The Land Before Time: Papyrus VI - Coptic Cairo, Khan el-Khalili Bazaar

After Islamic Cairo, we visited another part of Cairo with historical significance - Coptic Cairo. FYI the Coptic era of Cairo dates further back than the Islamic era. This is why Coptic Cairo is also known as Old Cairo, strongly influenced by Roman culture and Christianity.

Coptic Museum, with a very Roman architecture. Spent a significant amount of time inside but too bad no phototaking allowed.

Is that a maze underneath? Haha...

Another mosque?...Wait look carefully!

These are actually churches, not mosques. Don't let the domes fool you.

The familiar cross.

A very Egyptian architecture. Those who played empire-building games will find such design familiar.

I feel like in Rome...

Another pretty church...or mosque? It gets pretty confusing after a while.

Unknowingly we walked into a mosque. A nice red carpet to send us to another side of the courtyard haha.

Yes...escape the hot weather outside. Those fans is a godsend.

You know...I feel very sleepy whenever I enter this kind of prayer hall. It's far too cooling, quiet and comfortable.

After an afternoon nap in the mosque, we returned to see the churches...

Amen

Visited quite a few churches along the alleys, as well as synagogues too (place of worship for Jewish).

May Jesus be with you.

Small prayer room.

No one noticed...shhhh.

Walked into this gorgeously decorated room and started snapping away, until someone told us it's out of bounds to outsiders lol....we walked into private property.

Other than vehicles, there are many other road users in Egypt, including ponies as shown here, horses (lugging carriages) and camels too! Their camels are huge!

Cairo has a terrible waste disposal system. All household rubbish practically goes to the streets and they are hardly cleared. Super unsightly.

There is nothing much in Coptic Cairo, compared to Islamic Cairo. Hence we returned to Islamic Cairo to visit the biggest and most famous bazaar in Cairo - Khan el-Khalili. It was really crowded and flooding, not only with people but goods as well.

Lelong begins at the roadside. Both the shopfront and cars are competing for roadspace!

Came across this mango juice cart. Very nice to drink! (though the way they wash the cups is a bit...)

A true bazaar indeed. Lots of chapalang stuff on sale. It gets super crowded as you venture deeper. Not only shoulder-to-shoulder, but chest-to-chest.

Almost all goods sold on the streets don't carry any price tags. This means you have to ask for the price from the shopkeeper. And that also means you'll most likely be ripped off because they will quote a price 2-3 times (or even more) higher than the market price, the moment they see that you're a foreigner. But this gives you room for haggling, like taxi fares. Heard that shopkeepers are used to people haggling with them and therefore...

TLBT Tip No.7: NEVER agree to pay the price that they quote initially. ALWAYS try to haggle, especially in souvenir shops catered for foreigners. The rule of thumb is, ask for one-third of their quoted price, then work your way towards half of their initial price. (Eg. if they say 60 pounds, ask for 20 pounds first) Hopefully the deal can be struck by then. BUT...shopkeeper knows this rule pretty well, so they try to beat it by quoting the item 3 or 4 or even 5 times more than the market price. In such case, depending on the worth of the item (as judged from our own eyes) you may try to quote even lower than one-third. (Eg. if they say 100 pounds ask for 20 pounds right from the start) Yes, it's pretty hard to open your mouth and quote such a ridiculously low price. And you can see the shopkeeper's jaw drop and exclaim "WHAT?? NO!!" However sometimes it's just all an act to make you believe that the item is worth much more than you ask for. You need to be courageous sometimes.

When all else fails, WALK AWAY. Yes, walking away definitely helps in getting what you want at a much lower price. I walked away a lot of times and the shopkeeper was desperately calling me back:

Me: This one how much?
Shop: 200 pounds
Me: 60 pounds
Shop: No no no, 180 pounds
Me: *shakes head* 70 pounds
Shop: No...final price 150 pound okay?
Me: No, 80 pounds
Shop: No no no no...150 pound final price.
Me: *walks away*
Shop: Okay okay, 120 pounds okay?
Me: No. 80 pounds. *walks away*
Shop: Okay okay okay, 100 pounds final!
Me: *walks away*
Shop: OKAY OKAY OKAY OKAY!!! 80 POUNDS OKAY!!

Note that it's not ethical to suddenly lower your asking price, or refuse to buy AFTER you've agreed on the price. DON'T attempt to haggle if you've no interest in buying. The shopkeeper will curse you to death.

However the shopkeeper is often smarter/craftier than the buyer, after all they are experienced in dealing with all these kind of haggling. They won't do a losing business.

Even if they don't call you back after you walk away, it's totally fine since the same item can be found almost anywhere on the streets. In the bazaar, a lot of stalls sell practically the same things. After walking away, you can just walk to the next stall and try your luck.

Another strategy is to buy multiple items and ask for a set discount. Not only this will confuse the shopkeeper for a moment, the more items you buy the more the shopkeeper is willing to give a discount.

Me: This one, how much?
Shop: 45 pounds
Me: This one, how much?
Shop: 75 pounds
Me: This one, how much?
Shop: 120 pounds pounds
Me: I buy these three, for 60 pounds.
Shop: *hesitates and starts to count in own head* Noo...200 pounds!

A plaza with a nice view of the mosque.

I met an interesting kid here. He's about 8-10 years old I guess. He was playing with his friends in the plaza when he suddenly walked up to me and said "您好！". Not surprising...since I've been greeted like this by the locals for the nth time. Then he said "我爱中国" in perfect Chinese! Perfect as in the 4 tones and accent was spot on. I was stunned, since it's pretty rare to see non-Asian foreigners being able to grasp the 4 tones in Chinese. What's more he looks like a normal kid on the street, not from any elite families or whatsoever. How did he manage to learn such Chinese from? Out of sudden, he showed me a few packs of tissue paper and said "One for XXX pounds"... Okay...trying to build rapport with me right...

