# Part 1: The real Egypt and Egyptian and the scam



## ArabianNights

This is going to be a long one, so apologize in advance. I have put this in 2 parts, since I cannot make one long post in this forum. I guess this post can be informative for someone else who decides to travel to Luxor/Upper Egypt.

Family came over from home and we decided to go to Luxor and then do the Cairo sights last, so they can fly back from from Cairo, rather then travel back to Alexa dn then back to Cairo for the flight. The last few weeks in Egypt, to say the least have been near hell on earth. I was so traumatized by what happened to us, that I booked a flight out of Egypt to Dubai - where I was planning to go anyway, but I pushed forward my plans to the day after my family flew back to the UK. I just arrived back from Dubai day before yesterday. 

We got to Luxor and yes, I heard reports and read lots of stuff about the hassle by locals there - hassling tourists and what not, I expected that, but not to the extent that we experienced it. We were literally the only 'tourists' in the city - it was practically empty, apart from locals. We were hassled and near-forced to part with cash at every second step that we took: they do not understand the word 'no'. My sisters obviously came into Egypt all bushy tailed and wide eyed, and I am sure that if I had traveled there on my own, I wouldnt have had that much hassle. I wasnt just the hassle into buying a ride on a horse carriage constantly, it was the following around - we had men following us on a boat trip across to the West Bank, they followed us back to the hotel, they were waiting for us at the hotel door in the morning as soon as we left the hotel doors, everywhere we went, they were there and most of them were the same people. It wasn't hassle - they were being aggressive, making inappropriate and sometimes explicit comments, including offers of marriage, suggestions that we should divorce our husbands for them and the "No worries we are Muslim too!!!" It was so bad that we decided to cut our trip short, we could not even hear ourselves think.... they even hassles us inside the Luxor Temple, .... everywhere we went, we could not even eat in peace. So, after deciding to cut our trip short, we went to the train station to buy Cairo bound train tickets. This was the breaking point. They wouldnt sell them to us. We were not Egyptian. Every other Egyptian came and went, with ticket in hand. Once they sussed out that we were foreign, they were not interested in selling us tickets. The buses were only one a day - so we heard, but the ticket offices were closed, there was no where to find out information or buy tickets. When the bus ticket offices reopened, it was just men sitting behind a desk, smoking at laughing with each other and when I inquired about bus tickets to Cairo - they told me to come back later. That didn't happen - they stayed shut and we saw no buses. In the afternoon, we went back to the train station and thankfully it was a different man at the counter. I asked in a very rehearsed Cairo accent (in order to not disclose that I was not Egyptian) for 3 tickets to Cairo for that night. This is all whilst we had hordes of men behind us ogling at us and trying to sell something, or making other comments. After I asked, the ticket counter guy started thinking and randomly writing out numbers in a book. I have no idea what that was. After about 5 minutes of him doing that, and me asking him again, in a way that wouldnt disclose that I am not Egyptian, he eventually sold me tickets. Our tickets were 3 bits of dodgy cardboard with our destination printed on it, which was barely legible. I showed these to another guy who was sitting at the platform and he seemed OK with them. I wasn't keeping my hopes high until we landed on our seats. No words can describe how horrific our experience in Luxor was... it only showed us the disgusting minds, the perverseness and the zilch moral values that these creatures have (I will not call them men). I spent day in day out arguing with every other person, to just leave us alone....the result was that they just followed us the whole day and now my 2 sisters were really upset on the verge of tears constantly. When we were not sold tickets and when we couldnt find a way out of Luxor, it felt like we were thrown to the pits and the dogs were eating us.... there were hordes of them, it was like they were hungry dogs. Awful experience.

