Dear Our Guest
Due to The Instruction of The Ministry of Tourism and The Ministry of Health to Prevent or Accompany any Request for Food or Drinks From Outside The Hotel. For sake of Your Safety, The Hotel Management Demands Commitment Instructions With You.
With The Best Wishes in Good Accommodation.
Pharaoh Egypt Hotel
We knew from the outset that, in the unlikely event that we could comprehend and comply with
this demand, we would have mastered Cairo, the capital city of Egypt. Earlier, our arrival into Africa’s largest city could best be described as landing at an aerodrome than international airport. Our Emirates Boeing 777 was ushered onto a rough piece of tarmac and Kaelene’s quip that we may have to clamber down rope ladders to exit proved almost true. No air bridges here, just pull-up steps, Terminal 2 resembling more the old domestic terminal at Wellington airport than a first-class arrival lounge.
If first impressions count, they were mixed. Our arrangements for a transfer from airport to city proved perfect and went without a hitch. Similarly, the Pharaoh Egypt, our hotel, while more than just a little faded, has plentiful, friendly staff, is comparatively inexpensive and not too far from the centre of town. The traffic, however, is something else. If we had thought the road rules seemed hazy in Abu Dhabi they appear nonexistent here, it is bedlam. There seems no car on the road not battered and bruised, the taxis mostly beaten up old black and white Lada’s with hand-painted signage. There are brightly painted, old trucks and rough, aged buses, donkeys and horses pulling wagons with all manner of goods, fruit, rubbish, vegetables, anything at all.
Progress is made by weaving among (in and out would suggest a sense of order) the teeming traffic, confusion added to by the constantly tooting of horns and gesticulations. People cross the roads by just wandering out and applying the same skills, there are no such things as pedestrian crossings.
Brown apartment blocks, often crumbling or seemingly half-built, dominate the skyline, washing suspended from mid-air clotheslines and dust and dirt everywhere. First-world this ain’t, and a trip to Memphis (not Tennessee), the ancient capital of Egypt, illustrates that impression. Shops no more than shanties are open to the dirt and grime on rutted roads, there are butchers shops where uncovered carcasses hang outside in the sun, plastic drums on the road filled with waste. Locals get around in battered Toyota utes or on donkeys with cart loads of produce, the buildings are decrepit and rivers filthy, their banks strewn with all manner of rubbish, plastic and worn tyres both obvious culprits.
Solace had to be found, we were forced to the Hard Rock Café, nestled securely inside the Cairo Grand Hyatt Hotel on the banks of the Nile, for food and Egyptian red wine.
Due to The Instruction of The Ministry of Tourism and The Ministry of Health to Prevent or Accompany any Request for Food or Drinks From Outside The Hotel. For sake of Your Safety, The Hotel Management Demands Commitment Instructions With You.
With The Best Wishes in Good Accommodation.
Pharaoh Egypt Hotel
We knew from the outset that, in the unlikely event that we could comprehend and comply with
this demand, we would have mastered Cairo, the capital city of Egypt. Earlier, our arrival into Africa’s largest city could best be described as landing at an aerodrome than international airport. Our Emirates Boeing 777 was ushered onto a rough piece of tarmac and Kaelene’s quip that we may have to clamber down rope ladders to exit proved almost true. No air bridges here, just pull-up steps, Terminal 2 resembling more the old domestic terminal at Wellington airport than a first-class arrival lounge.If first impressions count, they were mixed. Our arrangements for a transfer from airport to city proved perfect and went without a hitch. Similarly, the Pharaoh Egypt, our hotel, while more than just a little faded, has plentiful, friendly staff, is comparatively inexpensive and not too far from the centre of town. The traffic, however, is something else. If we had thought the road rules seemed hazy in Abu Dhabi they appear nonexistent here, it is bedlam. There seems no car on the road not battered and bruised, the taxis mostly beaten up old black and white Lada’s with hand-painted signage. There are brightly painted, old trucks and rough, aged buses, donkeys and horses pulling wagons with all manner of goods, fruit, rubbish, vegetables, anything at all.
Progress is made by weaving among (in and out would suggest a sense of order) the teeming traffic, confusion added to by the constantly tooting of horns and gesticulations. People cross the roads by just wandering out and applying the same skills, there are no such things as pedestrian crossings.Brown apartment blocks, often crumbling or seemingly half-built, dominate the skyline, washing suspended from mid-air clotheslines and dust and dirt everywhere. First-world this ain’t, and a trip to Memphis (not Tennessee), the ancient capital of Egypt, illustrates that impression. Shops no more than shanties are open to the dirt and grime on rutted roads, there are butchers shops where uncovered carcasses hang outside in the sun, plastic drums on the road filled with waste. Locals get around in battered Toyota utes or on donkeys with cart loads of produce, the buildings are decrepit and rivers filthy, their banks strewn with all manner of rubbish, plastic and worn tyres both obvious culprits.
Solace had to be found, we were forced to the Hard Rock Café, nestled securely inside the Cairo Grand Hyatt Hotel on the banks of the Nile, for food and Egyptian red wine.
2 comments:
Reading about your experiences of the streets of Cairo suggests you will be at least half prepared for India!
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