When will Cairo love me? a question we might ask ourselves many times. As many of us find difficulty dealing with different aspects in Cairo. From its traffic, transportation to its pollution. These are all problems we deal with daily. Yet we still love Cairo with all our hearts, because it’s home.
I can’t help but think about how Cairo can feel like a cruel city sometimes. Too many cars, too many people, and barely any trees. You can be driving your car, walking on the side of the road, or waiting for your next train, and still think of how you hate it in here. The city with a population of over 10 million people, living and surviving the chaos of it.
Traffic (Whether you own a car or not, you will always find a reason to hate Cairo’s roads)
You can be driving during midnight hours and still magically get stuck in traffic. That’s beside the hassle of finding a parking spot, dealing with Al-Sayes, and paying him. All this makes the idea of outings not so appealing anymore.
Every morning, everybody appears to be so late, getting to their jobs or school on time. Everybody races with their cars, yelling and shouting, honking nonstop. An experience we all go through, hearing an unnecessary slur while driving. I don’t know about y’all, but that noise is so unpleasant to my ears. I’m sure half of the people who have experienced this are as frustrated as I am while writing about it.
Transportations (Middle-class people’s worst daily experience)
Let’s talk about transportation, the part I despise most in my daily life. But since I don’t own a car, transportation is pretty much a part of my daily life since I started having one! Except it never stops being a tiring process.
Fun fact: Every day, over one million people use the metro. And you’d be lucky to find a spot to stand on; sitting down needs a miracle.
One of the things I never understand about transportation is why people run to catch a train knowing that another one is coming in just two minutes!! Further, they don’t care if the train is already full; they would still try their hardest to squeeze themselves into the tiniest spaces of the metro or the bus. Let’s pretend that you found an empty seat. You still can’t spend your journey in peace from all the noise of the vendors that sell the most random things you might need.
Harassment (no matter what you’re wearing or where you’re walking, you will manage to get catcalled at least twice in the streets of Cairo)
Do you know what the common term they use for harassment in Egypt is? It’s “Mo3aksa,” translating to “Opposition”. It simply means that I will unnecessarily oppose your path of living!!
Harassment in Cairo follows this theory (in Egypt) that “Harassers are most likely to avoid harassing foreigners because it could cause consequences that are much worse than when they harass an Egyptian woman”.
On the other hand, some studies show that foreign women experience harassment just as high as Egyptian women do.
These studies consistently show extremely high rates of sexual harassment in Cairo, often exceeding 95% of women experiencing it in their lifetime, according to a 2014 study by HarrasMap and a 2013 UN Women study.
A 2008 study in Greater Cairo reported that 83% of Egyptian women and 98% of foreign women had experienced sexual harassment. Unfortunately, no matter what women do to save themselves from such unnecessary experiences, they still have to deal with them a few times a day on their 10-minute walk to the supermarket.
Pollution (Can we really breathe in the streets of Cairo?)
Here in Cairo, all you can breathe is car exhaust and garbage! A study by Nature.com ranked Cairo as the 7th deadliest city for air pollution. Cairo alone has a quarter of the cars in Egypt, which is one of the reasons why Cairo is so overcrowded.
As a daily walker through the streets of the city of Cars, all I could think of is how Cairo is fully consumed by dust and smoke to the point that I can’t see the blue sky. It’s as if it’s covered with a thick layer of air pollution.
As for garbage, when was the last time you saw a whole street from start to finish with no trace of trash? Piles of trash are mostly in every corner of the streets, even though sanitation workers are doing their best, but you can tell something is off about the process of getting rid of waste in Cairo.
How many parks do you stumble upon while walking or driving through Cairo? I feel like most of us can name most, if not all, the parks in Cairo. That’s how limited they are. We have been witnessing green areas, like areas in our beloved Maadi, being removed for the past year. It’s almost maddening how we are destroying the only source of clean air we have.
Is it easier to escape Cairo or to adapt to it?
Will Cairo ever be able to give us fresh air and peaceful mornings? We all want to live happy, fresh, and peaceful lives.
All I can say about this is try not to let the chaos consume you. You only live once, so don’t let the city make it harder for you. Don’t let the grumpy faces disappoint you. Don’t let the noise become the background of your life. We can always find the small sparks in Cairo. As small as it seems, it makes a difference. Like booking a ticket and spending your weekends in a different environment if you can. A change of scenery is very important. Always remember, you can find your own peace in the chaotic city.
So, the answer to my question is that you can’t make Cairo love you. You have to love Cairo for it to love you back.