Masalaama Egypt, Until Next Time!

Well, the time has finally come for me to leave Egypt and move onto the next country on my list of places-I've-never-been-so-I'ma-go-there-ASAP bucket list. 

It's crazy to think that I've been here for a month and a half already. Initially, I was only planning on staying for 2-3weeks...I ended up getting stuck here since I was having too much fun! 

I actually have a ridiculously embarrassing confession to make (which I probs shouldn't be writing on the internet, but whatevs - I've got nothing to hide): my Egyptian visa expired. About 2 weeks ago. 

I never even considered the fact that I want able to stay in the country as long as I wanted to, but then someone pointed it out en route to Dahab and I was SUPER nervous that I was going to get hassled at the check points, but no one said anything. I kind of freaked out and wanted to go to the airport ASAP to get a new visa, but then learned that you had to go to some obscure town that would cost about 10 times the visa itself to taxi there and back. Also, people kept telling me that all I had to do was pay an extra fee at the airport when I leave and 'you're lucky we are so nice to you tourists - we wouldn't be able to get away with this in your country' 

True dat.

Anywho, I had a nice last supper with my Momster and Emily at the Grand Cafe overlooking the Nile in Maadi, and then hung out with my mom's roomie Sherri aka my second mom :) 

Sherri on the far left, our permanent photo-bomber in Dahab over xmas ;)

I'm actually going to miss this place so much - it honestly feels like I'm leaving home all over again to head off on my travels, solo this time. 

Cairo airport 

I've been seriously blessed during my time here, and have made so (so so) many amazing memories that I won't soon forget! I hope one day to return, insha'Allah, God willing. 

In the meantime, I'm off to spread my wings in the direction of South East Asia - Thailand, here I come!!

Katie’s Last Day in Egypt

It was Katie’s last day in Egypt.

Le sad face.

I am going to miss her times a thousand. She has been my main partner in crime here.

Now I’ll just have to rely on rat #2 ;)

Juuuust kidding, love you Emsies!

Lunch at Grand Café on the Nile River

We have already done all of the big things that there are to do in and around Cairo: we’ve seen the pyramids, gone on a felucca ride, been to the markets and a couple different areas in old Cairo, so we decided to just kind of take it easy for Katie’s last day here.

We went to Corniche, the road that runs along the Nile River, and ended up going for lunch and Grand Café which overlooks the Nile.

We had a delicious lunch – we are a bit obsessed with the Greek salads here – and enjoyed some shisha as the felucca’s drifted by. The perfect way to spend the afternoon :)

Referendum on the New Constitution

Today also happened to be the first day of voting on the new constitution in Egypt. There is a bit of controversy around the vote since it is essentially voting on whether or not people agree with the military removing Morsi from power and naming the Muslim Brotherhood a terrorist organization.

The entire country has been bombarded with media supporting the ‘YES!’ to the referendum on the New Constitution. I have heard a lot of people talk about the referendum, and it seem like no two people think the same way: some are avid supporters of the YES vote, mostly people who just  want their lives to go back to ‘normal’ or how it was pre-revolution, others said they obstained from voting since they didn’t think that their vote would make a difference or because they didn’t think that it was a fair referendum, and barely anyone would vote NO – I heard that military had been given ‘shoot when needed’ orders, since a NO vote was associated with the Muslim Brotherhood.

Anyway, like ridiculous tourists, we decided to go out for a nice dinner with a bunch of people in order to send Katie off in style. Our taxi driver had no idea where he was going, and ended up dropping us off at one of the polling stations in Ma’adi. We got out of the taxi and thought that there was a lot of commotion going on and then I spotted the polling station. We started moving pretty quickly in the opposite direction, just in case anything started to happen.

We found someone who spoke English and asked what was going on, and whether it was okay for us to be walking around. The lady said “You know, its election night in Egypt, so there is just a lot of commotion today. It is not safe to be on the street.” We kind of freaked out a bit and asked her if we should just give up our search for the restaurant and grab a taxi home, and whether she thought it was safe for us. “Pfft this is Ma’adi. No worries”

That made us feel much better ;)

Dinner at Bau Khao

After a couple of wrong turns, we ended up finding our destination: Bau Khao, arguably one of the best Korean restaurants in Ma’adi.

I had the spicy ginger chicken with rice. So delicious.

Definitely check it out if you are in the area!

Felucca Ride on the Nile in New Cairo, Egypt

Bonjour tout le monde :) 

As promised, here's a wee little recap of our felucca ride on the Nile. 

We caught a taxi to the Nile in the Corniche, New Cairo. 

We haggled the guys there for a bit, and settled on a price of 80 Egyptian pounds (approx $12 - the exchange rate is $1 = 7 LE). 

We had the cutest sailor guy steering us around. He knew no English, so we communicated with him by our normal minor Arabic vocab and lots of hand gestures. 

Turns out there was no wind yesterday, so we literally just pushed ourselves out (well, our guy did) and then dropped anchor. 

Sad trombone. 

Nothing a good photo-op can't fix ;) 

We also prepared ourselves with a few cocktails. 

 

Felucca ride essentials ;) 

Overall, it was a gorgeous day since it wasn't windy out, so we just hung out and enjoyed the view. 

 

Maybe next time we will actually be able to go somewhere ;) 

We then had a big dinner with a bunch of my moms coworkers at Gaya - an awesome South Korean restaurant that you MUST try if you're in Maadi. 

I'll be back later tonight with a recap from today. Spoiler alert: it involves pyramid and ATVs ;)