Dancing Brave

Egypt, Part IV

We returned from Giza at about 1:30 p.m., tired and sweaty but exhilarated. And hungry, and thirsty, but finding a lunch place felt like a whole lot of effort. So we headed upstairs to the Nile Hilton's rooftop bar, which serves a lunch menu and let us sit back and drink in both the view of the river AND a frosty-cold Coca-Cola Light.

This photo is actually from the previous morning, in the hotel's cafe, but whatever. I am compelled at all times to take photos of foreign Diet Coke cans.

Anyway, the rooftop -- faintly breezy, totally empty -- refreshed us completely, aided in part by the greatest food discovery in the whole world: Doritos. No, really. The waiter brought us our drinks and a bowl of Doritos that looked, to the naked eye, more or less like the Nacho Cheese flavor. But when I ate one, it was... not. It exploded with Yum. These were not just any Doritos. They were the best m-f'ing Doritos we had ever m-f'ing tasted. They were the DORITOS OF THE GODS, caps required. We realize now this might be because we were hungry and in spectacular moods, or because they didn't taste as we expected them to and so it was like a glorious surprise. I don't know. And it almost doesn't matter. They were SO divine that when we go back someday, I will need to revisit that bar, just to see if they still serve them. "What flavor are these?" we asked our waiter. He, seeming delighted that he could answer the question, practically shouted, "DORITOS!" He didn't speak enough English to grasp that we were asking him what TYPE of Doritos they were. So we didn't press it. They were DORITOS OF THE GODS, and that's that.

I took this shot from the roof -- the other side of the roof, the side our backs faced in the photo I used up top -- just as we were leaving the bar. Egypt is so identifiable as part of the Middle East, we kept having to remind each other that we were, technically, in Africa. It just doesn't compute, though. Not that I expect all of Africa to be a giant safari -- hell, Kevin's been to areas of South Africa that he said felt exactly like San Diego -- but Cairo, at least, certainly seemed like part of Africa out of geographic conveniences only.

The afternoon was marked off for Coptic Cairo, the Catholic neighborhood. The lore goes that the Holy Family took refuge in Cairo when they fled from Judea, and Catholicism found its roots in Cairo during the bridge between the Pharaohs and the arrival of Islam, perpetuated in part by the Roman occupation. Coptic Catholicism doesn't believe in the dual nature of Christ. The view him as a divine being only, not divine and human. Every cabbie we had the entire time asked if we'd been there yet, and extolled how great it is that Cairo is a Middle Eastern city where two religions coexist completely peacefully.

It is a more laid-back, almost suburban-feeling part of town, a little more idyllic than the bustle of downtown and its uncrossable streets.

We took the Metro, and were definitely the only tourists on it. We'd read that sometimes it's advisable for women to get in the front car, because that's where most local ladies ride, but we saw some getting on a car in the middle and so we followed them. Nobody bothered us -- true of our entire trip, which I know differs a little from others' experiences, but I think it helped that we had Kevin there -- but they did stare a little. I ran into this in Beijing and Xian, too. It's not because we're so hot (although clearly we are; just LOOK at our hats!), but that people who don't hang out in touristy areas that much are just amused and interested to see Westerners come into their orbit. Still, Jess wore wedding rings on her left hand, because we had heard the locals appreciate the sanctity of marriage and tend not to hit on attached tourists the way they do the apparently single ones. That's not me trying to stereotype, by the way; that's just what we'd gleaned from Googling, checking travel books, and reading about the experiences of others. All of them seemed to indicate that women traveling alone get a lot of attention from the menfolk, and even though we weren't alone, we figured, hey, let's just make sure they know we're not looking for that kind of attention.

The most famous church in Coptic Cairo is the Hanging Church:

It's so named because it was built over a Roman fortress, so that to the naked eye it appeared to be suspended in the air. But the land level has risen since then and negated that effect.

That stunning pulpit up there is made of marble. Too heavy to move, it sits there every day but is only actually used on Palm Sunday. Can you imagine? I bet the lector that day is pretty stoked at the chance to ascend it. They claim there is a pillar for each disciple, with the black one representing Judas, but to my eye there seems to be a black one and a grey one. Maybe the grey stands for Jesus.

One thing I absolutely loved seeing was all the Catholic iconography with Arabic writing on it.

Coming back out the steps, you descend into the above-pictured courtyard, where people were running around and playing. You can see how much more residential the surrounding buildings seem to be. To the right, you see these Roman ruins from the old Babylon Fortress:

They're surprisingly well-preserved. Nearby is a Coptic Museum with lovely lush grounds -- tragically, you can't bring in a camera -- and tons of examples of Egyptian art from this period, all very rooted in Catholicism and its imagery.

This alley runs around underneath the area where the Church is:

It's down at the original city level. People down there sell CDs and DVDs and magazines, and the maze of little passages connect entrances to a nunnery, another little church, and even a synagogue.

We also saw this bag of Doritos in a planter, and excitedly took a photo.

I'm not kidding, both Jessica and I took this picture, just in case they were the DORITOS OF THE GODS. I mean, "Cheese and Spices"? Sounds good to me.

As a sidebar: Later, at our hotel in Luxor, we tried them and they were not the same. The chip texture itself was different, almost more wheaty and airy, or something, and the flavor wasn't a match. We were crushed, but undaunted; another day, we found and tried a flavor called Sweet Chili that seemed like it might be a winner, and it was CLOSE, but the texture of that chip was different, too. So then we thought they might be the Spicy Sweet Chili Doritos that Stephen Colbert had been pimping so amusingly on his show, but when we got home and tried them... and no. They're CLOSE but not quite the same. Which we think means that they ARE the Spicy Sweet Chili Doritos, but, like, the Continental Edition, or something, with some way better additive that doesn't pass the wack-ass FDA standards but which totally makes the grade overseas. Come on, people. I don't care if they kill me. I NEED THEM.

