Euro 2012 - according to Travellin Bob

Well, that was pretty good wasn't it?  The tournament, I mean, rather than England's results - which, to be fair, were probably better than expected.

A lot of goals - some of them absolutely fantastic -, only a couple of 0-0 draws and penalty shoot outs, hardly any crowd trouble and in the end Spain won (again) in record breaking fashion.

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Poland and Ukraine both did excellent jobs as hosts, even if their teams were not up to scratch and were eliminated in the group stages.  The hatchet job that Panorama did on them the week before the campaign started proved to be more of the usual amount of bollocks.  Yes, there was some crowd trouble, in Warsaw - more of which in a second - but no obvious neo-Nazi anti-Semitic and racist abuse that the program predicted would happen everywhere: what racist abuse was reported turned out to be by fans of Spain and the Czech Republic and was dealt with quickly (even if a little light-handedly) by UEFA, and so hardly the fault of either Poles or Ukrainians.  There was one minor incident when a group of idiots in Krakow threw a few questionable comments at certain Dutch players in an open training session, but they were pounced on by the police and the Dutch themselves laughed it off.

The biggest problem in fact was avoidable but somehow inevitable as soon as the tournament draw was made last year, placing Russia in the same group as Poland.  But with the fixtures and their dates cast in stone by UEFA, there was probably not a thing the Polish organizers could have done to avoid what followed, unless they were prepared to interfere politically - and under UEFA and FIFA statutes that would have meant their expulsion.  And so, the match between the two countries went ahead in Warsaw on Russia Day....... 

You don't need to be a student of history to figure that problems would be inevitable but still - consider that for 50 years the USSR ruled Poland and placed its own people in positions of power in Warsaw, and that the situation only ended twenty or so years ago (and even up until recently there were unreconstructed Communists in positions of influence  - indeed, there may still be).  Consider too that during the ill-fated Warsaw Uprising in 1944 the advancing Russian army camped on the eastern bank of the Vistula river and thus had a ringside seat as the Nazi Panzer divisions reduced Warsaw to a smoking pile of rubble, refusing to provide any assistance including supply flights that Churchill in particular was desperate to arrange.  Remember that at the end of the 18th centrury, Russia, together with the Austro-Hungarian and Prussian rulers, between them defeated Poland militarily and then divided its territory up between themselves, wiping the name Poland from any maps for over 100 years.

Talk about a recipe for trouble!

Despite the much trumpeted thaw in Polish - Russian relations after Smolensk (the air crash a few years ago that killed the Polish president and his retinue en route to a service commemorating the slaughter by Russian troops disguised as Nazis of several thousand captured Polish officers and soldiers at nearby Katyn) the thaw is only skin deep.  The average Russian still has a very low opinion of Poles and the feeling is certainly reciprocated.  A few years ago I worked on a project here where some of our on site team were Russian.   They refused to speak to the Polish bank employees in any language but Russian, and the Poles refused to reply in anything other than Polish.  This left us English, without a word of either language, trying to mediate the most petty and ridiculous disputes.....

The situation is much the same today.  I had a conversation with a close Polish friend a month or so before the tournament, and he told me that there would be "problems" at the match, as he had been told on a business trip to Moscow (where his company does quite a lot of business) that Putin was financing and arranging for several thousand Russian hooligans to travel to Warsaw for the match.  I laughed it off at the time, but now I'm not so sure.....

On match day, the Russian support - getting on for 20,000 people - met up in the centre of the city and marched to the stadium, carrying banners that were, shall we say, a little inflammatory.  The police had been expecting trouble ever since the local authorities had approved the march - God know's why they had approved it! - so there was a heavy police presence supervising it.   The inveitable happened -  enraged Poles, not all of them football fans, confronted the marching Russians and traded abuse.  It escalated and there were fights, widely televised I'm sure across Europe (certainly they were the lead item on the news channels here).  But considering the many thousands of people involved in these scuffles, there were less than 200 arrests, and very few hospital cases - about half a dozen.  One tournament organiser is quoted today as saying there were no more hospital admissions as a result of the "riot" than would be expected from the average Polish wedding reception. 

At the match, Russian fans unfurled a huge banner reading "This is Russia" - how they managed to get the thing into the stadium is anyone's guess, it must have been 30metres across - and were roundly criticised by everyone.  It was in fact their third disciplinary breach in two matches, and they already have a points deduction from the next qualification process hanging over them - personally I hope the arrogant shits are kicked out.  In any case, for them it all went pear shaped when they were unable to win and left themselves facing an early elimination - the first of the favoured teams to do so.

So overall, the doom and gloom predicted by Panorama and the ridiculous Sol Campbell ("Don't go there, watch it on tv, it ain't worth the rsik, you could come home in a coffin") were shown to be complete sensationalist bullshit and a total insult to all Polish and Ukrainian people.

I'd like to think they would have the decency to issue a public apology - but I'm not holding my breath.

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And what of the football itself?

Well, it was a bloody good tournament that threw up its fair of surprises.

The first was probably England's performance.  We went there with few expectations and even a certain amount of hostility - the appointment of Roy Hodgson as manager in place of Don Fabio was not universally welcomed, nor was the inclusion of (allegedly racist thug) John Terry, (allegedly lumbering) Andy Carroll or (allegedly useless) James Milner and Jordan Henderson in the squad.  Most fans predicted an embarrassing three defeats out of three matches and an early return home.  In the event, Terry justified his selection by some solid, even heroic, defensive performances, and Carroll scored one of our few goals with a towering header.  Milner was indeed useless, and Henderson not on the pitch long enough to register.  So instead of finishing pointless, we in fact won the group, and reached a quarter final against Italy, which we predictably drew 0-0 and lost on penalties.  But at least we got out of a potentially tricky group, and along the way beat Sweden for the first time ever in a competitive fixture.....so I suppose there is some hope for the future for us optimists.

Poland and Ukraine, while excellent host nations, weren't up to it as teams.  Poland froze in their opening match against Greece and after leading 1-0 at half time managed to drop a point.  They also drew with our friendly Russki neighbours and were left needing a win against the Czech Republic to go through.  We lost convincingly and the coach promptly resigned.  Ukraine, meanwhile, went into the final game against England also needing a win to progress and lost to a Wayne Rooney goal - his sole contribution to the tournament, having been suspended for the first two games and basically crap against both Ukraine and Italy.  The match also featured another "goal that wasn't", but this time England were the beneficiaries of the lack of goalline technology - the ball was at least a foot over the line before Terry hacked it clear.  The usual uproar followed, the match officials were pilloried and even Teflon Sepp Blatter admitted something had to be done.  The fact that the Ukrainian guy who "scored" was offside when the ball was played through to him was conveniently ignored during all this ballyhoo.

Meanwhile, pre-tournament fancies (and perennial under-achievers) Holland contrived to lose all three of their matches amid the usual in-fighting.  Robin van Persie and Klaas Jan Huntelaar, who between them scored something like 70 goals last season, clearly packed the wrong boots, misfired completely, and were thus a major factor in their exit.  The coach resigned.  Another fancied team, France, never really recovered from failing to beat England first game and although they qualified for the quarter finals as runners up, they there met Spain who were much too good for them and eliminated them, amid the usual French in-fighting.  The coach resigned.

Portugal, another favoured team, reached the semi finals, largely on the back of increasingly gelled and perma-tanned Cristiano Ronaldo.  He, as captain, was the centre of attention and absolutely loved it - every time he blazed another free kick into Row Z, second tier, which he did frequently, he seemed to check that he was in close up on the big screen at each ground (of course he always was) before reacting in a suitably histrionic fashion.  He also traded simulation - sorry, fouls - sorry, CHEATING - on a match to match basis with Cesc Fabregas, seemingly Spain's new golden boy, and along the way managed to score goals too.  After one finish, against Holland, came one of the moments of the tournament for me.  Earlier, Rafa van der Vaart had been mobbed by his team mates after opening the scoring.  CR7, meanwhile, scored and ran to the corner flag and turned to greet his adoring colleagues - who were nowhere to be seen.  Cue a stricken expression and hand gestures summoning an obviously reluctant mobbing.  I did chortle at that one.  He was also central to my other favourite moment, in the semi-final against Spain.  The match itself wasn't all that good, at least to this viewer, and after 120 minutes of swapping dives it all went down to penalties.....CR7's glory moment beckoned.  Instead, two of his team mates missed, and Portugal were eliminated before he could take his nominted 5th penalty and grab the glory.  He was left standing in the centre circle, away from the rest of his team mates, gazing up at the giant screens (of course....) with an expression that said "how can they DO that to me?!?!?!"  Absolutely priceless.

