Traffic
So I hopped a cab to work this morning, and realized that I've clearly been in Cairo too long ... I was getting actually, genuinely annoyed by the driver's refusal to dart into tiny openings in traffic, and when he turned on his turn signal to change lanes, it took me a couple of seconds to figure out what that little clicking noise was ... All I can say is, when I make it back to the states, I wouldn't recommend riding in my car for awhile ...
Cairo is crazy-overpopulated, and has significantly more taxis than I've ever seen anywhere, because most people don't own cars. However, some people do ... enough so that traffic is always absolutely insane. As a pedestrian, it's not too dangerous, although it's kind of like living in a game of Frogger - focus on making it to the next lane, not the other side of the street, and accept that cars will not stop or go around you. (Well, that's not entirely true ... I did dart directly in front of a van, which kindly slammed its brakes on, earlier this week. Still not an experiment I'd like to repeat, though ...) But the fact that most streets are one-way make things slightly less deadly, and there are always locals crossing, for use as a human shield.
However, I would never in a million years consider driving in this craziness! Yesterday, sitting quietly in the back of a cab, I counted a total of three cars, a van, and a bus next to each other on what was, in fact, a three-lane road. And actually owning a car worth any amount of money - idiocy! Pretty much every car on the road has scratches up and down both sides, and I noticed this morning that some people actually drive with their side-view mirrors folded in, because otherwise they might be lost - and I saw at least one driver reach out and fold his in, because someone was trying to get by that close ...
Riding in cabs can be its own kind of stress, though. Seatbelts are more or less unheard of, which would bother me more if we ever hit over 50 km - fortunately, traffic keeps the speed down to a manageable level. But there's a certain amount of angst surrounding the seemingly simple payment at the end of the ride. Cabs in Cairo are, for the most part, black and white and 15-20 years old. They all have meters, but the meters were calibrated when fuel was so much cheaper that, if anyone actually used them, the drivers would inevitably be operating at a loss. Thus, the fare either has to a) negotiate the price ahead of time, or b) pay at the end and hope the amount is mutually agreeable. Rumor has it that the locals follow the latter option - tell the driver where they're going, hop in, and once at the destination, hop back out and hand payment in through the window. That's what I've been doing, for the most part, and haven't had any trouble.
The problem, of course, is figuring out how much is okay ... I dread the day when I don't hand over enough and the cab driver starts screaming at me in Arabic. My roommate (who's half-Egyptian) told me that I shouldn't pay more than 5 LE to get to work in the morning. Nazli, a friend of mine (also Egyptian) had me pay seven for a cab out to the apartment. I figure that, somewhere in there, there must be an acceptable price. So far, though, I haven't had the guts to pay 5 LE - that tends to be the fare when moving around within downtown, but Mohandisseen (where I live) is a bit off the beaten path, so it seems that it should be worth more. And yet, I suspect 5 LE for downtown is inflated for foreigners, too, so ... The other option, negotiating the price ahead of time, seems to be potentially problematic. I heard that a couple British girls in the hostel negotiated for a 10 LE cab ride, paid when they got there (but before they got out), and then the driver started hassling them for more money as they frantically tried to find the door handle. And Ian, a kid from AZ studying Arabic for a month, always insists on negotiating ahead of time, but often has cabs refuse to pick him up because the negotiations go sour - when, if Ian just hopped the cab and went to the same final destination, and at the end paid what he had been proposing, it wouldn't be an issue. Of course, if local custom is to just get in as people have told me, then they might just be refusing him because they're annoyed with the fact that he's negotiating at all ...
And I have to admit - the least I've paid for a cab between home and downtown is 7.5 LE ... I think I'm going to drop it .5 LE each time until I get yelled at, and then bump it back up to the last acceptable price. You know, kind of like those "maximum load" signs on bridges - bigger and bigger trucks are driven over until the bridge collapses, and then the last truck is weighed and the bridge rebuilt ... (10 points to anyone who gets the reference!)
Another option is minibuses and microbuses. And, well, buses. I'm avoiding the buses, because they're overly crowded and old and rickety (of course, the same could be said of pretty much any form of transportation around here). However, there is a mini- (or micro-)bus that will bring me close-ish to work in the morning, once I get the hang of catching it. It's just an unmarked white van, sometimes with someone yelling the destination out the window - if I can make sure to catch the right one, it's a mere 50 piastres to make it downtown. Of course, if I catch the wrong one, it's hard to say what exactly will happen ... which is why I decided to just take a taxi this morning. Plenty of time for such an adventure down the road!
Another weird thing about Cairo traffic - the HORNS! Everyone uses them ALL the time. In America, I'm very used to reacting to traffic horns because they either mean someone's close to road-rage-pissed-off, or someone's about to get run over. But here, no such thing ... horns are used to say "Scoot over - I want to get around" and "Hello, Western woman walking down the side of the road" just as often as "Get out of my f'ing way!" In rush hour the other day, my taxi driver would honk his horn regularly every 25 seconds or so - I wished I spoke Arabic just so that I could ask him what in the world he thought to accomplish. The well-manicured woman in the Daewoo next to us had a different approach - she just held the damn thing down until traffic started moving, about a minute later. The moral of the story: Cairo is freaking LOUD!
