Introducing Cairo
In many ways, Cairo is Egypt, a top-heavy capital that dominates the country as it dominates Arabic culture, a magnet that draws people from subsistence livelihoods along the Nile Valley towards promises of a better life. What they find when they arrive among the chaos and charisma of Cairo depends on their luck and wusta (contacts/influence).
Visitors tend to enjoy Cairo in proportion to their tolerance levels. On a hot summer’s day, surrounded by a mangle of horn-blowing cars, buried under clouds of exhaust fumes, elbowed into the crowd, and tricked into being guided where you didn’t want to go, it takes a special patience to enjoy the city.
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Woman cleaning her house in the Northern Cemetery, Bab el Nasr.
- Gavin Quirke
- Lonely Planet photographer