I missed most of the final, between Spain and Italy (themselves a bit of a surprise package).  We went away for a weekend in the country and although we left in plenty of time for the 130km drive home we were stuck in the most appalling traffic (it took us nearly an hour to drive the 4km through one town) so missed the first 20 minutes or so (including David Silva's lovely header).  Then after 10 minutes or so of the second half, there was a massive thunderstorm and the satellite connection went so we missed the rest of the match.  Fortunately, so impressed was broadcaster TVP with the manner of Spain's 4-0 trouncing that they re-ran it in its entirety this morning so I watched and marvelled then.

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And so to the end.  No column like this is complete without an Awards list, so here are the 2012 Bobs:

Goal of the Tournament.
Plenty of candidates here.  Andy Carroll's header was a classic example of the centre forward's art that I thought had been lost forever.  Jordi Alba's goal in the Final was magnificent - his prefectly timed run onto Xavi's slide rule pass an example of how football should be played.  Andrei Shevchenko's header against Sweden was exquisite too - the movement he made to lose his marker by a yard was perfection.   But my favourite, for what it meant to this country on what could have been a dark day, was Poland captain Kuba Blaszczikowski's 30 metre howitzer (with his weaker left foot too!) against Russia on that riot-torn day.  Simply brilliant - it gave a nation (ultimately unfulfilled) hope and elegantly stuck two figures up at the Old Enemy.

Best goalkeeper.
In the end it came down to a choice between two.  Joe Hart did well enough, but had a few flappy moments.  Petr Cech did ok but made one scoolboy error that cost his team a crucial goal against Greece (who went through at the Czech Republic's expense).  Hugo Lloris of France and Maartin Stekkelenburg of Holland never lived up to their advance billing.  So for me the choice was between Iker Casillas, Spain's record breaking captain, and Gigi Buffon, Italy's Elder Statesman.   For all Saint Iker's brilliance, and lifting a trophy for a record breaking third tournament in row (2 Euros and 1 World Cup, to paraphrase the old English chant), Buffon shades it for me.  Written off as past it a couple of years ago, with a dodgy back and dodgier haicut, he still made the saves that matter - the brilliant one handed claw back from Glen Johnson that arguably won Italy the match against England, the tip over against Germany from Ozil's free kick that gained an unexpected place in the Final, were both top drawer goalkeeping.  Plus he always has a smile on his face, even after their trouncing yesterday.

Best Team.
Spain - who else is there?  Like 'em or loathe 'em, there is not a better team around.  Tiki-taka drives me mad - 800-odd passes to grind out a 1-0 win against someone like Denmark is not my favoured game. and the antics of certain players, throwing themselves to ground at the merest hint of a challenge is anti-football.  But they get results and when they put their mind to it nobody can live with them....just ask Italy.

Biggest Muppet.
Again, a few contenders here.  Wayne Rooney, for instance - hailed as the Returning Hero before the Ukraine group match, he managed a goal from about six inches my four year old daughter could have put away.  It was his only contribution in that match or the Quarter Final against Italy.  Cristiano Ronaldo because of who he is and his antics - diving is cheating, CR.  And just because you're captain it doesn't mean you have to take every free kick and corner - passing as allowed, you know.  Cesc Fabregas - largely for the same reasons as CR7, except for the captaincy bit.  I got fed up with his throwing himself around and whining - he was the only player to complain about a pitch - the one in Gdansk was "a disgrace" apparently, "we shouldn't have to play on this".  Funny he didn't make the same complaint a week later after stonking Ireland on the same surface.   But the winner is Arsenal and Poland's finest, Wojciech Szczesny.  Expected to be one of the stars of the tournament, he lasted less than an hour before charging, panic stricken, from his goal-line to challenge an approaching Greek - feet first and in the penalty area is NOT the way to do it.  Penalty to Greece and a red card that cost his country a crucial win and ended his participation in the tournament.

Best fans.
Only one contender here - the Irish, as usual.  Win, lose or draw (mostly lose) they are the same - good time boys out for some craic, a sing-song and a party  This year they excelled themselves at all three.  Most of them based themselves in the lovely old city of Torun, roughly half way between the group's venues of Poznan and Gdansk, and birth place of one of modern astronomy's founding fathers, Nicholas Copernicus.  Here, they endeared themselves to the locals by loudly cheering on Poland in their group matches, even trying to master some of the almost incomprehensible chants.  Groups of them also made hospital visits to children's wards dispensing gifts and bonhomie in equal measure.  Others went to schools and spoke to English students about their country, football, anything to help teach them our language.  Another group visited the local prison where they organised and competed against the inmates in a table football competition.  Ireland we salute you!

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So that's it.  Roll on Euro 2016.  In France apparently.

Farewell, Cairo

So after a less than perfect first week here, the last week and a half, leading up to my return home, have not been much better.  Added to all the earlier complaints about the hotel and the traffic – indeed, the city itself – has been added a political dimension that has flared up since I got here.  This has been a result of the first round of voting in the Presidential Election, and the Mubarak trial verdicts.  The two combined have made the stay even more boring than it already was, because of safety concerns,

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To take them both separately.

The Election is the first democratic election since the fall of the old regime last year, during the Arab Spring uprising season.  It attracted a wide field of candidates from across the Egyptian political spectrum, and voting itself passed off quite peacefully, despite widely voiced fears of violence and intimidation that in the event were unfounded.  Instead, there was a mood of hope and excitement that change really was about to come to the country and improve things.  The fact that the new President’s actual powers are still unclear because the new Constitution is still being written was rather glossed over by optimistic speeches by all the candidates.

The result of the first poll has changed the mood of the country.  Possibly because there was just too many candidates, voting was somewhat fragmented and as expected there was no outright winner and a run off between the leading two candidates is scheduled for the next couple of weeks.  The problem is in the identity of the two candidates.

The first is the representative of the Muslim Brotherhood.  Despite saying all the right things about continuing the revolution by accepting the will of the people, and bringing in legislation to provide more democratic freedom, the widely held fear is that once in power all this will be forgotten and the party will introduce legislation to move Egypt into a more rigid Islamic society like others in the Middle East – notably Iran, with whom the Brotherhood has close ties.  Clearly, this would be good for neither the country nor the region as a whole.

The other candidate is a more politically experienced operator who was the country’s last Prime Minister under the Mubarak Presidency.  That in itself is the major concern: that by voting him in, the “old regime” will make a comeback, and Egypt will suffer more waves of repression and set the whole democratic process back 30 years.

As one of the guys at the bank said, the result is a complete disaster for Egypt.

Meanwhile, a few days after this result was announced, the verdicts in the trial of Mubarak, his two sons, the old Defence chief and a number of security officers were read out by the presiding judge live on television.  The charges were of corruption and bringing about the deaths of several hundred protesters during the uprising last year.  The death sentence had been called for.  Instead, Mubarak was cleared of deliberately causing their deaths but found guilty of “failing to stop” them and imprisoned for life (given that he’s 84 and in ill health that is not likely to be long).  His Defence chief was found guilty in similar terms and was also given a life sentence.  To everyone’s surprise, the security officers were acquitted, as were Mubarak’s sons who now face a separate trial for stock market manipulation. 

The prosecution team was outraged and demanded a retrial as, in its opinion, the verdicts were not severe enough.  The defence team was equally outraged and demanded a re-trial on the basis that its clients were innocent and should be released.   

The public was even more outraged, again in both ways – the majority of people were still calling for the death sentence, and Mubarak supporters demanding his immediate release.  The one thing everyone seemed to agree on was that the trial judges had cocked it up big time.