That night we went to a gorgeous restaurant at a hotel right near ours, the Semiramis Something Something. Wait, I'm better than that... okay, thank you, Google: It's the Semiramis InterContinental. The Lebanese restaurant there, Sabaya, was excellent: delicious, perfect lamb, hummus, babaghanoush and falafel, and a bouquet of fresh veggies instead of flowers in a silver vase on the table. I recommend it to anyone who's planning a trip. We all sat there staring at them like a parched soul at a desert oasis, dying for the crunch of a carrot stick but too timid because because we'd been warned against eating uncooked veggies. Instead, we merely ogled the artful display of lettuce leaves, peeled carrots, tomatoes, and celery, and moaned about how none of us had brought a camera.

"They're washed!" the waiter told us... after we'd gobbled up our hummus with pita bread. Oh well. But we knew we had three days of awesome ahead of us in Luxor, and we weren't willing to take gastrointestinal chances just yet.

Egypt, Part III

The Great Pyramid? Yeah, it's big.

The trick to Giza, we figured, was booking a car for the day through the hotel. That way, we wouldn't be standing around trying to hail a cab at the necropolis itself, haggling frantically for a price. Instead, we'd just set it and forget it, like some kind of bad travel infomercial. The hotel suggested that we leave at 7:15 a.m. -- traffic is way lighter in Cairo on Fridays, because it's a holy day, but we wanted to get to the Pyramids right at 8 a.m. so we had a hope of getting inside whichever one would be open. On the ride there, we were amazed at how almost blase the first sighting of them is. You can see them over the suburb, on the highway, hanging out and towering over the nearby houses as if they're no big deal, as if they're not 3000-year old marvels.

The unfinished roof is an interesting story. The driver told us that in other African countries (he cited Tunisia), the government doesn't collect taxes on the buildings until they are finished, so people just leave them this way with the rebar sticking out the top. But the Egyptian government figured out that scam quickly, and charges taxes up front; the reason people leave them unfinished is because when your family grows and expands, it's cheaper to build up if you never fully finished the roof in the first place.

Anyway: About here is when we ran into one of the recurring scams. Everyone is incredibly friendly, but there is extreme poverty in Egypt as well -- driving back through one rural part of the town near the Giza necropolis, we saw a dead horse rotting in the street near a stream -- so the culture is also founded on getting tourists to think they need to spend more money. And that's fine; who can blame them? Just know when to say no, or if you don't care, then don't SAY no. In this case, our driver got us to the pyramids by about 7:50 a.m., chattering the whole way about how if we wanted to ride a horse or a camel, he'd take us straight to a stable right away. But we hadn't decided yet what we were going to do and wanted to consult the guidebooks privately first to remind ourselves where they advise people to get their mounts, so we declined. He mentioned it about three times, then conceded and drove us to the pyramids... where the police turned us away because the parking lot wasn't yet open.

"It doesn't open until 8:30," our driver said after he flipped a U-turn and then pulled over to the side of the road. We all exchanged glances. It didn't make sense: Why would the hotel suggest we arrive THAT early? Why did all the guidebooks say 8 a.m.? Why hadn't he even mentioned until now, "Oh, hey, by the way, you'll be about 45 minutes early"? We held our ground and said we'd wait to see if it opened at 8, and sure enough, as tour bus after tour bus lined up by the entrance, the gate went up at eight o'clock on the dot and people started driving inside. Our driver pretended to notice this with surprise, then drove us up through to the parking lot and the ticket offices. We figured out later that the driver was trying to get us to spend money at his friend's stable right away, to ride a camel up to the pyramids and then probably tip the guides for an extra tour of the structures, by convincing us we'd have no other option but to sit and wait for almost an hour in the heat. Oddly, we didn't mind. It wasn't awkward as much as it was amusing. We'd run into something similar the night before, when we were trying to cross one of Cairo's hideously crazy streets and we ended up falling in behind a local guy, figuring that he probably knew how to dodge cars and not get himself killed. He smiled at us and said he taught at the American University in Cairo, then asked where we were going and pointed us in the right direction. And then, suave as can be, he walked away and then SUDDENLY pretended to remember that, oh, the restaurant is closed and doesn't open for another 45 minutes, but if we'd like he could take us to a nearby bazaar where we could get souvenirs for way better prices than the more touristy ones. We thanked him politely but said no, and sure enough, the restaurant was not closed at all. When you think about it, it's sort of ingenious. Well, until the dollar bottoms out there, too, at which point it will become tiresome.

According to the guidebooks, they rotate which Pyramid you can pay extra to enter, and the ticket office only sells 150 passes when it opens at 8 a.m. and then another 150 at 1 p.m. Since this trip was all about No Regrets, doing whatever we could while we were there and never looking back and wishing we'd waited in that one line or paid that extra 50 Egyptian pounds, we decided we had to try. Of course, finding the two ticket offices is almost impossible -- our driver pointed us to the right place, and we probably would have sussed it out, but they're definitely not extremely concerned about making sure it's obvious where you're supposed to go. It all worked out, though, and we found ourselves heading straight over to The Great Pyramid and walking inside.

