2 months of Cairo

I arrived exactly 2 months ago. And like most other places I know, Cairo has its bevy of contradictions.

The most noticeable of which is the persona change Cairenes undergo behind the wheel. On the streets, in public transport and elsewhere, I've found Egyptians to be disarmingly gentle and ready with a smile. As drivers, they are flagrantly aggressive and ready with the horn. An alternative outlet for Cairene angst would be a welcome improvement.

Egyptian Arabic also sounds to my untrained ears to run counter to its written form. Arabic is a cursive script, visually mellifluous with a languid loopiness unlike blockier orthogonal Chinese script. Yet, ECA (Egyptian Colloquial Arabic) is spoken by its native speakers in much the same way as they drive. Cutting each other off, in each other's faces, high decibel. And I'm told this is normal. Oh to be a fly on the wall during whispered "Ba He Bek Kithir"s.......

My apartment is a contradiction. Prime Zamalek location, 10th floor view, fancy French restaurant & chic deli downstairs, with a rare pub next door to boot. Inside, an overstock of comfortably old-fashioned furniture adorning the 2 living rooms and 2 bedrooms. It even has a LAN though it took me 4 days of troubleshooting to get it working. Evidence of this being a waystation for like-minded nomads abounds. Left-behind paperbacks in Russian, Italian, German, French, English, Greek and Spanish abound, 4 volumes of "Teach Yourself Arabic" (along with notebooks hinting at early-aborted learning attempts), multiple Lonely Planets (Bahrain, Cyprus etc.) and loads of voltage transformers. There are Rolex and Patek-Philippe catalogs and a selection of foreign policy academic journals. The most noticeable thing though is the dust.

Cairo is a dusty city and it all comes into the apartment and settles into the nooks of the barely functioning furnishings. Toilet seat that doesn't stay up, insect screens that brittle away when touched, electrical tape holding all wiring together, 2-legged teetering mahogany dining table. One out of every four items I touch suffers subsequent damage. Once every fifteen minutes, I wash my hands off the newly accumulated dust.

I have been commuting about an hour daily to and from work in Maadi. A walk, then a bus, the metro, another bus, followed by a final walk. I've taken to wearing my Foakleys everyday to avoid countenancing the ubiquitous stares. Random conversations with Chinese language instructors (Egyptians) and apologists on behalf of blatant oglers spice up the daily ride. I've also gotten reasonably adept at embarking and alighting packed moving buses. Maybe one day I'll let my hair down and ride in the car reserved for women.

It has been difficult on the social scene. Invariably I meet people in pubs and have an enjoyable time though they're not people with whom I'd regularly hang. The "friends" I've met are very cool folk but again, not a regular crowd. This is mildly perturbing but not overwhelmingly so, being reminiscent of my general lifestyle elsewhere in other locales.

Progress in my attempt to launch a new condom brand here is rife with contradictions too. Provocative imagery is everywhere, from racy music videos to Viagra ads. Oh - so it's only on satellite TV but that penetrates over half the households anyway. People are not exactly against the concept (i.e., they're not "contra-ceptive", get it?), but mention a mass media condom ad and all the red flags appear, with a healthy tangle of red tape attached to them.