We got onto the train. Relief. So we thought. Some random guy in civilian clothing came upto my sister, who does not speak Arabic and asked her for her nationality, she told him British. 15 minutes later, the train ground to a halt. This was about 2-3 hours I think in the journey. Before the train grounded to a halt, there seemed to be a bit of commotion going on and then she got asked her nationality and then suddenly it stopped. I thought maybe because we, as I thought before, we got dodgy tickets. There were 3 elder Egyptian men in front of us, who had very kind faces and were ever so kind.... We asked them and they told us not to worry, it wasnt because of us. Our train halted at around 9:30pm/10pm and the train stood there until around 6am in the morning... we didnt move anywhere, we were frozen and the nice men in front of us went outside to the village, we we were stood to get us food. We were surrounded - well the train was with armed men in civilian clothes.... we got worried of course. When morning came, we waited and waited, asked so many times what was going on... the night before someone had told me that some people had cut the train tracks in front of us and that all trains were halted. After that, when I asked a train attendant for an update, he had tears in his eyes - he had been crying and was literally drying his eyes, when I asked him! He said through his sobs that he didnt know what was going to happen. The way he was made me even more worried.... 10 mins later, the attendant came back to us and said happily that we will be moving in an hour... that was a few hours after it had stopped and of course night had come and gone. Eventually, the guy who asked my sister her nationality came to us in the morning and told us that he is a police officer and that he is arranging a special bus for foreigners only, to Cairo. There was me and my sisters, 1 Swiss person, 1 Indian, 1 French and a few Russians, but the Russians had a tour operator who helped them, so they didn't join us. We had to wait a while for this supposed bus - we got off the train and we found that we were in some remote village somewhere that required a armed convoy to escort us. We waited hours for this convoy to arrange itself - eventually it came and our bus was a mare mikro, which we had to take to a place called Sohag, where we could then take a connecting train to Cairo. We had to pay a bit extra for this bus... but we were desperate to get out of there and so we went to Sohag along with one random Egyptian fellow passenger, who some how placed himself as the leader of the 'foreigners' group. The police was sat with the armed convoy. after about 5/6 hours, finally arrived at Sohag, tired, hungry, thirsty etc.... surprise, surprise no one knew what time the next train to Cairo was. So our Egyptian 'leader' suggested that we take a micro bus to Cairo from outside Sohag train station.... we were told that we could get a refund for the portion of the train journey between Sohag and Cairo (which we didnt use) and use that money towards the Sohag-Cairo meekro bus trip. Surprise, Surprise.... our tickets were found to be fake and hence we could not get a refund. 

Another long long journey from Sohag to Cairo on a meekro bus.... Id say around 10 hours or so.... wasnt the most comfortable journey, and by this time, I can reassuringly say that I was p*ss** off. We arrived to Cairo, near Tahrir Square and although the hotel that we booked in Cairo was just around the corner, literally, from Tahrir Square - the nice Egyptian leader of the group decided to take this opportunity to rip us off. He drove with us in the taxi to our hotel (I don't even know why!) he wanted to 'help us' find the hotel, even though I knew where it was and I said that I did, but he brushed it aside... He wasn't interested, he was interested in using the vulnerabilities of my sisters - who are visitors here and who do not know any Arabic. I told the taxi driver the address, he knew it, but the other leader guy was pulling this along... using his Blackberry to find the address etc.... his battery went flat (of course) so he went out to a random shop to use their plug to charge it... of course the taxi driver followed him out, leaving us in the car. It was obvious that the taxi driver and the 'leader' were negotiating how much to charge us, so they can split it. Low and behold, a taxi fare that usually costs 7 LE cost us 35LE. I was done arguing in Luxor, I was tired and hungry and it was past midnight. I mentioned to the leader that this is a rip off and that I know how much it usually costs... and he responded by placing the money into the taxi drivers hands, to show me that he was not going to get a cut of it... the very fact that he did that confirmed my thoughts and confirmed that this was actually what happened. He asked my sisters if they will be visiting the Pyramids tomorrow, they said yes, of course he offered to go with us and gave us his number... I knew what would happen, he would take us to that horrible village called something along the lines of blah blah Samaan near the Pyramids and where they force tourists to part with lots of cash for one of those camel/horse/donkey rides around the pyramids. A lovely well known scam where of course the referrer gets a commission.

Then we went to the Pyramids and.... (please see part 2)


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## bermac

We travelled to Luxor just after Christmas and had a wonderful time. Of course some hassle when walking around town but not much worse than the Khan in Cairo. We were there with our 2 daughters and niece and experienced no hassling or crude behavior. 

Traveling with a positive attitude makes such a difference. We love Egypt. Love the desert. Any developing country has scammers. I lived in Nigeria for almost 5 years and have nothing but find memories of my time there too. 

I always wonder why people complain about everything in Egypt and paint all Egyptians with the same brush and yet still stay here? If you find it so terrible then go somewhere where you will be happy. You only live once. Embrace life don't complain about it.


