This bitch went to Egypt

May 04, 2005 - 12:50 a.m.

I am probably the only person who has been to New York City four times, but never longer than 8 hours each time. It’s such a tease. My pilot decided we should fly to NYC at 6am and spend the day with his friends before catching our evening flight to Egypt, which was a great idea because it was like a mini-vacation before our vacation.

I met his peeps, who were all very nice, and we made plans to go to Coney Island to see an authentic human freak show. His friend Patty said, “They only have a Snake Man and a guy who eats nails so it isn’t very interesting.” Hmm. No midgets? No pin heads? No Lobster Boy? No “One of us, one of us!”? Screw that. So instead we went to Queens to a beach on the Atlantic and played fetch with Patty’s Weimaraner, using a plastic doll head we found in the street. You know those clown dolls that have two faces and you can spin his head around so he’s Happy Clown and Sad Clown? It was one of those clown heads, except that both the faces were identical, and sad. Sad Clown and Sad Clown. To this day I am still puzzled and disturbed by the two same faces. WHY DID THEY MAKE TWO SAME FACES?

Did I mention that we flew first class? I never thought I’d see the day…We flew the pilot’s airline to New York before switching to Egypt Air, and hell if I didn’t feel unworthy being up there. A hot towel for me? CASHEWS? Liquor? A full meal served with glass wear and cloth napkins?

A few weeks prior I had received an email from the pilot’s airline outlining the behavior that is expected of me as a guest of a pilot. It was a few pages long, detailing what I can and cannot talk about or read on the plane, and a dress code that said I must wear modest dress clothes with dress shoes, because I will be representing this airline. Jeez. That flight was 2 hours long. Too bad we couldn’t fly first class for the 11 hours to Cairo.

Upon arriving at JFK international airport, we caught a glimpse of what our visit to a third world country will be like. There was a line 300 people deep, each person carrying enormous makeshift luggage wrapped in twine and tape, and speaking Arabic. We were the only whities. The Boeing 777 was at max capacity and it was chaos, with screaming babies, stank armpits, unibrows, and people invading my personal space from every direction. I half expected to find chickens and goats running amongst the feet of the passengers. These people are very brash and will shove you out of their way with their bosoms and hips without a second thought. I didn’t interpret this as them being rude, they’re just more touchy-feely and no-nonsense and don’t live in a neurotic personal bubble like white people do. I feel very comfortable around people like this.

Six hours later I realized that I was wearing my Bitch Face, crossed with my Shit Face. I was hostile. I eyed people suspiciously. Unbeknownst to me, I was flying into this country with a chip on my shoulder. I had to check myself. Why are you such an asshole? I thought you wanted to be nice and befriend Egyptians?? Get it together!

And then it hit me. The Middle Eastern people that I encounter in Chicago are rude, nasty, condescending, shady, suspect and perverted. My natural defense was to pull out the Bitch-Shit Face because I was surrounded by Arabs, and the Arabs that I co-exist with treat me like shit. Damn. I had to reverse years of prejudices. By the time we landed, I was over it.

Cairo blew my mind. All I kept repeating in my head was:

UN FUKKIN REAL.

I was in awe.

Observation #1: There are no traffic laws.

You would think that in a world with no traffic laws, people would naturally drift towards some kind of order that is based on logic, safety, and ease. Not so. They do the exact opposite of anything that would result in a smooth flow of traffic. Why bother driving between the lines when you can just straddle the line? Why drive in a straight line when you can weave back and forth, knowing that others will beep at you and swerve out of your way? Why only utilize the three painted lanes when clearly this road is wide enough to accommodate 6 cars, pedestrians, and a donkey cart?

-- I saw a car drive in reverse at full speed down the middle of an expressway for no obvious reason. Meaning, I didn’t see any exits or turn-a-rounds. The expressway is elevated and travels above the entire city, with very few exits. The car weaved back and forth, and people just went around it.

-- Cars stop in the middle of the expressway for no reason, and just sit there. They are not broken down. And I mean the middle, with no attempts at moving towards the shoulder.

-- One of these stopped cars was full of children with no adults. There was a toddler at the wheel, leaning his head out the window and pretending to drive, with other infants in various positions on the seats and floor, and two 7 year-olds in the back. People whizzed by at 60 mph.

-- There are no sidewalks so pedestrians share the road with cars, donkeys, horses and tractors. Sometimes there is a fruit cart set up in the middle of a lane. Mothers walk next to speeding semi-trucks with babies and children in tow.

-- People get into car accidents and just continue on their merry way. Crash! Rear-ended or scrape the side of someone’s car? They just look at each other, nod, and keep driving. It’s like bumper-cars. Needless to say, all of their vehicles are smashed to hell.

-- One-way streets mean nothing, even if it is a narrow, single lane closed in by concrete walls. Go ahead and speed down it the wrong way, and then get pissed off when someone approaches you from the correct way, and honk at him until he drives in reverse, and you follow him nose-to-nose until you can get passed.

Our first night there, we stayed at a beautiful hotel and just laid around by the pool, fighting off jet lag in the desert sun. There was a mini-zoo on the premises that thrilled me, and I spent a lot of time staring at an emu, deer, and a flamingo and fucking monkeys! MONKEYS! I’m not sure of the species, but the boy monkey had sky-blue testicles and a fire-engine red penis, with a boner half the time. Where can I get one of these???

Rule number one about Egypt: There are no rules. Nothing is regulated or protected and you can pretty much do whatever the hell you want, especially if you have money. They’ll let you pour crude oil on baby seals and set a bald eagle on fire for $3. I could have taken a monkey back to my room if I had wanted, or eaten the emu for dinner. There is no signage anywhere proclaiming Warning! Or Caution! I never once saw anything that said, “We are not responsible…” What a goddamn relief. Obviously, this country does not have lawyers and frivolous lawsuits.

That night we had dinner at a very nice restaurant overlooking the pyramids under a full moon. We ordered the more expensive food on the menu, including a bottle of red wine and a hookah pipe with apple tobacco for dessert and our bill was 150£ Egyptian, which is $25 U.S. We lived like kings the whole time we were there. This is the number one benefit to vacationing in a third world country; regardless of the currency exchange rate, you’re still rich.

My pilot said, “Imagine. If we were in Paris, we would have paid $200 for this meal, it would have tasted like shit, and they would have been rude while serving it!”

And I was all: “Hell yeah, screw Europe, I’m all about Africa, the Middle East, and India! Three cheers for Africa!”

It’s true. Why would you want to go to Paris, Amsterdam, or London and have to pay $12 for a beer and everyone hates you anyway? Down with the white man.

Although, I did learn very quickly that it was better for us to be Canadian and married than American and traveling in sin. We saw the looks on their faces when we said, “America” so we started saying “Canada” by day two and everyone loved us. “Oh! Canada Dry, yes?”

“Yes, we love Canada Dry.”

Here is my beautiful emu that I chose not to eat. He is bald and diseased from the neck down but I cut that off because I didn’t want to shame him.

To be continued…

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