Coptic Cairo: Getting Home

Driving around in Cairo is always interesting, but the ride home from Coptic Cairo today was especially interesting.

First, a policeman stopped us and started yelling and gesturing loudly. Khalid (our driver) started yelling and gesturing back. The policeman didn't want us driving any further. I think Khalid won the yelling match because after a few minutes we drove forward.

Thanks to my very limited knowledge of Angry Arabic, I'm guessing that the policeman recognized us as tourists and didn't want us driving down this particular street and witnessing all the garbage.

I finally got a decent photo of one the pigeon coops.

Then as we were sitting in some pretty heavy traffic, we witnessed an accident.

The taxi above pulled out suddenly and without looking (or giving a warning honk which they do often here). A man on a bicycle ran right into it. Luckily the driver's side window was open and instead of hitting the glass, the bicyclist flew into the cab and onto the lap of the driver. I thought surely the driver would help him out and dust him off.

Nope, the driver threw him out of the cab and starting throwing punches. He was ticked even though I'm fairly certain it was his fault. Lots of shoving and yelling ensued. We drove off before I could see how it was resolved. Cairo isn't exactly the type of city where you stop and offer your name & number as a witness to an accident.

Finally, just as the boys were starting to get really antsy (we were coming up on about an hour in traffic), we happened upon some camels.

Driving around in Cairo is almost as fun as touring!