Croatia

So not a lot of Americans really know anything about Croatia. When I told people I was going there, they said “why?” “Why doesn’t the boat go to Italy or Greece instead?” But when I looked up Dubrovnik (because before seeing the itinerary of SAS, I didn’t even know what Dubrovnik was), I could already tell this was a place worth going to.

After going to Dubrovnik, I can tell you that Croatia is most certainly worth going to. However, Europeans seem to have already caught onto this: Croatia has 10 million tourists a year (and the country itself has less than 5 million people.) And most of those visitors go to the Dalmatian Coast, where Dubrovnik is.

Apparently, during the summer, Dubrovnik is packed with tourists. However, since we were there in November (when the weather isn’t that great, it was only in the mid 50s), Dubrovnik was pretty empty, which is awesome. The city has very few people (only 50,000), so when there aren’t tourists, there isn’t much at all. Pretty awesome, because Dubrovnik is one of the nicest places I’ve been to.

Dubrovnik is known for its old city, a small part of the city that is walled in, right on the water, and is just filled with old buildings and churches…..and its just so nice.

My first three days, I just chilled in Dubrovnik. I was thinking of going to Split for two days, but didn’t because I heard it was similar to Dubrovnik, and I wasn’t really in any hurry to make a 5 hour bus ride away from Dubrovnik when Dubrovnik was so awesome (and when the place I would be going was pretty similar.)

The first day, we just walked around the city, and went in a bunch of the churches in the city which were real nice. Definitely spent a lot of time eating, and Dubrovnik has really cheap (and really good) gelato which is pretty awesome. Croatia kind of has similar food to Italy (there is lots of pizza), except Croatia has more seafood (obviously, since most of the country is coastline.)

The second day, we just chilled in the Old City of Dubrovnik again, and the highlight of the day was when we walked the walls of the city. The city has massive walls surrounding it, and you can walk around them, and it was awesome. The view of the city from the walls is great, you can see everything, and the view of the water is obviously great when you are walking around the water side of the walls. And from this side, we saw a beam of light coming in from clouds over the water, and that was really cool:



The second night, we went out which was cool. We started out at some techno bar which was Euro as hell, and it was awesome because there were only 5 SAS kids in the whole place (just the two other people I was with and 2 random other people we saw there.) After that, we went to the one big club in Dubrovnik, called Latino Club Fuego (I like how they have to throw in that it’s a latino club in the name), but the club wasn’t actually latino because they only played rap. And it sucked because this place was packed with SAS kids, which sucks because nothing against SAS kids, but when you go out in a foreign country, you don’t want to see a ton of Americans (except there is an exception to this one night in Sevilla, which I’ll write about later.)

The third day, the day started with me finding out about Arizona beating Oregon (who was number 2 in the country, although they now suck because they lost their QB) which was awesome, I started screaming the UofA fight song as I left the boat because I was so stoked. Anyway, a bunch of us went to this area of the city called Lapad (first time not just going to the Old City) because we heard there was a Mexican restaurant there. We really wanted to see what Mexican food in Croatia is like, and well, its not really that Mexican, and not really that good either, but we still had to check it out. That night, we heard about some wine tasting at the Hilton so we crashed that for sure, it was pretty sick. I saw a few other SAS people there but not too many, and I also saw a few SAS teachers there including the SAS doctor which was funny. Anyway, since the wine was free we had a lot of it, and when I left, I thanked the guy who runs the vineyard or whatever for the great wine and then left (the wine was pretty good, I don’t like wine normally but this wine tasted good. This wine tasting was really funny because most of the people there were sophisticated and well dressed, and I was there in a hoodie so I definitely looked out of place (and there was only one other SAS guy there, all the other SAS kids, which was like 7 more, were girls, so its not like there were a bunch of people dressed like me to make me look less out of place).

Anyway that night we had a really good dinner in the Old City, then we went to the Irish Pub and met up with a few of our friends so that was pretty sick. Bars are way better than clubs, I hate clubs because people get well dressed to go to them and I hate doing that (luckily in Dubrovnik the clubs don’t care what you wear, but even with that, bars are still better), also the crowds at clubs tend to be worse, its where metrosexual type guys go and that‘s just not my crowd at all, but the Irish Pub was pretty good. At the pub we just chilled and had a few beers which was tight. This random drunk Irish guy started talking to us and he was trying to hit me up for money because he claimed that he had a son in Berkeley but he can’t make it to visit him, however I thought he was full of it because he has enough money to travel to other places, also he was really drunk, so I didn’t give in.

