Friendliest Falafel Stand Ever

I wish I could read Arabic because I'd like to know what the sign above this shop at the souq in Aswan says:

Actually, if I sit here long enough with the Standard Arabic Alphabet page of our Lonely Planet Middle East guide, maybe I can figure it out . . . [half-hour later] . . . OK, if I'm reading it correctly, it's "Htghm al Badaldzldy." Somehow I don't think that's correct.

Anyway, so shortly after arriving at Aswan, and before our field trip to Philae Temple, we had to go find something to eat. So a group of us went trooping through the souq looking for food. A shop owner on Sharia as-Souq asked what we were looking for — "meat or vegetable" — and herded us to this falafel place where for 10 Egyptian Pounds we got five falafel sandwiches. The guys at the falafel shop were so, so excited to serve us falafel.

We got a tour of their falafel-making operation:

Soon many men appeared. I don't know if it was because they saw us taking pictures that they wanted to take pictures with us or whether it was because three of us were female that they wanted to take pictures with us, but suffice it to say, pictures were taken, including several with some guy from the market who took a particular interest in Compulsory. It wasn't until later when we went through all the images that we noticed how earnest he was about putting his arm around Compulsory's shoulder. [Edit: Compulsory emails to say that it wasn't just that the guy was holding her shoulder with a death grip that was so notable but also that he had this unsmiling stare — bordering on a glare — that he gave the camera, while at the same time insisting that more and more pictures of the two of them be taken. OK — then how about we call it "very earnest"?]

The sociological aspects of male-female physical contact in a conservative society aside, it really would make a great commercial for Canon or Nikon or any old point-and-shoot camera with the word "pix" in its model name:

WOMAN OFF-CAMERA: Our trip to [fill in name of conservative country] was a real hoot!

[WHIMSICAL SCENES OF WESTERN WOMEN TRAVELING — BOAT TRIPS, SLEEPY OVERNIGHT TRAINS, ANCIENT ARCHAEOLOGICAL SITES]

WOMAN OFF-CAMERA (CONT'D): We traveled by plane, train, boat . . . and even a felucca!

[WHIMSICAL SCENES OF WESTERN WOMEN IN MARKETPLACE MISHAPS]

WOMAN OFF-CAMERA (CONT'D): And through it all we had the YouPix 35-2000D at the ready! Perfect for pointing, shooting . . .

[WHIMSICAL SCENE OF WESTERN WOMEN TAKING PICTURES WITH "LOCALS," ONE OF WHOM EARNESTLY GRIPPING THE SHOULDERS OF THE WOMEN]

WOMAN OFF-CAMERA (CONT'D): . . . and making new friends! The YouPix 35-2000D — for everything!

Now it did occur to me that it might not be wise to eat raw vegetables (Cucumber, I'm looking at you) within 48 hours of landing in Egypt, but the falafel guys were so friendly that it felt wrong to stop them to ask how they washed their produce or request that certain items be peeled. And there were several of us — I assumed someone else might have thought about it in advance and assumed it would be fine. Turns out all of us were worried about the same thing and none of us said anything. The false wisdom of the group.

So we went with it. It mostly worked out. For most of us. Except for when it didn't, which was the problem for some of us. But with falafel this friendly, how could you ever turn it down?

See also the Big Map: Egypt/Jordan, December 27, 2010-January 11, 2011.

You Only Really Use Street Lights And Headlights Half The Time Anyway

Late last night, CBS New York posted an article about how burned out street lights on highways are not being replaced:

In a dark manifestation of the new normal, lights on major highways are blinking out — and staying that way — and the American Automobile Association says New Yorkers may have to get used to it, reports CBS 2's Lou Young.

If you think Winter nights might be a little darker lately, it might not be your imagination. On the Cross County Parkway, it's difficult to count the number of unlit street lamps.

Many fear the darkened lights may be a sign of these austere times.

Certainly troubling, but are street lamps even necessary?

In Luxor we ate a nice meal at a restaurant called Sofra. Sofra was good, and it was nice to eat good Egyptian food in Egypt, especially when so many restaurant menus there seem to be tailored to international tourists' tastes (Veal Piccata, Fish & Chips — really?). We got a ride to the restaurant, but we needed to take a taxi back to our hotel, a 1.8 kilometer trip. Our Egyptian guide said we should expect to pay 20 Egyptian Pounds ($3.43) for the four of us.

After dinner, we rolled out onto Mohamed Farid Street where a taxi was waiting. Michael handled the negotiation. The driver wanted 30 pounds but Michael stood firm at 20 pounds. The driver began to leave, telling us that we would soon have to pay 50 pounds. Not twelve seconds later he returned, and agreed to our 20 pound price. I don't remember if he vigorously shook Michael's hand and grinned wildly but it seems like he would have. It was a very successful negotiation, and everyone was happy in the end.

What's surprising about Egypt isn't so much that you're expected to haggle over nearly everything — that's just a cliche about Egypt — but rather that so much time and effort goes into haggling over a price that was probably already determined well in advance.