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The two events have sparked a wave of protest across the country and in Cairo in particular.  Within a few days the pro-Mubarak presidential candidate had seen his campaign office torched – twice.  Increasing crowds have returned to Tahrir Square, primarily to protest the trial verdicts – the issues raised by the election run-off are temporarily at least on hold.  Mass demonstrations are again being held everywhere, and there is once again a palpable tension in the air.  At work, groups of people are standing in corridors and offices, discussing what is happening, and the name of Mubarak is most frequently mentioned, the only word I recognize in the Arabic tirade.  Some of them are leaving early to join the protests.   Yesterday’s mass protest in Tahrir will be repeated today – and probably every day until this mess is sorted out.  Demonstrators are openly calling for the revolution to start all over again before it’s too late to stop the country back sliding into its old ways and its old regime.  The Muslim Brotherhood is now confident it will win the run off on a wave of anti-Mubarak sentiment, and no-one is quite sure whether that will be a good thing or not.

The UK Foreign Office has provided a sterling service.  I’ve mentioned in other posts that before travelling anywhere new I check their Travel Advice website – for Egypt it gave probably the strongest advice I’ve yet seen.  Basically, it states parts of the country (mainly around Suez and the borders with Gaza and Israel) should be off limits, and everywhere else is dangerous and the utmost caution should be exercised.  As ever, I registered my trip with them, and this time I have received several e-mails from the Consular Office here keeping me appraised of the situation, what parts of Cairo and Egypt are worst affected by the new waves of protest, and where I shouldn’t go.

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As a result I’ve been holed up in my hotel most of the time.

Ordinarily this would not be a problem, but it’s not a particularly good hotel, as I wrote previously.  So far, I’ve had to have my key card re-set 5 times in not much more than two weeks.  The shoe cleaning pad – much needed with all the crud in the streets here – was used up by the end of the first week and not replaced, so I resorted to using one of the bathroom hand towels.  It too was not replaced for three days, just draped over the side of the bath.  The room hasn’t been hoovered the entire time I’ve been using it, even if the bed linen is changed every day.   I’ve used the pool a few times and that is, for me at least, the best part of the entire establishment.  It’s clean, a good size and well served with loungers and umbrellas.  But it’s been uncomfortably hot the last few days, and over the weekend, making sitting out by the pool the whole time less than pleasant.  Fortunately there have been some quite decent movies on the two channels on tv that are worth watching, so the evenings have been ok even if time has dragged sometimes.

The food has continued to be of a questionable quality.  I tried a mixed grill one evening – by which we’re talking a selection of kebabs with rice.  It was foul, dry and overcooked.  Mostly I’ve settled on omelettes and chips from room service, with the odd pizza from the Italian restaurant– they have been ok but not spectacular.  There seems to be no rhyme or reason as to which restaurant is open on any given day, and no notice of any closure.   So it’s pot luck where you’re going to eat in the evenings.  The Thai restaurant seems permanently closed, although I’ve been told a couple of times it’s open.  I gave up on breakfast since the rolls and so on were invariably stale.  With luck, I’ve lost a bit of weight……especially with the digestive issues.  Twice now I’ve visited this country and both times had to take copious amounts of Immodium.

So because of this uncertain political situation I’ve been in the hotel and I’ve missed out on visiting the Antiquities Museum – I went there on our first trip years ago and it was really good, I would have enjoyed wandering around it for a few hours.  I’ve also missed out on exploring the downtown areas and bazaars, and the huge shopping mall out in the Heliopolis suburb (near the airport apparently) with its English bookshops and Starbucks coffee shop.  Had I been able to do that my opinion of the place may be a bit different, who knows?   But if the FO says avoid crowded places for safety reasons, then avoid crowds I will.  I always try to do so anyway, and there is certainly more reason to here than anywhere else I’ve been to over the years.

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Anyhow, I’m pretty much done now.  I fly home tomorrow and at the moment there are no plans to return – even if I’m asked to I’ll try and get out of it.

Of all the places I’ve visited in this Travellin Life, I can safely say Cairo is the one I have liked least.   Other places like Sofia and Beirut have, on the surface, been damaged and dirty and unpleasant, but have actually been rewarding and worth the trip, and visibly trying to improve themselves.  There has always been something to do and somewhere to go, but aside from the Pyramids I am struggling to find anything to recommend about Cairo at all.  This city is stuck in turmoil and poverty, with no money and seemingly no will to do anything about it….I see no evidence of a physical change taking place.    That will happen over time, I have no doubt, once all the political uncertainty is gone and there is a clear and recognized society in place – whether Islamic or otherwise – and a government with the will and the budget to do the work.   But I fear this time is years rather than months away.

I admire the people for what they are trying to achieve through this revolutionary movement, and hope they succeed, because God knows many of them have precious little to look forward to.   It’s a tragedy that the descendants of the society that built such magnificent monuments as the Pyramids, the Sphinx, and, further afield, the Temple at Luxor and, nearby, the Valley of Kings is reduced to such a poor and reduced state. 

 It’s incredible to me that in this second decade of the 21st century, in a major capital city, it’s possible to drive down a side street, within a kilometer of the Nile and the city centre, and come across piles of rubbish ten feet high, and between these stinking piles find separately no less than three old men looking after herds of goats that wander in the road amongst all the traffic.  Yet that is exactly what happened Monday evening, when my taxi home took a wrong turning maybe half a kilometer from the bank where I’ve been working.  The old men sat quietly smoking on boxes, watching the cars go by, listening to the constant blare of horns, breathing in like the rest of us the stinking traffic fumes, while their goats foraged in the trash for some scraps to eat.  Along this road, like every other road, old ladies and young were trying to sell pathetic little packets of tissues or matches or scraps of cloth, to raise money to feed themselves and their families. Beggars merely held out their hands as we drove by, calling plaintively after us, more in hope than expectation.

Cairo......

Euro 2012: A message to Panorama and Sol Campbell

I see Panorama is at it again.

For non UK readers, this a current affairs program on the BBC that specializes in using investigative journalism – much like our friendly neighbourhood tabloid press – to present stories that typically feature exposes of bribery and corruption in high places.  Politicians are favourite targets.  Over the years it has provided a valuable service in exposing all kinds of malpractice for the public good, but has equally suffered from plenty of criticism.  It is sometimes accused of being less than accurate in the way it presents its case, and has also been accused more than once of lying or paying people to stage acts to illustrate a particular theme.   I watch it sometimes on BBC World and always enjoy it.

Sometimes it moves away from the political arena and presents sports stories, and on football in particular, and invariably focuses on some of the less savoury aspects of the sport.  Now this is not always a bad thing.  However, sometimes the timing, to gain maximum publicity and exposure, can lead to consequences that are less than agreeable to football fans.  The classic example was a couple of years ago, when England was among the bidders to stage the World Cup in 2018 or 2022. 

Now the bid process for this, like that for both Olympics and the UEFA football Championships, is always fertile ground for this sort of program, as the amounts of money being spent by bidders to try and win the prize are invariably huge (although paling into insignificance against the costs of actually delivering a successful event, or indeed the potential profits generated by it), and wide open to all kinds of abuse.  Fertile ground then, and a fair target for Panorama and any other similar program, and of course newspapers of all description.

One of the program‘s journalists made a very good report that basically presented “proof” that a number of high-ranking FIFA executives involved in this particular bidding process had been paying significant bribes in order to secure the tournament for their countries, and that the organization’s general secretary, the odious Swiss Sepp Blatter had been aware of it all along.  All well and good: stuff like that needs to be out in the public domain: FIFA has had a reputation for years for corruption – the subject is a blog post in itself.  However, the BBC chose to screen the program the night before voting was to take place – with predictable results.  England, favourites to win the bid for 2018, with an infrastructure in place, and after a highly impressive campaign featuring among others David Beckham and Prince William, came nowhere – the voting members of FIFA, extremely pissed off at their dirty laundry being aired so publicly, voted elsewhere.  The fact that most of the allegation were subsequently found to be true, and a number of the accused (including the head of the successful Qatar bid for 2022) suspended or kicked out of the organization was immaterial.  Despite being proved right all along, Panorama and the BBC were vilified by the majority of the country’s football fans, accused of having a political agenda and labeled a national disgrace for losing England’s World Cup bid.  The criticism was second only to that poured on FIFA itself.

