As we took pictures in front of the Red Pyramid, Rania decided to readdress the taxi issue. Nancy felt that the waiting fee was reasonable. I agreed, but said the drivers should give us some kind of discount for the time they spent getting lost. Rania wanted the waiting fee and the lost time wiped off the meter, and since she was the only one among us who spoke fluent Arabic, I told her she had my full support to, “Make a fuss.”

We foreigners stood back and conversed while Rania went to talk to the drivers, but our conversation was soon interrupted by the sound of shouting in Arabic. Rania was letting the driver who drove Maggie and me have it with both barrels while the other driver seemed to be trying to calm the situation. We came over to see if we could help, but Rania was storming over to the nice driver’s car and ordering “Maggie, you and Jamie are riding with us!”

At this point the argument had attracted a crowd including Ustez Muhammad, two uniformed tourist police and one plainclothes officer. Maggie asked had happened and Rania told us that the rude driver said that Maggie and I should have been more polite to him. At first I thought he was offended that I fell asleep on the way to Dahshur, but apparently at some point Maggie had put her head on my shoulder or held my hand and offended the driver’s delicate conservative sensibilities. He was also demanding that we pay him for the return trip to Zamalek even if we didn’t ride with him.

Ultimately Maggie and I found ourselves in Ustez Muhammad’s car, followed by Rania, Nancy and Allison in the good taxi and the offended driver alone in his taxi on the way to the tourist police station. Rania asked me to come into the station with her to lend credibility to her argument. Maggie followed as well, mainly because she just didn’t want to stand in the sun outside while we plead our case in front of the local law enforcement.

By the time Rania, Ustez Muhammad, the plainclothes officer and the offended driver had filed into the captain’s cozy office, there was only enough room for me to stand in the doorway, arms crossed and wearing a stern gaze. The captain was typical for a high-ranking officer in Egypt, overweight but authoritative, parked in the most comfortable chair in the room. He kept a passive demeanor as Rania and the driver plead their respective cases.

When they finished, the driver stormed out of the office, and the people in the office invited me to come sit by the captain. Maggie came inside and sat next to Rania, who took my phone to call City Cab and speak with customer service. Ustez Muhammad and the plainclothes officer started passing around cigarettes, which I accepted if for no other reason than to identify myself with the gang. I was too hot and thirsty to actually want to smoke.

While Rania shouted into the phone, the captain and I discussed the difference in prices for American luxury automobiles between the States and Egypt. Finally Rania handed the phone to the captain, and I looked for a way to discretely dispose of my cigarette. Once the captain finished on the phone, Rania told us we would have to give the offended driver 100 LE ($18.19).

After thanking the authorities, we all packed into the good driver’s car and took off for Lucille’s, my favorite restaurant in Maadi. On the way, Rania told us that City Cab had assured us that the rude driver would be losing his job, which wasn’t what we wanted to see, but he probably doesn’t need to be working with a foreign clientele anymore. If you spend enough time in Egypt, you’ll hear plenty of foreigners say that these people are all in league to cheat tourists at every turn, but I can say in this instance that they did the right thing.

Oh, and I saw this in Maadi and feel it needs to be shared with the world:

On the ride to the Red Pyramid I noticed the meter had gone from 120 LE ($21.82) to 140 LE ($25.46). Considering how long we had left the cabs waiting, I was relieved to see the waiting fee was so low, but I made a mental note to complain to City Cab’s customer service if this driver charged us full price for getting lost earlier.

As we ascended the much more attractive paved path leading to the Red Pyramid’s entrance, Rania told Maggie how displeased she had been to see we were charged a 2-hour waiting fee even though we had only been gone for a little more than an hour. I tried not to think about it as I marveled that the Red Pyramid is in every way as impressive as the Pyramids at Giza, even though the individual blocks from which the structure is constructed are smaller.

Descending the shaft was much easier, since it came equipped with luxuries like steps and light. At the bottom, I crawled through the typical 1m x 1m x 10m shaft into the antechamber. There I noticed that this pyramid contained the familiar pyramid musk from airborne moisture, topped with a smell that became increasingly identifiable as urine. I tried to ignore it, focusing instead on the stepped ceilings which are like a smaller version of the grand hall in the Great Pyramid.

The last antechamber was a vast room with a huge wooden staircase leading to the burial chamber. The urine smell became even more intense, so I resolved to breathe through my mouth and get a look at the burial room as fast as possible.