The fourth day, me, Teej, Lily, and Lisette (they are two Cuban sisters from Miami, although they look more like cousins than sisters) went to Korcula for the day and that was pretty good. Korcula is an island around three hours from Dubrovnik. We booked a tour the day before to do this and the guy came to our boat at 8 AM to drive us around. The drive to Korcula was so nice, the Dalmatian Coast is just incredible and it was so cool to make the drive…..it was definitely the nicest coastline I’ve seen. After driving for 2 and a half hours or so, we had to wait for a ferry to take us to Korcula. Croatia has really cool, modern looking ferries, and they can fit big tractor trailers on them: we saw 2 18 wheelers just drive onto the ferry. After the 15 minute ferry, we got to Korcula and it was awesome. The island was completely empty (of course, because its offseason and its 55 degrees every day in November) and it was really nice. We saw some cool churches and buildings, and we saw the birthplace of Marco Polo so that was cool. Walking the streets of Korcula was awesome, it had a different feel than Dubrovnik because its more isolated so that was pretty tight.

After that, we took the ferry back, drove a little bit, and went to this vineyard to taste some wine. It was called the Indijian vineyard, because the guy who runs it apparently is Indian, but he didn’t look it. Anyway, we tried some of his wine in this creepy, dark room where he had a bunch of machines that make wine alongside a few bottles. We then walked, and we saw this fire coming out, so we check out this room and there is some old lady just sitting there watching a fire. It ended up being the place where they make brandy. We think the lady has been sitting there her whole life just watching brandy being made, it was pretty weird. However, she was really nice and had us try some of the brandy, which was pretty strong, and they don’t expect us to have a chaser for it, guess Croatians don’t care to chase down brandy, they must actually like the taste. After that, we went to Ston which is a city where every building is made of stone and that was cool. On the way, we saw this thing that looks kind of like the Great Wall of China, but it’s the Croatian version of a long wall. Pretty funny to see that. After Ston, the guy took us back to the ship to end the tour. One other thing in Ston, as we were getting in the car, we heard some car with a loudspeaker approaching. We looked and one car was just carrying a huge billboard with some guys face, and the second car had a loudspeaker over it. This was for a political candidate since the elections were 8 days. The guy on the billboard was from the Croatian Peasants Party, which is a smaller political party. Anyway, it was cool to see some Croatian political campaigning, and the guy gave us posters with the guys face on it which is awesome. However, I looked up the party and they wouldn’t be my choice if I was Croatian, the Peasants Party is socially conservative which isn’t something I go for. And Croatia just had their election three days ago, however, just like in most parliamentary systems, no party got a majority so a coalition needs to be formed to decide on a new Prime Minister, and that hasn’t happened, so the current Prime Minister (Sanader) might stay or he might go, he just needs to be able to find a smaller party to make a coalition with.

The fifth day, we just chilled. Got a good view of the city early on, and I saw the best thing while getting that view. There was a car with a sticker that said TUC, on top it said the Old Pueblo, and on bottom it said Tucson, AZ. I was so stoked to see a Croatian car reppin Tucson on it, how random is that? I wish I could have seen the owner of the car, but I wasn’t that lucky. Then, me and Teej went into the old city and bumped into Adam and these Croatian girls we met the night before, so we all went to some pizza place that the girls said was really good. Adam is also an Oregon fan, so he was pretty pissed that my school beat Oregon which is awesome. It was cool talking to the Croatian girls though, they were our age and we talked about their country. They think Dubrovnik is boring because its small, which it is….guess when you live somewhere for so long, you forget about how nice it is and want something else (kind of like me, because I don’t like New York when everyone else loves it) We also talked to them about the upcoming elections, they said they don’t like Sanader and the HDZ (his party) and that they thought he would lose (he ended up getting more votes than the opposition Social Democrats, but not by much, and either party could take power depending on who can make a coalition.) Also, they talked about how their fathers helped protect the city 15 years ago. Going to Dubrovnik (and Croatia), you would never guess the country had huge problems 15 years ago. The country is beautiful, and it looks very developed. However, 20 years ago, Croatia was part of communist Yugoslavia. In 1991, the Serbian military invaded Dubrovnik, and these girls’ fathers helped fight the Serbs off. Croatia has only been a stable democracy for around 15 years, but it seems like democracy is doing pretty well there and the economy has gotten real good. Now, it has tons of tourism and Croatia is widely considered to be next in line to join the EU, it is expected for them to join around 2010 although nothing has been set yet. Anyway, talking to them was really cool and after that, we went to an internet café, bumped into Eric there, then we went to dinner. Going to dinner, we saw a huge ceremony with kids lighting candles in front of a church. This was in commemoration of the attack on the city in 1991, it was really interesting and moving to see. We then got dinner after that and went back to the boat to leave for Spain.