Earlier the same year the program had further ruffled feathers with a report that looked at the political and security situation in South Africa, who was hosting that year’s World Cup.  High levels of violent crime including rape and armed robbery were reported from across the country, but especially around Johannesburg.  The infrastructure – roads, railways, hotels – was criticized as being unable to cope with the expected influx of fans from around the world.  Of course, there were allegations of corruption, with city officials and FIFA creaming off huge sums of money from construction projects that were running behind schedule.  Fans were solemnly warned not to travel because of the dangers.  In the event, the tournament went off without a hitch, and apart from the mostly dire quality of the football was largely seen as a roaring success.

So that’s 1-1 then.

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Now their latest effort is a cracker.

Next week sees the start of the latest Euro championship, jointly hosted by Poland and Ukraine – the first time Eastern European and ex-Soviet bloc nations have hosted an event of this stature.  From the start, voices have been raised against their choice – the countries can’t cope with all the people coming to watch, the stadiums are shit, the roads are terrible……the list of complaints goes on and on.  In actual fact, both countries over the past few years, since being awarded the tournament, have been working flat out to prepare, and mostly things look pretty good.  To their credit, UEFA, the governing body, has insisted all along that the choice is the right one and stressed that it will have great long term benefit for both countries – this despite the occasional warning to both governments that preparations are running late.

The host cities have either updated existing, or built brand new, stadia that are as good as anything in the world – there are some wonderful looking venues.  They are all ready and in use.  Billions of euros have been spent improving road and rail networks, extending and re-furbishing airports or opening new ones.  Those too are up and running – although admittedly some of the road improvements will not be completed in time.  In most cities there are good hotels ready and waiting, and huge efforts have been put into adding additional accommodation as required – there are campsites in some areas, including Gdansk on Poland’s Baltic Coast that from personal experience I know is very nice at this time of year.  In both countries beer and food is cheap and excellent, and there are plenty of activities to do and places to go between matches.  Most importantly, I think, the average Pole or Ukrainian is excited about the tournament (even though both national teams are crap and unlikely to get out of their respective groups) and looking forward to welcoming fans from across the continent and enjoying the tournament with them.  Everywhere you go there are shops and stalls selling souvenirs, special hats, footballs, replica kits of all the competing nations, fanzones set up to enjoy the game in the open air with a beer and a burger – there are special concerts and entertainment laid on in some places and of course wall-to-wall publicity and tv coverage.  It’s all set fair then to be roaring success.

And then along comes Panorama.  This week it aired a program that focused on apparent racism, anti-Semitism and neo-Nazi violence at matches in both countries.  Let me be straight here: as I’m in Cairo right now I haven’t seen the program.  What I have seen is extensive coverage on the BBC website, the Guardian Online and other sites and blogs, and frankly I’ve never seen such a poisonous amount of tosh in all my life.  It doesn’t help that Sol Campbell, ex-Arsenal and England international and in his day a fine player, comes out and advises people not to travel to Poland and Ukraine “because you might come home in a coffin”.  What a bunch of ill-informed sensationalist bullshit!  Nor does it help when the families of Theo Walcott and Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain, also both of Arsenal and in the England squad, announce to the press that they are not going to see their kids play because they are frightened they will be the victims of racist violence and abuse.   Note that all three players are black.

From what I have read, the program contained footage of football supporters giving Nazi salutes and chanting anti-Semitic abuse, making monkey noises at black players and in one case attacking a group of Indian fans at a match in Kharkiv, one of the Ukrainian venues.  The thrust of it seems to be that we in England have eradicated this sort of behaviour, that Poland and Ukraine have failed badly in not taking sterner action to eradicate it themselves, and they should never have been awarded the games because they are both racist and anti-Semitic societies who don’t deserve it.  That is certainly a point of view widely aired on the blogs, and could hardly be further from the truth.  My assumption is that most of the clowns posting these comments are either from non-white ethnicity, have never been to either country to experience them themselves, are easily led – or a combination of all three.

The governments of both countries have predictably reacted angrily.  Having lived in Warsaw for getting on for 12 years now, and recently visited Kiev, I can understand their anger, and that of the people in both countries.  Now I’m not accusing the BBC or the program of lying or fabricating events to make good television – although it’s not impossible that is what happened.  I can only speak for what I have seen – and never in all the years I’ve been here have I witnessed anything remotely like the footage that Panorama apparently aired – at least not since I went to Crystal Palace v Leeds back in the early 1970s.  I have never come across any racism – overt or otherwise – in Warsaw.  There are an increasing number of black and Asian people living in the country – there is even a black MP, an immigrant from the Caribbean (I wonder if the program sought his views at all?) – and I can’t remember any cases of violence or abuse against them.    I have come across no anti-Semitism either, and after the suffering that both countries went through during the Second World War and since, under Communism, when the vast majority of both their Jewish populations was, in one way or another, wiped out I would not expect to. 

                                                                *          *          *

That is not to say racism and anti-Semitism doesn’t exist there – it probably does, just as it does in Britain and France and Germany and pretty much every country in the world.   Anyone who suggests otherwise is an idiot.  But to suggest as Campbell does that if you go to Poland or Ukraine to a football match you might be killed because of your skin colour is not only wildly inaccurate but is deeply deeply offensive.  The man really should shut up and not discuss things he has no clue about – I can only assume he’s running short of cash and needed a top up from his BBC fee.

The people currently yelling from the rooftops and posting on various blogs and websites that this year’s host nations are a disgrace to humanity, and so on, should take a look around them first.  Last year many people, mainly black but from other enthnicities as well, including white, rioted and burned swathes of London and elsewhere in protest at alleged police victimization.  Don’t see that in Warsaw and Kiev.  France has recently passed laws that ban Moslem women from wearing the burqua in public and in the recent Presidential election an anti-immigration party leader came very close to a place in the run-off.  That too seems to be a little racist.   It works in reverse too – there are areas of some inner cities still where the local immigrant community is openly hostile towards white people and not a good place to be after dark.  In football, there have been two high profile cases of racial abuse in the Premier League last season – one has resulted in legal action being taken (the case is scheduled for the week after the tournament ends) and yet the accused is in the England squad.

A point that many of the critics are missing in their complaints that the Polish and Ukrainian governments are not being proactive enough in this problem is that the countries themselves, as democracies, are relatively new.  England, France, Spain and so on have perhaps hundreds of years of “exposure” to non-white cultures, and with mass immigration over perhaps 70 years or so, plenty of time to assimilate those cultures into their own societies (not always with total success, it has to be said).  Poland and Ukraine, both locked behind the Iron Curtain, have only freed themselves and become open, democratic societies in the last 20 years or so, and up until that time non-white faces were like snow in the Sahara.  Of course it will take time for some parts of their societies to adapt and accept the non-white immigrants, in the same way as it took western society many years to do so – and arguably is still trying to do.  To expect Poland and Ukraine to adapt in twenty years to something that the West has spent a couple of hundred years doing (the US is still struggling in some parts) is fatuous.

The other point being missed is that despite the great advances made in recent years, Poland and Ukraine are both relatively poor countries, with above average rates of unemployment and below average earnings, especially in rural areas.  Horse drawn carts and ploughs are still used in many places (especially in Ukraine).  The thing here is that tickets for matches are priced at a level that is likely to be beyond the reach of many of the, shall we say, lesser educated elements who normally go to watch matches and from whom typically these hooligan gangs draw their membership.  The majority of tickets sold for the tournament have gone to the competing – and generally wealthier (with the exception of Greece) - nations and it is highly unlikely that their own hooligan elements that still exist will get close to the stadia, such is the security being put in place – that’s if they even bother to travel.

                                                       *          *          *

My own feeling, based solely on what I’ve seen in my travels in both countries, is that Panorama has this time overplayed its hand.  I’m convinced that anyone who does travel to either country for this football festival will not only be safe but have a great time too, and be warmly welcomed by the locals.  Just because they remain outside of “mainstream” Europe if you like, and are a little off the normal tourist trail does not make them bad people – quite the contrary, in my experience they are more friendly and generous than most English people I know.  It’s a shame the Walcott and Oxlade-Chamberlain families have decided not travel, for they would have had just as good a time as everyone else.