When you climb up to the indentation, you leave your camera with the guards -- whom, of course, you must then tip in order to get it back; brilliant, and since we're talking a tip that equals about 50 cents, no skin off my nose either -- and proceed inside a ways, at which point you think, "It's sort of cooling in here, and not that claustrophobic at all!" Then you come to the tiny walkway that requires you to hunch down almost in half and walk up a steep ramp for about two minutes. Right around the time your back silently complains to you, the ceiling opens up again, and you take another ramp up to a room that's about the size of a bedroom in a moderately sized apartment. The inside was dark, smooth stone, as smooth and flawless and perfectly engineered as if it were built ten years ago rather than in 2500 B.C. An air vent that had been there since ancient times, back when they used this as a burial chamber, let in a little air and light. Somberly we stood there, awed, amazed, that we were standing about halfway up the Great Pyramid in a room that looked more modern than half of Los Angeles. We touched the walls, agape. We breathed deep. And then a group from New Zealand chose to commemorate this moment by sing-shouting a national song at the top of their lungs. Twice. I'm all for being jovial, but... pipe down, y'all. Khufu wants you to can it.

What goes up must come down, and just as we headed for the steep ramp -- now, of course, slanted down like a wooden slide -- it occurred to us that they hadn't stopped letting people INSIDE, which meant we'd have to squeeze our way down in a contorted ball while OTHER tourists came up the way we did. We managed, and it was actually really fun and crazy and unlike anything else I've ever experienced, but there was a moment where I wondered if my neck would ever be straight again. Once we burst out into the light, oh, BOY, did the lactic acid burn set in on my thighs.

Jess and I had to stop and stretch. I love this picture -- very "Schlamiel! Schlamazel!" of us. Jessica does not care for tight spaces, so I was very proud of her for screwing up her courage and going inside the Pyramid. She had totally the right attitude about it being a once-in-a-lifetime experience that she might not ever want to do again, but that she might regret never doing at all, so major props must be given. I've never seen her look so relieved as when we were back outside with no ceiling but the cloudless sky.

From there, we just moseyed around and enjoyed the sights and the ambiance. The above pyramid is Khafre's Pyramid, the second-tallest of the three large pyramids on the site, the one belonging to the Pharaoh whose face is believed to be depicted by the Sphinx, and the only one with its limestone casing present on the apex. They all used to be covered in that smooth finish, the better to gleam in the sunlight like jewels of the desert, but over the years the Egyptians borrowed the limestone so they could use it to build other things. Bet they're regretting that now. The smaller pile of rubble there is a pyramid as well -- one of the Queens' pyramids. There are six of those on the site.

Speaking of Sphinxy:

I am crushing his head. The Kids In The Hall boys would be so proud.

My favorite quote about the Sphinx was in one of our guidebooks. Apparently some dude once compared seeing it to encountering a famous actor in person: attractive, but must smaller than you expect. This shot of the discrepancy in scale between the lion paws and the head illustrates the truth of that. Incidentally, Napoleon gets the official blame for the missing nose, although Egyptologists generally all agree that it wasn't really his doing. The lesson here: Apparently, it's never not been fun to blame the French.

Hey, what's he been looking at all this time, anyway?

Oh. Well, carry on, then.

Men on camels roam the Giza Necropolis trying to convince tourists to hop on for a ride. They're persistent, but apparently you do get a better deal in town, so we ignored them. Instead, we had our driver take us back to his friend's place, and we all got hooked up on a steed: two camels...

... and a horse...

... which let's face it, was actually a pony named Sugar.

Don't worry, Jess and Kevin traded mounts for the ride back; they let me stay on the camel because I had been the keenest on the whole camel experience from the get-go. They are nice. Also, Kevin was going to look way funnier on Sugar than I was. Trust.

Oh, and my camel's name? Michael Jackson. The other was Mickey Mouse. I am pretty sure these names change every time they go out, based on whatever American references leap to the guides' minds. Michael Jackson was very kind to me. He didn't spit at all, but he did ride behind Mickey Mouse, who had a bit of a flatulence problem -- of the noisy, rather than smelly, variety, thank God. I will never forget the first few times it let fly as Kevin sat atop it, and our guide, who didn't speak a whole lot of English, promptly made a joke as if it were Kevin who'd let one rip. It's not often that a fart joke makes me laugh, but that was definitely one of the last contexts in which I expected to hear one.

It was tough getting used to the gait of a camel. It lopes, with a slight side-to-side feel, and when it sits down and stands up you have to lean back really far or else you'll tumble off. This accounts for my sore stomach muscles the next day, because of course, he said lean back and man, did I lean. I LEANED. I was practically lying down along its back.

We wandered through town out to the desert, to the spot at which you can see all nine pyramids in one camera shot.

I love the kid's "Hummer" shirt. The only weirder one we saw was when we passed a competing guide who wore, I kid you not, a denim vest emblazoned with the ORANGE COUNTY CHOPPERS logo.

Okay, this next photo is one of my absolute favorites, for two very different reasons, one of which is totally embarrassing. Ready?

1) It's just a cool photo;

2) I realized a month ago, when I contemplated putting it as my Facebook picture, that the way I'm sitting with the saddle makes it look like I have my hand wrapped around a giant, fat boner. No, seriously. It does. Check it. If ever the horrible, icky euphemism "chubby" applied, it would be to this. Maybe it's not as bad when you see the picture at this size, but when I was uploading it to the wee space on Facebook, it was like, "Hello, friends from high school whom I haven't seen in 12 years! CHECK OUT MY AWESOME LADY-WANG!" Sigh.

See? More amusing seeing Kevin on a tiny pony. Told you.

It was at this point that something really awesome happened.

