Egypt’s VIP police taxi service

Taking tourist security to that extra level in Egypt Deep in misty dreams of sumptuous temptations, something knocked on the doors of my subconscious, cruelly beckoning me back to the world of daylight. The unwarranted intrusion into my reverie metamorphosed into the insistent clatter of fist against the shoddy carpentry claiming to be my door. Some words of arabic had little trouble piercing the feeble woodwork, “hokouma” was the only word I needed to understand, government. “Yeah,yeah, yeah”, I grumbled…

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Making friends in Fayoum

The first signs were good: within minutes of getting off the bus somewhere on the outskirts of Fayoum I’d found a motorbike taxi who didn’t make any attempt to rip me off, in fact I couldn’t be sure if he wasnt just some guy who was happy to help out.  Certainly he spent most of the time shouting out to all and sundry as we passed by, something along the lines of, “look look a foreigner has come to visit”!…

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