July 10th
Today, Chris and I went to the Pyramids. The guidebook said it opened at 7 and when we showed up at 7:30 we were disappointed to find that we couldn’t get in. The taxi-driver tried the same kind of scam where he took us to his friend next to the gate who wanted to hook us up with horses and show us everything we were going to see. I simply leaned back let him give me his spiel and then declined saying that I want to walk and that I know the pyramids as I live in Cairo. Swindlers 0, Me and Chris 1.
Next after we found the pyramid still closed some guy insisted on showing us around the town around the pyramids. He would pick up rubbish off the ground and then give it to us for “free.” He gave me a broken head of Cleopatra and gave Chris a piece of alabaster. It was kind of hilarious, considering we had nothing better to do. They changed the ticket booth at the entrance since the last time I had been there so I was kind of suspicious of whether or not it was legitimate. But it was and after getting through security we wandered off to the Pyramids, thinking that we had lost the guy as he didn’t go through security. I felt pretty victorious as we didn’t have to pay him. Swindlers 0, Me and Chris 2.
However, I might have counted my points too soon as when we were half way up the hill to the Pyramids, he came running after us asking for us to wait. You see, before the gate he had learned that we had interest in climbing the pyramids, and had apparently made some calls. So we went with him and he would pay guards money as we walked towards the third pyramid. I was willing to see what would become of it. On the way we got stopped by a guy who wanted to have us take a picture of him, and he insisted it was for free. So I said go ahead to Chris, and then went to listen to the guy talk to a police officer. When I turned back, Chris had a kuffiya on his head and was up on the Camel, I was like whoa-whoa, but Chris said he was willing to pay a little. So we wandered along towards the third pyramid as the “guy” took pictures of Chris up on the Camel. Eventually we had enough and it took some coaxing to let him let Chris down. He then insisted on us paying him 100 pounds. I was offended at this, as the distance was worth 20 only. We got into an argument, rather heated I might add in a mix of Arabic and English, as there was no way I was paying 100. Eventually we gave him 40, which I was still kind of upset about, but just to get him to leave. He was pissed and rode off in a huff. Oh well, who the hell did he think we were? I would count that as a neutral point, as neither of us really won that one.
Next our guy continued to show us stuff on the way to the third pyramid, and eventually I got fed up of this and said we want to climb only. He finally ceased with the time-wasting and took us to the pyramid. Here we meet the guy that would take us up, who originally was going to charge us 200 dollars, which we refused, and since I lived in Zamalek, and was like an Egyptian, they were going to give us it for 120 dollars each I believe. I feigned not hearing on this and argeed on 120 dollars for the two of us, which they accepted. I had heard the going rate to climb the third pyramid was 100 dollars so 60 each seemed more than fair for us. So the man, who was like 50 took us up the third great pyramid, and he sure could climb. He would hop up the blocks like it was nothing. It wasn’t a tricky climb but it was on of endurance and eventually we made it too the top, which was really sweet. We had to stay on the south side as we didn’t want too many cops to see or too many people to see. Still it was fun, and we gave the man 20 dollars in tip. Considering several police officers came over during the time we were climbing it seemed legitimately illegal and we bribed the right people. I felt good about the price and once we were far enough away the “guy” continued to try and show us stuff. At this point I had enough of him and told him that we wanted to walk by ourselves. I thought 100 pounds was more than enough for what he did, but he was absolutely would not it. We gave him 200 and he still insisted we needed to give him 100 more. This I thought was bullshit, and started to argue with him a lot. He wouldn’t budge and neither would I and I was willing to just walk away or tell him to get lost as he really couldn’t do anything, but we instead we gave him 60 pounds more. I wasn’t happy about this, but he was gone and all in all it only cost us 90 dollars to climb the pyramid each, which is still 10 dollars less than the going rate. So I was pretty happy with this.
Afterwards we headed off to the second pyramid, ate a little bit, and then Chris headed down into it. I had already been and had no desire to go again so I waited outside with the Camera. Chris came back up and said that I didn’t miss anything, so we headed to the Sphinx and then around the largest Pyramid. Finally, we headed out and found the bus back to the Midan Tahrir. Not knowing when to get off we rather awkwardly had to get called out by girls in the front of the bus and got off closer to the museum then anything else. Oh well, we headed off to K-tah and then got some Mango juice, which apparently Chris didn’t think was the safest thing or the tastiest. However, these to me were all things Chris needed to experience in order to get the whole
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