As we started back, with the pyramids on our left, nothing but desert on our right, and a view of the city ahead, it struck noon. The call to prayer rang out in the distance, echoing eerily and stirringly around the necropolis. Because it was a holy day, it lasted through our entire ride back to town, and at one point we crossed paths with a car being driven around town while someone yelled things in Arabic through a megaphone. Our driver was at the mosque when we dismounted, so we had to wait for him to finish, which we were more than happy to do. It gave us a chance to soak it all in, this incredible cultural difference between there and here. Really, there is nothing analogous to it. Can you imagine if at a set time on Sunday, people came on over the loudspeakers all over your hometown and recited prayers, or incited you to attend a service? And can you imagine if that happened every day? It's hard. I couldn't picture it even then. Totally fascinating, moving, and strangely beautiful. And what a way to hear it for the first time. I will never, ever forget what it felt like to be on top of a camel, slowly padding my way past the only original Wonder of the World that still stands, a gentle breeze cooling my face while the call to prayer sounded around us. Some memories fade but with others, you just close your eyes and you're right back there, and that's one of them.

And to think that's only what we did for HALF the day.

Egypt Part II

Gotta love getting up, throwing open the curtains, and being greeted with a view of one of the world's most famous rivers. First thing in the morning, the haze generally hasn't set in yet, allowing for nice clear shots like this one. I loved sitting out on the balcony and just watching, listening.

We spent our first morning in Cairo totally immersed in Very Old Things. Our hotel sat right next to The Egyptian Museum, and we thought that was a good way to begin -- kind of like a complete immersion, and as a bonus, we could walk without even having to cross a major street and thereby take our lives into our hands.

The guidebooks all give out hearty recommendations for dressing modestly while in Egypt -- generally targeted at women, as the culture there is increasingly conservative, but guys are also discouraged from tank tops and the like. So when we set off on our first day, Jess and I were careful to wear a skirt past the knees, and sleeves that were elbow-length or longer. I also kept one of those weird Survivor-style kerchiefs in my purse, in case we went into a mosque or something that discouraged hats but still wanted covered heads. It all led to a lot of photos where we look incredibly boho, like we're moments away from wandering into a coffee shop to play some folk music.

This is a shot from the balcony of our hotel room at the end of the trip, where we didn't pay the extra for a Nile view (post-Luxor, we spent one more day and night in Cairo before flying out). If you can't stare at the Nile, I'd argue that gazing upon this structure is a pretty appealing alternative. The building is beautiful, but not exactly modern -- no air conditioning, for instance, which would make a visit any later in the summer rather challenging. Inside, it's a glorified warehouse. Everything is chucked in there, organized by era very generally but otherwise just sitting around waiting for you to pay them attention. Walls are lined with sarcophagi, standing up or stacked on shelves, some cracked for a peek inside. At either end are two mummy displays, which show the partially unwrapped preserved carcasses of the country's great rulers (and a couple pretty middling ones). Very few things -- except the mummies, and a handful of other artifacts -- are labeled, so a guide or a good book are crucial if you want every single detail about all the artifacts from the Old, Middle, and New Kingdoms; we tried to make do with our books, which helped to a point and then left us to our own devices to interpret what everything else might be. In a way that was just as entertaining. Somewhere in the middle of the second floor there is a cooled room housing all the Tut artifacts that aren't in the traveling exhibit, including his famous death mask and the sarcophagus. The experience of wandering through this stunning building, looking at stuff that's as old as anything you've ever seen in your life, is really stirring and it fully whet our appetites for the coming days.

Sadly, Egypt is trying to build a new facility out near Giza to replace this one. It would be air-conditioned and probably better organized, but the reason I think it's a shame is that not only is this building stunning, but the experience of seeing such a remarkable collection laid out with no fanfare and zero fancy displays... it's rare, and almost half the fun.

The afternoon was spent at The Citadel, a gigantic old compound on a hill that contains one of Egypt's most famous mosques and a military museum.

Jessica has decided to parlay Egypt's need for better signage into millions of dollars. She's not wrong -- this one wasn't the most helpful thing in the world. But I love it -- for some reason I LOVE photographing signs, and this one is just so ancient and shabby-looking, it's perfect.

Despite wearing my long skirt, shirt, and hideous head-kerchief, when we went into one of the mosques, the ladies required me to wear a green sheet over myself. Just me, which was endlessly amusing to Jessica and Kevin, both of whom documented me in my very regal bedlinens:

Smart women, too: It's a heavy tipping culture, so if they see you taking this off as you prepare to leave, the ladies rush over and do it for you and then you are expected to tip them. And boy do people milk this elsewhere -- at the airport there are luggage scanners right when you walk in, before you even go to the check-in desk, and a dude will accost you and lift your luggage onto the belt, then act affronted when you don't tip him (even though these folks, who officially work at the airport, are not supposed to try and get tips from you here). Then before you know it, you've walked through the detector and a dude is already loading your cases onto a cart and insists on wheeling you over to the line. Guess what? Another tip. Guys hailing taxis for you want tips for themselves AND for the drivers, especially if they decide that both of them need to help put your luggage in the cars. As off-putting as all that can sound, though, they all kind of know they're playing the role and hoping to guilt people into a tip, and sometimes we were totally okay with that and sometimes we'd just smile and say "SHOKRAN" very firmly, which means "Thank you," and that kind of serves as a polite, "I SAID GOOD DAY, SIR," and they back away and act annoyed but no doubt get over it kind of fast because, again, it's all part of the game. It can come in handy, though -- our tour guide in Luxor often tipped the guards at the tombs so that we could sneak in ahead of a really large group. As off-putting as that sounds, though, Fortunately, Egypt is one of the few places where the dollar still has some heft, so you're not breaking the bank even with a generous tip.