Overall, Croatia is great. It’s really hard to believe that 20 years ago, it was communist, and that it wasn’t really open for tourism till less than 15 years ago due to war and all that, but now it is a modern country. It looks really nice (I left Dubrovnik and went up the coast, and to me, I can’t really tell Croatia apart from other modern, industrialized countries), the country is doing real well considering its relatively recent history, and it is most certainly worth going to. Dubrovnik is one of the most beautiful cities I’ve ever been to, and driving up the coast, I definitely saw the nicest coastline I’ve ever seen. I personally really want to go back because it was just that nice and I’ve heard other parts of the country are amazing too…..I’m really happy SAS went to Croatia instead of Italy or Greece because it opened my eyes up to something I probably wouldn’t know much about if it weren’t for Dubrovnik being on the SAS itinerary.

Now, we are in the Atlantic heading back to the US. It really sucks that all the traveling is done with (I still technically have Miami, which is a city I love, but I’ve already been there), but this trip has been an amazing experience, I would most certainly recommend SAS to anyone (even though the administration isn’t great at all, maybe I’ll get into that at some point) because SAS takes you to great countries and you get to see so much in so little time. Going around the world and checking out so many different countries and seeing so many great cultural sites and cities has been awesome. However, I still haven’t written about one country: Spain, which I just left yesterday. I was really excited for Spain (and it ended up being awesome) because my whole dad’s side of the family is Andalucían, so docking in that region of Spain was awesome (even if I speak no Spanish.) A bunch of us went up to Sevilla and Granada and I got to reunite with the legendary Luca, who I’ve known since my freshman year of college and he left the US to travel around Europe, so seeing him was awesome…..anyway, I’ll write about that in the next few days.



Inside the Old City of Dubrovnik
Me on the wall, with Dubrovnik in the background
The Dalmatian Coast
On the rock, looking out, with Dubrovnik on the side

Turkey

So I haven’t gotten around to writing about this for a while, but the ship went to Turkey and I spent all five days in Istanbul and it was awesome. Istanbul was the first port where I never left the city where the boat docked, but I just never felt the need to leave because Istanbul is so big and I really wanted to check it out.

In my five days in Istanbul, I got to check out a lot of the major sites of the city (Hagia Sophia, Blue Mosque, etc.) and just get to walk around and check out the city. The city was much different from what I expected, it was much more modernized and European than I thought it would be. Being in Istanbul really felt like being in Europe. The city is on two continents (although the boat docked on the European side, and all of the tourist attractions of the city are on that side) but both sides totally feel like Europe. It looks like Europe, except for the fact it has mosques.

Istanbul is one of the nicest cities I’ve been to (and Dubrovnik, Croatia, where I just went to and will write about later, may be the nicest of them all.) Its just very nice to look at, with the Bosphorous separating the two sides and all of the mosques lining the skyline. The city is very beautiful (it looks very European), and its very clean too. The city also has great public transportation, it has these really awesome, modern looking, above ground trams that go around the city and those were pretty awesome to ride. It also has really nice ferries that go around the city and connect the European and Asian sides (the Bosphorous is really wide, and I only saw one bridge that connects the two, although there must be more in other areas.)

Even though Istanbul is an Islamic city in an Islamic country, it doesn’t really feel Islamic at all. Istanbul is very westernized, and you see very few women wearing headscarves (big contrast from Egypt, where almost every woman is wearing a headscarf.) Alcohol is served everywhere, and lots of Turks drink (big difference from Egypt, where alcohol can be found relatively easily, but not lots of Egyptians drink.) It doesn’t feel like Islam is really important to lots of Turks, especially ones in Istanbul, although the mosques still blast prayers five times a day to accommodate to those who are religious (speaking of this, I stayed on the boat for two nights, but me and some of my friends got a hotel for two nights to get away. Our hotel was right around the corner from the Blue Mosque and the Hagia Sophia, and one morning, I heard the prayers blasting from the Blue Mosque at 6 AM…..in Islamic countries, the mosque blast things from loudspeakers than can be heard from pretty far away.)

Turkey is also pretty nationalist….the only place where I’ve seen more flags is America post 9/11 (and in America, you don’t see as many flags now as you do in Istanbul.) The Turkish flag is literally everywhere, you go down a street and you see flags all over the place. There is definitely lots of national pride in Turkey. They also really love the father of the country, Mustafa Ataturk, who westernized the country in the 1920s, and you see pictures of him everywhere as well. He’s also on all of the currency.