Anyhow, that's today's rant. Tune in next week for a fascinating discussion of the many uses of fava beans!
Cairo is crazy-overpopulated, and has significantly more taxis than I've ever seen anywhere, because most people don't own cars. However, some people do ... enough so that traffic is always absolutely insane. As a pedestrian, it's not too dangerous, although it's kind of like living in a game of Frogger - focus on making it to the next lane, not the other side of the street, and accept that cars will not stop or go around you. (Well, that's not entirely true ... I did dart directly in front of a van, which kindly slammed its brakes on, earlier this week. Still not an experiment I'd like to repeat, though ...) But the fact that most streets are one-way make things slightly less deadly, and there are always locals crossing, for use as a human shield.
However, I would never in a million years consider driving in this craziness! Yesterday, sitting quietly in the back of a cab, I counted a total of three cars, a van, and a bus next to each other on what was, in fact, a three-lane road. And actually owning a car worth any amount of money - idiocy! Pretty much every car on the road has scratches up and down both sides, and I noticed this morning that some people actually drive with their side-view mirrors folded in, because otherwise they might be lost - and I saw at least one driver reach out and fold his in, because someone was trying to get by that close ...
Riding in cabs can be its own kind of stress, though. Seatbelts are more or less unheard of, which would bother me more if we ever hit over 50 km - fortunately, traffic keeps the speed down to a manageable level. But there's a certain amount of angst surrounding the seemingly simple payment at the end of the ride. Cabs in Cairo are, for the most part, black and white and 15-20 years old. They all have meters, but the meters were calibrated when fuel was so much cheaper that, if anyone actually used them, the drivers would inevitably be operating at a loss. Thus, the fare either has to a) negotiate the price ahead of time, or b) pay at the end and hope the amount is mutually agreeable. Rumor has it that the locals follow the latter option - tell the driver where they're going, hop in, and once at the destination, hop back out and hand payment in through the window. That's what I've been doing, for the most part, and haven't had any trouble.
The problem, of course, is figuring out how much is okay ... I dread the day when I don't hand over enough and the cab driver starts screaming at me in Arabic. My roommate (who's half-Egyptian) told me that I shouldn't pay more than 5 LE to get to work in the morning. Nazli, a friend of mine (also Egyptian) had me pay seven for a cab out to the apartment. I figure that, somewhere in there, there must be an acceptable price. So far, though, I haven't had the guts to pay 5 LE - that tends to be the fare when moving around within downtown, but Mohandisseen (where I live) is a bit off the beaten path, so it seems that it should be worth more. And yet, I suspect 5 LE for downtown is inflated for foreigners, too, so ... The other option, negotiating the price ahead of time, seems to be potentially problematic. I heard that a couple British girls in the hostel negotiated for a 10 LE cab ride, paid when they got there (but before they got out), and then the driver started hassling them for more money as they frantically tried to find the door handle. And Ian, a kid from AZ studying Arabic for a month, always insists on negotiating ahead of time, but often has cabs refuse to pick him up because the negotiations go sour - when, if Ian just hopped the cab and went to the same final destination, and at the end paid what he had been proposing, it wouldn't be an issue. Of course, if local custom is to just get in as people have told me, then they might just be refusing him because they're annoyed with the fact that he's negotiating at all ...
And I have to admit - the least I've paid for a cab between home and downtown is 7.5 LE ... I think I'm going to drop it .5 LE each time until I get yelled at, and then bump it back up to the last acceptable price. You know, kind of like those "maximum load" signs on bridges - bigger and bigger trucks are driven over until the bridge collapses, and then the last truck is weighed and the bridge rebuilt ... (10 points to anyone who gets the reference!)
Another option is minibuses and microbuses. And, well, buses. I'm avoiding the buses, because they're overly crowded and old and rickety (of course, the same could be said of pretty much any form of transportation around here). However, there is a mini- (or micro-)bus that will bring me close-ish to work in the morning, once I get the hang of catching it. It's just an unmarked white van, sometimes with someone yelling the destination out the window - if I can make sure to catch the right one, it's a mere 50 piastres to make it downtown. Of course, if I catch the wrong one, it's hard to say what exactly will happen ... which is why I decided to just take a taxi this morning. Plenty of time for such an adventure down the road!
Another weird thing about Cairo traffic - the HORNS! Everyone uses them ALL the time. In America, I'm very used to reacting to traffic horns because they either mean someone's close to road-rage-pissed-off, or someone's about to get run over. But here, no such thing ... horns are used to say "Scoot over - I want to get around" and "Hello, Western woman walking down the side of the road" just as often as "Get out of my f'ing way!" In rush hour the other day, my taxi driver would honk his horn regularly every 25 seconds or so - I wished I spoke Arabic just so that I could ask him what in the world he thought to accomplish. The well-manicured woman in the Daewoo next to us had a different approach - she just held the damn thing down until traffic started moving, about a minute later. The moral of the story: Cairo is freaking LOUD!
Anyhow, that's today's rant. Tune in next week for a fascinating discussion of the many uses of fava beans!
posted by Teale at 9:31 AM
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