Cairo

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Days 56-66, Wed 21st - Sat 31st Mar:

I spent these days in Cairo where the air is filled with choking smog and the ground seems to be one big rubbish-bin. My initial mission was to find out about ferries running from ports in Egypt to other North African countries, or ideally Europe. I visited numerous travel agencies in the hope of getting an answer I wanted, but what I was repeatedly told was that the only other country which passenger ships from egyptian ports sailed to was Saudi Arabia. I also met a man in the street called Adam who reckoned it was possible to get from Egypt to Europe on a container ship running from Port Said to Greece. I had heard that this option was a thing of the past due to increased security on all forms of transport in response to terrorism, but Adam offered to phone the shipping company for me to find out. The result of his call was more or less as I had expected: It was possible to be a passenger on such a container ship, but the catch was that you had to be egyptian. It struck me as interesting that in Egypt egyptians are subject to more security checks than tourists, but when taking ships in and out of the country they have their freedom restricted less.
It was now clear that the only way to get back to England without either (1) flying, or (2) returning the way I had come, was to travel through Libya and into Tunisia where there is a ferry service to various european ports.

Knowing that it might not be easy to get a visa for Libya, I applied for it at the consulate dressed in a suit. Adam had pointed out that a smart appearance can make a big difference when dealing with authority in the Arab world, and this corresponded with advice given to me earlier in the year by an english traveler who had had a lot of Middle-East travel experience. The staff at the consulate dealt with me pleasantly, but nevertheless told me that it would be an absolute minimum of two weeks before the consulate in Libya itself would make a decision on whether I could enter the country. While waiting at the consulate I met Francoise, a Frenchman, who had been waiting for nearly three weeks for his visa. He had traveled to Egypt by a route similar to mine, but with the difference that he had walked!

I got to know Adam quite well and spent several evenings in cafe's with him during my time in Cairo. He was sixty-two and, in common with most recent conversations with Egyptians, I got into theological discussion with him. My philosophical thinkings seemed to have a lot in common with islamic ideas, and this gave rise to many interesting discussions. One evening with Adam became particularly surreal and is worth describing:

Adam borrowed a Volkswagen Beetle, and using the common technique of switching on the headlights only occasionally, we went to visit his friend Micky. Micky lived on the third floor of a block of run down flats, and greeted us dressed in pyjamas which he continued to wear for the rest of the evening. He was fifty five and looked it, despite his dyed-black hair. He spoke reasonable English and was a man of various talents including repairing televisions, which was how he earned his living, and psychoanalysis. Having made us cups of tea, Micky sat on a sofa opposite Adam and I and immediately began asking me questions. First he asked me to spell my first name, and then that of my mother, and a little later my father's. He wrote down this information and after some pondering proceded to tell me many things about my character, and that of my parents. He had apparantly studied the significance of letters and names, and the inherent meanings which are attached to them and the people who have them. His results were mixed though as he was right about some things and definitely wrong about others. He was no better than your average Gypsie Rose Lee. It was however an unexpected and strange beginning to the evening.

We then spoke for some time about the concepts of Islam and Micky quizzed me a bit about my interest in it. Just after mentioning that there were ninety-nine names of Allah which were apparantly very significant, he announced that he would do something which would truly amaze me. I was slightly apprehensive as I didn't know what to expect from this curious man. He got up from his sofa and fetched a large electric fan from the kitchen which he then stood on the arm of another chair, directed into the room and switched on. It was quite noisy. He then sat down and spent a few minutes writing words on a piece of paper on his lap, which I guessed were the names of Allah, as that was the topic which had preceded this act. He finally put down the pen, glanced at me and then began quietly murmuring in the direction of the fan. After about a minute of this he slowly and carefully stood up and walked over to the fan to switch it off. It seemed that the spell-casting ritual was over.
Micky said to me: Did you feel something?! I said that I felt a bit strange, but it was probably due to being mystified by the strange act. He modified his question: Did you feel something on your shoulders here? He tapped my shoulders with both hands. 'Not really' I said. 'Did you feel a weight disappear from your heart?' he continued. I apologetically told him that I hadn't felt any of these things. 'You have really got me thinking though' I said, which was true. During his strange ritual I had begun thinking in a new way about the theological ideas we had been discussing and how they related to my own philosophical thoughts on Free Will. I seemed to have formed a much clearer vision of the way human minds interact and a sensible theoretical conception of what religion meant to me. Whether this advancement in my thinking was a direct result of Micky's antics, or an unintentional side effect, I may never know.
However, having explained to Micky that I felt I had developed a clearer understanding of what religion was, his analysis was that his spell had been successful. 'You will become a moslem', he announced, 'In three Saturdays'. 'Time will tell' I said, not entirely convinced, but nevertheless open to the possibility. After all, a wierd experience like that made anything seem possible. I was both bemused and inspired by the whole evening.

