Let My People Go

LET MY PEOPLE GO

AH – Arab Hand – Gregg Freeman.

FC – Female Contingent – Polly Buckle

Gary Min – sat nav, some Garmin effort

Tuppence – 1997 Land Rover Discovery 300TDI

The vessel that was to bear us to the Land of the Pharaohs appeared to be a semi-derelict former Scandinavian pleasure cruiser, full of Egyptian truckers and a few confused tourists. Anxious about the famed Egyptian customs procedures that we had to face in the morning we lay down on some hard benches in the foreigners only section near our new neighbour Hussein and pretended that it was possible to sleep.

Roused by the morning call to prayer, random Arabic shouting and nightmares about the sanitary arrangements on board, we discovered that the ship would be around an hour late “because the Captain wanted more than four hours sleep” – four hours being the designated sailing time for this 21 km crossing. Wondering who the hell was driving the ship we settled down to wait. And wait. Even after we had docked at Nuweiba there was a good deal more waiting to do before we were allowed off the boat. Good thing really, as we needed some waiting practice to be in good mid-season waiting form for the many hours of customs waiting that stretched ahead.

Finally we were allowed to return to Tuppence and drive her off the ship, first in the queue which we thought might be a good sign. Driving over to the customs area we sat dumbly for a few minutes while all around us other drivers ran from booth to booth conducting business of which we were ignorant. We did some photocopying and got a file going which seemed like a good start and AH drove over an inspection pit. After that we were a bit stumped until we discovered the Tourist Police, whom we believed to be our salvation, though we were a bit wrong about that too.

Four or five hours passed during which the Tourist Policeman occasionally did some more photocopying and took AH off to booths to hand over other random amount of cash for indecipherable reasons. Most of the time was spent standing round, drinking tea and waiting for the various agents of the state to get into work, many of them having a punishing commute from the mattresses on their office floors all two foot to their desks. AH tried and failed to use the onsite sanitary facilities but FC decided just to give up consuming liquid for the remainder of her time in the Middle East.

Having docked at 6am, by about 11am we were told we were free to go. However upon reaching the exit of the godforsaken place a man chased afterwards waving a piece of paper and demanded we show him our equivalent. A thorough search of the dozen or so pieces of paper we’d accrued during our time at customs proved fruitless. Apparently we didn’t have the right form so they fannied around for an hour or so more before we were eventually allowed to drive off into the desert.

Attempting to drive into Cairo having not slept the previous night would have defeated a lesser man than AH. After a 7 hour drive across the completely barren desert of the Sinai, crossing the Suez canal through a tunnel, we made it to the capital of the Arab world at rush hour in the dark. Trained up through the mean streets of Istanbul, Beirut and Damascus AH thought nothing could phase him but the sheer volume of traffic and disregard for human life shown by our new Egyptian friends managed to beat everything we had hitherto witnessed. Thankfully Gary did manage to perk up a bit at this point and got us close-ish to our chosen hotel, before he did his usual spazz about the one-way system and left us to it. Thanks again, Gary. Parking up at a garage FC had to run off in to the night, discovering the Egyptians to be very nice and helpful when they weren’t hissing and staring, particularly the gay ones who ran the hotel who accompanied her back to rescue AH from an irate garage attendant and guide Tuppence to a parking space outside the hotel.

A $15 night’s sleep later and we were ready to begin our visa mission. Heading down to the British Consulate requested two letters of introduction to the Sudanese consul, for which we were fleeced of £60 and didn’t even get a cup of tea. Rocking on down to the Sudanese consulate we did some form filling and photocopying and used the time honoured strategy of Arab negotiation – i.e. AH did the talking. FC came over all mute.

It’s worth noting that by this point in our travels AH had taken to suggesting that FC covered her head and wore dark glasses at all times, the hissing and staring from Egyptian men becoming a littler disquieting after a while, though we were to discover that the Cairenes were rank amateurs at this kind of unwanted attention.

We were informed that our visas would be ready at 10am the next morning and set off on our merry way, relieved that a process we’d been told could take up to a month would be dealt with so quickly.

