Egypt, The Bazaar in Cairo

Now it was midday and extremely hot. There was a nice shade in the narrow streets inside the Bazaar area but still hot. Most of the shops were open but no tourists other than us. We looked at different stuff, Shehab was keen on

On the way we stopped at every other fastfood joint or restaurant to get a drink and enjoy the aircondition. I myself does not easily react to cold or heat but this was too extreme. We got a cab and went for the radiotower in the middle of the city. It is located on a small island in the Nile with a good view of Cairo. In the distance you can faintly see the outline of the pyramids at Giza and on the other side of town the immense quarry

There is a restaurant on top but no artificial cooling so we went out on top and there was a nice breeze coming in from the desert. The capital of Egypt is dominated by the colour brown that time of year. No water is wasted in keeping the footballfields green and that is okay, I can't imagine that anything other than palms can survive such a summer.

We took a cab back to a subway station and found the train going for El Maadi and walked from there back to the flat. On the way we bought some bread and turkey sausage to have on the flight home the next morning. Then it was showertime, nice to get some clean clothes and a nap in the breeze of the aircondition.

At 6PM we were picked up by the rest of Shehabs family in Cairo and went to downtown El Maadi to have a traditional diner. Most of the evening the family made fun of Shehab and his spoken Arabic, he hadn't been using it for several years. Most of the conversation was in english so I could be part of the conversation and Shehab didn't have to translate.

Afterwards Shehab and I went down to

Fellucca

this club of which he had signed up to be a member. In Cairo there isn't much of a nightlife except for the clubs. This one has a good location, just opposite the Pyramids. In the late afternoon the sun sets between the two major pyramids, must be a wonderful sight but now it was 10PM and black night. We settled for some delecious and cold mango-juice drinks and enjoyed watching the life on the river. One Fellucca was going by sail but the current was just powerful enough to keep the boat going nowhere. I guess the he made a few hundred feet upstream while we had our drink.

Tuesday, July 5'th

The next morning our limousine was waiting and we drove off to the airport at a modest time. On the way I spotted the tribune where

while waiting we managed to write some last minute postcards, all in all I must

The plane was going past Stockholm, slightly delayed and we tried to make a phonecall from there, the machine wouldn't accept our credit cards but my sister was waiting for us.