Panorama – keep up the good work, but please be a little less sensationalist and scare-mongering in the future.  It does your reputation for free and impartial journalism no good at all and tarnishes the good work you do.

Sol – shut up.  You idiot.

The Pyramids at Giza

When I first started writing this blog, I posted on here another piece about Egypt, memories from a vacation in Hurghada 7 or 8 years ago.  I tried to contrast the modern country with its (perhaps more illustrious) past, when Pharoahs not dictators ruled an empire not a country.   I called the piece Egypt: Ancient meets Modern.  Give it a read, it’s still here in the Archive.  At the time, I never expected a return to the country – though expressing a liking for the Red Sea resort – and certainly never anticipated an extended stay in Cairo.  On the vacation, we only made a day trip, a long and tedious coach journey, specifically to visit the Antiquities Museum and the Pyramids.  Despite the journey, it was a good day, though I described the Pyramids as “disappointing”, mainly due to their proximity to the city itself.  Last weekend, I paid a return visit.

                                                           *          *          *

In the years since I last trudged through the sand at Giza, sweltering in 35C dry heat, Egypt has changed.  At that time, Hosni Mubarak ruled the country with a carefully concealed iron fist.  Outwardly, it seemed a prosperous and by Middle Eastern standards stable country.  The Iraq War had essentially ended, inasmuch as the Iraqi forces and government had collapsed, Saddam was on the run, the Americans and British and other coalition forces were managing the collapsed society and trying to organize the place into something resembling a democracy.  The insurgency that plagued the place for years hadn’t really been recognized: the regular bombs and killings were blamed on Saddam loyalists who refused to accept the reality of their defeat.
 
Across the border, Iran was Iran – ruled by the mullahs, stridently anti-west and to European eyes very strange.  Its own nuclear program was underway but undercover, not in the public eye at all.  It was still considered part of Bush’s Axis of Evil, as it is today, but apart from that the ordinary man in the street (that’s you and me, loyal reader) paid it little if any attention.

Elsewhere in the region, Gaddafi still ruled the Libyan roost, mad as ever but swimming in oil wealth whilst his country starved, still denying his involvement in the Lockerbie bombing 15 years or so before.  Syria was stable with a popular president who the West liked, complete with an English born wife.  He’s still there of course, as is the missus, but the leopard has changed its spots and he’s now systematically slaughtering citizens who disagree with him.  Israel was Israel – so no change there then.  The Gulf States were prospering as never before.

Egypt, meanwhile, went its own sweet way.  Its tourism industry was, understandably, flourishing – our visits to Cairo and Luxor were made on coaches that formed part of police escorted convoys.  It was cheap, the weather in October was great, the resort on the Red Sea brilliant, and people flowed into the place all year round.  Of course things were not all perfect, that was obvious – the police escort for the coaches was a bit of giveaway, as was the abject poverty we saw out of the coach windows wherever we went.  But still – it was stable, and people seemed happy enough.
Well, after the events of last year, in the Arab Spring, where Mubarak became the second biggest casualty (after Mad Dog himself), demonstrates that all was not as it seemed.  Everything in the garden was not rosy at all – all smoke and mirrors.  Mubarak is now on trial for various crimes against the state, and the verdict is due in the next couple of weeks.

                                                                 *          *          *

But back to the Pyramids.

This time I didn’t need a coach.  My hotel is a mile or so away, so I walked.  It was a hot Friday (it being the weekend here, no work for Travellin Bob that day) but there was a bit of cloud about and a breeze that made it more bearable.  I had breakfast, donned the sunscreen and the iPod, then camera in hand headed off.

                                           
                                           The flyover outside my hotel - lovely, eh?

The main road just along from my hotel leads from Cairo city centre straight to the Pyramids.  Friday, this quietest of days – the Islamic Day of Prayer – seemed to make no difference at all.  The traffic on the road was not appreciably less, nor was the driving any better.  The old man selling cloves of garlic was still at his place, sitting on the kerb in the dust.  The taxi-bus drivers were still pulling out without using mirrors, horns blaring, cutting other drivers up and coming close to mowing pedestrians down as they did so.  Under the flyover there were market stalls selling fruit and vegetables, cigarettes, and pitta breads.  Another guy was selling quite decent-looking luggage sets – a suitcase with matching laptop bag, sports bag or vanity case: the quality looked pretty good.  Right on the corner, another old man had spread out a tarpaulin and from this was selling newspapers, all neatly stacked in little piles according to title.  He was in a very precarious position, as any car or taxi or bus turning right came incredibly close to running him down or scattering his wares to the wind, but he was doing a brisk business – the preliminary results of last week’s Presidential Election first round were due to be published.  There were people everywhere, talking volubly about this no doubt, but of course it was all gibberish to me.

                                                   The neighbourhood mosque


I strolled along, Vivaldi’s Four Seasons going someway to drowning out the traffic noise, taking the odd snapshot as I went – the squalor under the flyover outside my hotel gates, an attractive mosque surrounded by crumbling apartment buildings: typical Cairo views.  Some people gave me odd looks, others smiling gestured at my head set and yelled “Good music eh?” amiably enough.  It was a pleasant walk, past the archetypal crumbling blocks, separated by little narrow alleys, across which were strung  washing lines full of clothes drying in the shade (rarely did direct sunlight fall upon these thoroughfares). In many doorways, groups of men, mostly middle aged to old, sat around smoking and talking, probably about the Elections.   Veiled women and their children passed by laden with carrier bags full of shopping.  Despite all the dirt and poverty, Cairo is a vibrant place, full of talk and noise and argument and laughter – I’ve seen very few people, even among the numerous beggars, who look sad and unhappy.

All the way, through the odd gap in the buildings, the Pyramids loomed larger until eventually I came to a crossing where a wide side road joined the main road.  Across from me was a wall, perhaps five feet high, and beyond it the plateau topped by the Great Pyramid of Cheops and its neighbours.  I crossed the side street and switched the camera on to take the first picture, and found that between the wall and the plateau was an unkempt and obviously disused pitch-and-putt course.  The fairways looked like the rough, the greens were overgrown and the bunkers full of weeds.  I would guess it has only recently been abandoned, because it still looked functional rather than a field – with some care and attention it could be up and running again very quickly I should think.  And in the shadow of the Great Pyramid a nice place to play.  I took my snapshot and walked on – and within a few yards it all started.

                                                      Home of the Egyptian Open?


                                                            *          *          *

Everyone in this part of town is trying to make a quick buck.  From the hotel waiters and bell hops to the poor old sod trying to sell his garlic, everyone wants a piece of the action.  It’s the same the world over I know – why else am I working except to make money? – but here it’s taken to extremes.  For instance, the room service menu says, quite clearly, that a 22% service charge is added to the bill, which in most places (and certainly to me) means no tip is needed.  That evening, the waiter brought my food to my room, I signed the bill and gave it back to him.  He was looking at my watch on the bedside table.

 “Beautiful,” he said.  “How much did it cost?” 

“It was a gift,” I said and gave him the wallet with the signed bill in it.  He looked at it and frowned.

“Do you have something for me?” he said, and held out his hand.  “To help me.”

Saucy sod.  I showed him the door.

And that is par for the course.  Don’t get me wrong, I have no problem with tipping, but I will do it on my terms.  If the service is good, I’ll leave something, even where a service charge has already been included in the bill.  But if someone holds their hand out like that and demands it, well, they can piss off.  Not a penny.  Taxis are the same.  The journey to the office is about 7km, can take an hour or so but the fare consistently in the morning comes up on the meter as about LE12.50.  I usually give the guy LE15 – it saves me carrying shrapnel about in my pocket and it’s a reasonable tip for the driver.  Yesterday I did the same – and the guy starts yelling at me, presumably demanding more.  I left him to it and went to work.  Going home the traffic tends to be worse so the metered fare comes out around 17 – so I give 20: again, no shrapnel and everyone’s happy.  Last night, for once, the road was pretty clear and the fare only came to 12.50.  I gave the guy (who spoke a bit of English) a twenty and asked for 5 change – the going rate.  He laughed and said he had no fives.  I told him he’s better get some then, and took my 20 back.  He went into a shop and changed a ten, so we were all happy – but clearly he was looking for a little extra.  He chose the wrong tourist, sorry.

