Sarah here. Just blogging to shock my hubby.
We’re staying in a nice hotel which is on the fifth floor of an old nondescript building downtown. You would never suspect that a nice hotel existed upstairs when you arrived. You enter the dark and dirty building lobby and go up via a truly ancient elevator, which is basically just an iron cage on a cord, but when you get upstairs, it’s lovely.
We spent the day today wandering aimlessly around Cairo, which is pretty enormous. Our cab driver last night told us that there are 25 million inhabitants. I thought it was 20, but you get the idea. It was raining this morning and we weren’t aware before we left our room because our windows face out onto a narrow courtyard such that you don’t really look out the window carefully. It wasn’t raining that hard, though, so we didn’t alter our clothing choices once we realized it. But Cairo seems to be permanently coated in a fine layer of black silt, such that the rain turned the whole place into a mud pit. Eloïse splattered a huge amount of mud onto the backs of her bare legs and the skirt of her dress. I’m hoping that I’ll be able to get it out. Even Ian was embarrassed while walking around. He said that people were laughing at her. That’s the kind of thing that I would usually think and he would tell me that I’m ridiculous. As the person wearing a baby in a wrap all day, I’m pretty convinced that they were actually laughing about Lukie. Clearly a baby in a sling is an unusual sight.
Having spent the entire day walking in a very crowded city, I can still say that we didn’t see a single stroller of any sort all day. As with the people of Oman, Egyptians seems to prefer carrying their children. Last night when we were out seeking our dinner (late, it must have been 10:15 or something), I saw lots of women carrying their very small babies just as we had in Oman: wrapped up in a lot of furry blankets like little burritos with virtually no baby sticking out. It was interesting last night that children of all ages were out. That was also reminiscent of our UAE/Oman trip.
We had a tasty lunch at some random place on the street that had smelled nice as we walked by earlier in the day. They also gave us crackers made of fried pita bread as we walked by and they were yummy. So we headed back and enjoyed a large lunch. This seems to be one of those countries where they just dump stuff on your table and you’re not sure whether it’s what you ordered or whether it’s some freebie that comes with every meal or if it’s something that they’re giving you and will charge you for if you don’t refuse it. We refused nothing and ended up with way too much food. But still, when we were all finished and asked how much we owed, the guy said “50?” in a way that made it clear that he was just making up a number that seemed suitably high for the tourists. We didn’t complain since that is under 7 Euros for the whole large meal and drinks.
We had another similar experience earlier when we stopped for juice. Ian asked how much for a fresh orange juice and the guy said 3 (it’s 7.50 to the Euro). That seemed fair enough, although we realized that it was probably high, and we ordered two. Then two 11-year old boys came in and were practising their English on us. They had a nice fruit cocktail-looking thing and Ian asked how much it costed. The boy said 1 and in the midst of our confusion about what he was saying (first he tried to describe what was in it) the proprietor suddenly shooed him out and it was clear that he realized that the one finger being held up in the air was going to clue us in to the extent that we had been overcharged. Oh well, we got 50 cents of enjoyment out of our juice so we don’t mind.
Time to get these kiddies out the door for some dinner so we don’t have a repeat of last night’s late night. I’m sure Ian will blog more later.
Hi there! To tell the truth, I haven’t been in Egypt for ages, but when little (back in early 90’s) I was staying in Cairo with my parents for long – well, long enough to learn this and that about the habits of its inhabitants and so forth – and remember the first cultural teaching, I received from my mom, was that Arabs won’t respect you if you don’t haggle with them, but you shan’t do that if you aren’t genuinely interested in the product offered and never do that for fun or just for a tryout.
See, the prices they ask you to pay them for goods will be most of the time far too exaggerated compared to the regular fair value of the product or service in question, so if you care for acquiring the particular thing (be it meal, cab fare, or anything you’re not given a real receipt for), know that it has its negotiable price that you can always discuss with them, provided that you have a fixed price in your mind and that you know the equivalent rates the other sellers would charge.
I’ve also heard that they make fun (between themselves and in Arabic of course) of tourists who never haggle, but instead just humbly pay the price they offer – no matter how high and unreasonable it is – and they simply consider them naïve.
The inquiry you’ve heard after asking about the cost of your meal today was not exactly what you thought was just making up the price on the spot (well, in a way it might be), but it seemed clear enough to me that they were expecting your bid in return, so that you could negotiate the fair price. Not sure, though, how those rules changed over the past twenty years, but the great chances are that not much – seeing (from what you post here) that the city still looks the way it was when I was 8. Sigh… 🙂 Don’t know – perhaps it might be worth a try to google the haggling thing in the web and see how things look these days.
Ah, and would forget: don’t miss the opportunity to try the über-delicious freshly pressed mango juice and suger cain juice served cold with ice cubes! They were my all-time favorites when I was little. 🙂 Look for them at the street stalls or other random places found on the street.