Istanbul is also COLD, after going to countries where it was in the 80s and 90s for two months, we went somewhere where it was in the 40s and 50s the whole time, and it also got pretty rainy and windy at different points. It really got cold the fourth night when we all went to a soccer game, which was the highlight of my trip. I’m a huge soccer fan, so I knew I wanted to get to a match at some point in Istanbul. I looked up the different clubs in Istanbul, and saw that I couldn’t see Fenerbahce because they were away the weekend I was there, and that I couldn’t see Galatasaray because their match was late on Sunday and I wouldn’t get back to the boat on time if I went to see them. However, Besiktas had a home match Saturday night, so I knew I had to get tickets for that. Even better was the fact that they were playing Sivasspor, which was second in the Turkish league at the time (and Besiktas was fourth in the league) so I knew it would be a cool match to get to. When I got to Istanbul, I went to get tickets for the match, so around 10 of us went to check out the match the fourth night. The stadium actually had a lot of empty seats, but it was because Besiktas lost 8-0 in Champions League to Liverpool that week so the manager told the fans not to show up. Still, the stadium was two thirds full, and it was real loud.

Going into the stadium, it was really funny because our group was half girls, but yet there were no girls at all going to the match (besides other random SAS kids we saw there), so they definitely got some weird looks. Also, when going in, the cop pulled me to the side because I had too much stuff in my pocket. He was saying all of this stuff in Turkish, but when I said “No Turkish” he just let me go in. I guess he thought I was Turkish because that day, we were walking around the market and they had jerseys for 30 lira (like 25 USD) so I bought one (and I was wearing it above my hoodie and you couldn’t really see my face, so I guess I sort of fit in, although wearing a hoodie isn’t something people in Europe do.) Anyway, after getting in, the fans had all sorts of crazy chants, and we talked to some awesome fans and they taught us a few of the different chants. The match overall was pretty sloppy, but it started off well with a Besiktas goal by this guy named Bobo (I think hes Brazilian) in the first half. However, the second half didn’t go as well. Besiktas got a red card around the 55th minute for a bad tackle near the penalty area, and Sivasspor scored off a free kick. Around the 80th minute, Sivasspor scored their second goal off a counter attack and won the match 2-1. I froze my ass off, and it sucks Besiktas lost, but the environment was still loud and awesome and it was just pretty sweet overall to see some Turkish soccer. Sivasspor also got to the top of the league after the win, but I doubt they are still there. Also, I love how they have so many cops at matches in Turkey (way more than they do at sporting events in America), and they sit out in a line essentially waiting for a riot to happen. It’s awesome, but there was no riot that night, there were only a few bottles thrown from another area of the stadium after the second goal.

Besides the match, going to the Hagia Sophia and Blue Mosque were awesome. The Hagia Sophia was one of the 20 or so candidates for the new seven wonders of the world competition, and it’s a really cool site. It doesn’t look great from the outside, but its so cool on the inside. It’s also a really cool site because it used to be a Catholic church, but was turned into a mosque after Istanbul became Islamic. It isn’t used for prayer anymore, but its just really nice on the inside and the fact that it was both Catholic and Islamic momentos on the inside makes it cool. The walls and ceilings are painted with images of Catholicism, but there are signs in Arabic and Islamic images on the inside as well….just really cool.

The Blue Mosque was also awesome, it’s a really nice building (my favorite in Istanbul) and I definitely went inside and checked it out. The inside to me wasn’t really that much cooler than other mosques I’ve been to, but it was still pretty cool.

The area with the Hagia Sophia and Blue Mosque, called Sultanahmet, is absolutely awesome. It has all of the tourist attractions, but yet it’s a really quiet, chill area that’s really nice and has lots of good restaurants and stuff like that. It was definitely awesome to stay there for two days instead of on the boat (the boat was around 20 minutes away from there by tram….it was in a pretty good spot.) And speaking of food, Turkish food is awesome. I was stuffed the whole time because we just kept eating and eating some more.

We also hit up the Asian side one day. Istanbul has a great ferry set up, each port has ferries that go to all these different ferries around the city so one day we just went and took a ferry to check out the Asian side. The Asian side of the city we saw was just like the European side (which means it feels like Europe), except there were no tourists whatsoever. The restaurants there didn’t have menus translated into English like they do on the European side. It was pretty residential, but it had lots of shops and restaurants and it was cool to go there for a few hours, especially since it was another continent. Also, the view of the European side from the ferry was awesome, the view of the Blue Mosque, Hagia Sophia, and Topkapi Palace (the place where the leaders of the Ottoman Empire lived until the mid 1800s….I went there too, it wasn’t that great) from the water was great.

And one last thing. The last day, me and Teejana thought it would be cool to just take the tram and see where it would end up. However, what happened is that the areas just started to look a little worse, then after a while, it started to get more sparse and spread out, so we just took the tram back. Thought doing this would take us somewhere cool, but it just didn’t happen.