During several evenings spent strolling around Cairo's streets with Adam seeking out the city's best places to drink tea and salep we talked about many aspects of Islam, either because they didn't make sense to me or because they did. I also explained further my theories about the nature of human consciousness and how it seemed to parallel some theological concepts.

One evening Adam explained to me that he was planning to set up a project to help the homeless work their way out of poverty. Due to a far from benevolent government, which I found surprising in a moslem country as assisting the needy is a core concept of Islam, there is a great proportion of the population living in absolute poverty. They sleep on the streets in ragged, dirty clothes, and beg day and night in order to eat. Adam felt that he had a duty as a capable moslem to help these people. I had mentioned on a previous occassion that I believed in the ideal of helping people to help themselves rather than making them dependant on donations, and this was compatible with Adams plan. He proposed to rent a premises where a number of these desperately poor people would cook meals which they would then deliver to households in the area. Adam said that there were many people who finished work in the afternoon who would welcome such a food delivery service. The market existed and so did the labour; if this plan could be realised, dozens of homeless people would be usefully employed and earning a regular income. It seemed surprising that it wasn't already being done, but Adam assured me it wasn't. It was a plan which made a lot of sense to me, and I pledged to do what I could to help make it happen.

Apart from all this, I did do some sightseeing in Cairo. Ever since taking an interest in the Great Pyramids of Giza some thirteen years ago I had wanted to see them, and now at last I achieved that dream. The main three are very close together and inspire awe by their sheer size. It would be a difficult task to lift just one of the stone blocks, but there are literally millions extending upwards into the sky. It is truly mind boggling. I entered the internal passageway of Chephren's Pyramid, which is the one with some of the original facing stones still remaining near the top. The passageway began at ground level in the middle of one of the pyramid's sides and descended at perhaps thirty degrees. I had to walk in a semi-crouch posture due to the low height of the passage, but after about half a minute the floor became level and the ceiling rose to a comfortable height. Another half minute's walk along this level section, passing an inaccessable descending passage halfway, brought me to the foot of an ascending passage at the top of which the way became level again and soon terminated at the corner of the great room at the pyramid's centre. The room was about ten metres by five metres, and five metres high with a ceiling which sloped upwards from each long wall to a high point running along the centre of the room. The room was exactly the same shape as a simple house, and about the size of one too. Apart from some bold graffiti by the nineteenth century egyptologist Belzoni, the walls were plain, and at one end of the room lay an empty stone sarcophagus. As bare and simple that it was, I felt that I was in a very special place: I was in the very heart of one of the most incredible monuments ever created by mankind. I was in awe.

On another day I traveled by bus and then taxi to Saqqara, about 25km south of Giza, where the first monumental pyramid of Ancient Egypt was built, and still stands today. It is formed of several giant steps which form an approximate pyramid shape and is the oldest pyramid in egypt, and in fact, the world. Near the step-pyramid were some smaller pyramids which had greatly disintegrated, showing that the preservation of the other pyramids was indeed due to skillful building, and not just a kind environment. In fact, the standard of building in Egypt today is low enough that cracks can start appearing in buildings after only one or two years, so by this measure the surviving ancient monuments are literally thousands of times better.
On my return from this trip I enjoyed the pleasure of the nightly 'sound and light show' at Giza during which there is an english commentary about the general history of the Great Pyramids with accompanying laser images projected onto the pyramids and the sphinx to illustrate the described facts and events.

The famous Egyptian Museum absorbed most of a day, despite an American telling me beforehand that 'no-one's ever spent more than two hours in there'. I saw dozens of stone sarcophogi and many statues from Ancient Egypt, some being 4,500 years old. On the museum's upper floor I saw hundreds of beautifully decorated and gilded wooden coffins, and perhaps most interestingly, the contents of Tutankhamun's tomb. This included ornate chairs, beds, games, model ships, statuettes, jewellery and, surprisingly, boomerangs! Also I saw the world famous mask of Tutankhamun, which looked like it was made yesterday with its perfectly preserved blue and gold striped headdress and glistening jewels in the breast-plate surrounding the young king's serene looking face of pure gold.
My main complaint about the museum was that interesting looking pieces often had no information attached to them, but otherwise I was nothing but impressed by the number of artifacts, their great age, and their good condition.

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