Night on the Town

Tonight I went out to dinner with Dan and Sean, my awesome new survey partner. Our survey team is now up to three people, which means that Dawn can leave us alone to work while she hikes around site looking for new features to map in. Since Sean and I spent most of today slogging through sand in the broiling sun, we got hungry. Really hungry. Fortunately for us, there's Gad. Gad is basically an Egyptian version of McDonalds that sells falafel and foul (a bean dish, pronounced "fool") sandwiches for 1.25 EGP each. We also enjoyed some schawarma. Check out that meat!



Unfortunately, I couldn't get my meat without an awkward encounter with the schawarma boy, who asked me where I was from. Our conversation went something like this:

"Where you from?"

"America."

"Washington?"

"No, Texas."

"From sexy! Hahaha!"

"No."

Gad actually has two floors. The first floor is cheap takeout, and the second is a sit down restaurant with a fancier menu. We went with the first floor extravaganza, then took our food over to one of Cairo's many outdoor cafes. They usually consist of clusters of plastic lawn furniture, where you can sit around, drink tea, and smoke shisha pipes. We were in a crowded area, so our relaxation was constantly interrupted by a stream of traveling street vendors and begging children. Among the products offered to us were watches, socks, and tissues. But we were more interested in our feast.



As we walked around past cluttered storefronts, we also saw crowds of street vendors with their wares laid out on the sidewalk. Pants, toys, t-shirts, head scarves, and even underwear were on display for streetside shoppers. Right by our cafe there was a store with a large display of Egyptian lingerie (very tame by American standards). Every so often an old man would appear at the door and eagerly scan the area for customers, which did not make me feel inclined to shop there.

It was great to sit and chill for a while, but the evening was not perfectly smooth—we were seriously overcharged for our tea and shisha because we obviously weren't Egyptians. Our waiter got very uncomfortable when Dan turned and asked another customer, in Arabic, what he was paying for the same items. Even though it was obviously bull, the cafe staff still gouged us. While it didn't actually hurt my wallet, the price hike got my hackles up. But that's just part of the game when you are a foreigner in Egypt, and even though it's no good to be a pushover, sometimes you have to suck it up and be a good sport. In the end, we still had an awesome time shooting the breeze and lazily blowing smoke into the air.



And afterwards, we couldn't resist another trip to a juice bar! I almost regretted all that food on the way home because our cabbie drove like a madman, but we made it safe and sound.

On the subject of food, last weekend we were outside of Carrefour when Dan and I took some free samples from a food cart. Eventually Dan could no longer resist and bought these donut-like treats, made of fried dough that is glazed and perfectly crisp when you first bite down on it. A "small" batch cost 7 EGP (roughly $1.40). Behold this glory: