Back in good old Poland again now, having got back last Thursday. I finished last time writing about Sinai, which for me was unquestionably the highlight of the trip. The scenery, the people, the general ambience and way of life there were quite different, it seemed, to the rest of Egypt. After we left there, we had quite a few more hassles and day to day travelling was slightly more stressful. Also, once you're in the Nile Valley, you're in package/coach/boat cruise tourist territory, and surrounded not by like-minded backpackers but by middle class, middle aged couples with lots of money (who the locals milk as much as possible). For the main part, foreigners are seen as walking dollars, and the constant 'friendly' attention from street salesmen, taxi drivers, felukah (sail boat) captains and various other touts required a high degree of patience. This does give the tourist a jaundiced view of people there though, because when you venture away from the main tourist sights, they have a genuineness and decency which is heart-warming. On our bus trip from Nuweiba to Cairo, we were befriended by a local police officer, an elderly guy whose friendliness was genuine and welcome, but who proceeded to tell me everything about Egypt, including a full run-down of the politics of the region, the prices of everything, the economy, the Egyptian football team and his family, for the entire 5 hour trip. Eventually, after just nodding and occasionally saying 'yes?' and 'really' for about two hours, I had to turn to my book and put on my mp3 headphones. Unfortunately, this did not discourage him in his mission to tell me absolutely everything he knew, and he intermitantly nudged me and motioned me to take out my headphones so we could resume the one-sided conversation. This was irritating of course, and made even more grating by his rather shaky command of English; he seemed to have an unusual liking for the word 'already', which he (usually incorrectly) dropped into his conversation at the merest opportunity. 'Are you already from England?' he would ask, and then add 'I've already been to England'. Later: 'is your girlfriend already reading?' 'Did you know Cairo is the biggest city in Africa. There are already 20 million people living there. I've already lived there for twenty years'. And so on. Either he was permanently surprised about the precipitate nature of life and how quickly everything was happening, or he had just read a really bad English grammar book.

Anyway, after swapping e-mail addresses, he told me that he already had to get off the bus on the outskirts of Cairo, and I was left in peace. He was a genuinely nice guy, so what can you do in a situation like that. The bus had taken 5 and a half hours to get to the edge of Cairo, and it took another hour to get to the centre. The city is just huge; you go through countless jerry-built slums on your way along the highway - constructions which are just roughly-built brick places that look like they would fall over with a gust of strong wind. An earthquake a few years back created havoc there for this reason. The bus was swerving dangerously from time to time and it seemed like the bus driver was falling asleep at the wheel. He started driving extremely aggressively, accelerating up to the bumpers of cars ahead of us, flashing his lights repeatedly and honking his horn to get cars out of the way. Like India, the roads in Egypt seemed to have no set rules - there were no slow or fast lanes, and cars were swerving in and out of traffic suicidally it seemed. I was quite glad when we pulled into the bus station finally and we were able to leap out and into a swarm of taxi drivers begging to take us to the downtown area we wanted to stay in. We haggled a guy down a bit and sped to a hotel called 'Luna' - quite a pleasant place several floors up in a city-centre tenement. The town centre itself felt quite European - a little like the Pest part of Budapest, maybe a bit Parisian, with high 1920's buildings towering over the crowded streets below. All these buildings had ancient lift systems in place which never quite gave you the confidence you would reach your floor without getting stuck half way up. Anyway, the hotel itself was pretty good for the price - clean linen, private bathroom, balcony etc, pretty friendly and with a real 'hostel' feel to it.

Cairo is a huge city, as I said, and we spent the first day just getting to know it on foot - a great way of getting your bearings, but easier said than done in some ways - firstly because of the manic traffic and lack of reasonable places to cross roads without putting yourself in considerable danger (drivers there make Polish drivers look like they have the patience of saints), and secondly because we didn't have a decent map, so finding our way along the warrens of streets, especially in the Islamic part of town, was quite a challenge. The traffic pollution and noise were horrendous, but on the occasional moments you escaped that and found yourself in some quiet mosque or Coptic church, or sat down in a little coffee shop for a chai and a water-pipe, you felt a degree of calm that made you feel incredibly content. Anyway, once you've dodged the gladiatorial traffic a few times, promenaded along the Corniche (waterfront) and grown attuned to the multitudinous muezzin calls (calls to prayer which start at 5am), you forget you're filthy and exhausted and throw yourself willingly into the mayhem. I loved Cairo for its madness in a way. The people there, away from the major sights (which are quite spread out) are extremely friendly, and we were treated with real warmth a few times - once in a little tea shop where were sitting three ancient men in head scarves, smoking sheesha pipes - they welcomed us fondly and let us take their pictures, then bought us tea. Other times, when we were walking through the 'souq' (market) area, we were told 'welcome to Egypt' by countless people, many of whom were more than happy to pose for pictures, and laugh and joke with us, even if they didn't speak English. A few of them wolf-whistled at Natalia (or maybe me) as we walked around, but there was never any sense of threat. Possibly the highlight of Islamic Cairo was the Al-azhar mosque, an institution which has been there for almost a thousand years, doubling as a university building. We were given a little guided tour of it, and picked up some free literature about Islam. From the top of the minaret, there were fantastic views across Cairo and down to the Nile. It was one of those places which was a refuge from the madness and traffic outside, and felt extraordinarily calming to wander around. We went down to Gezira and Zamalek by taxi, having seen the Citadel on the way down. This area is more upmarket, down by the river. It's where all the posh hotels are, and it is an island in the middle of the Nile, connected by bridge. It's where a lot of the restaurants and bars are, and there are plenty of places you can wander in and get a drink with great views out over the river - admittedly a lot of them are rather overpriced though. Just because the restaurant is on a boat with amazing views shouldn't affect the price of a beer in my opinion. We found a nice Korean restaurant with great 'kimchi' (fermented chilli peppers and vegetables). All very pleasant and reasonably priced.

