c a i r o

t h e  v i c t o r i o u s 

when i arrived in cairo in january 2008 it was my third time to visit “the victorious”, as cairo is also called. but this time i wanted to stay longer. my first encounter with cairo dates back to 2001. back then i was simply overwhelmed. this chaotic and noisy jungle leaves you hardly time to acclimatize yourself, one gets rather inhaled by the city. it doesn’t matter if you enter cairo by land or by plane. veni, vidi …  and: plopp! you are in. surrounded by millions of cars and people. 20 million of the latter are living here, creating an amazing cacophony of horns, voices, noises. cairo is an own planet with it’s own rules and laws.

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though it’s certainly not new knowledge – but living in cairo is totally different from just visiting cairo for a couple of weeks. cairo sucks constantly energy out of its inhabitants. especially in summer, when the mercury in the thermometers hits 40 degrees and more. the airpollution sometimes makes you choke. and there is the traffic of course. still – i use my bicycle every day. apart from the pollution i still consider it the most easiest way to move around. but is it crazy anyway? join me on a small ride through cairo.

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though one might get the impression, living in cairo is best described with the word ‘battle’ – it’s not always like this. sitting on the azhar-park, above the roofs of old cairo, listening to the voices of 500 or so muezzins, calling the beliviers to the prayer, is truly a magic event. and cairo is full of hidden treasures. it is a most rewarding game, to leave the big roads, sneak into small lanes – to find one of this calm places, where you drink some tea, having a shisha (waterpipe) and play some domino. it is often not far from the big roads that one can find such an oasis.

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it is this “janus face” that  amazes me again and again – and it is exhaustive. on the one hand it is loud, fast, noisy. but you also find calm, almost serene places, which existed long before i was born – and will be there long after i will be gone. the difference between appearance and reality can be huge, the old proverb becomes true once again: the eye can deceive you. but i am also aware, that my point of view is the unique view of an ousider, who voluntarily decided to live here for a while – and who is able to leave anytime. though there were these times, when i felt: enough!, i still like to live in this town. cairo is always good for a big surprise. but then again – if we keep our eyes and mind open it will be like this anywhere, anytime …

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finally: what am i doing here? i work with the german cultural institute – the ‘goethe-institute’. i am responsible for a project called li-lak. li-lak is arabic and means ‘for me – for you’.  it is a website for german and arab youngsters. their personal experiences and views on their own country as well as their views on the other culture constitute the ‘core’ of li-lak. so li-lak wants to foster the often quoted ‘dialogue of cultures’.

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for how long i will stay here? till 2010 at least – and afterwards: who knows?

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join me on a small walk through cairo

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