Let me describe Egypt as I’ve seen it for the past few days.

Dualities of Egypt.

Egypt is about the people. In spite of struggles, they are beautiful, resourceful, welcoming, aggressive, passive, hospitable and any adjective one can use. Most people are welcoming and gracious. Every one I told about being born here, moving as a ten year old and my first return after sixty-one years replied brightened the country with a genuine, heartfelt and gracious tone. I was humbled and touched.

It’s an amazing sight to behold. Like Dicken’s England it’s the best of times and the worst of times, but even that may be too simplistic when it comes to describing Egypt.

Egypt is a combination of dualities put into a blender to come up with an intoxicating mix.

The traffic

The dualities or multitude of variety of both the road and method of transport. Egypt has some beautiful and ultramodern seven lane highways and decades if not centuries old narrow city streets. The brand new cars and the Lada’s from Russia that have several hundred thousand Kilometers. It’s a place where lane markings are a waste of paint. The place where drivers take advantage of a lane opening to pass an ambulance on its way to an emergency with its horn blaring. There are indeed traffic lights but only in extremely busy intersections in big cities like Cairo and Alexandria.

I’ve documented the motorcycle where the driver is on a cellphone in one hand. In town, the motorcyclists are daredevils zigzagging their way with, against and even across traffic without a care for anything other than getting past as many cars as possible. The combination of riders with as many as a family of five on a bike is a sight to behold. The true marvel was the women who because of modesty sat side saddle on the back of the bike she looked so relaxed that she must have had veins of ice.

It’s no different with the boat shuttle drivers in Aswan. We’ve also experienced how cool under pressure the boat drivers are, I’m sure there would be heated moments. In this dog eat dog competition, survival, is all about passenger movement - the more trips you make, the more money and tips you make. This is basically a bumper boats ride.at pick up and drop off points. That process works best if you have an accomplished guide. Thi is not a do it yourself project. An added point, is this is a swing season and not the busy tourist time.

The Tuktuk going down the wrong way - but is it really? There’s a certain harmony on the roads, but big time chaos mixed in. Add to that mix, pedestrians both trying to cross the road and the ones waiting for transport buses on the side of the road.

We mustn’t forget the people setting up a stand, or sitting on the edge selling whatever little trinket they can to make a living.

Egypt is personified by its people, whether the person is riding the donkey with a load on the same road or a horse drawn trailer. It’s the camel driver crossing the busy road, with a chain of five camels on their way to the pyramids for the camel rides. At the same time, Egypt has always been a cosmopolitan centre in Africa and in the Arab world. Many European and Global visitors make Egypt a go to place for the ultra wealthy as well.

The true measure of their technical ability, is literally everyone has a cell phone. The average person never puts their phone down, it is a way most people run their lives. We’re in the so called developed world, where we use our cell phones at one tenth the ability of the person on the street in Egypt. It’s amazing just how much they do on their phones.

One other observation is just how varied the available mode of shuttling of goods from one place to another. I marvel at the person carrying the two tiered rack ladden with bread from the bakery to a stand. It’s not just that, carts pulled by donkeys, horses, bikes and motorcycles with baskets or mounds of produce, or bags just tied to the cart.

It’s the neighbourhood shop keeper with a jam packed to the fourteen foot ceilings