Like this:

It’s nighttime, and we’re driving through the streets of Cairo. I see the obscure, glittering water of the Nile–and a street so jammed with traffic it makes Doha’s streets at rush hour  look like abandoned country roads. We’re listening to Britney Spears, Hilary Duff, Miley Cyrus and Glee music. It’s as if I’ve been dropped into a 12-year-old American girl’s sleepover party—only I’m in a small speeding car with three Egyptian college students. All males.

I knew one from Northwestern, a guy who hasn’t been back to Egypt for five years. When his friends picked us up from the airport, I told them the name of my hotel. They stared at me blankly–an excellent sign. It turned out almost no one knew the exact location of the President Hotel. Policemen, taxi drivers, random residents all shrugged their shoulders. We drove from 6pm until  9pm before we finally found it. Looking back, I spent much of my time in Cairo in a car. Most of the time, we didn’t listen to bad American pop; rather, I tuned in to the constant blaring of horns,  or Nile FM.

I only spent two days in Cairo, but learned more Arabic than I’ve picked up after two months in Doha. I rode a camel around the pyramids, took a felucca along the nile, got a marriage proposal, and several phone numbers of places to stay next time I come. Inshallah.

I ate Egyptian Koshari (noodles, lentils, rice, garbanzo beans and red sauce mixed together), pizza (my ironic first meal) and a delicious soda called Fayrouz.  Inhaled the perfume of street falafels, shisha and exhaust fumes.

This morning, on my way to the airport, I thought my cab driver, Abdul, was going to kill me. At 6am, it takes a lot to jar me from a sleepy stupor. This ride just about did it.

Abdul’s car looked hours away from collapsing, and he drove as though he couldn’t see any other cars on the road. He was, however, quite joyous that he had “King Elizabeth” in his car. We talked about “good Obama,” “bad Bush,” and the tenuous state of Israeli-Egyptian affairs. In very broken English, of course. Oh, and he emphatically told me, “Elizabeth, Habebty!”  several times. Loosely translated: Elizabeth, my love.

I’ll write more tomorrow, as I’m pretty tired tonight.

Ma’salaama!

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