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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