As for bad things about Istanbul, I have one complaint, and that it’s more racist than the other places I’ve been. Most of the people there are real nice, but when I traveled around with Teej (whose Indian), she sometimes had racist comments said to her out of nowhere (someone called her a “negro,” which is funny because shes not black) and the worst was when we were walking to the soccer game. We saw a group of black people walking around (which you don’t see often in Istanbul) and right after we passed them, a little Turkish girl behind us started to make monkey noises while her whole family laughed. Obviously, not everyone in Turkey is like this, but the fact that people aren’t scared to make racist comments out loud and the fact that little girls in Istanbul will mock black people shows that racism is still a problem among Turks. Really sad, but hopefully this gets fixed over time.

Overall, Istanbul is a really nice city and I would definitely go back. I hope that some people there change their ways when it comes to racism (which I was personally really surprised by, no one on the trip complained about any racism in other countries until we got to Turkey where I personally saw it multiple times), but I would still say most of the people are really nice and that its just a really beautiful city.

After Turkey, we went to Croatia which was so nice. Stayed in Dubrovnik for four of the five days, went to Korcula for a day, and all of it was great…hopefully I’ll have time to write about it before Spain.

And to end…how about Arizona beating Number 2 Oregon in football last week and knocking them out of the National Title game race? I definitely wish I was in Arizona to see that, but I would still rather much be on SAS. Now, if we beat the scum (Arizona State) in 2 weeks, we get to a bowl game…GO CATS!

But I am happy I’m missing the NFL this year, because the Dolphins are 0-10. That isn’t something I want to witness…..

Bridge in Istanbul

Me and Eric outside of the Hagia Sophia

Inside one of the great buildings of the world, the Hagia Sophia

Blue Mosque at night

Teej, me, and Anthony at the Besiktas match

Random pictures from SAS

Right now, I'm in Istanbul which is an awesome city. I'll write more about it later, but this city is really cool. It has lots of really nice mosques, everything in the city in general is really nice, it's got an awesome landscape with the two sides (Asia and Europe) being separated by the Bosphorus, and its just a really cool city to just walk around and check out. I'm spending all my time in Turkey here, and its my favorite city so far. The weather is cold, its in the 50s which isn't something I tend to like, but I do really like this city, it has a great culture clash because it feels and looks like Europe even though it's Islamic and not fully in Europe (and unfortunately, things are priced like Europe, it's hard to adjust to that after being in inexpensive countries for 2 months). I haven't gone to the Asian side yet (our boat is docked on the European side, and most of the attractions are there too), but I'm definitely going to go over there today or tomorrow to see it. And a bunch of us got tickets to the Besiktas/Sivasspor soccer (football) match for Saturday night which should be awesome, it's the second place team in the Turkish league against the fourth place team and Turkish fans go absolutely crazy for soccer so it should be awesome (especially since I'm a huge soccer fan.) Besiktas just got wrecked by Liverpool in Champions League a few days ago (lots of people here have been talking about it) so it should be interesting to see how they respond on Saturday in their Turkish league game. Anyway, I've posted some random pics from throughout the trip, so here they are:


Housing on the Mekong Delta
Sketchy bridge on the Mekong Delta
That snake was real heavy
Monk walking by the Royal Palace in Bangkok
River right behind the Taj Mahal
Kids playing cricket by the Ganges in Varanasi
Tuk tuk in New Delhi
Sportscenter.....Indian style
View of Varanasi from the Ganges

Our halloween constumes, we had to get really creative since you can't go to a store and just by stuff....we ended up being the cast of Aladdin.
Bridge over the Suez Canal

On the Suez Canal

Egypt

So Egypt was my favorite country so far. I had already expected all of the tourist sites to be awesome, but everything was actually way better than I expected, especially Cairo, which was great. Egypt is a really amazing country, there is so much to see, the people are really nice, the food is really good, it has a really good vibe, and I would go back in a second.

We had a group of seven going into the trip, although we traveled around in two groups and then met up at random times during the trip. First day, we got off the boat in Alexandria and the port was really nice, it looked really new. We started the day by fitting 7 people into one normal sized cab (which was definitely not spacious) and we went to the train station to get our train to Cairo. On our cab ride, we talked to the driver about America, he said he likes the people but not the government, and it’s the same deal with most other Egyptians. People in Egypt are extremely nice, and no one was ever rude to me because I’m an American (even though I said a lot of the time that I’m Canadian) or because I’m white. Some may think Egypt is dangerous for tourists or that the people there would be hostile towards tourists since it’s a Middle Eastern country, but neither are true. Egypt has tons of tourism, its extremely important to their economy, and it is very rare for tourists to be attacked. The train ride to Cairo took 3 hours, then we took a cab to Zamalek to check into our hotel.

