Bargain hunting

One of the most obvious factors in Middle Eastern life is bargaining. Taxi fares, souvenir prices, food prices, and even exchange rates can be haggled over. Western visitors often have a hard time adjusting to this system. They can’t believe that any shopkeeper would lie about the price of an item. If they ask 50 guineas, that must be a fair price and paying less would be unfair to the shopkeeper.

In the movie Gallipoli, Aussie soldiers in Egypt buy souvenirs at different shops and then compare their goods. When one of them realizes he paid five times as much as his friends, they all go back to the shop and beat up the shopkeeper till he gives them their money back.
Although all the vendors in the Middle East are obtrusive and inflate their prices, each country is unique. In Egypt, they try to flirt with people to get their attention, then swear to the authenticity of their goods. On average, it is possible to bring their prices down by about 50%.

In Turkey, the main way to get tourists attention is to make them feel guilty. It goes like this. “Excuse me, I have what you want. Hey sir! I’m talking to you. Here in Turkey it’s rude not to look at someone who is talking to you. Excuse me, please don’t turn your back on me! All right, good bye…” They inflate their prices about as much as Egyptians but are very much harder to argue down.

Syrians, like Turks, often act extremely offended by the insult offered to their goods when you try to bring the price down. They also like to use the calculator trick. They pull out their calculator and do elaborate calculations to make it look like they are just barely getting enough to make a profit. (They hate it if you take the calculator and do your own calculations…)
Finally, there are the Israelis. They are so used to gullible tourists paying what they ask that their prices are 4-5x the real value of the objects. As soon as you balk at the price, it drops like a lead balloon. 100 shekels for a box becomes 75 (the “special price for a friend”) then 60 (“but don’t tell anyone I sold it this cheap).

Once you get used to it, shopping can be fun – just like fighting to get onto a subway or risking your life by crossing a street or …

Morning in the Old City

One of the ways that security is manifested in the Old City is how early everything closes. Shortly after sunset, even the Muslim shopkeepers have closed their steel gates in front of their shops. The streets are bare and occupied mainly by soldiers and boys playing soccer. Our hostel closes its gates at 11:00. That's not too eraly to go to bed though, because the city wakes up very early.

At 4:00 or so, the mosques give the first call to prayer. Ther loudspeakers of the hearest one are right over our windows and we are in a fine position ot listen to the performance. It doesn't help much that the standard call to prayer is altered for the morning calls to include the statement that "prayer is better than sleep, so wake up and pray".

For those who fall asleep again (or managed to ignore the first wake up call) there are soon children running up and down the street under our window and yelling. They show up at about the same time as the light. Although our room is never dark because we have no curtians to shut out the street lights, when the sun rises it is very hard to ignore the increase in brightness.

Finally, to top it all off, the toursits kick in. As early as 6:45, some groups of pilgrims will show up outside our gate and start singing hymns. They actually sound pretty good. It's fun to watch all the different groups go by. Some have matching blue or yelow hats, others actually have matching outfits (the ones from Africa), and some are all clergy in matching habits.

Oh, and if you are still asleep, there are the ice-cold showers...

pilgrims singing in street

Tension in Jerusalem

The other day, we walked around the Old City to orient ourselves to our surroundings. In the small space contained within the city walls, an amazing variety of very different, often sharply opposed groups was represented.


Quite visible were the tourists (both the church groups with their bright, matching sun hats and the hippieish individuals who just like to hang around Israel). Then, there are the Jews. There are settler Jews who live in the fenced settlements in the West Bank. They are easily identified by their white knitted keppis and by the handguns stuffed in their belts or the machine guns slung over their shoulders. Any citizen is free to carry weapons openly or concealed (and many do) in the state of Israel.


Then, there are the Orthodox Jews. Although there are many differnt sects, these can genreally be recognised by their long curls, prayer shawls, overcoats, or widebrimmed hats. The third group of Jews isn't as visible because they are the secular Jews and don't do much to identify themselvs outwardly. Because we live in the Muslim Quarter, there are lots of Muslim women wearing higabs in the streets. These people can also be distinguished from the Jews because of their more Arab features. Many of the shops around our hospice have Hammas posters or Palestinian signs in the windows.