The driver wanted to know if we needed the service of a driver while we were in Luxor. The travel agency coordinated all our transport, so we did not. "I can do it cheaper," he maintained. "All the sights." It was OK, we insisted, we would use the minivan that was already arranged for us. Eventually he gave up.

As we were twisting around the traffic circle at the end of Khaled Ibn Al Walid Street, I was reminded of something I was curious about. It was one of the first things we noticed shortly after landing in Cairo as we hurtled down the 20-plus kilometer 6th October Bridge elevated highway, the longest such elevated roadway in Africa (we were told), which also commemorates the Yom Kippur/Ramadan/October/1973 Arab-Israeli/Fourth Arab-Israeli War. Simply, many drivers in Egypt eschewed headlights.

Now I'm a Triple-A type of guy, and I always assumed that headlights were absolutely essential for safety, but maybe there was something I didn't understand.

Easy, the driver explained as he flipped his lights on and off — it is unnecessary to use headlights when the streets are already lit by street lights. Besides, he added, you don't want to drive with people who use headlights in this situation because it shows that they have bad eyesight.

Fair enough. For another perspective, the BBC h2g2 site notes that "Egyptians consider it rude to drive with the headlights on," which is a stranger explanation, for sure. (Later on we'll discuss the cultural significance of wet hair, but all in good time.)

When we got out at our hotel, the driver insisted we take his card, just in case we needed a driver. Here is his card:

We were not in Luxor more than 36 hours — and much of that was spent on the West Bank looking at old stuff — but we ran into Mr. Fish at least twice, maybe three times. The first time he made us feel bad for wanting to walk (in retrospect, a poor decision on our part). The other times were just funny — everyone laughed — "Mr. Fish, he's the best!" one of his friends enthused.

So it was very gratifying to me this morning to see that Mr. Fish is an entire forum on Trip Advisor, and that apparently Mr. Fish is not just just one fish but rather a whole school of fish, or rather a family of brothers, or perhaps just a bunch of drivers working for the same company. And the Trip Advisor posters add that there is also a Mr. Chips. Fish and Chips — no wonder the menus are what they are.

See also the Big Map: Egypt/Jordan, December 27, 2010-January 11, 2011.

You Know It Until You See It

In the seventh grade I had a science teacher with a wicked pedagogical sense who, among other things, successfully convinced many of us that it was at least theoretically possible for a man to bear a child. The method wasn't easy and would be quite onerous, he explained, but it had something to do with growing an embryo in one's eye, transferring it to one's side via invasive surgery and removing it via surgery again once the baby reached full term.

Of all the bad information he liked to dole out, this was one item that stuck with me for a very long time. Even into adulthood I held on to this possibility, this despite all rational evidence to the contrary, not least of which being a very thorough week of sex education in the sixth grade. This teacher, I don't mind telling you, was the subject of odd rumors at my school after we found out that he had been transferred from another school in the district.

Then again, for the duration of the school year, he had what could have been an unruly class in the palm of his hand, so maybe it all worked out in the end. I don't think this method of teaching would pass muster in the overly standard-focused era of No Child Left Behind, however.

I don't know for sure that this teacher was the same source of information about flushing toilets in Egypt, but it wouldn't surprise me. Because long after I excised the admittedly remote possibility that a man could bear a child, I stubbornly held on to the notion that toilets in Egypt flushed in the opposite direction as toilets elsewhere. During Christmas — this past Christmas! — I went as far as asking one of Jen's relatives if this was true, this person being an industrial designer for a major company that manufactures toilets. We were headed to Egypt, I explained, and I was dying to know.

Cousin Mike was gentle with me and he buried the obvious lead — that even if this were true, and a toilet's flush did actually flow in the opposite direction in the Southern Hemisphere, Cairo was more than 2000 miles north of the equator. But in his professional opinion, the flow of a toilet's flush had more to do with the shape of the ceramic than any sort of alleged Coriolis Effect.

Our first night in Egypt I anxiously inspected the bathroom, only to find a frustratingly square-shaped toilet bowl:

So this mystery would never be solved on this particular trip. And after coming home and Googling the subject, I'm satisfied that I wasn't missing anything.

But going back to why I thought this in the first place, I wondered where this all came from. You know where certain stubborn beliefs originate. Not treating diarrhea with anti-diarrheal medicine based on the mistaken belief that it's better to get the bug out than leave it in your system, for example — I can probably figure out who and when I got this. Maybe it's just all goofy scientific experiments in grade school — the faith in empirical data — or "you know it until you see it."

One thing I never fully comprehended, except that I eventually figured it out, was that the Upper Nile is not north of the Lower Nile. In this way, the Upper Aswan Dam — what a piece of engineering! — is south of the Lower Aswan Dam. The Nile flows from south to north, of course, which is unusual (but not unique), thus the globe-upending sensation while you're in Egypt.

It's possible that's what I was thinking of — since the Nile flowed north, then clearly the toilets would flush in a similarly exotic manner. And the best thing — our toilet at home seems to flush in no particular direction, just straight down (I just checked). Now go figure out that one.

See also the Big Map: Egypt/Jordan, December 27, 2010-January 11, 2011.