Unlike the burial rooms of Khufu and Khafre’s pyramids, Sneferu’s is a relatively small room. You’re confined to one side by a railed wooden platform, as the floor is covered in rubble and lacks any sarcophagus that I could identify.

Right as I was about to leave, Allison and Nancy and Maggie arrived, so I hung out to snap a few pictures, then, like the Pharaoh’s soul, I raced out of the burial chamber as fast as possible. Relieved to escape, I asked Maggie what the deal was with that smell. She told me the prevailing opinion at the SCA is that it must be tourists using the burial chamber as a toilet because Egyptians don’t visit Dahshur.

When I exited the pyramid, I was relieved to know that the bat had only hit me in the chest and my shirt was still intact. The winged rat had brushed Maggie’s arm, but the people at the CDC laughed when she called their hot line and asked if she should be have treatment for rabies. Nancy and the Egyptians, of course, were fine.

As I stood in front of the pyramid telling Allison about the unsecured wooden ladders and bats, I turned to see Rania climbing onto a police camel’s saddle. Maggie gave me a look that I knew meant I would not be leaving Dahshur without taking my first camel ride. I figured we would just take turns sitting on the camel and having our pictures taken, but instead the tourist police marched two camels over for Maggie and me.

Mounting a camel is very different from performing the same task on a horse.  For one thing, the camel has to kneel on all fours, something they seem loathe to do. Maggie’s ride vocally protested, however eventually consented. The saddle, upon objective observation, seems to have been made more for the camel’s comfort than the rider’s. The bottom is padded and contoured to the shape of the animal’s hump. The top, rather, is essentially a wooden box with a blanket. There are wooden blocks at the front and back, the former presumably functions as a handhold while the latter can only be used to keep the rider from tumbling off the back, since it makes for terrible arch support.

As we trod toward the Valley Temple, Maggie took pictures and video, entranced by making images with a camel head poking up from the bottom. Rania chatted in Arabic with the police who were leading the camels and explained to Allison, who was leading Maggie’s camel, what names the camels had. I posed for Maggie’s pictures while thinking about what it must have been like as an Arab conquerer 1300 years ago, riding between these massive stone monuments to “god” kings who were long dead before Islam was first revealed.

Arrival at the temple turned out to be anti-climactic since we stayed on our mounts and let the police take our pictures, then left. On the way back, Maggie and Rania got a big kick out of seeing the rifle hanging out of my camel’s saddle bag. They advised me against picking it up, waving it in the air and ululating for a photo op. As we neared the pyramid, Rania told us that she felt 10 LE ($1.81) for each of us was a fair tip for the accommodating officers.

When we arrived, the police started ordering the camels to kneel. Maggie and Rania’s rides dropped with maximum vocal, but limited physical protest. My ride dropped to his front knees but stubbornly refused to drop his rear. Lacking any educated solution, I blurted “Please?” The camel quickly obliged. I immediately dismounted even more awkwardly than I had mounted, scraping my leg on the gun barrel.

I turned to the oldest-looking officer and palmed him two 20’s ($3.63) as we headed back to the taxis. Another officer stopped me and rubbed his fingers together, but I gestured at his associates and moved on, hoping they’d understand the tip was for everyone. Mark Twain once said every Egyptian’s first word was “Bakshish.”*

*Arabic for “tip.”

At the entrance to Dahshur we met our inspector, Ustez* Muhammad, who got in his car and led our taxi caravan down the sand/gravel road to the Bent Pyramid. This twisted monument was possibly the first attempt by Sneferu (some say the Maidum Pyramid was his) to smooth out the design of the Step Pyramid into the more familiar shape we picture when we hear the word “pyramid.” Unfortunately they started the pyramid at an unsustainable angle and realized too late that the foundation couldn’t support it. In true Egyptian fashion, they decided to finish the pyramid at a less ambitious angle.

At the moment, the Bent Pyramid is not open to tourists, so we had to have special permission to be there, but word around the campfire is that the inside will be open to the public in two months. You have to climb a three-story wooden structure to get to the entrance, which is just over a meter and a half tall. It opens into a shaft that takes you down at a 30 degree angle for about 70 meters. Allison decided about half-way down the unlit, slippery slope that this adventure was not for her.

