CITY LIFE IN EGYPT
The city of Egypt is a strange mix of old and new. You have condensed living in apartments mixed with paved roads and occasional dirt roads. It is a common sight to see horse or donkey drawn carts driving on the same road as cars. Not just residential slow roads but highways and busy city center roads. We even came upon a man riding his camel through town.
Just as odd is the store windows. There are many modern clothing stores aimed at young adults. Some of the clothing would border on risqué but walking down the street you see women in full burka’s. The majority of the women wear a head scarf but not the full burka. The clothes the ladies wear with their head scarf might be a tight fitting pair of jeans but full covered arms. Even though they are advertising many low cut short sleeve tops in the store windows you see the ladies put them over a long sleeve shirt. However, the children under the age of 10 wear very western style clothes. The young children wear tank tops and shorts.
Transportation can be very rustic. There does not seem to be any enforcement of traffic laws. Our first taxi driver told us that the lines in the road are for decoration. No one uses them and traffic lights sometimes work and sometimes do not. Pedestrians walk through traffic like the frog in the game Frogger. Amazingly it actually feels very efficient. We did see a few wrecks but not near as many as you would think. Another observation I had was the number of people that fit in a car. I have seen as many as 7 in a back seat of a sedan. Children are not seat belted in and often ride on laps of adults or play in the back seat. Also – many people smoke in their cars – even with the kids inside.
If you notice in the photo’s that a good amount (our guestimate is 50%) of homes, apartments have unfinished roofs as if they are going to put on another floor. We learned that you do not have to pay taxes on your home until the construction ends. In order to avoid taxes people, do not finish their homes.
I could go on and on with my observations but the city photos will explain a lot. If you are curious and have any questions – please feel free to send them my way. Thank you for your interest. Beth