Zamalek is a really cool area of Cairo. A lot of the embassies are there, and it’s a really nice area. It has a ton of hotels, a lot going on overall, and has a really cool vibe. It feels a little bit like Europe, even though it obviously isn’t. Our hotel, the President Hotel, was pretty nice and only $40 USD a night, so it was definitely a good deal. In Egypt, they have a policemen and a metal detector in front of every hotel, but if you look like you are from the West, they rarely stop you. I set off the metal detectors countless times and I was only stopped once.

The first night, four of us went to the sound and light show at the Great Pyramids, which were 30 minutes away from our hotel. The Great Pyramids are in Giza, which is a city right next to Cairo. We took a cab there (and cabs are cheap, it was 35 Egyptian pounds there, which is around $7 USD, and that was a bit expensive by Egyptian standards) and seeing the Pyramids for the first time was unreal. It didn’t feel like they were really there, but that may have been because they were being used in a light show. They lit the pyramids up in all of these different colors, which was really cool, although a bit corny. Also, when it ended, we saw all of the SAS trips there (and that was a ton of people), and every time I see them, I start laughing because I’m happy I’m traveling on my own instead of doing their trips in huge groups….knowing from the experience of doing both, traveling without SAS is way better (although my SAS trips weren’t bad, its just so much better not doing SAS trips.)

One note about the Pyramids: they are right next to restaurants. You look one way, you see the Pyramids, you look the other way, you see Pizza Hut. In pictures, it looks like the Pyramids are in the middle of no where, and if you look at them from one direction, it looks like they are in the middle of no where, but if you look the other direction, its all buildings.

After the light show, we got dinner near the Pyramids and then went back to Zamalek. Teejana has a friend from her home island of Mauritius that lives in Cairo because he goes to the American University in Cairo, so we hung out with him after. We then chilled at his friends apartment that night which was really cool, it was in Zamalek right near our hotel and had an absolutely awesome view of the Nile from the 20th floor. What an awesome place that would be to live at.

The second day, four of the seven of us (we were in a group of seven, but we traveled around in two groups because its hard to get around if there are seven) got a cab to take us to Saqqara, which is a step pyramid around 50 minutes away from Cairo. We were able to get a cab who would take us there, then to the Great Pyramids of Giza, then back to our hotel all for 150 pounds, which was a decent deal…..ended up being around 7 dollars USD a person for the day. We got to Saqqara, and it was awesome. Looks really cool, its in the middle of the desert (it isn’t a 2 minute walk away from restaurants like the Giza Pyramids), and you could see the other Pyramids from it.

We walked around Saqqara for a little bit, then we took pictures on a camel, then left for Giza. Here are some Saqqara pictures though:

Me, Teejana, and Jason

Me on a camel with Saqqara in the background....and the arab headcovering

After Saqqara, our driver drove us to a place to get camels to ride them into the Giza Pyramids. These camels were not like any of the other ones we saw, they were ghetto, had cuts on them, and were acting up. The camel I got on was making weird noises before I got on it, which was pretty sketchy. However, when I got up on it, it was fine. However, one of the other camels was not fine. When Teejana got up on that one, it flew right up, then it tried to walk into cars, then it tried to get in her face, so we all thought these camels were no good since the camels you can find at the Pyramids actually behave so we got off of these, got our money back, and then went to Giza. Besides, riding camels up to Giza would have taken a while, and we didn’t really want to ride them for a few hours, we only really wanted them for a few minutes, which you can hook up at Giza (besides, after riding these camels for 3 minutes, it already wasn’t that great, when we got to Giza, only Mia rode a camel, the rest of us didn’t bother.)

Anyway, we got up to the Giza Pyramids and they were packed. We first walked by the Sphinx, which is way smaller than you would expect, but it was still awesome then you would see. Then, we walked up to the Pyramids. The Giza Pyramids have the Sphinx and then 3 pyramids, although one of them is really small. We walked by the bigger two, and at the Pyramids, you constantly get hassled for services. People are always asking you to ride their camel, buy their postcards, etc., it gets annoying after a while, but I’m so used to it right now because it happens in almost all of the countries we go to on this trip, so we know that if you just ignore them, they stop after a while. Also, one disappointment of the Pyramids is that there is tons of garbage right next to them. You see cans, bottles, bags, etc. right next to the Pyramids. They could really do a better job with upkeep there and a better job with not littering them, but to me, it didn’t really take away from the Pyramids, they were awesome, although they felt a bit unreal. You hear about them from the time you are young, and its hard to believe you are actually seeing them when you do. Anyway, we ended up going in the second biggest pyramid, which you have to pay extra for (its 50 Egyptian pounds to get into the Giza Pyramids complex, another 25 to get into the Middle Pyramid, so that’s around $15 USD total for that complex….in Egypt, they really hit up the tourists at all the destinations, you pay $5-$10 at each one and in Egypt, you end up going to a lot of them so it adds up.) Anyway, the inside of the Pyramid was really hot….one of the hottest things I’ve ever experienced. It also has very low ceilings on the descent down, and it’s a steep decent (you keep having to go up and down inclines with 4.5 foot rooves) but it was still awesome to be inside a Pyramid.