Outside the military museum at The Citadel, you can gaze on an exhibit of planes and tanks and other warcraft, which is how we came to find these local kids frolicking on one of the tanks. I love this picture.

The complex is enormous and we were low on energy, so we moseyed around and checked out the inside of the mosque, the exterior exhibits of the museum, and the beautiful city views from up on the hill. There's a legend that says back in the Days of Yore, the air up there was considered the best in the city, because meat they left out would stay fresh for several days longer than it would anywhere else.

This is the view we got as we exited the facility. It was a fun trip up there, because a local group of kids was also there, and when they caught sight of us, they beamed wide and shouted, "HELLO! WELCOME TO EGYPT!" over and over again, friendly as can be. In fact, everyone we ran into was incredibly friendly. Sometime we would tell them we were Canadian, a pathetic little trick people claim helps American tourists avoid having to defend themselves to people who hate what our country is doing right now, and when we did we'd get an elated "Canada! Canada Dry!" But honestly, when we copped to being American, which was more often than not, people were even more excited. (The stock joke in that case, as the sun beat down on us: "Welcome to Alaska!") Over and over we heard how thrilled they were to see Americans coming to see their country, and loud insistences that we return home and tell everyone that Egyptians don't hate Americans and that we have nothing to fear by visiting. Many times we even heard that their favorite tourists are Americans because we're very expressive of our appreciation, so when they're pointing out the things they're so proud of about their city and their country, they relish the effusive reactions common to the natives of the U.S. That's always nice to hear. What's interesting to me about it is that, in a way, our self-consciousness as American travelers is not so different from their concerns -- they worry that all Muslims and Middle Eastern countries are judged by the actions of the extremists, and we worry that all Americans are judged by the actions and policies of our government. In fact, chatting to the gregarious cabbies was one of our absolute favorite experiences over there.

Dinner that night was hummus and grilled chicken and lamb, all relatively safe foods in a country where people worry about getting stomach bugs. None of us really got sick the whole time we were in Egypt, which I attribute to healthy paranoia -- no raw veg, bottled water (the water itself doesn't carry germs, but is in fact over-chlorinated, which can upset you as well because most people's stomachs aren't used to that level of chemical -- and rightly, I imagine), and limited experimentation when it came to food. We cleaned the tops of soda cans with baby wipes when drinking directly from them. And we stayed away from buffets, just so that we could (theoretically) control the freshness of what we were eating. It seemed to work.

So we gorged on falafel, mint-tinged hummus, grilled chicken skewers, and for me and Kevin some lamb dishes, plus large bottles of cold Egyptian beer. Then we headed back to the hotel for a good night's sleep. The next day, we planned to hit the pyramids, and come hell or high water, I wasn't returning without having sat astride a camel.

Egypt Travelogue: Day 1: Getting There

My first impression of Egypt was that it was blurry.

Of course, that's just because I was bleary-eyed and exhausted from the flights; we went from LAX to Heathrow to Cairo, with a 2.5-hour layover in between. Even Beijing wasn't that much travel -- 12 hours, direct, on Air China. So it was a lot of sitting, but when it ended, I was at my final destination. Heathrow was 10 hours away and Cairo another four-and-a-half. At least the British Airways flights had those seat monitors so we could watch whatever movies we chose:When I wasn't gossiping with Jessica, I whiled away the hours with Enchanted and, eventually, National Treasure: Book of SEEEEECRETS (you must utter it with a raspy, melodramatic tone), as well as most of the five magazines I packed and part of one of the six books. Like Jess, I have a pathological fear of running out of amusements on flights. It could've been worse: I left the house with eight books but decided to "be good" and leave two behind in the car. I have problems. But, SPOILER, I did end up arriving back home at the end of the trip having read all but two of the books and every magazine plus the Heat I purchased in Heathrow.

The big drama is that we had to fly into Terminal 5 -- our LAX flight landed there, but we transferred to Terminal 4 to catch the plane to Cairo. And about a week and a half before we left Los Angeles, British Airways opened T5 to much fanfare and disastrous baggage-handling problems that stranded or permanently lost thousands and thousands of suitcases. We joked about losing our bags, exacerbated by arriving at LAX and checking in, only to have the dude put "TRANSFER: TERMINAL 1" tags on our luggage because "we're out of all the T4 ones." We all opened our mouths to say something and then noticed the weary expression on his face that seemed to say, "I know what's coming, and I have had to give this answer a thousand times in the last week," so we just gave it up to the fates and prayed the Heathrow people would figure it out. Ultimately all three of us packed carry-on bags full of tiny toiletry essentials and as many clothes as we could fit, though, because the last thing we wanted was to get stranded in a hot climate and a culture that demands more conservative dress and good walking shoes, and find ourselves without an ample supply of those things. Bloody good thing: When we landed in Cairo on Wednesday just before midnight after about 18 hours of travel, Kevin's duffel bag -- into which we'd stuffed spare sneakers, big bottles of sunscreen, Luna bars, an extra hat, and overflow clothes in case we got sweaty and needed to change a few times a day -- wasn't on the baggage belt.