Deciding that the Pyramids, one of the Wonders of the World and the greatest monument to antiquity, sounded a bit shit, we took ourselves off for a sumptuous afternoon tea in an ex-colonial palace which was a lot more pleasant than being chased around by a load of touts all afternoon. We then moved on the next installment of One Man’s Search for Travel Injections – the Gregg Freeman Story where we tried and failed to find a doctor with whom the hotel had made an appointment. And good thing we did. Deciding to get the metro back into town, a young Cairene landscape architect offered to help us find our destination. This was somewhat hampered when the three of us boarded only to discover that we had found the  ladies only carriage – a marvelous invention which would greatly improve the female experience of the London Underground, should it be introduced. Making their excuses with alacrity, FC was left behind and departed alone to be reunited with AH at the next station.

During AH’s Man Time alone with the young lad he discovered that a revolution was planned for the very next day, a public holiday, to take place right round the corner from our hotel. With our usual cultural sensitivity we’d had no idea that Egypt was in fact a corrupt military dictatorship, whose leadership were more concerned with clinging to power, keeping the land of apple pie content and buying weapons than developing Egypt into the leader of the Arab world that it should be.

Relieved that we were going to get our Sudanese visas in the morning and would be able to depart town before the protests kicked off we booked a hotel on the Red Sea coast and got a good night’s kip, though not before AH had braved the Cairo pizza making system, and maybe had a cheeky shawarma to wash it down with.

Heading to the Sudanese Embassy in the morning we realized the streets were mostly full of riot police and roadblocks. A little disquieting but, we thought with our usual cultural sensitivity, probably an overreaction by an authoritarian regime to a protest which would no doubt have little national effect.

Upon reaching the Sudanese Embassy we were informed that it was closed for the public holiday and we would have to return tomorrow. Fucksticks. AH did his best with a Firm Voice on the phone to the Visa Man but to no avail. We returned to the hotel and decided to implement plan B – head to Giza, away from the protest zone, and see the bastard pyramids before getting the visas in the morning and heading out of town.

As we drove Tuppence out of town to Giza on the other side of the river we realized we were leaving not a moment to soon – it now being 1pm due to a noodle stop to see if the Egyptian noodles could be compared to pizza or shawarma – answer – yes they could. The roads around Tahrir Square were blocked off and the riot police looked like they meant business.

We did a drive by of the Pyramids and decided that we couldn’t face the touts, the hotel checking in procedure being more than enough of the hardsell for one day. Concerned that there was a revolution in the offing and we had no passports and no way to get them back if the Sudanese Embassy failed to open in the morning, we comforted ourselves with a trip to Pizza Hut and went to bed.

The next morning AH decided to undertake a solo mission to the Sudanese Embassy 12km away as FC had a tendency to cause trouble. Thankfully at this point the protests were peaceful and the Sudanese Embassy was open, returning our passports to us with visas inside. We think this was the last day the embassy was open before the trouble really started. A day later and we could have been stuck in Cairo with no passports, which would probably not have been much fun.

Blithely heading off to the Red Sea and assuming most of the trouble would be over by the time we had to head to Aswan two days later to catch the ferry, we passed a pleasant couple of days snorkeling, golfing and perfecting the art of the 8 course breakfast buffet in order to survive on one meal a day and avoid any costly charges for other foodstuffs. For reasons I can’t go into we can never return to that hotel but you’ll have to get us drunk to find out why,

We departed for Aswan on the Friday morning, aware that the political situation was worsening but with FC adamant that there would be no trouble in Aswan or Luxor as there were tourist centres who would not dare disrupt the holidays of their main source of income. Besides, we really thought this whole revolution business was being overhyped. About 30% of the people we talked to quite liked Mubarak. Obviously we later found out that was because they thought the secret police would get them if they didn’t say that but, you know, we’re on holiday, can’t be expected to know EVERYTHING about all the countries we’re driving through…

Our optimism about the situation proved absolutely true until we drove into Luxor to go to McDonalds go to see the beautiful Valley of the Kings only to find it full of riot police, bolting carriage horses and a host of angry protestors, who thankfully all paused slightly bemused and long enough for AH to take Tuppence through her enormous turning circle before resuming so we could hightail it out of town.

Clearly the revolution was still in full flow, which was a little concerning. We’re love democracy and freedom and everything but if things really kicked off it could become a bit inconvenient. There’s only one boat a week from Aswan to Wadi Halfa in Sudan and if it didn’t leave with us on it we’d be stuck in Egypt.