Two biggest Pyramids of Giza with the Sphinx
Me, Jason, Teejana, and Mia with the biggest Pyramid behind us

Anyway, after that, we left the Pyramids, and it was already 4:30 so we got something to eat and then we went to our Nile Cruise instead of going back to the hotel. All seven of us did that, and it was kind of a rip off. The boat would just go one way and then turn the opposite way, so we were in the same area which was lame, and the food on it was mediocre. It was just 2 hours of going back and fourth, not really that cool.

So after that, we went back to the hotel and met up with Sachi again, who is Teejana’s friend. He needed us to get him alcohol, and he said that they only sell good bottles at the duty free (in Egypt, alcohol is legal, and some restaurants and all hotels serve beer, and they have some local Egyptian beers which are pretty good, but apparently its impossible to get good bottles of hard liquor unless you hit up the duty free), so we had to do a liquor run for him. Even though he is Mauritian, he can’t go to the duty free because he has a visa allowing him to live in Egypt. Anyway, we went to the Sheraton because that’s where the duty free was, and there is only a 3 bottle limit a person. They wouldn’t let me buy alcohol because you have to be 21 to buy it in Egypt (although they don’t check in the hotels or restaurants) but she is of age so she was able to get him 3 bottles, which is the limit at the duty free.

So after that, we went to some hookah place and just chilled and had some beer, so that was pretty chill, then we went to bed.

The third day (our last in Cairo) was awesome. We started out by going to the National Museum and that had tons of Egyptian artifacts, it was so cool. After spending an hour there (and we bumped into lots of SAS people there, although none were on SAS trips so they were all people traveling the right way), we went to the Citadel, which was an amazing Mosque. Its huge, and it was really cool going to a Mosque. This one, however, was pretty touristy, it’s a really nice building, really old, and the view of Cairo from it is awesome. It overviews the whole city, so you can see everything, and in the distance, you can even see the Giza Pyramids.

The Citadel

Inside the Citadel

After that, we went to Khan el Khalili which is a crazy bazaar in the Islamic section of Cairo. This bazaar had dirt roads, was really hectic, and was a really cool market to see, I liked it. After spending an hour there, Mia and Teejana still wanted to shop since they are female and me and Jason didn’t want to because we aren’t so we left to check out some more mosques. We started out by going to a mosque across the street from the bazaar, which wasn’t that touristy (even though tons of tourists go to the bazaar) and that was so cool. We got to see a really important aspect of Egyptian life as we saw them praying in their mosque. At the mosque, we were both given some newspaper about Islam (most of it is in Arabic, but it has an English part) and then they had all of these books about Islam in so many different languages, so they gave one to both of us in English. The people there were really nice to us and were totally cool about tourists going into the Mosque. We saw a few other tourists there, but not too many.

Many people have this misconception that Egyptians are hostile towards Westerners, but its not true. Yes, there have been some attacks on Westerners over the years in Egypt, but they are very rare, and it’s a very open and safe country for tourists. They are welcoming of tourists everywhere, and there isn’t animosity towards Western people (although a lot of the people don’t like the American government, but right now, most Americans, including myself, don’t really like the current government either.)

After that, me and Jason went to another huge mosque back near the Citadel, but it was closed so we could only look at from the outside. We saw some kids playing soccer there, and they really wanted us to take pictures of them, so we did, and they were really cool and talked to us for a little bit. That was really cool. Then, we got a cab to take us to the Coptic Christian area. Egypt is 7% Coptic Christian, so they are a strong minority, and going to their area of the city was really cool. We saw a church, but couldn’t go in because it was closed so we just walked around the area as the sun was going down. It was a really cool area to explore. Then, some kids started to get all over us because we were taking pictures, which was cool at first. I then got my camcorder out and started to record the area, which I would assume is fine. However, some old guy came and got pissed at me for recording stuff so I put the camera away. Then, we just decided to leave because it was dark at this point. Also, we started to hear bottles breaking somewhere which was pretty sketch. We entered off of a major street, but our exit was off some sketchy, dark street (you know when you are entering or leaving the area because they have police guarding all of the entrances due to the fact it’s a Christian area in an Islamic country.) We walked down the sketchy street for a few minutes before getting to the road, then we wanted to go to the biggest mosque in the city, which is right next to the Coptic area. We got a cab to take us there since it was on the other side (but its okay because cabs are so cheap in Egypt, every cab ride is 2 or 3 bucks, this one was only 1) and we checked out this huge mosque which was awesome.

