Let's go to the beach beach let's go to the beach

After an action packed day yesterday, we allowed ourselves to sleep in (...again, hey it's vacation right?) and got ready for beach day. Derek and Camille had already been to the beach both evenings I'd been sidelined, but this was going to be my first trip to swim in the Mediterranean this trip. They had gone to beaches closer to the hotel (~30 mins by train) and were whelmed, so we decided to go all out and take the 1 hour tram ride to the extra special beach where all the high class resorts are. 

Following what seemed like forever on the tram with some rowdy teenagers, we reached the end of the line and paid modestly to get into a beach club. There were dozens of rows of hundreds of cushioned chairs lining the beach almost none of which were occupied. 20 or so teens lined the beach hitting tennis balls back and forth with wooden paddles, and other than them we had the place to ourselves. There was an inflatable wonderland floating 10 meters off the beach with various different types of objects to climb on and (based oh how the kids were using it) push your friends off. We staked out some chairs, and an attendant came over informing us it was 2€ to use the cushioned chairs. When we offered to move he told us to forget about it and we were left alone. 

Ham sandwich + raddler (aka shanty) + front row beach chairs = good way to spend the afternoon. We took a quick dip in the water which was right on the verge of being to cold. After you get your armpits wet the water turns the perfect temperature if you keep moving. We threw the frisbee around in the water and climbed out to sundry. Derek and Camille finished their books as I (not wanting to bring my iPad to ready my book) took a snooze.

We braved the hour ride back, ringed off the saltwater and sunscreen and went to dinner at another guide recommended restaurant. The venue seemed chic but the food was at or below average in my opinion. My chicken and figs over a squash purée turned into a sweet, sesame/Asian brown blob. The bruschetta to start was good although they tried to charge us for bread! What cheapskates! We took the 2€ we would have spent on bread and re-invested in something much more delicious: gelato from the shop next door. My nutella scoop hit the spot and we strolled back to the hotel well satiated save one desire: we had yet to drink ouzo in Greece. 

We stop into the cafe next to our hotel and Derek and I order up two. The smell of licorice pierces the air as our waitress strolls back with two tall glasses of the clear liquid. "Opa!" Clink. Wince. It reminds me of one of my favorite aperitifs in France, Ricard, but in a bad way. I usually mix that with half water so we add a few ice cubes from the tray the waitress brought with our order. They quickly melt and a tantric wisp slowly fall from the cube and gathers at the bottom in a cloudy ring. Soon the whole glass is a light milky color. The burn of drinking straight liquor fades and the licorice comes to the front. After our first sip of the cooled ouzo, we determine Derek preferred it neat whereas I enjoy the chilled version much more. Finishing our ouzo while watching soccer, we retire for the night.

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Athens: Day 1 (or at least the first I remember)

Having seen most of the attractions people know (can anyone name anything in Athens other than the Parthenon?), we took a more leisurely pace the second day. We started out retracing our steps from yesterday so I could remember all the cool places we went.

Since the Acropolis museum wasn't free on environment day, we passed it yesterday and opted to see what it was about today. We learned all about the Acropolis, but the major take-away, is a majority of the antiquities are at the British museum (aka the imperialist era was good to the Brits). We wandered from there to the Athens flee market which turned out to be less of a market and more of a slew of tourist chotchky stores on a pedestrian pathway. We took a quick 5 o'clock appero, and then headed to the parliament district for dinner.

The district behind parliament is my favorite of Athens thus far. Although it is hilly it has quaint restaurants cages and bars tucked in many pedestrian walkways with shady trees. Despite the trees being of dubious intentions (haha get it? "shady" trees), we find two restaurants our guidebook recommends and have my favorite meal of Athens. Off a dare I order traditional Greek mustaflo (basically lasagna with eggplant instead of noodles which in case you haven't heard my rant about eggplant being the most under appreciated vegetable, is right up my ally). Washed down with plenty of house red made a delightful meal.