Side note: More thoughts on Terminal 5 later, but because of the suddenness of the flight cancellations and how it stalled BA's full switch to T5, they have a coach route between terminals that takes forever. Seriously, we spent 20 minutes on an overcrowded bus going over and under and around and through all these weird parts of the airport, with random tunnels and an up-close view of planes being restocked and refueled... if I'd been more awake I'd have wondered if this was the part where we were all killed so we couldn't complain about the future whereabouts of our luggage. But more to the point: Even though most flight ops will be from T5, why wouldn't they plan some kind of monorail to other terminals? $4.3 billion pounds and they couldn't drop a couple extra pence in the coffers for a shuttle? Please.

Back to Cairo: Fortunately we'd shelled out for a driver from the Nile Hilton to pick us up, and he helped Kevin convey all the lost luggage information to the right people. Since they kept trying to convince us the bag was somewhere on the belt despite it being empty, the smart money had that suitcase never finding us in Egypt.

The Cairo airport was a crowded nightmare, so having a driver helped immensely. You have to buy an entry visa, but you get it AT the airport before you go through to claim your bags. Lines are long and seemingly random, but the guide meant he could get someone's attention faster, get our paperwork, get our passports stamped, and get us through by circumventing the queues. Imagining having to negotiate that throng of humanity -- and dim lighting -- in the wee hours and on very little sleep, without ANY kind of aid, made my eyes cross.

But finally we were away, sailing through the then-empty streets, past statues and mosque minarets and the occasional billboard (my favorite: a Dorito with a hairy wig). It's always hard to drink in a city on a cab ride from the airport, but our tired eyes were still hungry. We were just so anxious to dive right in and get a feel for Cairo.

When picking our hotel, we went for a combination of location and reviews and moderate price, and we totally hit the jackpot. The Nile Hilton is in downtown Cairo alongside the famous river, right next to the Egyptian Museum and by a subway stop. We were on the same side of town as the Khan-el-Khalili bazaar, Coptic Cairo, the Citadel and other famous mosques; Giza and the pyramids were across the water. And that worked out to be our best decision, in terms of enjoying restaurants and playing our days fast and loose in terms of what we saw when.

It also had a great pool and a rooftop bar, which never hurts.

The one thing we'd read is that the Nile Hilton, one of the first major hotels to be built in Cairo, could use a renovation. And that's sort of true. While the cooling lobby was all fresh marble and ATMs and a deli and some shops, the rooms were a little more rustic. Totally clean, comfortable beds, beautiful Nile views, but fairly basic decor and even some awesome old furniture. When we entered, there was a wooden lattice frame that half-blocked the bedroom from the closet/foyer and bathroom (here, in Jess's room; mine and Kevin's was the mirror image), and one nightstand had channel-changing dials and volume knobs that, in the days of yore, would've controlled the TV, which you can sort of see in Jess's room in this shot. But I wouldn't have changed it for anything. There was something awesomely retro about it, and it wasn't run-down or disheveled. Just not state-of-the-art. And in an era where everyone seems to want to become a hip boutique hotel with minimalist decor that's never actually comfortable, I appreciate that the room felt homey even though it didn't feel new.

Because of the heat, we'd sworn we'd get an early start most days. But this being our first day, we let ourselves "sleep in" and planned to meet at nine to kick off our sightseeing. Even at this late -- or early? -- hour, there was music and chatter wafting up to our seventh-floor balcony, just enough to give us a feel for the rhythm of the city but not enough to keep us from conking out as soon as we switched off the lamp. Cairo would have to wait.

But just for seven hours.

Flights of Fancy

So sorry -- I have not totally dropped off the face of the Earth, I promise. See, Jessica and I are smack in the middle of a period in our lives we have been referring to as The Crazy, and it's keeping me away from a lot of things. Like vegetables, and this blog.

We just got back from an eight-day trip that was work-related, long days and then blogging by candlelight at night, and on Thursday morning we're turning around and flying to NYC for Fashion Week for another nine. Then we're home for two weeks exactly before we head BACK to the Big Apple for a couple book interviews on the radio and a party that our publisher and New York magazine are throwing for it.

I know, I know, champagne problems. And I'm not complaining. So far, despite being knackered, I'm thrilled and happy with everything we're doing. But by the time I had been awake for 24 hours and arrived home at 2:30 a.m. Monday, I was completely exhausted. At one point on the short hop to LA from our Vegas connection, I lost the ability to read. While waiting for our bags at LAX, we were both struggling to hold ourselves upright.

Still, we always yield a story or two -- it feels like whenever Jessica and I travel together, SOMETHING happens to aggravate us. We have a knack for attracting either really annoying flight attendants, or hugely amusing ones. On this trip, we got a United pilot on the way out who hopped on the loudspeaker and delivered a stand-up comedy routine while everyone boarded, closely followed by one of my two suitcases not arriving and the United counter not properly filing the baggage report -- leading to my bag not getting there until 4 p.m. the next day, although if you used the telephone or online baggage-locater service that they try foisting upon you so that they don't have to trouble an actual person with your problem, you would think my bag never arrived. Because for three hours after my missing bag had been delivered and unpacked, the online service still claimed United had no idea where it was. Guess who's getting a letter?

On the way back, we had a code-share situation where we booked through United but the flight was Air Canada, with a US Airways connection in Las Vegas taking us home to Los Angeles. When we went to check in at the Air Canada desk, we were told that we'd have to go check in at United. So we rolled our two giant bags each over to the United desk, waited in line again, and then heard from THAT girl that we'd have to go check in with Air Canada.

"But she told us we had to come to you," I said.

"Well, you can't."

By now, the Air Canada line was seven-deep. "Are we going to walk all the way over there and have to wait in line, only to be told AGAIN that we can't check in there?" I asked.

