I Love Bubbles
Welcome to my random musings about the world, on a weekly-to-occasional basis.
Where we are: We’re in Provence right now; I wrote this several months ago, while we were in New Giza City.
I Love Bubbles
Egypt is a lot. It’s a lot of everything—noise, clamor, traffic, unpredictability. I can’t be bothered to research actual statistics, but in my anecdotal experience, most tourists who visit Egypt do so on some kind of pre-arranged organized tour. And I totally understand why—Egypt is a lot. We’re usually pretty independent travelers, but in Egypt, I can see the advantage of being inside a group-tour bubble.
It began when we arrived at the Cairo airport, at about 8 pm. We had a domestic flight very, very obscenely unreasonably early the next morning, so we had booked a room at the airport hotel. We’ve stayed there before, and knew that there’s a pedestrian overpass that would get us there, but first we had to find it. We exited the international terminal, and walked straight into a wall of men vying for our attention.
Sir, taxi, taxi.
Sir, downtown hotel?
Taxi to hotel?
Madam, which hotel?
Where are you going?
I can help you.
This way, madam.
And Lee’s favorite: Sir, I am your Uber.
Actually my friend, you are definitely not our Uber, because we definitely didn’t order an Uber.
That was Monday. Now it’s Thursday, and this introvert is so tired I got in bed at 7pm. All day we’ve been handing out bakseesh (tips) and saying no. Over and over—no thank you, no thank you. It wears one down.
Today we went to see a group of tombs in Aswan, built by wealthy townspeople about four thousand years ago. Some of them are quite basic, but others are stunning—complete with still-vibrant paint on the walls and ceilings. Sadly, I found it difficult to really appreciate them, because I was on high-alert for touts the whole time. It didn’t help that even the (heavily armed) security guards were angling for tips. There were piles of poo, and men hawking camel rides, and the toilets were vile and there was a lot of garbage blowing around in the corners. Also, at one point I felt something on my shin, and looked down to see a tick crawling up my leg. I like ticks even less than I like opportunistic security guards.
But tomorrow we’re getting on a ship for a 3-night Nile Cruise, and I can’t wait. While I am somewhat ambivalent about the early morning wake-ups, I am thrilled at the prospect of being in the Tourism Bubble. I intend to hide in the middle of the group, so no one can ask me for a tip, or where I’m going, or what I’m looking for. Transportation will be arranged for us; meals will magically appear at the designated time. I won’t have to haggle with taxi drivers or fend off wanna-be guides who really just wanna-tip. I won’t have to plaster on a fake smile and try to be polite. I’ll be just one of the multitude, sheltered from the clamor.
That’s the trade-off of an organized tour: on one hand, the Tombs of the Nobles are fairly obscure, so tours don’t really go there. On the other hand, wherever your tour does go, you’re insulated from the most tiresome parts of a place like Egypt—the touts, the souvenir hawkers, the people trying to get your attention. We’ll be going to see the Unfinished Obelisk, which sounds excruciatingly dull to me, but that’s okay! We’ll be in the bubble!
UPDATE, FOUR DAYS LATER: We’ve now finished our Nile Cruise, and my hope of group anonymity was—laughable. The capacity of our ship was 140 passengers. How many were we? Seventeen. Seventeen! Lee and I had our own guide. There was no hiding in the bubble. There was no insulation. Instead there was three days of trying to look like I was paying attention, and still having to tip everyone in sight.
Maybe tonight I’ll go to bed at 7pm again.
UPDATE, FOUR MONTHS LATER: To be clear, I adore Egypt. As a matter of fact, Lee didn’t want me to use this essay when I first wrote it, because he thought it sounded more negative than I really feel. He’s right—I will never be ‘done’ with Egypt; I will always want to go back. I love the people, the food, the antiquities, the Nile, the chaos. And now that I’m rested and relaxed and just hanging out in the calm peacefulness of shoulder-season Provence, I can totally imagine planning another trip. But … maybe not right away.
Take care,
Lisa
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