Walking further up the hill, we reach the funicular to our afternoon activity: the tallest mountain in Athens. It's right in the center and goes straight up so it offers an outstanding panoramic view of all of Athens. This was my #1 thing to do in Athens, not necessarily this specific hill, but see Athens from above. Everything in the city is 3-5 stories tall, so once you pass that height, you can see for miles in either direction. It took this view for me to really appreciate Athens, the architecture, the vibe. A few minutes past sunset, we ride back down the mountain, introduce Derek and Camille to grappa at a nearby cafe, and head back to the hotel.


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Athens... No, the other one

For those of you confused as to why I told you I'd be in Athens starting the 4th and then didn't see you, it's because I was talking about the less famous Athens. You know, the one in Greece.

My Athens experience started pretty rough as I was confined to my bed with a nasty bought of food poisoning from Cairo. I'm pretty sure it was the lentil soup at the hotel (which is a pity because it wasn't very tasty, if I'm getting food poisoning I at least want it to be worth it (see: last year's food poisoning post(s))). Derek and Camille went exploring, checked up on me regularly, and were very nice to hold off doing any of the big tourist things until the next day. The next morning, despite probably needing to hold off for another day (or at least morning), I was determined to get up and moving...in my first draft of that sentence, I typed running instead of moving, but lets be real, running was wayyyyyy out of the picture. Having not eaten or drunk anything for 36 hours, we went sightseeing.

When you're extremely dehydrated, everything seems like a big blur. Having to catch my breath every 100 meters and avoiding steps like the plague I felt like an old man. And if there are two things that mix well with climbing the acropolis of Greece they are blurred vision and avoiding steps. Derek and Camille were very helpful and supportive every shuffling step of the way.

Maybe it was my physical condition, but everything the first day seemed slightly underwhelming. We saw the acropolis and Parthenon, temple to zeus, parliament and 1896 Olympic stadium, and enjoyed every stop. We gladly found out it was Environment Day in Greece, allowing to visit them all for free! By the end of our 4 hour walking tour I was ready for a nap at 5 in the afternoon. You can imagine my surprise when I awoke at noon the next day.


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Flyday flyday gonna get down on flyday

This might be the shortest post of all time.

As much as food poisoning sucks, getting food poisoning the day of an intercontinental flight sucks ten times worse. Slept 19/24 hours today. Goodnight again.


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Location:Athens,Greece

Cairo. Day 3: Islamic Cairo

For our third and final night in Cairo, we switched hotels to be closer to the action. So using father's handy diamond Hilton status booked a room at the Hilton World Trade Center Residences. We take our final Giza-Cairo cab ride and check into our new hotel. They inform us that we've been upgraded to the Nile Suite on the 27th floor and we can't believe it as we walk in. We have 1/4th of a hotel floor. This room has a sitting room, dining room, office, living room, 3 full bathrooms, a master and double bedrooms, and a wrap around porch overlooking the Nile. Thanks dad! As we're unloading we hear a strange knocking noise on a distant door. We open what we assumed was the hot water heater to find a full kitchen (full sized fridge, four burner stove, oven ect) and a butler ready to stock our fridge with various groceries. This thing is nicer than my apartment.

The room is nice and all, but that's not why we're in Cairo, so we quickly sunscreen up and hop in a cab for Islamic Cairo. This is the first cab driver we've had that doesn't speak a word of English. The cab driver and I spend the first 2 minutes in the cab speaking slowly loudly and at the same time at each other hoping the other would magically learn to understand our language, and eventually pull up to another cab to act as a translator. We hop out and pay next to our lunch venue, the only park in Cairo. We have to pay what we are convinced is the white man price to get into the park, but the greenery is lovely and the restaurant in the middle leaves nothing to be desired. The restaurant (appropriately called citadel view) has a great view of the Citadel and a palatable fare. We again do the Egyptian sampler appetizer which was again my favorite part, and finish it off with a collection of grilled meat.

We walk through the park, looking for the start of our guidebook recommended walking tour of Islamic Cairo, but get moderately lost. Thanks to some friendly helpers, who of course want to be tipped afterwards, found the start. The walking tour itself was unremarkable. Lots of cool buildings and mosques, lots of cool streets bustling with people, lots of people trying to weasel every last pound out of your pockets (including in the mosques which Derek and I agree doesnt seem very pious). The highlight for me was the touristy market, where we picked up some souvenirs which, thanks to a large amount of aggressive negotiation, we never paid more than quarter price for. We cabed back, at a pretty terrible (in more way than one (see my next post)) dinner. And got ready for our flight to Greece.