"I don't know," she shrugged. Finally she wandered over to the counter to ask the Air Canada ladies -- two different ones, of course -- and they all looked at us disapprovingly. Then she came back and dispatched us over there.

"Are we going to have to wait in that long line again, even though we already did once and were mistakenly sent to you?" I asked.

"Yep, guess so," she said.

At this point, Jess got in line at Air Canada -- seething -- while I checked us in for our Vegas-LA leg with two lovely ladies at the US Airways counter. Then I scampered back to the Air Canada line, where we waited, and waited, and waited... and were checked in without incident, despite the fact that the first lady had insisted boredly that she had no idea what we were talking about with our itinerary, and that we clearly were in the wrong line. FURY. Guess who ELSE is getting a letter? Actually, mostly United -- that lady was truly a terror. She should have expressed an interest in making sure we were taken care of correctly, and possibly even secured us a spot at the front of the Air Canada line because we'd been bounced around so incorrectly and unceremoniously. But no.

The Continental flights we take to Newark for Fashion Week ALWAYS have a raging cow on board, also, so it'll be interesting to see how this goes on Thursday.

Travelogue: 46 in 54

2. Travel to a place where the language isn't as easy to learn: Anywhere in the Far East, for example, or maybe Russia.

In many ways, I wish I'd visited China ten years ago. The country it was then, as seen by my parents, didn't bear much resemblance to the way it is now; English was less widely embraced, construction and refurbishment was less widespread, and the nation didn't yet know that a decade hence it would be preparing to sit in the global spotlight.

Yet on the other hand, I'm thrilled to have seen Beijing as I did, in the throes of a transition as it prepares for the Olympics to arrive on 08/08/08 -- a date chosen for its numerical symmetry and the repetition of the digit that symbolizes prosperity.

This is an entry I had to wait to write for a while, but also one I dreaded tackling because there's no way I can say it all, recount everything, or fully convey what the trip was to me. Where to begin, I didn't even know. But, buoyed by a back issue of Sports Illlustrated about the Olympics, I decided to start there and see how it flowed.

Just DEAL WITH IT, Sir

I've always been a stickler for following rules. Simply put, I don't like to get in trouble; I hate that feeling of embarrassment and shame that washes over me when I am busted for something, like the time I got caught by my mother for letting a friend smoke in our house in seventh grade and thinking opening a window would be enough to combat the smell. Or the time none of us cleaned up our rooms the way my mother asked us to, so that when a prospective buyer came to look at our house, there was underwear on my floor. This is also one major reason I have never gotten into drugs or shoplifted anything on a dare, or even stolen cable. I don't like getting in trouble with my MOTHER. Imagine if the long arm of the law were doing the busting.

This does, however, have the effect of making me not understand when people do stuff that's against the rules (within reason; obviously, I drank before I was 21, dabbled in premarital sex, and ran four road races with an iPod even though they don't like it when you do that). Specifically, it rankles me when people flout little stuff that it would cost you NOTHING to do the way you're asked.

On our flight back home from New York, the guy sitting in front of Jessica plopped down after he boarded and knocked his seat back and lounged. We looked at each other, amused, because who doesn't know that you have to have your seat in the fully upright position for takeoff and landing? This guy was slick -- white leisure suit, gelled hair, designer shades, and probably expensive leather loafers. He was young, cocky. But we figured he just wanted to wait in maximum comfort until we pulled away from the gate, and although it seemed sort of pointless, we ignored it.

But then the flight attendant -- I miss the word "stewardess," though; are we really not allowed to say it any more? -- came by to do her sweep of the cabin. On her fourth pass down the aisle, she noticed his seat was still reclined, and asked him to move it fully upright. He did... until she walked away, at which point HE JAMMED IT BACKWARD AGAIN.

Really, sir? Obviously, this is the sort of rule-breaking that is probably not hurting anyone, but at the same time, it's also not the kind of rule that's impossible to obey. Just DO IT, already. Sure, your seat being back might not affect our safe takeoff, but is it really so impossible for you to wait until we're in the air to recline? We have a 5.5 hour flight; you can't take 20 minutes beforehand to endure sitting upright before relaxing? What galls me most, though, is how he was told to fix it, pretended to, and then went right back to doing whatever he damn well pleased.

Otherwise, the flight was fine. We have a history of weird stewardesses (screw it, world, I like that word) on our Continental flights to Newark Airport; usually the way out there, we have total kooks -- like the woman this season who couldn't remember Jessica's drink order, then paced the aisles three times to try and find who the rogue Diet Coke was for and never noticed that we were trying to get her attention -- and on the way back, complete bitches. One time, the service was so slow, poor, and rude that the passenger behind us actually saw fit to speak up to the lady committing most of the fouls. He made a very polite, totally merited complaint. Her response? She smiled mirthlessly at him and hissed, "Well, Continental is always looking to hire enthusiastic flight attendants, so maybe you should contact them about signing up!" Translation: YOU THINK YOU CAN DO BETTER? THEN GO F'ING SIGN UP AND DO IT YOURSELF. We appreciated the originality of her approach, but in this case, it wasn't a harried lady trying to be diplomatic with a mean customer. It was a justifiably frustrated passenger getting told, though not in so many words, to stuff it.

New York was wonderful, even on the rainy days. Aside from London, there's no other place I'd like to be in a downpour. But the pretty days made for calm lunch breaks in Bryant Park -- even with the tents up, there's room outside to sit and eat, or read The Daily, or just catch your breath before BlackBerrying an update to your editor. And I love setting off for a place on foot, if I can, so all the walking we did -- despite occasionally hacking up my feet -- was exactly what I wanted out of the trip. As was the celeb-spotting.

