Saturday 28th of April

Today we got up and had more yummy breakfast. We then met for a tour of Cairo in the lobby, an optional extra for the people who arrived early was only £4. We were taken into the centre of Cairo and shown a few shopping malls (nothing like at home, and way more men than women at these shops) as well as the city of the dead. The Egyptian people buried their dead in the West because they believed the sun ‘died’ in the West and the East was where people lived because the sun rose and became alive in the East.

In the city of the dead there are tombs and people who are mostly undertakers live around the tombs. We went to one family’s home there which was pretty nice inside compared to the outside. These people get to live there for free because the family that own the tomb near them do so in return for security and care taking of the tombs. We also drove around the city which is very dusty. The traffic is chaotic. There are cars, trucks, vans, donkeys and buses all using the same road. You understand now why they don’t use street lights as they would never move. At least the traffic is always moving.

All the house flats seem as though they are unfinished and look as though they will all fall down at any moment. The houses look unfinished because the families build more levels as there family grows. So there is always one extra floor in case the family gets bigger. After our tour we returned back to the hotel where we put on our swimmers and went down to the pool to have a swim and have lunch.
At 530pm we had our tour meeting and then at 7pm had our dinner cruise on the Nile where we also watched a belly dancer (again not that good) and other Egyptian dancers and music.