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Cairo. Aside: Traffic

I desired the traffic and cab experiences deserve their own post because they are unlike anything I've ever experienced. Even in morocco things weren't this bad.

First lets start with pollution. On top of Cairo tower, it was striking how quickly your line of sight turns from clear to hazy to opaque. You can visibly see the pollution rise up from the major arteries, spread through the air in a mushroom cloud of years without emission laws, and ultimately settle in a thin layer of smog over all of Cairo. I wish I could say this was the first we noticed the pollution. Driving with the windows down or even walking around leaves a foul taste in your mouth. I don't say this at all metaphorically, you can actually taste the pollution to the point of needing to rinse out your mouth whenever you finish traveling.

Side effects aside, the traffic itself is atrocious. Cars in stop and go traffic that makes peachtree street at rush hour look desirable. I believe this is in large part attributable to how they deal with traffic: everyone floods to whatever lane is moving the fastest, causing that lane to screech to a halt. This constant lane changing doubles your distance traveled by adding enough lateral movement to hit both curbs (yes literally) in under a quarter mile regularly. I use the phrase "lanes" loosely because none of the streets actually have lines to show where lanes are and where traffic should switch directions. This causes a lot of confusion of how many lanes a road is so when traffic merges, some people underestimate the width of their car. This causes ~80% of cars to have pretty severe scrapes from bumper to bumper on either side.

The honking. Oh my the honking. Egyptians honk all the time. One of our first cab drivers jokingly said "Egyptian music" and then laid on his horn.at first it might seem like there is no rhyme or reason as to why someone honks at any particular moment, but we've been able to classify all honking into five main buckets:

1) Alerting someone to your presence. Eg you see a group of two teenagers, an old woman, a police officer and several nuns crossing the street, you honk to alert them that you are hurtling towards them at 100 KPH and have no intention of slowing regardless of their progress.
2) Admitting defeat or declaring victory. Eg As the four lane highway inexplicably turns into a two lane road, you fight with the other lane to merge. Whether you successfully overtake the other lane for merging superiority or get overtaken, honk the whole time. (side note: if you manage to exert dominance over the same car as the car ahead of you, twice as much honking is required of both the victor and vanquished).
3) You are about to do something dangerous. Eg you are pulling one wheel up on the sidewalk to make the two lane road into a four lane road (because the of course your counterpart on the right side is doing the same) and honk to alert both the cars around you and pedestrians who might have been foolishly walking on the sidewalk.
4) You recognize someone else doing something dangerous. Eg pretty much any time you see someone else driving
5) You haven't heard anyone else honk in a long time and/or miss the sound of honking. Eg driving down an empty interstate late at night with nothing but pristine silence and the pyramids surrounding you, your cab driver lets out a short series of five honks.

Notice there are no mentions of legality in the above commentary mostly because it is unclear if there are even traffic laws, if traffic laws did exist, lord knows what they were, and even if everyone knew them, the idea of enforcement is laughable. I guess the Egyptians police have better things to do than pass out moving violations.

After seeing how traffic works here I am much more willing to be patient with Atlanta rush hour, and whatever you do, don't rent a car in Egypt!!

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Cairo. Day Two: the Egyptian Museum and a horse ride

