned that despite having spent his entire life in Cairo, he'd never been to any of the sites we were visiting. It was cool to drive down the road with him and hear him having the same awed reaction as me.
This is the back of Djoser's Step Pyramid. It's from 2630 BCE (4,640 years ago!!!) and is considered one of the oldest stone monuments in human history.
Saqqara is a huge burial complex for the Old Kingdom of Egypt. We pulled off the lush green local roads and suddenly we were in the middle of a desert and there were two pyramids (well, one step pyramid and a pile of rubble!) rising out of the desert.
BTW, the pile of rubble is the remains of Userkaf's Pyramid! Guess that'll teach him to skimp on pyramid building supplies!
After finishing my breakfast, I grabbed my backpack and hit the streets of Cairo to try to find a driver! After a few failed attempts with drivers who spoke absolutely NO English, I finally met a driver who was willing to hear me out. Not that he spoke a single word of English either, he simply possessed enough patience to sit with me on the side of the road while I tried to communicate with a combination of phrases listed in the back of my guidebook and clumsy hand gestures.
After getting the gist that I wanted to hire him for the day, he told me that "We see friend with English." I agreed and he drove me to a hotel to visit a friend of his working as a security guard. His friend spoke great English and asked me where I wanted to go and how much I wanted to pay. I named the three cities and told him that I was offereing 200 EP (~$38 USD). He told me "Ahhhh! That is a very good and fair price!" He translated what I had just said for Ahmed, the driver, who happily agreed. After sitting in Cairo's morning traffic for close to an hour, we hit the highway and were on our way!
On the loooong ass flight over I'd had plenty of time to read up good places to stay in Cairo and had decided to head to an area called Shariff Adly where there were lots of places to choose from. After clearing customs uneventfully, I got into a cab and got a nerve-wracking two minutes of blank stares as I tried every possible pronunciation of "Shariff Adly" before finally stumbling upon "SHAR adley." And the dude laughed and was like "Oh, sure. No problem 80 EP" (80 Egyptian Pounds like $15 USD).
As we pulled away from the airport, the cabbie asked me where I was from. He told me he liked New York, but not George Bush. I agreed. He told me he liked American music and turned the radio on. Right as he flipped it on, the song that goes "Caught between the moon and New York Ci-it-it-taaaay...the best that you can do" was on and we both had a laugh.
Sitting in mid-day afternoon Egyptian traffic after almost 20 hours of travel = feeling like this.
After getting dropped off, I wandered around and checked out a few hotels and hostels before deciding on a room at the Carlton Hotel on 26th of July Street (just a few blocks away from the Nile River!).