Visible everywhere are soldiers strolling through the streets in groups of two or three. They are not just for show and will occasionaly stop and question people on the street. One of our guys was stopped and asked for some form of identification less than 2 hours after we arrived. Security is highly visible (if not effective) with guards standing outside most major establishments.

Border crossings

In the last three days, we have crossed two different borders. First, from Syria into Jordan, then from Jordan into Israel. Surprisingly, the Israeli border was not much stricer than the Jordanian. At each, we had to run our luggage through scanners and then wait for our visas to be issued. The biggest hangup was because one of our number had lost her passport in Turkey. Thus, every border-guard that looked at her temporary passport was suspicious of it being a forgery.

In Israel, we were rushed through the process and our director didn't even have to get his luggage scanned. Apparently, Israel is trying to improve its image by being extra nice at the borders. Still, some of us got interesting scrutiny. As I was walking into the building, a plainclothes guard carrying an M16 starting trying to call me aside. Since I didn't realize he was talking to me, I kept walking. Finally, he got my attention and wanted to know where I lived and if I was really part of the group. The same guard also pulled another guy in our group aside and demanded to know "Where do you pray". Apparently, his answer of "In my church" was satisfactory.

Once inside, as we went through the metal detectors, my passport was kept for 10 minutes while they checked something or other. Altogther, our group took barely 30 minutes to get through the entire border.

Now, we are staying in the Armenian Hospice alogn the Via Dolorosa in the Muslim quarter of the Old City. We can see the Dome on the Rock from our roof and the Wailing Wall is less than five minutes walk from our door. In the next two weeks we will be meeting with Israeli settlers, Palestinian leaders, and government representatives to discuss various aspects of the conflict here.

Monasteries and Birthdays

Some people seem to think I needed it, but unfortunately, I did not spend by 21^st birthday in a monastery. I did spend the day before at the retreat center/monastery of Anaphora.

Anaphora is located in the desert about halfway along the Desert road from Cairo to Alex. Although everything else around it is a sandy yellow, the monastery is full of green growing things and sparkling pools. They have dug a lot of wells and are growing all kinds of fruits, vegetables, and cereals organically. Winding throughout the land is the irrigation system. In the living area, the water system is shaped into a series of pools and fountains which can be either for decoration or swimming.

People are welcome from all over the world to come and relax for a few days. Some people, from the Mennonite Central Committee for example, stay for several months working to support the monastery's farm work or helping Bishop Thomas with his writing. This time, we just stayed for one day, but at the end of our semester, we will go back for several days.

We were joined there by Coptic youth from the Mar Girgis church. We spent the day enjoying the monastery surroundings and discussing how evangelical and orthodox Christianity compare. We talked a lot about the persecution of Christians (less pronounced in cities, more significant in the towns) and some about theological points of difference. What we did, and what Bishop Thomas teaches are very unique for Orthodox Christians. Bishop Thomas is very ecumenical and did not seem to follow many of the more controversial, questionable teachings of the Coptic Church. (non-copts are saved, less emphasis on works).

The only drawback to our day was that we had to get up really early (7:30) and didn't get back to Cairo till midnight. On the plus side, we ate more traditional Egyptian food than we've had most of our time here (date jam, halava, bitter orange preserves, belilah, pickled lemons).

For my Birthday, I slept till 11 and then wrote 4 pages of a Koran research paper in record time. Then, I ate lunch and absolutely pounded one of my flat-mates in backgammon. Later, I went to my cousins flat and promptly got locked out. Because the key was still in the lock on the inside, it took almost an hour to get the door open again. We finished off the day (around midnight) with cake and pizza (or maybe it was pizza and cake).