We woke up late again trying to get rid of the last of our jet lag. A quick pastry for breakfast and a 1 hour taxi ride later and we were in downtown Cairo. The first thing you notice when going to the Egyptian Museum is the 7 story building right next door that is blackened from a pretty serious fire. This is the only remaining relic of the old Egyptian government. They literally burnt down his building. A striking reminder that less than two years ago one of the greatest modern revolutions started in this very square.
We enter the Egyptian museum around noon, dismiss the overly persistent tour guides, and start to walk around in reverse chronological order. With thousands and thousands of pieces in the museum, most of the older relics seem to follow the same basic motif: "here I am in my cool pharaoh hat, here's my wife, she's touching me". Seriously. The coolest part of the museum for me was the embalmed animals which included a fish, alligator, and a dog which still had fur on it!
We finished up at the museum, and walked across the bridge towards the tallest building in Egypt, the Cairo tower. Taking care to get a little lost on the way, we show up sweaty tired and hot. The view was stupendous (you could even see the pyramids!) but we were ready to move on to our next stop: lunch.
Our guidebook recommended a hipster Egyptian restaurant close to the tower, and a 10 minute walk later, we sit down in a dark room with ritch fabrics and low seating. We order an Egyptian sampler (which turns out to be the highlight of the meal) and three traditional Egyptian dishes. It's so much food we can hardly finish it all, so well fed and well rested, we walk around the local area to admire its notable architecture.
We hop in a cab, pantomime sphinx (which is harder to do than you might think: call over a friend and try it) and take another long, hot cab ride past our hotel and to the stable district.
I know what you might be envisioning: large sweeping pastures with rows and rows of well cleaned paddock and noble steeds. Nope. Any normal dirty paved Egyptian street + untethered geldings eating a mixture of dirt, leaves and shit = stable district. Our guidebook gave some good advise: find a purveyor with healthy looking horses and haggle him down to 100 pounds per hour per person (13 bucks). And that is what we did.
We wind our way through the streets for 20 minutes until we get out in the open desert when our guide yells a firm "up up! " and the horses respond with an open gallop. My mind switches from "oh look at the pretty desert" to "oh god, when did I forget how to ride a horse". I quickly get him back under control and coax him for a little more speed.
We ride for 10 minutes through the desert, until our guide takes us into a small stop where the tenants take our horses, force a Pepsi in our hands and shove us down on a beat up couch that's missing one cover. They are overly kind hosts which means one thing in Egypt: they're going to want a large tip at the end. We drink the soda and they take some photos of us (including a couple on a camel which are hilarious) with the pyramids in the background. They heckle me for a larger tip but our guide dismisses them, and gets us back on our horses and our way. On our way back, he offers me a cigarette through our large language barrier. While I decline, I'm glad he's with us, even if he too is working for a tip.
Back at the stable, we pay our fee, take a scooter taxi back to our hotel, and after a quick dip, turn in for the night.
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Cairo. Day One: The Pyramids

Strange is the breakfast buffet where puréed kidney beans look more appetizing than the neighboring scrambled eggs, but sure enough, with a little cumin "Spoiled Bean Mash" is a pretty good breakfast food.

After the quick breakfast, we get a 7:30AM start to the pyramids. Given this followed a day and a half of traveling fatigue and jet lag, this is a testament to how excited we were. How could we not be? We were going to the flipping pyramids!! We get a smidgen lost, and eventually find our way to the ticket booth.

After buying our tickets (and really before we buy them), we're berated by the onslaught of Egyptians selling postcards, plastic pyramid chotchky, and (the majority of them) horse/camel rides around the pyramids. It takes a while to getting in the groove of dismissing them, and after a while, their persistence loses to our frugality and guidebook and we're largely left alone.

This next comment might get laughed at if you haven't seen the pyramids in person: the pyramids are really big. Seriously. Even given modern technology, I seriously doubt I could build something similar. Standing in the shadow (both figuratively and literally because it's 105 degrees outside) of the great pyramid, you realize the Egyptians had their act together.

We were able to snag one of the 150 daily tickets to go inside the great pyramid (score!), and I really wish I could post pictures to give you a visual of what this was like but I cannot because 1) cameras were not allowed inside, and 2) I have no way of transferring pictures from my camera to my iPad so alas, the posts on this trip will all be picture free.

Inside the pyramid makes you feel like Indiana Jones. After a short walk through a winding passage, you reach what looks like a dead end until you realize the 3'X3' opening at your feet. This is an entrance to a 100 foot passage 3 feet high ascending at a 45 degree angle. So you climb, stooped over with a piece of plywood for footing, and praying no one is descending at the same time. While I am making this sound more dramatic that it actually was, the climb up really did have an authentic feel (only a whip and a cool hat from straight up Indiana Jones'n it) and was much more extreme than anything you'd find at a major US landmark. After the 100 feet of crouched climbing, the ceiling opened up to 30 foot high and you assented for another 200 feet. At the summit of the climb? An anti climactic 15'X15' room where the mummy used to be. A quick stop to catch our breath and then we descended.