But it's good to be home. Kevin starts a new job here today, so I got back just in time to wish him well and send him out the door with his lunch money. And I'll get to back in the glow of NFL Sunday Ticket this weekend -- lots of pretty football in pretty, pretty HD. I'm ready. I've been waiting since basically February for this and I plan to enjoy the hell out of it.

And then there's the Fall TV Preview issue of Entertainment Weekly and the viewing schedule I need to make, plus a stack of magazines to read and bills to pay... it's like coming back to a giant pile of homework. Tomorrow: 500 words on the importance of Hayden Panettiere to American society, and an outline for a term paper on Heath Ledger's Private Pain.

Get Off My Lap, You Crazy Wench

I'm back from vacation, having caught a wicked flu on the plane on the way home -- which MIGHT be due, in part, to the evil woman next to me. Not that she had any demonstrable signs of sickness, but she was the most inconsiderate seatmate I've ever encountered in my life, so I want to blame her for my life's ills.

First up, she nailed me hard in the arm with her elbow no fewer than five times, and never once looked over to acknowledge it or offer up an apology. Then she fell asleep for a few hours stretched out with her legs over her husband's lap and her head on our shared armrest, which meant that at first just one of her elbows was jabbing at my lap and after a while, half her head and all her hair basically ended up in MY lap, and whenever I tried to scoot out of the way, she took that to mean, "YAY, more space for ME!" Who does that? Who?

She also spent whatever time she wasn't asleep talking at top volume to her husband -- prompting the woman sitting behind me to approach me after we landed and say sympathetically, "You had a REALLY pleasant flight, huh? I wanted to smack them for you" -- and, once I finally started dozing off, she actually LEANED OVER ME and opened my window shade, letting in bright light that immediately woke me up, and then proceeded to yap AGAIN in her outside voice right into my ear.

My one comfort right now: I returned to discover that our DirecTV DVR seems to have updated its software, and suddenly, PRAISE JESUS, it adopted that awesome thing TiVo does where when you hit "play" after fast-forwarding, it backs up a few seconds. THANK YOU, MY LOVE. I think we're going to get along just fine after all.

Speaking of spiders

This is the one we had in our hotel room in Cabo. (Apparently the next morning there was another in the bathroom. Kevin killed them both. He is brave.) We had one on our patio that had its legs flatter, so you could really see its size, but I was not drunk when I spied that one and so I was too scared to get a picture. Seriously, thank GOD I was hammered out of my mind, or else I'd never have been able to sleep knowing those bitches were out there.

This was our hotel, the Pueblo Bonito Sunset Beach. For anyone who cares about such things, Duckie from Pretty In Pink just married a very pretty and nice local reporter at this hotel, on this beach. Aw. There was a wedding when we were staying there, and an older relative of the bride was staying in our cluster of rooms; we saw her getting ready to go in her golf cart and she was freaking out about whether her hair could survive the breeze on the way down to the beach. I sympathize.

And I wonder if THEY had spiders in THEIR room. Loved this hotel, but until I know for sure those monsters don't want to eat me or poison my blood, I'm not sure I'd return.

5 States, 4 Time Zones, 3 Bruins, 2 Domers, and a Syracuse Grad

What a weekend. I got to show my girls around one of my favorite places on Earth, I drank too much beer and ate too much grease and screamed my throat raw and loved every damn second of it -- except for the stupid trash-talking asswad who managed to be That One Guy who misrepresents an entire fan base and ruins a good experience with his idiocy. But I'll get to that later. First, there's so much fun stuff to remember.

(I don't think Dan will mind me sharing: The most recent photos here are from our trip, but he also has an ND gallery; the ones from our trip begin with the last two shots on the penultimate row.)

Since about 2002, we've been talking about traveling to South Bend for the ND-UCLA game, the first in a pair that will conclude in 2007 when Notre Dame comes to the Rose Bowl. I've wanted to show them the campus, the gleaming Dome, all the things that own a huge piece of my heart but which felt so distant from my life in L.A. You can watch the telecasts and you can hear stories and see photos but it's always more fun to see it in person -- always better to be able to tell the stupid tales as well as pointing out the landmarks. Like, "Oh, that's where my roommate Sarah jumped into a bush when we were drunk, not realizing there was a bench on the other side, and we took her to the infirmary for stitches and had to pretend it was something she did while sober." Or, 'That's the dorm lobby where I sat -- so I could work through the night rather than keep MB awake with my desk light or get distracted by hallway gossip -- on those two November nights to fabricate entries for my ignored daily Freshman Seminar journal, and MB would walk in and out of the dorm for dinner or a date or whatnot, and shout, 'What day is it, HAC?' and I'd scream, 'September 16!' and then hit myself in the head with the notebook."

Kevin and I arrived in Chicago late Thursday night so that we could spend Friday morning with his grandmother, who lives in a nursing home in Schaumburg. She's doing much better -- having them dispense her medication has made her a lot more lucid -- but you can't stop the disease from addling your short-term memory. However, the disease can't stop a proud grandmother from exaggerating, either. Every time we passed an employee who greeted her by name, she'd grab Kevin's elbow and say, "This is my grandson. He... tell them what you do," and he'd say, "I'm your grandson!" and she'd tsk and tell the ladies, "Any movie you've seen, he did it." Which we, and they, let slide, because everyone knows that the language of grandparents needs to be divided by 10. Or in this case, infinity.

Then we picked up the girls at O'Hare, and the long-awaited trip began. Finally.