This is Al-Azhar mosque - the very first mosque we visited. The sunset makes the structure look really pretty.

Shishas are everywhere!

Huge pancakes for dinner! One of the best pancakes I've ever eaten. Extremely filling too.

After all the shopping and haggling, I felt I've levelled up considerably haha. But it was really exhausting as well. Both mentally and physically. Because it's a crowded place, I had to stay alert at all times and not let my mind wander off.

The Land Before Time: Papyrus V - Islamic Cairo, Al-Azhar Park

After visiting Citadel, we decided to walk to our next destination. From the map, it doesn't look very far...but the scale of maps can be quite deceiving lol.

I don't really like walking along, or being near, roads in Egypt, for a few reasons:

1) The way Egyptians drive makes me feel that they are going to hit an innocent pedestrian sooner or later.

2) We are constantly honked by taxis, even though we showed no sign of wanting to ride one. The most frustrating part is when we are waiting for cars to pass by so as to cross the road, and then a taxi slows down in front of us and blocks our way (with a loud honk of course).

3) There are always mischievous people calling out 'Hey!' or 'Welcome!' or '你好！' from their cars/motorcycles as they drive past us. The amazing thing is that they are able to tell that we are Chinese (or yellow skinned Asians) merely from our back view.

Walking along such congested road isn't a good idea. Not only you get whacked by the unfiltered exhaust fumes, motorists who get bored by the traffic jam will disengage their gears and turn to engage with rare foreigner pedestrians like us... Yes I feel very very welcomed, thank you. -__-

The pavements aren't very nice to walk on, as you can see. Lots of rocks and debris, and some parts there isn't any proper pavements and we had to walk on the road. But walking and looking at such 'exotic' views 也是别有一番风味 :p

It wasn't planned in our schedule initially, but I'm glad we went here - Al-Azhar Park

A very Islamic society indeed. Men and women have different ticket booths. I don't really see a point in this but well...

This must be the most peaceful place in Cairo. I could walk around freely without any hassle from locals.

I'm actually glad that this park requires an admission fee. Though it's not expensive at all (to us), it is sufficient to sieve in only people from the upper social class of Cairo. That's why there are no annoying pesters from beggars etc, or persistent touts who seek to suck tourists' blood. 

Saw a group of people with lots of 'graffiti' written on their white shirts. I guess this is some university graduation gathering. (Oops...someone spotted me taking pictures of them...)

Wow...this greenery is equivalent to that in SG's Botanic Gardens. Never expect to see such lush greenery in Egypt. Somehow it makes my mind more calm and relaxed.

Water is very precious in Egypt. This must be the only time I see such a big body of water in Egypt.

Wedding in the park! In SG this is rare because of the hot weather. Yes it's hot here too, but you don't sweat remember?

I'm not joking when I say the sun is the powered-up version of what we experience in SG. It looks so huge from this pic haha.

A view of the pretty Citadel

View of the park entrance from the top of the knoll. Other than the park, it's all sand and desert beyond...

Not only the most peaceful, but the greenest place in Egypt. Too bad without artificial soil, these trees cannot survive on the normal grounds. Maintenance cost of this park must be pretty high.

Behold the green pastures and the minaret-filled skyline.

在沙漠中的草原

This place used to be a fortress I think, that's why castle walls can still be seen surrounding the elevation.

These university graduates seem to be enjoying themselves =) In SG, we attend balls/prom etc but in Egypt a park with lush greenery is sufficient.

Time to reward a good dinner to ourselves =)

This grilled chicken was not bad. And the juice was heavenly (under thirsty conditions).

You'll never see an Egyptian meal without pita bread. Look at the acne-like spots on the bread surface. This is one reason why I feel pita bread doesn't look very appetizing. There is also too much flour for my liking.

Night falls. The park starts lighting up.

Pretty illumination from Citadel!

Other than the roads, the rest of the city is generally quite dark.

Time to head back to the hotel! Of course it's not very safe to walk on the streets under such darkness. But fret not, there are plenty of taxis at the park entrance, which makes it easy to slash prices.

Talking about taxis in Egypt, their fares are really cheap. This is due to their low petrol prices - about 0.40 SGD per liter. (compared to SG which is about 2.00 SGD per liter) So you can expect taxi fares to be about 5 times as cheap haha.

TLBT Tip No.6: In Egypt, most taxis don't have a meter. Even if a taxi has one, the driver never use it. So it's very important to decide on the fare with the driver BEFORE you get on, otherwise there will be a big argument and the driver will never let you off until you pay his assumed fare. This gives you room to haggle on the price, but you need to know the 'standard' market price first, which is not easy because of the unfamiliarity with distances in a foreign country. For example according to the guidebook, the trip from A to B usually cost 20 EGP, but most drivers will quote much higher at about 50 EGP. Though it might be a little shameless to haggle when the price is already quite cheap (compared to SG standards), don't let the locals keep sucking your blood. It can be a little unbelievable for a 20-25min trip to cost only 5 SGD, but it can be further haggled until 3 SGD!

There was once I managed to haggle until a low price (I hope it was) and the taxi driver eventually gave in to my request, albeit reluctantly. He asked me which country I am from and I said 'China'. Then he asked me how much a taxi would cost in China for the same distance, and I gave a really cheap amount, cheaper than what I agreed to pay the driver LOL. The driver became speechless...I guess he knows things in China are pretty cheap too. This is one of many situations in overseas where I found that pretending to be a tourist from China can be quite convenient muhahahaha.