Aswan High Dam

When we visited Aswan a few weeks ago, we stopped to see Lake Nasser and the two Aswan dams. The first dam was built in the early 20^th century and currently supplies 90% of Egypt's energy need! It's funny to think that the country with the worst pollution in the world is getting 100% of its electricity from a hydroelectric dam.

The second dam (or the High Dam) was built in 1970 with Soviet assistance and cost $1 billion. The material used to create this dam occupies 18 times the volume of the Great Pyramid! The length of the dam is almost 4 km and its base is close to 1000 m wide. With 12 generators inside the dam, it can generate 2.1 gigawatts/hour when operating at peak capacity. Currently, only a tiny fraction of this power is used, but the government is trying to start exporting the electricity to Europe or Turkey.

It is almost impossible to fully appreciate the size of the High Dam just by driving across the top of it. While we were standing on the top enjoying the view, the guards kept hovering around insisting "Don't zoom!" "Not allowed to zoom!" They were no doubt afraid that we were stealing the plans for the parts of the generators and power plant apparatus that were visible from where we were. It turns out that the dam is a very high risk target for terrorism. The dam as a whole could withstand a nuclear blast without breaking. A well placed bomb inside the dam, however, would release the 5.97 trillion cubic feet of water stored in Lake Nasser. The result would be an enormous tidal wave that would sweep down the valley to Cairo in less than 7 hours. Imagine trying to evacuate 17 million people from a capital city in less than 7 hours and you can understand their concern.
As a result of the construction of these two dams, 13 ancient Greek and Egyptian temples were drowned in the resulting lake. They have all been relocated with the assistance of a number of other countries. Unfortunately, many of them have significant water damage from being submerged for a long time. While the increased control of the Nile has greatly extended the growing season and made it possible to irrigate a much larger part of the country, overall fertility of the Nile valley has decreased. The annual Nile floods used to bring in a lot of nutrient rich silt which is now lost. The reduced flow out of the Nile delta is also allowing salt from the Mediterranean to seep back into the Delta reducing fertility further there.

You can go here to see more pictures from Egypt. I've also added a slideshow at the top of this page that will scroll through different pictures frrom over here.

We just got back from a trip to Mount Sinai and Dahab (a resort) so there will be some new posts soon.

Cairo - The City

The city of Cairo has a population of more than 17 million. Over 20% of the country lives in this area of the Nile delta. This leads to a very interesting traffic situation. There are lots of traffic lights and one way street signs scattered around the city. They are all purely decorative.
The real traffic control is done the old fashioned way by having underpaid policemen stand at the intersection. These guys are actually really useful when there is a traffic jam because they have the authority to make the cars take turns and play nice. The streets are shared by cars, taxis, trucks, delivery boys on motorcycles, and donkey carts.

No vehicle is intended to carry only one person - that would be a waste of resources. Motorcycles and even mopeds will often carry as many as 3 adult men, or as in this picture, a whole family.

The Nile which divides the city into Giza and Cairo runs in the middle of everything. Along its banks are large fancy western hotels and green parks. Throughout the city you can find a mixture of magnificent old mosques, shiny western high-rise, and dingy unfinished apartment buildings.

ATM's can be found in random walls of varied buildings. (But, they are usually empty.)

During the day, everything is dusty and polluted. Cairo holds the dubious distinction of being the most polluted city in the world. At night, however, everything looks better. The dust is hidden in a uniform blackness, and the profusion of lights makes the city look as well off as anywhere else.

Valentine’s Day Cruise

Since it took a while to get this blog started, there are pictures and stories from the past that will be appearing along with the events of the present. For now, here is a story of a recent present.

Almost every weekend, we get a chance to travel to different tourist attractions of Egypt. On the one hand, we get a nice break from studying while we play at being tourists. But, at the same time, it is just another distraction from all our studying and paper writing. Last weekend, our tourist activity was a Nile cruise. Now, fiction books are full of tales that should scare anyone away from wanting to cruise the Nile. (Think Death on the Nile, Anthony and Cleopatra, etc.) Well, if those stories aren't enough, here is ours.