And we were rapidly realizing that that would be A Bad Thing. Driving into Aswan, the sleepy tourist town that I’d been told of, we were again greeted by riot police and the tasty smell of teargas and burning garbage. Still, it didn’t seem too bad, though the Internet had been taken down by the government… And the phone networks…But we had little choice but to find a hotel and wait to talk to Mr Saleh in the ferry office in the morning. AH had to contend with a non-shawarma, non-pizza Nubian dinner and we retired to bed. Woken by frantic texts and calls from family at home, we realized that the situation in Cairo was worsening, reinforcing our desire to get on the boat to Sudan at whatever cost.

The next morning we headed to Mr Saleh’s office, setting off late as usual, with only Gary to guide us there. Think Gary had a hangover as he didn’t want to find his satellites, no doubt he’d fallen out with them again, but after a sharp slap he got himself into gear at last and provided us with a map to the co-ordinates. When we got there we did some traditional waiting, during which we met Peter, an Austrian traveling with his wife Traudl, who was also hoping to get the ferry. After the wait had gone on a bit it seemed we’d been queue jumped by another man, also named Pieter. Of course, as Brits, we’d have sat there all day and probably never have got to talk to Mr Saleh at all but Austrian Peter was having none of it and ensured that if Mr Saleh spoke to one he spoke to all. Turns out Pieter was traveling with his wife Fiona, and their three children Mara, Archie and Euan on their way from Scotland to Cape Town.

South African Pieter had already sorted a fixer for the ferry trip which was why he’d been first in to see Mr Saleh. And it turns out it’s true that adversity makes for strange bedfellows – almost literally – as we resolved to join forces to get ourselves on the ferry – Pieter having already discovered that the Traffic Courts and Traffic Police, both of whom had to attest to our clean driving records and lack of parking tickets before we could leave the country, were closed on account of the Trouble. All we could do was hope they were open the next day so we went off for a nice refreshing wait.

We headed off to look at the Aswan Dam, which was big, and failed to find the Temple of Philae (Gary’s fault, doesn’t seem to like Egypt, can’t say I blame him), and headed back into town. We were feeling a little tense so comforted ourselves with a nice, warming McDonalds, mostly so we could use the loos.

We then headed round to the daily protests just to see what was brewing. There didn’t seem to be many people and the 100 or so riot police seemed more bored then anything else. With our usual cultural sensitivity we didn’t realize that the bulk of the protests were out of sight next to the police station, but more of that later.

As we carried out some vehicle checks on Tuppence at the side of the Corniche FC alerted AH to the fact that the protesters were headed in our direction. AH shrugged – so what? It was only when the protesters drew closer that we saw the small group of vociferous political activists had turned into a running mob. AH had to once again take Tuppence through her laborious turning circle and make a not so quick get away.

As we sat in a long queue to get fuel, suddenly it felt like something had changed, and not for the better. People were terser, ruder, a gang of lads groped FC’s arse and AH had to be restrained from launching a counter offensive. It seemed that the power vacuum caused by Mubarak’s lack of legitimacy had filtered down to the man of the street and turned him into a massive perve.

We debated whether we should get out of town for the night but we had to be at the hotel next door early to try to get our paperwork done again. So we found a nice quiet parking space away from the main drag. The protests could be heard throughout the town now and when we went into our hotel, the manager who had been previously entirely blasé about the whole revolution thing told us not to go out again that evening, though he assured us that the car would be fine.

We headed up to the roof of the hotel to keep an eye on the car. A gang of youths seem to be congregating near it, eyeing up a line of riot police about 200m away. We figured the riot police were there to keep people in the main square at the other end of the road. Turns out they were guarding the police station and our little friends around the car were planning an offensive against them.

We watched as the situation became tenser and tenser, the group of “protesters” throwing stones and the police, helpfully, throwing them back (not one of the policemen we saw was above about 5ft tall. Maybe they were Oompa Loompas. They certainly had no idea how to control a hostile crowd).

As the police line came closer and closer to Tuppence we started to shit ourselves. What if Tuppence got hurt? But by this point the group of protesters were armed with sticks and were kicking the shit out of a stray local policeman and we decided it was too late to do anything now.

The police fired round after round of teargas at the protesters. As they continued, undeterred, to crowd round Tuppence suddenly my liberal views went out of the window and I cursed the British government for selling the Egyptians such substandard weapons with which to subjugate their people.

When one of the little fuckers climbed onto Tuppence and slashed the rooftent I would dearly have loved to have brought back the death penalty for him. We don’t know if he was looking for something to set fire to or just to steal but we suddenly thought that if we didn’t do something Tuppence was about to be reduced to cinders. AH legged it down the stairs whilst a completely hysterical FC screamed bloody murder at the little shits to get away from her Tuppence.