We went to the Egyptian museum the next day, and as I'm not one for Egyptology, I'm not going to talk about all the amazing archaeological treasures on display there. Yes, the remains of Tuttankhamoun's tomb are there and yes it is impressive, but it's very poorly presented, with small - handwritten notes that look 30 year old, little or no explanation about the significance and magnificence of Howard Carter's 1922 find. The story is that he had been looking for the tomb for a number of years in Luxor, and was sure that it must exist because King Tut was the last in his family line - he was a boy king and died young - and when this happens, all of the family possessions are thrown in with the dead king, including the kitchen sink. Carter knew that when he did find the tomb, it would be a biggie. Just as his sponsor was threatening to pull the plug on the whole enterprise, Carter's team started digging underneath a load of work mens' hut in the Valley of the Kings and made the monumental discovery. He's really quite a national hero, but you don't hear much of him these days. At the time of the discovery, it sparked massive interest in Egyptology, many stories and myths and a whole line of Hollywood stories which has made the place so familiar to everyone the world over. After leaving the museum , I couldn't help feeling that they could have done a lot more with it. I remember being really interested in Viking history after a visit to the Jorvik museum in York when I was a kid - it was just a really well-presented, interesting museum. I'm not suggesting they do the same with the Egyptian museum, but the reason Egyptology remains the realm of batty old archaeologists is this - no one even tries to make the whole thing seem interesting. If you don't have any idea what hyroglyphics mean or why people were mummified and put in a sarcophagus, you wouldn't be much the wiser after leaving there.

We visited the Pyramids on our final day in Cairo. Again, what can be said about the Pyramids that hasn't already been said? It was neither an obsession with death, nor a fear of it, that led the ancient Egyptians to build such incredible mausoleums as the Pyramids. Rather it was their belief in eternal life and their desire to be at one with the cosmos. The Pharaoh was the son of the gods and also their intermediary; his role was to conduct the gods' powers to his people. Set between the earth and the sky to connect the worlds mortal and divine, he was therefore honoured in life and worshipped in death. The pyramid was a fitting tribute for such an individual. It came as quite a shock therefore when we visited the sandy plateau of Giza to find that the Pyramids are not in some quixotic desert location, but a stone's throw from a congested Cairo suburb. You can get there by metro. The words of Alan Bennett on the sphinx next to the pyramids seem very apt - it's a bit like meeting a film star in that in the flesh - a lot smaller than they appear in the movies. As soon as we arrived there, a huge black cloud rolled up behind it and a stiff wind blew up; the temperature felt to be barely in double figures. For all of these reasons, and perhaps also because we were there early morning before the tour buses full of tourists had arrived and there weren't as many touts as I had anticipated - the whole experience felt a bit strange, flatter and less impressive than I thought it would be. Still, there is no denying the absolute majesty of the Pyramids, of which there are four at Giza. Four thousand years old and still in great shape, designed with utter perfection in mind, to a celestial pattern. I remembered the jerry-built rubbish that makes up most of Cairo and wondered what we are going to leave behind for future generations. One thing that most people don't know is that there are about 97 pyramids in all, of different shapes and sizes, stretching for miles south down the Nile plains. We visited one of the more famous of these At Saqquara, some 25km away. Not quite so impressive, this was one of the prototype pyramids, with a kind of 'step' design, and built of stone - a revolutionary move since before then all funerary complexes had been constructed of mud. It's about 500 years older than the pyramids at Giza, which I suppose gave them plenty of time to perfect their techniques.

We left for Luxor by train the next day, on a slow train down the Nile - but that's all for now, I'll write one more soon