We left Agouza late in the evening to take the night train down to Aswan to meet our cruise boat. On the train, everyone got plenty of studying and sleeping done, that way we didn't feel bad about not doing any work for the next three days of vacation. After eating lunch (the first of 9 meals on that boat) we went to the temple of Philae. So far so good. The next post will have picture of the temples. This post is intended to give you cruise willies…

Every meal was served as a buffet line that began with an assortment of 6-7 salads. Our interns warned against touching them, but a few hearty souls ate them anyway. The first casualties appeared late the second day of the cruise. 2 or 3 people started to complain of general malaise. By breakfast on Friday, several more were sick. While those of us who were feeling okay visited Karnak temple, everyone else lay on the boat and drank Sprite. After lunch a few more people opted to skip Hatchepsut's tomb and the Valley of the Kings in the afternoon because they were feeling queasy. I was feeling just fine up till 15 minutes before I threw up on the bus floor. While everyone else visited Tut's tomb, I relaxed on the cool marble floor in the museum and wandered through the tourist shops outside.

By dinner time, several more people were feeling iffy. In the morning, we all got up early and got off the boat as fast as possible. We were in the process of getting off the boat when Suzanne fainted on the sidewalk from dehydration and fever. In the midst of that commotion, some of the boat's crew snuck into one of our rooms and stole a bag of candy that our guide had given as a good bye gift. We finally got onto our train and everyone dosed up on Immodium and settled in for a 9 hour train ride. Instead of racing north at 100 km/h, our train proceeded to crawl along at 50 km/h and stop at every train station no matter how small. In the end, out trip took almost 12 hours. Fortunately, the medicine worked and no one was sick on the train. Just as our bus was delivering us and all our luggage back to Agouza, Jay spewed in the bus. A number of other exhausted students barely reeled back to their flats before collapsing.

All told, 24 out of the 28 members of our group were quite sick for at least a little while in the course of the cruise. Even our Egyptian guide who had been doing cruise tours for years got sick. It didn't matter that some people had been careful what they ate, even they got sick. Fortunately, everyone was sick on the boat where there were decent bathroom facilities instead of on the train where the bathroom was just a smelly hole that opened onto the track. Plus, we had Claire who found out from Diaa what medicine everyone needed, found a pharmacy, dosed everyone at the right times, and got us all Sprite and crackers to eat.

Did I mention that we were on this cruise on Valentine's day?

The program

Welcome to my blog. As you may already know or have figured out, I'm currently studying in Egypt. The Middle East Studies Program (MESP) is an opportunity to learn Arabic and study Middle East politics and religion. There are 28 students in the program.

Most of us only met for the first time at the airport. Spending 7 hours of layovers and 13 hours of plane time together is a great way to get to know a lot about someone else!

We live and study in Agouza, a decent neighborhood in Cairo (well, actually Giza). Our apartments (red dot) are quite close to the villa where we have our classes (blue dot). Even better, we are only five minutes away from the Nile. As they say here, 'Ishta' (cool).

Our flats are quite roomy with 3 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, a living room and a kitchen.

Our door has a paper on it with the Arabic words to say to inform someone on the phone that there is a fire/emergency and that we only speak English. Sure to come in useful soon…
Our program is directed by Dr David Holt. He met his wife a few semesters ago when she visited the program. They got married in December. Since for tax purposes he can't spend more than 30 days in the US each year, he flew back on the 16^th, married on the 17^th, and flew back to Egypt with her on the 19^th. He keeps fidgeting with his ring during class and the interns say that he is acting much nicer than he used to.

He is assisted by Dr. Diaa Nashed. Diaa is trained as a physician, but he got bored with that and now manages our programs finances, healthcare, travel plans, and any other arrangements that need to be made.

Oh, and he has a cute 1 year old named Grace.

Finally, we have two interns, Barret and Claire. They are both former students. We're still not sure, but it's beginning to look like they might know everything about Egypt. Anyway, they definitely know where to eat and how to get around.