We spent the rest of the morning walking around the other pyramids and sphinx and refusing camel and horse rides: we wanted to do that at sunset. We returned to the hotel sweaty and tired, and after a quick dip in the pool headed upstairs for a nap. 30 minutes turned into 4 hours quickly, and we missed sunset. Content to sit the rest of the night by the pool playing cards, we vowed to catch a sunset horse ride tomorrow.

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Location:Giza, Egypt

Cairo: The Preface

We get off the plane in Cairo at 1:30AM. In line for customs, we see a man with my name on a valet sign. I had requested a car from the airport so we hail him down. He quickly introduces himself and holds out his hand for our passports and $15 for the Egyptian visa. We give him what he wants, and as we watch him power walk away Camille let's out a "uhmmmmmmm, guys???". Oh shit moment number one of the trip: check. Don't worry, this guy was legit, he got us our visas without a bribe (which is apparently require for most foreigners trying to get visas) and quickly whisks us through the Diplomat passport control.

Hurling down the interstate at 120KPHs in the median used to not phase me in Morocco, but I guess I've been spoiled by 2 full years of the US and its "traffic laws". I spent most of the trip holding on for life but the few glances I steal out the window remind me I've been transported to another side of the world. Street signs scribbled in handwritten Arabic, traffic jams caused by watermelon vendors standing in the middle of the street hawking their goods to passing cars, mosques transcending the nondescript skyline, dirt run-off from the streets mixing with trash to turn curbs into ramps, and all the while the quasi-banter between two people that barely speak the same language with the cab driver. When we arrive at the hotel 45 minutes later, its apparent we're not in Kansas anymore.

I wonder why we've stopped for so long at the hotel gate as a German Shepard and a machine gun armed guard check the underside of the car for bombs. We pass through a metal detector and x-ray machine and I hand my passport to the front desk for check in. The desk man's tired eyes perk up, and someone hits the big red button in the middle of the desk. "Mr. Passarello we've been expecting you," as the tan suit clad hotel manager arises from his slouching on the sofa nap to introduce himself. Even though we're not supposed to check in for another 13 hours, they have our deluxe suite ready for habitation. Guess they don't get too many SPG members.

As much as I appreciated the personal tour of the whole hotel, I just wanted to go to bed, so I was relieved when we were left alone in our room. Not thirty seconds later, I can't sleep. The very idea of sleep is laughable, because I HAD to see the pyramids. I drag an equally drowsy Derek and Camille outside to catch a glimpse of the last existing wonder of the ancient world. We round the corner of the pool deck where they should be visible from, and all squint into the 3am darkness.

"...those're it?".

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The 12 hour layover

Oh sit right back and enjoy a tale, a tale of a faithful trip, that started from Houston Tex-as and crossed the At-lan-tic. We landed in Schipol early that morn', com-ing from Detroit. Three passengers set sail that day for a 12 hour layover, a 12 hour layover. Withdrawling cash was kinda rough, Camille was not deterred. A train ride with a couple crazy Brits flirting with a girl demure. The train pulled into the station of this famous city of sin with: A canal boat, the red light district, (which surprisingly, had girls at 3), an Amstel light, dam square, and the flower market! That's all we did in Amsterdam.
..In case you didn't pick up on it, setting our 12 hour layover to the tune of Gilligan's isle was the only way I could find to make our layover in Amsterdam interesting. Im glad we went into town (because sitting in the airport for 12 hours would have been mind-numbing), and maybe it was the jet lag, maybe it's because of how exciting the prospects of our future adventures are, but everyone just seemed to be welmed with our AMS experience. My favorite part was the flower market south of town. Lots of pretty flowers and bulbs in every color you could imagine. On to Cairo! (After the least efficient plane boarding process fathomable of course)
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The Itinerary

Once again, this blog is a lie. I am not in France.

Those of you who haven't spoken to me in the last 65 weeks, you might not have heard that I'm going on a trip. Here's the plan: Derek, Camille and I are taking a gangbuster two week trip before we sell every waking minute to corporate America. We're hitting Cairo, Athens and Istambul in that order. These are their stories (duhn duhn).


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