At the Pyramids, this gimme gimme gimme attitude was far far worse.  It became evident as I walked away from taking my first picture – a young guy, maybe 15 years old, was passing on a horse and cart.

“Hey, mister, pyramids,” he called.  “I take you. Twenty pounds”.

I ignored him.  In a couple of hundred yards I came to the entrance to the site, the road going uphill for perhaps another 300 yards to the ticket booth.  Within seconds, six guys of varying ages offered to drive me to the gate.  Another old guy followed offering me a ride in his horse drawn cart to the site, with a 10 km ride into the desert thrown in.  I said no thanks, but he followed me for another 50 yards or so, haranguing me about how would he feed his horse and his family (interesting order, I thought….) with no money, please help me mister…..   I hadn’t even reached the gate and I was getting fed up.

At the ticket office there was no queue, and the big car and coach park, crowded when last I came here 7 years ago, was empty – perhaps a dozen cars and not a coach in sight: so much has the tourist trade collapsed since the Arab Spring.  A ticket for the site is LE60 (that’s about EUR7-00, GBP6-50, PLN35) – this gets you onto the plateau and allows you an unlimited time to wander around quite happily taking your pictures, and also admits you to one of the smaller pyramids (there are 9 in total) and the Engineer’s Tomb.  A further LE100 gets you into the Great Pyramid of Cheops.  I took the cheaper option, and strolled into the grounds.

                                                                 *           *          *

Within 50 yards, I was surrounded by three hawkers and 2 camel jockeys.  The one guy snatched off my cap, quickly stuck an Arab headdress on, and stuffed another one in my bag, laughing and congratulating me on how I looked.  I gave him LE100 on the basis they will be useful for shading the kids’ heads on the beach when we go to Spain in August.   Big mistake!  It opened the floodgates.  In the space of about 10 minutes I ended up the proud owner of two sets of (admittedly nicely carved) pyramids, a pair of stone and fake gold necklaces, and half a dozen pictures taking by one of the camel jockeys, with him and his camel, all the while fending offers of postcards and other assorted tat from everyone else.  At a total cost of about another LE300.  

                                                Me and my mate Mohamed


Mohamed (the camel jockey – he was actually a nice bloke) then started giving me a guided tour, telling me how there were three different types of stone used in the site’s construction, how it had taken 10 years to quarry it all from Luxor and ship it a couple of hundred miles up-river to Cairo on papyrus rafts, then dragged overland to the site, then another 20 or 30 years to build it – he was talking about the Great Pyramid – and all this using slave labour over 5000 years ago.  It gave me pause for thought: what were we doing in Britain then?  Or Poland and the rest of Europe, for that matter.  Not a lot…..which makes the Pyramids all the more impressive.   He took me to the Engineer’s Tomb and introduced me to his mate Ahmed, who was the security bloke – he happily took me in, and pointed out which one of several statues was the Engineer, which his son, his wife, his mother and so on (they’re all buried there), showed me the beautiful carvings in hieroglyphs depicting the work going on at the site, the Engineer’s death and his funeral.   We took a bunch of pictures (there was a big sign on the door: “No Photography” – I pointed it out to him: “it’s ok, I not stop you,” he laughed) and he took me back out into the hot air, stuffing a gift of LE300 into his back pocket.  He was happy.
Mohamed met me, and led me off again, ignoring my protests (“look, I’m ok, I just want to be left alone!”) and started explaining to me who all the other Pyramids had been built for, how long it had all taken, where the stone came from…..the guy clearly knew his stuff (or was a very good story teller – I won’t call him a liar).  Eventually, after climbing to the top of a pile of rubble where he took a couple of novelty pictures (me holding a Pyramid between thumb and forefinger of one hand), I finally managed to get a word in……

                                                                   Heavy stuff....

“STOP!!!!!!”  He looked at me with a gap toothed grin. “Look, I know you’re trying to be friendly and help, but really, mate, I’ve had ENOUGH ALREADY!!!!!  LEAVE ME ALONE!!!!!!”

He laughed.  “OK, ok, ok!  But was I helpful……”  holding out a grubby hand.  Bloody hell.  I peeled off another 200.

“That’s it, I said.  “No more.  Go away please.”

He was happy enough, and with a final hug and instruction that I was not to open my wallet for anyone else, he hopped on his camel and headed back to the entrance to find another punter.
I was exhausted.

                                                             *          *          *

I changed my music to Fleetwood Mac and headed downslope to the Sphinx.

As usual – half a dozen hawkers charged up, hands outstretched offering me playing cards, more bloody Pyramids, more bloody postcards in tatty airmail envelopes.  I had the volume turned up and stomped past them, wallet firmly shut and zipped in my bag, and ignored them.  One or two followed me a few yards, yelling about feeding the cats or something, but quickly dropped back and left me to it.

The Sphinx was deserted too – again a shocking contrast.  On my last visit we had spent maybe 15 minutes waiting patiently in line to get to the ideal position for the obligatory novelty “Kissing the Sphinx” picture, but this time we could have gone straight to the spot.  There were no more than 20 people around the statue (and not many more than that back up by the Pyramids) – a pitiful number for a sunny weekend.  It is an extraordinary statue, but seemed if anything to be in bigger disrepair then I remembered it.  I took my pictures and headed back to the hotel.

                                             Smile?  What smile?  What FACE??


Just beyond the Sphinx is an open air market, about 50 stalls selling assorted Pyramids-related souvenirs and assorted junk.  Seven years ago it was packed with coachfuls of tourists, pleasantly haggling the afternoon away.  This time it was deserted.  The lack of visitors is clearly having a devastating effect on the people who work there – my friends Mohamed and Ahmed were clearly pulling out all the stops to get as much from me as possible, on the basis that it might be a while before anyone else came along, and I don’t blame them: there seemed to be more camel jockeys and hawkers than there were punters.  Slim pickings indeed, and tough when you have families to support and camels to feed.  So although I had spent a lot more than I had expected or wanted to spend, on reflection I don’t begrudge it – these poor sods are not wealthy, they don’t have a lot and no state aid to make up their earnings in these lean and difficult times.  They face a future far more uncertain and less lucrative than I do so I hope my couple of days’ per diem helps them and their families a little.

                                             This place used to be busy....

                                                           *          *          *


All in all, my opinion of the Pyramids has changed after this visit.  Seeing them close up and talking to Mohamed has really brought it home to me just want an extraordinary piece of engineering it all is, and all hand crafted and hand hauled.  No power tools or heavy lifting gear, just very clever designers (genius, probably) and thousands of naked and sweating slaves, toiling the in the baking sun for years at a time.   This, at a time when Europe was just crawling out of the Stone Ages into the Iron Age, with no civilization worthy of the name.

The location is still spoiled by its proximity to the sprawling and noisy mass of Cairo, but that unfortunately is the price paid for 5000 years of growth and progress.    The site seems to be run down and in a state of disrepair to what it was, and the lack of business is clearly adversely affecting it: no visitors so reduced income, less money to spend on upkeep.  Even the floodlights that illuminate them after dark are no longer switched on, as a means of saving money.  In fairness, after 30 years of Mubarak’s corrupt regime and the last 12 months of transition, the fledgling democracy has a lot more to worry about than looking after an ancient monument that, in better times, financed itself (and I’m sure one day will do so again).  There are more important priorities for this fragile democracy, in infrastructure and healthcare, relieving the poverty that most people live though day after day, cleaning the place up and finishing some of the stalled civil projects across the whole nation, not just around its capital. 

At some point, when progress has been made on some of these issues, when safety is not a concern, the tourists will I’m sure come back.  Right now, most of the guests in my hotel (at least those I’ve seen and heard so far – the place is far from fully booked) have been Indian families, a few Chinese, some elderly Americans and Germans, and the odd Russian.  Not the average package tourists, certainly, and those are the ones who really need to return.  The resorts at Hurghada and elsewhere on the Red Sea offer the same brilliant diving and beaches as ever, and once they start filling again the coaches will start running again for the day trips to Giza, for it is well worth the trip.

