1 Boring Old Man

There’s something there called American Coffee. The way it’s made is to put some instant Nescafe in a cup or pot, then to steam it with an Expresso Machine and serve it with hot milk and a generous supply of sugar [which they add – package after package]. I do understand why they add a lot of sugar. It makes it almost drinkable. But to my way of thinking, coffee that has to be turned into syrup and which has a slightly gray coloring doesn’t suit. For any Middle Easterners reading this, here’s how it’s done. American coffee is brewed in something called Mr. Coffee [in our case using chicory coffee from Louisiana]. It is served with whole milk, lightly sweetened, and is a rich brown color. Grayness is a sign that it’s time to brew a new pot. Most [uninitiated] Americans don’t use the chicory [we do have a diverse culture.]. The cup sitting before me is delicious. It has that feeling you have when you visit your home town after a long absence and are flooded with memories you didn’t even know were there to be felt – a continuous history of morning reflections spread from the dawn of personal time. It took me days to settle for a morning caffeine boost from gray syrup. It was like using a Macintosh computer – it got the job done, but …

Unlike the free-wheeling days of our youth when we just went places, when we leave the States we go with tour groups. It’s safe, convenient, and cheap. I admit to liking having the details handled by someone else. It’s not so adventurous, but in places like China, Peru, Africa, or the Middle East, there’s adventure enough without the danger that would accompany any alternative. So early in any such trip, there’s the added piece of getting to know a tour guide and the fellow travelers, most of whom are retired people [from a particular subsegment of elder America that lives in something called retirement communities]. They introduce themselves with two places of origin – one where they lived as adults, and the other where they live now. "We live outside Phoenix, but we’re from Long Island." And a lot of them have traveled a lot, so the conversation drifts quickly to former trips.

On this trip, the opening conversations usually contained something that identified the shared Republican-ness of couples. My wife and I don’t fit that moniker from a hundred feet, so it took us longer to be included in the "getting to know you" communion of tour groups. The first break was a couple from South Georgia – a retired High School Principal and his wife. Delightful folks who surprisingly said, "Give the guy a chance" [referring to Obama]. "I’m doing a lot better than I did with that other guy." Then there was a couple from New Orleans who also didn’t have that Republican look. One night at dinner on the Nile Cruise, we found ourselves at a big table with people we hadn’t yet met. It was as if the Democrats, Obama supporters, had figured who was who by then and been magnetically drawn to this large round table to get relief from avoiding politics – and we had a fine time together bemoaning the Bush years. Interestingly, after the first week, this silly division of people disappeared and we all settled into the shared role of fellow travelers.

Another first impression – Cairo. Three things seem to part of a unified whole – population density, traffic, and smog. Prior to this trip, Mexico City and Beijing were vying for first place in my experience. But Cairo wins in all three hands down. The city is flat and covered with box-like high rises that are all sand and concrete colored, dirty, packed together, and monotonously constructed. They build concrete frameworks with floors and corners, then fill in the holes with bricks. Unoccupied apartments have nothing but holes for windows and are unfinished inside. The tops of the buildings are also unfinished and still have rebar sticking out [for the next floor]. They sprawl upwards. Apparently, unfinished buildings aren’t taxed, so they never finish them. All roofs are covered with Satellite Dishes in various state of rust, all pointing to the same imaginary point in the sky. The only break in the scene are frequent Minarets with speakers that go off more or less at the same time five times a day [starting before daybreak]. The reason we know about the tops of buildings is that the major thoroughfares are elevated [to make more room below].  So the oldest civilization on the planet still looks like it’s  "under construction." And as for traffic. Unequaled. All cars have small dents along the edges – testimony to the din of cars. One of our group commented on the relative absence of bicycles and motorcycles. The guide explained that it would be bad for health to ride in such things because of the smog – implying that cars are safer. While I doubt that cars have any safer air inside than out, the notion that riding cars to avoid the fumes from cars has a circularity that struck us all.

Just one other early impression. Egypt is 96% uninhabited and uninhabitable. Almost all 80 million Egyptians live within at most a few miles of the Nile River. It has no tributaries that I could see. The rains from Equatorial Africa feed the Nile that flows north to the Mediterranean and create a very thin place we call Egypt. Beyond its banks there’s nothing. Flying over the desert, one can see that the desert is covered with canyons and riverbeds that were dry long before the first pyramids were built over 4000 years ago. That ribbon of green delta around the Nile is where the people are – all except a few Bedouins.

^{ancient river beds                                                             the Nile delta}