My ticket in hand, I was at the train station early. It was cavernous and empty, and I could hear echoes of train sounds and I watched paper wastes blow across the open floor. The British held a protectorate over Egypt for more than a century and the train station, like the Cairo Museum, had the feel of British architecture.  Except, as I recall, unlike London rail stations where the waiting trains are covered in a glass roof like Victoria Station, or any roof – rain expected on a daily basis – the trains in Cairo were open to the sky. 

 

No rain is expected in Cairo; the desert is a short taxi ride away. But the area where the customer waits is covered and I remember wondering where all the people were, was this a national holiday I didn’t know about? I unslung my knapsack and leaned it against one of the I-beam columns holding up the portico. I looked down the train tracks, glistening from usage and running away parallel into infinity.

 

I checked the big clock on the station wall. I should expect my train in ten minutes. A few people began to arrive. There was more activity. I angled back to my knapsack and stood near the column. People looked at me as I was clearly foreign, and most would guess without much forethought – based on my denim cut-offs, long hair and red and blue knapsack – American. I experienced Egyptians to be of two camps towards Americans. 

 

The first group, and by far the largest, were those genuinely intrigued to see and talk to an American, and they wanted conversation and contact. They were excited by their culture and their opportunity to show it off and explain the real Egypt. 

 

Then there was a small minority that took exception to Americans, wanted nothing to do with them, blamed us for their losses in their wars.  Some were afraid we were there to steal their oil and gas, both of which, at that time, were being discovered at an impressive rate near the Delta and other areas. The sounds of the train station changed abruptly, and a cacophony of human bustle and human commands filled the air, and just minutes before the train was due, people arrived by the hundreds, by the thousands. 

 

It was a remarkable sight of coincidental human planning, and no moment was wasted as the passengers arrived at the same time as the train and I was in a bit of shock at how quickly the scene had progressed. Others might describe Cairo as a third world city, but I don’t use that term. I find it bigoted, arrogant and a display of the obtuse. You can read all the Karl Marx and Max Weber and Milton Friedman you want and still not understand the real and persisting causes of poverty and societal degradation. Too often the term “third world” is used by a “first world” speaker to paste blame on the poorer society for not embracing the social and political and economic structure of the successful, read, colonizer. Poverty is too complex, I thought as the train itself was now mobbed by thousands of needy travelers. I massaged my way onto a train car and stood near one of the roof support polls and had a hold on a strap hanger. 

As a “first worlder”, I had seen the photos and films of trains overloaded with passengers, and during my brief time in Cairo had seen what overcrowding and stress there was on the municipal services. One day, on a bus – and I got to know some of the bus routes between the museum and the hostel – there was a brand new bus, right from the factory, and this bus was mobbed just like the old buses and the driver was beside himself, as this was his charge, this was his responsibility, and he tried to protect the bus, his bus, and he was in tears as he beat people off the windows, and the doorframe and the bus was soon destroyed by desperate people, people who knew there might not be another bus later, and that this might be it. Everyone had their reason.

 

Here I was now on this train, and I was increasingly uncomfortable there by myself, and I felt someone pulling on the back of my knapsack and I could not turn around as there were so many people. Then a fight broke out about ten people away from me. A man in an army uniform was beating, or was being beaten, I could not tell, over the occupancy of a seat, or some other infraction, and I became alarmed that the altercation was about to spread as the shouts spread, and I decided to, excuse me, let me off, and I could see some with their eyes argue me against such a move, to apologize that this was no big thing, and that I should stay and they were imploring me to stay, as what I was about to experience, they knew, was so much more in reward than this little altercation should alter my plans, that I shouldn’t, don’t go, don’t get off.

 

But I got off the train.

 

The train pulled out of the station with people on the roof and hanging from the windows and holding onto the doorframe and, as soon as the train left the station, the station was as empty as I had found it that morning. I walked through the station truly defeated in a way I had never experienced. And I don’t think I made it to the outside doorway before I realized what a mistake, what a big mistake I had made, and that this day would never come again, and I would never likely be in Egypt again, and that what was up that river waiting for me, in Luxor and the Valley of the Kings, was something I would never know. And I thought it was probably just a few stops and the majority of people would have disembarked the train, happy to be at their stop, the suburb, and next village, or within three villages the train would have been nearly empty, and this is something, a day, a decision, I have regretted my whole life. Until right now, who, as a septuagenarian, might manage a quiet trip to Portugal, or a meandering bus down the west coast of Morrocco, but not Egypt. Egypt is too grand, Egypt is too big in history, too big in energy. I’m sorry, but here, I can take you no further.

 

Next week: Part three: Egypt, The Lover and the Scribe.