Kids outside a mosque

After that, we went back to our hotel where we met up with the girls, then we went to dinner which was awesome (there were two awesome restaurants right next to our hotel) and then we went to the airport to catch our flight to Luxor.

After our one hour flight, we got a cab and went to our hotel, which was the Sheraton Resort. It was the cheapest one on expedia, and it was $80, which isn’t too bad because it meant it would be only 20 a person. I lied to them when I booked it online and said we would only have three in the room (it wouldn’t let me book the room for four, and three and two were the same price) . Our plan was for the girls to use the bed while we would just crash on the floor. However, we had a really bad for covering up the fact that it was four, so we got busted, I should have just never had them come into the hotel instead of having them just sit on the couches in the lounge…dumb idea, it was so obvious. However, while you would think they would get mad, instead they just upgraded us to a bigger room for the same rate! That was so awesome.

This hotel, by the way, was so nice. It was right on the Nile, had two pools, and the rooms were real nice. Anyway, we chilled by the pool for a little bit, then went to the bar there where there were no more than 8 people, then we went to bed.

The next day, we woke up at 8 and went to the train station to get our tickets to go to Cairo that night. The train was sold out, but our cab driver (who drove us for half the day, we hired him to take us to the Valley of the Kings, Queen Hatshepsuts Temple, and then back to the hotel) was so nice that he used his hook up at the train station to get us tickets on the train that night.

After we got our tickets for the train, we went to the Valley of the Kings which was awesome. Its on the other side of the Nile in the desert. It was in such a cool spot, and the tombs there were awesome. There are 20 or so tombs, and you can spend all day there, but the tickets only allow for 3 tombs (otherwise you have to buy another) so we saw 3 and they were really cool. So many cool hieroglyphs and stuff in them, and it was just awesome to be in the place where so many former Egyptian kings were buried.

After that, we went to the Queen Hatshepsut Temple which was also awesome. The building was so cool, and there were just some cool statues and stuff inside:

Queen Hatshepsut Temple

Posing like the statues at the Queen Hatshepsut Temple


After that, our cab was going to take us back to the hotel where we were gonna chill for a little bit before going to the Karnak Temple. On the way back, some bee got into the car and then stung me on the neck. Then, when I tried to get it off me, it flung onto finger and stung that too. I thought bees could only sting once, but apparently that’s not true. Anyway, I had stinging feeling in me for a few hours (and I’ve never been stung before) but I was eventually fine by the time we went to the Karnak Temple.

At the hotel, we chilled on the Nile and ate which was cool...view of the Nile:

After that, we went to the Karnak Temple. The Karnak Temple was so cool, I thought it was the best thing I saw in Egypt. It’s hard to describe, but its just massive, has tons of statues (although many had their heads cut off by imperial powers, unfortunately), and overall it was just amazing. It had huge pillars that had hieroglyphs all over them, had 2 obelisks, had really cool, massive ruins, and is one of those places that is just so much better in person than it is in pictures (you can say that for almost anything, but for some things, its more true than it is for others, and the Karnak Temple is just one of those places where the pictures will never do it justice.) We were there until sunset, which was really cool because by the time we left, very few people were there, so it felt like we were in this huge temple by ourselves.

Me with one of the pillars.....way taller than me
Statues in the Karnak Temple

Me at the Karnak Temple with the Obelisks in the background
Statue with its head cut off at the Karnak Temple

After that, we got dinner and just hung out for a little bit before we went to the train station for our 11 pm train to Cairo. The train wasn’t bad, they gave us this room with 6 pretty big seats so we were actually able to get a little bit of sleep on it. The train ride took 10.5 hours, so we got to Cairo at 9:30. We then went to book the next train to Alexandria, which was at 11, so we got to Alexandria by 1:45. We then went to the boat, dropped our stuff off, and then went to the Bibliotecha Alexandrina, which is the library and its massive. It’s in a new building that looks really cool, and is one of the most famous libraries in the world, mainly because the oldest library in the world is in Alexandria (I think.) The library had a museum in it and all of these great things, such as original pages from the New Testament, it was really cool to go to that Library. We wanted to go to the Catacombs too in Alexandria, but we just didn’t have time. However, after the library, we got dinner at this place right near the Nile which was great and so cheap (my meal was $3 USD) and then we went back to the boat. Alexandria looked like a really cool city, its right on the Mediterranean which is awesome, but I didn’t have enough time to check out the whole city, but I am happy I got to see a little bit of it.

Overall, Egypt was just so amazing, there was just so much to see there and I really saw a ton in my 5 days. Egypt was just so cool, and I would love to go back there, it’s just a really awesome place (and much safer for tourists than people think.)