Thankfully by the time AH got to the street the hoodlums had thought better of whatever they planned to do to Tuppence. Maybe they realized that the tent was of no value to them. Maybe they’d just been deafened by FC’s shrieks. Either way AH was able to circumvent the baying mob in order to access the vehicle, perform another one of her legendary turns and get out of there.

As AH drove the streets of Aswan seeking a safe place, FC hysterically accosted anyone who would listen to tell them that AH was on the streets and what the fuck was she supposed to do. As the teargas began to flow ever more freely and the gangs of kids started to rip up street signs and throw them into the road she just hoped AH had the sense not to drive back.

A note here in defence of the Egyptian protesters. Clearly there was a group of dedicated, genuine people, protesting against an oppressive regime that had stunted their country’s growth and their personal freedom for over 30 years. Egypt is the most populous country in the Arab world with archeological treasures and a tourist industry that should be the envy of its neighbours, yet 40% of its people live on less than $2. On the other hand there were also a load of little scallies who were using his as an opportunity to go on a wrecking mission and intent on taking Tuppence down with them. The first group I salute. The second can fuck off. But as we watched the naughty boys rip apart the street furniture, we also saw older members of the community clearing the road, preventing more harm being done and trying to get the little shits to see the error of their ways.

That aside, when the lads in front of the hotel started trying to get the petrol tank off a motorbike in order to make petrol bombs, and there was still no word from AH, FC started to get herself in a right old tizzy. Thankfully an eccentric English couple called Brian and Sue took it upon themselves to talk nonsense at her until AH returned. The call to prayer seemed to have the effect of calming the rioting mob a little and afterwards a voice came over the megaphone – as we don’t speak Arabic he could of course have been saying anything but whatever it was seemed to make the rioters think better of it and go their separate ways. Once it looked safe to go out we legged it across the road to the posh hotel and calmed our nerves with the first beers we’d had in a while. Whilst the booze had the desired affect, our first view of CNN in a few days did not. As we watched Tahrir Square burn, where we’d been only days before, we thought we could really be screwed.

The next morning, a Sunday, dawned with another trip to the traffic court. FC was left at the hotel to play with the children as this was clearly Man Business.

When the Men returned it was to announce the failure of their mission. The court remained closed, and no-one thought it would open until Tuesday. No one would sign us out of the country until a new government was formed to attest to our lack of parking tickets. Nice one, Egypt.

The boat was scheduled to depart Monday night and apparently they wouldn’t move it and inconvenience the other 100 or so passengers just go get 9 scared Gringos out of town. There was nothing to do but some more waiting. Having spent a sleepless night the previous evening we drove to a hotel slightly out of town with a car park where Tuppence would be safe. A pleasant Nubian meal in a hillside restaurant later and the world seemed to look like a better place. The news in Arabic had stopped showing photos of riots and instead stripped pictures of the rioters and looters who had been arrested being named and shamed. Perhaps not the most liberal of crowd control techniques but it seemed to be having the desired affect. Egypt still didn’t have a government but they did have an army that everyone was shitscared of.

The optimistic feeling persisted into the next day, despite a scary breakfast buffet which only AH could have faced up to with the bravery that he did. And sure enough, a mere couple of hours later and the courts had passed our paperwork – we were on the way to the port to get the boat. Whoop. We think this is because a Scottish Sudanese man called Mahmoon, who was driving from Edinburgh to Khartoum with his two mates, was in a wheelchair and, being able to speak Arabic, the three lads had managed to cajole the ferry company into getting the cogs moving so that he wouldn’t get stuck in Egypt without his medication and the nursing care he needed. The three of them were top lads who were the first Sudanese we had met – a sign of things to come on the next stage of our journey.

Six or seven hours of waiting and form filling later and our team of nine were loading the cars onto a barge and boarding the passenger ferry, otherwise known as the boat that hygiene forgot. We then had a good old wait for four or five hours whilst a boat that wasn’t even coming with us on the trip was loaded with fridges and the Captain of our ship had a couple of good long prays and then another pray for good luck (didn’t fill us with confidence about the state of his vessel). Finally around 7pm we set off, leaving the blighted Land of the Pharoahs behind us as we sailed to the famously stable Islamic Republic of Sudan.