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## MaidenScotland

bermac said:


> We travelled to Luxor just after Christmas and had a wonderful time. Of course some hassle when walking around town but not much worse than the Khan in Cairo. We were there with our 2 daughters and niece and experienced no hassling or crude behavior.
> 
> Traveling with a positive attitude makes such a difference. We love Egypt. Love the desert. Any developing country has scammers. I lived in Nigeria for almost 5 years and have nothing but find memories of my time there too.
> 
> I always wonder why people complain about everything in Egypt and paint all Egyptians with the same brush and yet still stay here? If you find it so terrible then go somewhere where you will be happy. You only live once. Embrace life don't complain about it.




some people can't leave.. they have their family, jobs etc here. 

I have a friend who left Egypt after 12 years which she loved for Nigeria which she has just left... saying she hated it. 

At the end of the day Egypt or any developing country should be making life welcoming for visitors and not hassling the hell out of them.


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## ArabianNights

bermac said:


> Traveling with a positive attitude makes such a difference.


God knows I have had many a positive attitudes. I went to Luxor with a positive attitude, in fact I went there with a love of Egypt (and that hasn't waned) - I didnt go there in a vacation with a bad attitude for Christs sakes! Having a 'positive' attitude does not stop the hassling.




> We love Egypt. Love the desert. Any developing country has scammers. I lived in Nigeria for almost 5 years and have nothing but find memories of my time there too.


I also love the desert and I know that there are scammers everywhere, even in developing country's. Knowing this doesnt somehow make my experience in Luxor more pleasant, and neither does your experience in Nigeria mean that I should have a good one in Luxor! 




> I always wonder why people complain about everything in Egypt and paint all Egyptians with the same brush and yet still stay here?


Excuse me, until recently I was the first person to defend Egypt and Egyptians.... my experience has changed that. Each individual experience is to their own, just because it was sunny one day, it doesn't mean it will be sunny the next. I am here because I have to be here, not because I want to be here - I do not hate Egypt, and God knows I have made compromises in living here. I always wonder about why people make such assumptions about others. 




> If you find it so terrible then go somewhere where you will be happy.


As Maiden mentioned, people are here for reasons, not primarily out of choice.


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## bermac

Arabian Nights

But the thing is being positive may not stop the hassles but it makes them not bother one so much. A positive attitude does not change what happens around you but it changes your perception of what is happening around you. 

The way I see it is one has two choices in life: 1) to make the best of your situation and enjoy life, or 2) to complain and hate where you are. Life is too short for the second choice.


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## ArabianNights

bermac said:


> Arabian Nights
> 
> But the thing is being positive may not stop the hassles but it makes them not bother one so much. A positive attitude does not change what happens around you but it changes your perception of what is happening around you.
> 
> The way I see it is one has two choices in life: 1) to make the best of your situation and enjoy life, or 2) to complain and hate where you are. Life is too short for the second choice.



I appreciate your advise. What you are saying is exactly what I thought. Until I went to Luxor. No human being is able to experience the exact same experience that I had, and take it or leave it, this is what has happened and it was bad. I am usually not one to complain, I always look at positives to everything. The second choice that you describe is not an option for me, I do not hate Egypt, but I do not like the inconveniences... I keep myself occupied and just get on with it, I have to, what else can one do? Doesn't mean that I cannot discuss my frustrations with others. Its an experience after all


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## bermac

ArabianNights said:


> I appreciate your advise. What you are saying is exactly what I thought. Until I went to Luxor. No human being is able to experience the exact same experience that I had, and take it or leave it, this is what has happened and it was bad. I am usually not one to complain, I always look at positives to everything. The second choice that you describe is not an option for me, I do not hate Egypt, but I do not like the inconveniences... I keep myself occupied and just get on with it, I have to, what else can one do? Doesn't mean that I cannot discuss my frustrations with others. Its an experience after all


True AN. After reading more of your posts I can see you are not in the best situation right now. So buckling down and getting through it is the right thing to do. And you are right sometimes one needs to vent. And of course I am a man so I don't get the unwanted attention as much as a young single woman. Anyway you will look back on this as an experience that taught you a lot and made you realize you can live through adversity. 

I hope things get better for you. If you come to Cairo come and visit my wife and me.


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## ArabianNights

bermac said:


> True AN. After reading more of your posts I can see you are not in the best situation right now. So buckling down and getting through it is the right thing to do. And you are right sometimes one needs to vent. And of course I am a man so I don't get the unwanted attention as much as a young single woman. Anyway you will look back on this as an experience that taught you a lot and made you realize you can live through adversity.
> 
> I hope things get better for you. If you come to Cairo come and visit my wife and me.



Thank you for your advise, I really appreciate it, truly


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