At the bottom of the shaft, we crawled along a six-foot 4×4 over a pile of rubble into a a small space with a 3 meter tall wooden ladder.At the top of the ladder is a relatively spacious room with a series of wooden platforms and ladders reaching nearly 3 times as high as the previous one. We were instructed to climb this structure one at a time because the movement would shake loose a lot of dust and debris. I took five steps up the ladder before deciding that the previous evening’s alcohol consumption had left me far too shaky to trust myself on an unsecured ladder while holding an LED flashlight. After her own test, Maggie came to the same conclusion.

This meant that Rania and Ustez Muhammad would proceed to the burial chamber without the foreigners. As Nancy, Maggie and I passed the time with our one LED flashlight, it occurred to me that this was the first time I had stood in a pyramid with a comfortable temperature, unchoked by the humidity created by 100 wheezing tourists.

It was quiet, too, until the sound of 1,000 screeching bats told us that Muhammad and Rania had reached the burial chamber. Fortunately Nancy was under the impression that those bats were actually birds. No one bothered to correct her.

Eventually our errant Egyptians returned, so we made our way back to the entrance. We gave Nancy the head start ascending the shaft. Somewhere along the way, she told me to go ahead to spare us the frequent breaks she needed to take. Nancy broke her leg last year at Mount Sinai, so crawling around inside of this pyramid was a herculean effort on her part.

Sending me first turned out to be a good decision. As I neared the exit, a tourist policeman stepped into the door. A second later, I felt what I thought was a wad of rope slap into my chest. I looked at the ground to see what had hit me, but nothing was there, prompting me to blurt, “What the hell was that?”

Maggie’s voice rose up from behind me, “That was a bat, sweetie.”

*Ustez is Arabic for “Mister.” I use the term to distinguish him from other Muhammads.

After two years, on and off, of living in Egypt, I finally got my wish: we were going to Dahshur. I’ve had an obsession with seeing the Bent and Red pyramids of Dahshur since I first glimpsed them on the horizon from Sakkara.

Maggie and I arrived in front of the SCA at 6 AM. Nancy, our 60-year-old retiree friend who is seeing the world on her pension had arranged for two yellow taxis (as opposed to the unmetered black and whites) to pick us up. Allison and Rania were there as well, but Julie and Garry bailed because I had force-fed them more beer than either of them could handle on the previous evening. This meant that Maggie and I would take the one taxi while Nancy, Rania and Allison would pile into the other.

The ride was very quiet. Maggie and I listened to the local western music station in silence while I drifted in and out of consciousness, taking occasional note of the price displayed on the meter. At some point the drivers took a turn on the road to Faiyum, which struck me as odd, but I figured they knew a faster way to go south and drifted back to sleep.

Around 8 AM we finally rolled up on Dahshur, as the cute sign out front informed us. The meter read a bewildering 120 LE ($21.81), so I turned to Maggie and said, “Did they get lost.” She just silently nodded. “Hell with it, I said. We’re here.”

A couple of my friends have sent me the above-linked article from BBC News relaying the worst news to hit Egypt since the war in Gaza: An Egyptian court has ruled that internet pornography should be banned. Worry not, children. This is not the end of porn in Cairo.

Aside from the fact that I’m just not a big porn guy, I don’t buy that this change will be either immediate or effective. For one thing, China has shown us time and time again that a full blown “Ministry of Truth” will never be able to completely block internet access. For every site you block, ten more will show up to replace it and meanwhile there’s going to be a dozen proxy sites out there which are more than willing to link you to the filth you crave.

That said, I don’t think the Egyptian government has the resources or the motivation to actually start blocking access. Keep in mind that this legislation was not initiated by the government, but rather by a Muslim attorney who thinks the government isn’t doing enough to defend the moral values of the people who live in Egypt. This is the same government that doesn’t bother enforcing traffic policies that keep people physically safe. How can anyone expect them to defend the moral decency of private citizens?

This turn is, however, cause for concern. This court decision sets a precedent for the government to monitor internet use and police it. Should the government ever decide to divert enough resources to start policing the internet, the legal groundwork has already been laid. Once they’ve got a lock on the porn, it’s only a matter of time before they start blocking Facebook, blog sites, and everything else that is a challenge to Egypt’s “essential decency.” It’s times like this that I’m glad I’ll be out of this country soon, insha’allah.

*My best approximation for how to spell the Arabic word for ”No more.”

