Yeah, Egypt is cool. I’ve had an awesome time here. I met cool people, got into crazy adventures and saw some really old stuff. I’ve learned a bit about how to be more assertive and learned how to haggle…sorta.
So basically, I stick out like a sore thumb here. Or like a sucker. ‘Random’ people come up to me with pretty much the same story. ‘Where you from? Ah! America, Welcome! Where are you going? Have you seen the papyrus museum? Are you looking for a cheap taxi?….hotel? Come I will show you. Just let me give you my business card. My cousin will give you good price, cheap price! Taxi? Taxi? Legs, legs, legs!’
Here’s the deal, basically you can drop into Egypt unannounced and have no problem getting around or finding a place to stay. The hard part is not getting ‘ripped off’. And when I say ripped off I mean you paid more than you could have, but not should have. The mentality here is that you will pay for it if it is worth that much to YOU. If it is not, then you will not pay for it. Some Americans may stop at the bazar outside a temple and buy a 2 foot high fertility god statue for 380 LE ($65). Not bad for a rather large statue with an even larger penis, straight from Egypt. I on the other hand would pay 20 LE ($3.50). Why? Because I know two things:
- Bazars outside of Temples are for tourists, tourists have big money, and will pay tourist prices.
- It’s always cheaper in town.
Things are genuinely cheap here. If you would pay $2 for a large 1.5L of water back home, you would pay 2 LE here. That is if you aren’t in the only place that sells water and its a tourist trap. Expect to pay $2 (10 LE). Most merchants, taxi drivers, etc are keen on how much the average American spends on these things at home. On the upside, they also make most of their money from locals who pay normal prices. Chances are they are giving you the American price–anywhere from 2 to 10 times the real price, maybe even more.
Basically the only way to find out the real price is to watch locals pay, ask a local (good luck with that one, the Egpytian price is a secret), ask other tourists what they paid (not the best gauge since they probably got screwed too) or get screwed a couple times while haggling the best you can. I learned I could get to the Pyramids for 20 LE from my hotel because an Aussie had already done it. I got there for 15. Now when a taxi driver tells me its 20 LE to go down the street and around the corner, I laugh and tell him I can go all the way to the pyramids for that (a 20 minute drive). I get him down to 5 LE which is probably 5 times what I could pay.
Anyways, haggling 101 is over. I took a train down to Aswan and saw some temples. Then sailed up the Nile and slept on the falluca (small sail boat) to Luxor. Saw some more temples. Then took a train up to Cairo again. In Luxor, I ran into people that were in my Aswan group. So we hung out and had a blast in Luxor. Donna, my new ‘wife’, was constantly being harrassed by locals. Normally women don’t show any leg here and so when a girl is wearing shorts they get excited. They would yell ‘Legs, legs, legs! You need a taxi?’
Donna and I went to a disco after dinner to wait for the belly dancer. We arrived and saw only an old man in his 70’s dancing on the dance floor. Yes, I have a picture. We decided to get out there and shake it as well. Later in the evening one young guy came up to me and begged to dance with my wife for 1 minute. I shrugged thinking it was odd but said ’sure’. So they danced for a bit till she was done with it. He continued to ask me permission throughout the night. Later the bar keep came up to me and asked ‘Why don’t you dance with her? Why are you letting him dance your wife?’ I told him the other guy was a better dancer and shrugged it off. He said ‘If another man was dancing with my wife I would KILL HIM!’. I laughed and he reiterated that he was serious. I told him it was not a big deal because she is enjoying herself. 
I told Donna about what happened. We laughed and decided that it was best to keep up the appearance of being married to give her a way out of wierd situations. Donna told me she heard the Egyptians don’t usually date, they just marry and so they naturally assumed that we were married because we were together.
We continued our charade thru the next day while merchants told her how much they wanted to marry her and how beautiful she was. She would say I already have a husband over there. I was constantly being asked if she was my wife or girlfriend, and then told how lucky I was for having such a beautiful wife. If at any point I denied our relationship they were on her like vultures. It’s a shame we weren’t actually married. She IS very beautiful! And a hell of alot of fun! We agreed to meet back up in Australia when I arrive in late September. She’s going to show me the wonders of Melbourne and surrounding areas.
Donna, our new friend Pedro and I took a horse and carriage ride into town. The driver agreed to take us there and back to the hotel for 2 LE and if ew didn’t like the ride we pay nothing. We quickly agreed. He took us to the friends’ shops in one of the bazars in Luxor and then back to the hotel. When we jumped out and started to greatfully hand him much more that 2 LE he turned to the dark side. Immidiately he accused us of missunderstanding at that it was 2 LE for the horses and 150 LE for the trip–whatever that means. 50 LE each. We let him know that was never agreed upon and that we would have never gotten in the carriage had we known it was more than 2 LE. He was very angry and yelling trying to tell us we needed to pay him more, refusing to take the 2 LE we agreed to. I told him we will give him 22 LE (all the money in my wallet at the time) but that he’ll get nothing more because he was being very dishonest and tricked us. He refused to take it. We told him, ‘Fine, you’ll get nothing!’ He tryed to angrily haggle us down to 30 a person and then 20 a person. We stood our ground. 22 LE or nothing. He refused. Pedro said that was fine, we’ll just leave. We started walking away. Then he quickly and quietly said, ‘If you leave I will KILL YOU!’ I stepped back up to him and said that wasn’t a very good option for anyone either and offered him the 22 LE again. Pedro again told him to take the 2 LE we agreed or we’ll pay nothing, because now we aren’t satisfied. And if he continued we would simply go talk to the tourist police. A few moments and ugly comments later he reluctantly took the full 22 LE. He threw a fit as we walked away, calling Pedro a few names and so on.
The rest of the night we decided to stay in the hotel. We were a little shaken. But everything turned out alright. We ended up having photos of him with his carriage license number and told the hotel management how informed the police. We didn’t fill out a report because they took too long to get us the forms. Sorry Donna and Pedro, if I left out any details! Leave a comment to add in your thoughts about our adventure!