Day 1- 97/10/18
Stockholm:
13:30; What a day. Last night I was at Sophie's party and it was nice to meet Freddy and break down some barriers between me and Krusty for a change. She's a good soul no matter what some might think. Saying good-bye to the girls and guys, I continued homewards for some sleep. Waking up at 10:00, my breath was choking me silly. I was not the slightest bit nervous or excited since I've written my testament in case the worst was to happen. There's so much I want to say to people before my time comes, but I summarized it because they know how I feel (somewhat is just as good). Not managing to sleep anymore, I wanted to relax to the tunes of Ravel's Bolero, a classical masterpiece which can really mellow someone out in no time at all. After my good-byes with the family, my father drove me off to the bus terminal downtown and I hopped on after waving good-bye to him. Finally at peace and solitude.
On the plane and in the air, waited for two hours after going through the regular security procedure. The metal detector was a real stupid scene, instead of bothering myself with emptying out my jacket pockets, I just threw the damn thing in the basket and they ran it through the X-ray machine. My vest was packed with all sorts of things and it's got a billion different pockets which I still am not aware of but it is good for photography, so I believe. The meal on KLM flight 196 to Amsterdam was fabulous, the meat was suculous and the passengers were a dull Swedish couple who barely touched their plates.
Cairo: What it took to get there and how much it was worth it when I got there.
First there was the arrival at Amsterdam Shiphool Airport which was actually pretty early and effective. I always believed it was amongst the best airports in Europe, but it was just big, boring, and empty. I stood waiting for nearly two hours because all the seats in the 'lounge' were triple-packed. The procedure went like this: the plane delayed for fifteen minutes and then the security came and checked every little ashtray, seat, crack, etc. in the other room before having 'filtered and funneled' in the people only to be checked up to some point. People were occasionally body-searched (briefly) but I passed the detector test with flying colors. One passenger was carrying four bottles with him according to my sneak-peak at the screen.
Boarding flight KL 553 to Cairo was pulled off at 20:00 and things worked just fine. I was placed in seat 28B of this 280-seat 767 which meant that it was an aisle seat in the tourist class and amongst non-smokers (how's THAT for detail?!?). I was neighboring an elderly Egyptian woman who told me that she was flying for about twenty hours all the way from Toronto and I thought I had it rough by standing for two hours in Amsterdam.
The food was good, service was great, but entertainment was always interrupted by the Dutch boys up front in the cabin who were telling us that everything was "OK", I knew it was fine but I didn't have to be reminded of that every quarter-hour while watching "Batman and Robin (along with 'Wonder-Buns' Alicia Silverstone)". But the MOST definite annoyment was the young child by the name of Kemo who was most probably half-Dutch and half-Egyptian (no more than five), Kemo was crying as if there was no tomorrow.
The movie was just one way of loosening the tension after waiting like stupid for the plane to land no matter where it was, I thought the show was a waste of two-and-a-half hours of mindless back-and-forth action. I nearly had a short fit once the stewardess was handing out the visa application forms out for Egypt until I saw it, I smirked at the quality which even my sister could of done better with PaintBrush. Noticing the electronic map on the screen showing the temperature, ground-speed, altitude, location, arrival time, destination city time, local time, didn't add up to much when I saw the plane on the screen doing a 180-spin 100km north of Cairo. I laughed out loud and Kemo's father looked at me as if out of my mind, I just pointed towards the screen and asked "What, already?"
Touching down in Cairo was miraculous, we landed 30 minutes late and got off the plane after another half-hour due to the slow driving caused by the tension in the wheels. The first thing I saw from the plane about Cairo was Zamalek, the island in the Nile where my brother's apartment is positioned. I saw the lit bridges built by the great architects of the century and the famous Cairo Tower shaped as a lotus flower on the tip. A lot more new sky-scrapers this time. A lot more.
Getting off the plane, the army was anywhere and everywhere in sight. Egypt is run only by Mubarak and that's how it goes even though they have a somewhat Republic constitution with martial law. The visa situation was a piece of cake, two stamps cost me a total of $15 and I placed them in the passport for further bureaucracy awaiting me at the front of the line. The stupid thing about the Middle East is that they want to know everything irrelevant to your stay, this time they just narrowed it down to "Your fazer's name, bleeze?" and "Where you born?", I just smiled and said "Hani" and "Kuwait". The cool thing about Cairo International Airport is that no matter if you're not expecting someone to meet you, they are expecting you! A short, smooth, fast-talking 'concerned' man approached me and quickly asked "You need drive?", "You happy, yes?", "You have hotel?" "I drive you, yes?". I just said "No, no, no, no, no, me happy, I have place, OK?" He looked at me and asked "OK?", I replied "OK". We smiled and I walked off. Suddenly my educated English just went to hell and I was stuck with my basic Neanderthal grunting and Mediterranean sign-language again, which felt great.
Picking up my suitcase, I headed off to the exit when I was stopped by security, I was too calm to worry since I was in Egypt again. The man pointed towards my bag strapped around my shoulder and asked:
Cop: "Video?"
Me: "Photo"
Cop: "OK, you go"
Me: "Shukran, ma'asalama" (Thank you, good-bye)
Cop: "Tfadal" (Proceed/welcome)
Egypt is simple, no deep explanations and no problems with individuals due to large population. Having met Amir, we exchanged tons of cheek-kisses. We proceeded outwards away from the crowds of whole families waiting for just one long-lost relative. Suddenly, the heat kicked in and I felt a slight headache from the pollution, I felt great again. Mom and dad were happy to hear from me that everything went just fine when I called them by Amir's cellular-phone from the parking-lot. The streets of Cairo were almost empty at night in comparison to the suicidal-driving through the afternoon traffic which is close to impossible to maneuver through due to the insane driving technics and the constant honking which after a while becomes somewhat sublime. Eighteen million people in Cairo and the only thing I kept seeing was the surplus of building guards armed to their teeth like the fedayeen while guarding an embassy, hotel, institute, hospital, school, restaurant, etc. Some residential buildings had a more discreet and effective measure of security with men in gray suits who in Cairo don't bother hiding their Uzi sub-machine guns under their arm-pits. No matter the security nowadays, the attitude gives it all away. We parked outside a different building where the guards didn't recognize my brother at all, the guard asked if the jeep was going to leave the site in the morning, Amir just said "I'll drive off in the morning". The guard helped my brother out and said "OK, tomorrow it go, yes?" Why argue with that? In Cairo, no-one cares about anything no matter how far you go to fix the problem. The city is not going anywhere, so time is irrelevant. Stores, restaurants, and businesses work around the clock which is very convenient to the average Cairene. Life is easy here, hard, yet easy.