I hope it happens soon, because my mate Mohamed the camel jockey really needs to visit the dentist….

 

At last! A trip....to Cairo

My first extended trip of the year – I discount the week arguing with Latino Americans in Orlando – is to Cairo.

I’m scheduled here for just under three weeks.  This is my fourth day, and frankly I can’t wait to get home.  My project manager has been here three years – he deserves a medal for perseverance above and beyond the call of duty.  In England people have received knighthoods for less.  But then he is German and they tend to do things like that all the time.

So I’m taking a deep breath (but not out of doors: I’ll explain that in a minute) and getting on with it in true company style – you do what you have to do and get the hell out as quickly as you can.

I am counting the days…..

                                                                  *          *          *

Getting here was challenging. 

There are direct flights here from Warsaw but not every day.  Only LOT can explain why the days they do run bear no relationship to the Islamic working week where the weekend is Friday and Saturday and Sunday is a working day.  Faced with the choice of awkward midweek arrival and departure that would have been unacceptable to the client, I’m taking the scenic route.  Outbound, via Frankfurt with an unpleasant early morning (as in 2:30 a.m.) arrival, and home via Brussels – a daytime departure that will mean leaving the hotel at 6 a.m., and a wonderful five hour connection time in Belgium, to arrive home late in the evening.

Now, I should have expected no less – over my 12 years travelling the initial trip to a new destination is always a bit of a problem, especially when the journey takes me through Frankfurt.  Other posts on this blog have told of painful journeys to Almaty and Beirut and elsewhere through Frankfurt, and less than enjoyable first times to the Gulf through Paris and London.  This trip was, then, par for the course.

It started ok.  The usual efficient on-line check in on Friday and an equally painless bag drop at the airport 45mins before boarding Saturday evening.  I just had time for a quick coffee in the newly decorated Business Lounge and onto the plane for a simple hour and 20 minute hop to Frankfurt that lifted off bang on time.  Which is where the fun started.

We went into a holding pattern over the city – after the third circuit I, at least, noticed we were going nowhere, even if no-one else did.  After about 20 minutes of aimless meandering around the sky, the captain finally came clean and explained the situation: unexpected bad weather passing through, we’ll be doing this for another twenty minutes or so – but don’t worry about your connections, nothing is taking off either so you won’t miss it.   Now that sounds like fun….

It was.  The landing was very scary, the worst I’ve had in 12 years, like riding a rollercoaster in torrential rain, thunder and lightning.  We made it ok, the pilot thoroughly deserving the round of applause he got from the passengers (an odd Polish tradition that, for once, made sense).  We were bussed in to the terminal, and I got to my gate 10 minutes before boarding. 

We got on the plane.  They closed the doors.  We sat there 15 minutes.  The pilot came on and announced Bayern Munich were a goal up, oh and by the way we’re held here for at least another hour and a half because of the weather, sorry about that.  Five minutes later: it’s 1-1, extra time.  And no change, we still have no slot for take-off…..and still the thunder roared and the rain poured down.  

We were given water and magazines.  I listened to Jimi Hendrix and read my book.  At 11:30, we were told that there was still no take-off scheduled but it would have to be soon because the airport closes at midnight…..oh, and Chelsea won.  Clearly, he was no longer a happy man.  At a quarter to 12, the engines started, and stewardesses started running around telling everyone to sit down, switch off that laptop, do your belt up, we’re off…… and we were, in a hurry, despite the continued downpour.  Clearly someone had decided that trying a take-off was better than putting another hundred or so people in a hotel for the night…..  As it turned out, the take-off was fine, as was the flight to Cairo.  Due in at 2:20, we actually landed at 3:35……..

I got into the terminal, bought my entry visa at a branch of AlexBank, joined a short queue for passport control, and was through in 10 minutes – pretty good.  The baggage came through quite quickly too – except for my bag.  Despite there being the best part of two hours to do so, it wasn’t transferred between flights in Frankfurt – presumably someone didn’t fancy getting wet.  Brand new bag, too, never used before…..  So another hour passed while I filled out forms and got a receipt for the key (that was needed so the contents could be cleared through customs when eventually the bag arrived) and off I went.  Now then, ATM…..  No problem, got some cash, then followed by half a dozen competing cab drivers I wandered across to a limo hire desk – I had been told not to risk the locals as the cars were crap and I wouldn’t get a receipt.  The limo desk was closed – by now it was nearly 4:30……  So I had to take a local.  He demanded 250 pounds.  I offered 150.  We agreed on 200 with him giving me a receipt.  Welcome to Egypt where haggling is expected for every damned thing. 

                                                                *          *          *

The cab was indeed crap, at least 15 years old and falling apart.  The driver wasn’t sure where the hotel was and had to ask directions.  It was a long drive, maybe 30km across town, on terrible roads that even at this ungodly hour were busy with trucks and mini buses, motor bikes and horse drawn carts full of vegetables – and all of them without lights.  But at least it was getting light now.
My hotel is listed on its website and elsewhere as 4 Star.  It’s within sight on the Pyramids at Giza, and offers “excellent views” of these wonderful old monuments.  It has a couple of pools and a health centre, and a range of restaurants for guests’ pleasure.

Well, yes – if your criteria for awarding stars to hotels are very generous.

For a start, right outside the front door is a huge flyover that carries traffic 24 hours a day on the city’s ring road.  At ground level, and parallel to this road, is the approach to the hotel – and a more filthy and unpleasant thoroughfare would be hard to find, even in this dirtiest of cities.   My taxi pulled up outside and I paid the guy my 200.  He gave me the receipt and told me to fill in the amounts myself as he couldn’t write – I presume he mean English.  He then demanded another 20 pounds to pay a toll (that was way back at the airport exit).  I told him to piss off, as I’d already paid over the odds and frankly, at just after 5 a.m. after a long and tiring journey I was in no mood to haggle further.  I got out and left him to it.

The place was deserted apart from the guy at Reception.  He checked me in efficiently enough and took me to my room.  The hotel is in three buildings that form three sides of a square.  I’m on the top floor of a side building, overlooking the pool area – a quiet room, as I asked for.  It’s no more than average.  The “king sized bed” is actually a standard double, but is comfortable enough.  There are only 6 hangers in the built-in double wardrobe, but at least it has adequate shelf space and the safe works.  There is a fridge I assumed to be the mini bar but it turned out to be quite empty.  The tv is a nice enough Sony flat screen, but the choice of viewing is, shall we say, limited – a selection of Arabic channels, a couple of movie channels showing English language films with sub-titles, and two news channels.  Not the usual suspects (CNN and BBC World) but NHK Hong Kong and CCTV Beijing – both English language but heavily Asian (well, actually China….) slanted so of little interest.    Then there are a couple of comfortable but shabby brown armchairs, a grubby and threadbare carpet , a small coffee table and a desk with internet connection at a cost of 50 Egyptian pounds for half an hour (that’s about EUR6.50, or nearly PLN30) – very expensive and not what you would normally expect in a 4 Star hotel.  There is a separate WiFi connection in Reception that is free however……I tried it and it’s very slow and unreliable.

Anyway, I sent a message to the PM and told him as I had no clothes I wouldn’t be in the office and settled down to a good sleep.  I woke at lunch time, and explored a bit.  My room does indeed boast a view of the Pyramids – across the flyover and between a couple of tatty looking apartment blocks.  I would guess only rooms on the top floor would have the view, and not all of them – so the claims on the website are little exaggerated.  There are a couple of ludicrously expensive shops flogging jewelry and local clothes and souvenirs and guide books.   The Thai restaurant it turns out has closed down because the tenants running it had not paid the rent (a pity – I quite like Thai food).  There is also a scruffy looking Italian restaurant that is closed during the day, a couple of pool side snack bars and room service.  The health centre turned out to be a ladies only spa and wellness centre – so no exercise bike for me.  I tried room service.  The “service” wasn’t, really – it took half an hour and four attempts before someone picked up the phone, and the food was no more than acceptable: I had a steak sandwich with fries – the steak was cold, the melted cheese hadn’t melted and there were perhaps 20 chips.  But I ate it anyway.  Monday night’s offering was not much better – chicken Gordon Blue (I think they mean cordon bleu….) with fries: a few more fries this time, but the chicken was very tough and unpleasant.  Last night the Italian place was open and finally a decent meal – minestrone soup and ground beef calzone plus a beer – Stella: the local one, not Stella Artois, Belgium’s finest.