I’ve been sitting here with a tab open for the last week because it has a BBC article on the traffic in Cairo, and I’ve been dying for a chance to talk about some of my experiences with the roads in Egypt. It’s just so hard to find a place to start, but I think I know where to begin: I love the traffic in Cairo.

Don’t get me wrong. I have no desire to sit in a car for a couple of hours instead of being at home watching movies or drinking with friends. Traffic will always suck, but the thing about traffic in Cairo is that it could be and should be a lot worse. Since so much of the industry and culture of Egypt is centralized to Cairo, I’ve been told that the population fluctuates by millions when the weekend hits because so many people commute back to the villages.

That said, the most major roads in Cairo are maybe 6 lanes wide. Back in Atlanta, where the population is almost 1/5 of Egypt’s, the widest roads are twice as wide and we still have stop and go traffic. How do Egyptians manage? They manage by totally ignoring all laws that regulate safety on the roads. If one side of the road is marked for two lanes, you will usually see three cars packed side by side in the space. Signals and headlights are used sparingly. The retractor and buckle have usually been removed from seat belts so you can lay them across your lap without actually wearing them so the cops don’t hassle you. Street lights are merely suggestions. If the municipality really cares whether or not you stop at an intersection, a police officer will be posted there to direct traffic, and if you feel he’s doing a poor job, you are more than welcome to blow your horn, shout insults, or just ignore him (though I don’t recommend the last one).

All of these things may horrify you if you’ve never seen it in action (and sometimes even if you have), but I see a certain beauty in it. If Americans see something that doesn’t work, the majority just whines until someone comes along and fixes it, meanwhile Egyptians rarely find a problem that can’t be solved with baling wire and duct tape. There’s also a cathartic element to it. Who hasn’t been sitting in traffic and thought, “Why can’t I just drive up the median/emergency lane?” In Egypt, you can. Granted, emergency vehicles have a nightmare of a time getting around, but I just consider that an inadvertent form of population control.

It all reminds me of a bit George Carlin used to do where he said that they should just let terrorists onto airplanes without hassle because it would serve to make things more interesting. Cairo life more than makes up with traffic accidents the danger you avoid not having to worry about gun violence, but at least it’s interesting! With all of the regulations we put on traffic in the States, auto accidents are still one of the top causes of death we have.  I’m not saying it should be “Road Warrior” out there, but do you seriously think your life would be in greater danger if the guy in front of you in the fast lane didn’t slam on his breaks whenever he sees a car parked by the side of the road? It’s something to consider.

“Ah, Cairo! City of the living! A paradise on Earth!” -Sallah, “Raiders of the Lost Ark”

Here I am, kids! Having made my triumphant return to Cairo, I’m returning to the blogging. With all the travel preparations (and going away parties) it became difficult to spend enough time to build an attractive and informative post between my other responsibilities.

Apparently Delta recently made Cairo a direct flight destination, because I was able to book a flight this time from Atlanta to New York and then direct to Cairo. The only snag was having to transfer from La Guardia to JFK, however the New York Port Authority directed me to the airport express bus, which cost all of $13 to get me there in less than 45 minutes. The flight from New York to Cairo, however is torturous. While I appreciate that it’s much easier to handle a flight transfer in New York than say, Frankfurt (In German Cairo is spelled with a ‘K’), the roughly 13 hours of travel are much easier to take when broken up in segments of 8 and 5 hours. 11 hours cruising across the least interesting part of the Western Hemisphere had me ready to gouge my eyes out toward the end (it was either that or the fact that the movies started repeating in the last 3 hours). Fortunately, a nice Egyptian student by the name of Ahmed kept the conversation interesting.

Needless to say, arrival was a relief, but was immediately followed by customs (which is easy, but tedious). I passed the time by giving the two girls ahead of me in line a little advice on not getting ripped off in Egypt. Then I realized they were on some backpacking tour and would be more or less insulated from the actual travel experience. Anyway, baggage claim was made simple by the fact that waiting in line at customs gave them plenty of time to unload my stuff, and then I was free to go. Of course, my special lady was there to pick me up.

The rest of the day was a blur of video games, McDonald’s delivery, and getting reacquainted after 9 months of physical separation. Needless to say, after dinner at Sequoya and a few levels of “Lego Indiana Jones,” I was ready for bed.

So here I am again. Maggie and I are talking about hitting Coptic Cairo today, but we may just say in. There’s no telling.  More in a bit.