It wasn’t a great start.
It was a new day in Cairo, 12.30 in the morning actually, and I was standing at the baggage claim area with the other people who flew from Jeddah to Cairo waiting for that glorious moment when your bags appear (like a new born baby through the birth canal), through those split plastic curtains.
I waited.
And waited.
And waited.
And waited until a guy brought out the last few remaining items off the baggage trolly.
No bags for me. No glorious celebration of the arrivals I had been gestating in my mind whilst travelling over from New Zealand - none of that. No celebration. No exhalation of breath.
Just that horrible sinking feeling and the reek of your smelly lived-in clothes mixed in with the lost baggage guy’s cigarette smoke (which by the way he sucked on voraciously) whilst me and the other person to lose bags on the same flights as me from New Zealand, stood and filled out flimsy lost baggage forms. Oh great - I thought - another piece of paper to get lost in “the system’.
Fortunately for me, the other person who had travelled the same flights as me, was a lovely Egyptian guy who had been living in New Zealand for 13 years. He and I had found each other at KL airport transfer desk, and we were both assured our luggage would be in Cairo (as we had both been re-booked at the last minute to Jeddah due to Malaysian Airlines being 3.5 hours late in leaving Auckland). We made polite comments intending good luck to one another and then didn’t see each other again until Jeddah (a nine hour flight from KL).
I have to say the bonus of the flight to Jeddah was getting to fly with Saudia Air. This flight was like being in first class compared to Malaysian Airlines. I also had the luxury of a bulkhead seat. Bliss (its the little things!).
Jeddah is a MASSIVE airport - and I mean massive. It is a popular airport to fly to for Muslims making their pilgrimage to Mecca, a short bus trip from Jeddah in Saudia Arabia. Being the only ‘weird’ person on the flight - I was noticed by everyone; women eyeballed me through slits in their Niqab; men stared at me suspiciously. I made a mental note never to accept a teaching job in Saudi Arabia.
Somewhere in the massive airport, I think my bags got way-laid.
The arrival in Egypt wasn’t one of great anticipation and excitement as I was expecting with my initial landing time of 5.30 pm - this landing was instead, 15 minutes past midnight.We were offloaded onto a bus and ferried to an obscure looking terminal which I thought was rather drab for such a massive international airport to one of the oldest cities on the planet. I paid my $25 USD for a visa (it reminded me of arriving in Nepal) my passport all the better for it, as this alone was a stunning piece of artwork, and I trundled through to the baggage collection area for that joyous moment.
And here we are, back at the lost baggage counter with the guy smoking, wearing what looked like a thick military style jacket that made him appear as if he had 6-foot wide shoulders. He didn’t smile.
I also wasn’t smiling.
He made me fill out a claim form which was written in Arabic (my new-found friend from New Zealand going home to visit his family, was of amazing help here; I so wish I had gotten his phone number as I would really like to know if he got his bags). Anyone out there know an Egyptian guy who works for Google NZ? If so get in touch!
We both exited the building, he had family collecting him and he disappeared, waving me goodbyes and good lucks and ‘perhaps we will meet again someday in new Zealand”, and I supposedly had the school principal collecting me. Well I waited.
And waited.
And got hassled by taxi drivers.
And I saw nowhere to buy a sim card as I had been told I would be able to, so I could make a phone call.
In fact this was the most bizarre looking airport I had ever seen - it was a huge vacant building with locked doors. There were no typical arrival shops; places to exchange currency, not even a toilet - it was out of order. I was the last person to leave it and this was via a customs guy asking me “do you have anything to declare?”. My response - ‘no’.
His response - ‘welcome to Egypt’.
Welcome. No bags; no one to be seen.
Where the f**k did they take us to!!?! I started to look around to see if I could hunker down on the concrete somewhere for the night. At least even though it was winter, it wasn’t cold. I felt like crying. I felt like I didn’t have the mental capacity after 30+ hours of travel and no sleep to even think let alone try to figure out what to do next.
But, I asked a taxi driver if I could use his phone - he allowed me to and I soon connected with my pick-up, plus established that the arrivals building was a ten minute drive away and by now it was two in the morning and I was beginning to lose the plot. This was really not going well. I will walk there, I thought (I had no Egyptian currency), but the taxi driver said he would take me there and I figured my pick-up could pay him. When we got to the main terminal of Cairo International Airport, I could see it was a HUGE modern airport - why on earth had we been taken to some weird small terminal ten minutes away from where the aircraft had landed? No wonder bags get lost.
At three in the morning Cairo is still and quiet. There is little to no traffic; dogs wander lazily across the highway and everyone is free to drive in the middle of the road. I sat in the back of the van and took in what I could in the pitch black. Construction everywhere; piles of red sand like material everywhere; illuminated signs along highways selling the latest product.
I was deposited at the Helnan Landmark Hotel in New Cairo - not far from the school I would be working at. This hotel is F L A S H. Right now, I needed flash. I was smashed. This would be home for the next three days while I found a home for the next 16 months.