My bag arrived from the airport about 8 on Sunday evening.  I asked at Reception for an iron and ironing board so that I could press my shirts that had been stuffed in the case for over 24 hours.  There are no irons, the guy said, you must use our laundry service.  This is off-site and of course costs money.  I told him to forget it, and I’m now wearing slightly rumpled clothes to the office.   But for a 4 Star hotel that is just unacceptable service – as I told the bloke.

So far, then. I’m not over-impressed by the place.

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And what of Cairo?

Well, safe to say it’s the dirtiest, noisiest, smelliest city I’ve ever been to.  If Beirut looks unfinished, largely due Israeli inflicted damage in various conflicts, at least the roads and pavements are (generally) swept and washed clean.   Any city in the world with a significant traffic problem – be it London, Almaty, Beirut or wherever -  has less than fresh air to breath, but they all pale when compared to Cairo.

On the way in from the airport, we followed the flyover for three or four kilometres before we reached the hotel (yes, it’s that big), and along the whole of its length below the structure are piles and piles of dirt, broken rock and concrete and assorted trash, perhaps three or four feet or more in height.  For much of the distance the road we were on was narrow and unlit, with scruffy and unfinished-looking (but nonetheless occupied – you can tell by the washing hanging over every balcony) apartment blocks.  The gutters alongside the road are clogged with dust.  I had put this down to unfinished roadworks, from the relatively new construction of the flyover, but it’s not – it’s city wide.  Abu Dhabi is a dusty city, despite the efforts of legions of migrant workers, but the dust there is mostly sand blown in from the desert or from the beach.  In Cairo, it’s fine grey concrete and gravel dust, so it looks just dirty.

The buildings, as a consequence, are also dirty, covered in a coating of the stuff.    Like buildings everywhere in the Arab world, they all have an unfinished look about them: big blocks of grey or sandy concrete with no plasterwork or paint to improve their appearance, with small balconies festooned with washing lines, and the usual proliferation of tv aerials and satellite dishes.  They make the city, any city, look slummy and uncared for.  In somewhere like Beirut or Gaza, Homms, Jerusalem and so on, it’s understandable, since they are all (or have recently been) conflict zones, but it’s difficult to find an excuse for it Cairo.  Despite the disturbances last year there wasn’t any wide-spread military activity to cause the sort of damage that characterize the other cities I listed.  It just seems to be very badly built and ill-maintained.

There is little point in cleaning your shoes because a ten yard walk along the footpaths (that are as bad as the roads) covers them equally in this crud.  Windows are grimy and dull, and to add to it all is the stinking petrol fumes from the worse traffic I have seen in my life.  I had read that Cairo traffic is bad, but I wasn’t prepared for how bad.  Beirut traffic was fun, in a way, heavy on most roads, particularly the highway from hotel to office, as I’ve written here previously, but at least there are road markings and traffic lights there (even if everyone ignores them).  Kiev was bad in places, but that’s down to the amount of development going on in the city.  London and New York and other major cities have high traffic volumes, but generally speaking it’s managed efficiently (more or less) by road markings, traffic lights and strictly enforced codes of conduct.  Plus drivers in those cities tend to know what they’re doing.

So far here I haven’t seen a single white line or traffic light.  The sheer number of vehicles on the roads, of all kinds, is horrendous.  There are huge numbers of cars – taxis and private vehicles – and the majority of them are old and poorly maintained.  There are fleets of Volkswagen, Toyota and Hyundai mini-buses that serve as a sort of bus-cum-taxi hybrid: again many of them have seen better days, and drive around with their bonnets open (these are mostly at the back of the vehicle) to keep the engines cool-ish – or at least try and prevent them overheating.  Then there are the buses themselves – old and in the usual Egyptian state of disrepair.  There are motor bikes, some converted to sort of three wheeled trucks for carrying stuff – I saw one yesterday piled ten high with plastic cages containing live chickens.   The (very) occasional bicycle wobbles along.  Carts piled high with vegetables or assorted junk, or merely empty, being hauled along by horses and donkeys, and pushed by some poor perspiring kid.  Then there are pedestrians crossing the road, weaving around traffic that is often stationary because the buses and taxis just pull up to pick up or drop off passengers wherever they are asked to do, with no attempt to pull into the side of the road, thus blocking every other vehicle.    As well as the pedestrians there are desperately poor people selling packets of tissues, matches – anything to raise a few coins to live on, or simply wandering between rows of traffic asking for donations.  Most of them are old, men and women, but there are young mothers carrying infants too.  Little kids, the age of my two (so 6 and 4) play on the concrete strip between carriageways while the parents and grandparents do this.  I’ve never seen anything like it.  Everyone is trying to weave from line to line to overtake, squeezing through non-existent gaps, leaning on the horn all the time.  It is complete and utter chaos, and only seems to quieten down after midnight (and then only briefly).

All this traffic spewing out petrol fumes, added to the dust being kicked up everywhere, and the reek of horse shit (and other stuff that doesn’t bear thinking about…..) is added to by everyone smoking and adding to the fume.  It’s too hot to drive with the windows closed, so as a passenger you’re exposed to this lung-busting shite as you pick your way through the traffic, windows open in the hope of generating some air circulation to cool you down – but rarely travelling fast enough to do so.  The cars have nothing remotely like air-conditioning fitted, of course.   Then your taxi driver decides to have a quick puff and lights up some foul and cheap local cigarette, and adds the smoke from that to the general fug in the car.  It’s no good asking him to stop, because he’ll look at you as if you’re insane, shrug his shoulders and ignore your request, probably blowing smoke at you as he does so.  It’s his car and his choice to smoke, and tough luck if you don’t like – you’re only a fare paying passenger after all. 

The 7 kilometre drive from the hotel to the office or back in the evening can take well over an hour with all this – and by the time we arrive I am feeling physically sick from it all.

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So all in all, I’m not too happy with my lot. 

Work itself is fine, the people are friendly, both ours and the bank’s teams, and at least I have a desk and all the connectivity I need – and all set up within an hour of my arrival: a pleasant change to the usual new site experience.   The office is a dump, probably one of the more modern buildings, but still a mess and dirty everywhere. 

It could be an interesting couple of weeks, too.  Today and Thursday see the first Presidential election since the Arab Spring last year, and I had an e-mail from the Foreign Office about it yesterday, basically warning me to stay away from crowds, be vigilant and on no account go near a Polling Station.  As if I would…..  The taxi passed half a dozen Polling Stations on the way in today, and there were queues around the building at all of them – separate lines, of course, one for men and another women.   Clearly they are taking it seriously here, though, and a high turnout is expected.   Then next week the verdict in the Mubarak trial is expected.  Civil disorder (for which read violent demonstrations and cops wielding clubs and tear-gas) is expected, at least if you are to believe the Foreign Office’s prognosis (which I don’t; they have a tendency to over-exaggerate potential issues – according to them nowhere is safe to travel).  It may well be that once all the political uncertainty has been put to bed and life returned to something like normality things will improve.  But that will take years.   In the interim, Cairo will remain a dump.

I plan a stroll to the Pyramids at the weekend, to take a load of pictures and ignore the beggars that throng all the tourist spots here.   I can remember visiting them some years ago – I wrote about it here, in Egypt: Ancient meets Modern.  There were huge numbers of beggars then, and mostly kids I remember: I wonder if they’re still there?   I also plan to spend as much time as I can in the pool, or lying on a couch beside it working on the tan.  I hope to find some decent food and beer by then as well.   I have my music and a couple of books to work through.  And a magazine to finish. 
I’ll be ok.   But I’m still counting the bloody days – 15 now.