Khan el-Khalili: Cairo's historic bazaar
A couple of days after seeing the pyramids of Gizeh (blog about the pyramids here), I decided that it was time to visit the city center. After staying in Gizeh and seeing the area around, I was afraid of Cairo. Gizeh streets looked like you were going to get robbed imminently. I was afraid Cairo would be much worse than Giza and it would feel much more insecure. But this worry came to an end when I met Mustafa, a local Egyptian from Saqqara, living in Gizeh. He was willing to show me the city center of Cairo. In particular the Khan el-Khalili bazar, on my request. Going with him seemed more relaxed as he spoke Arabic and knew the hows and wheres in Cairo. He was a very kind and generous person.
Mustafa Awyan
I met with Mustafa in Gizeh, early in the morning at 09:00 and together we took a taxi to downtown Cairo. The taxi driver dropped us near Khan el-Khalili souq. It was strange for me to have to go through an x-ray scan in the street just to get into an open market. We started walking down the main street of the market. This place was empty and it was hard to imagine that once it was full of tourists and travelers. It is considered, for that reason, one of the touristic hotspots of Cairo. I knew that tourism was Egypt's main revenue so this place would be hardly hit by the pandemic. I would lie if I said that I didn't expect this place to be deserted.
Some stores were open but the majority was closed. Often, in the entrance of the few opened ones, the owners sat in a chair awaiting for customers. It seemed to me that the practice of sitting in the entrance of the store was a habit of earlier times before the pandemic hit the world. These men looked serious, speechless and their eyes were locked to the ground. A wide stock of items laid around them, which couldn't be sold anymore because tourists were nowhere to be seen. This made staying there, with their store open, a moral obligation for them. The silence of this morning walking down these streets spoke by itself: these men were sad, desperate and hopeless. The stores sold all kind of items but most of them had something in common: souvenirs. Apart from souvenirs there were some local scarfs that called my eye, as well as some wicker baskets that reminded me of fishermen baskets. It is all sorted by areas. For example, in the area closer to the entrance most of the stores sell belly dancing costumes. It seemed to me though, that the whole market is slightly oriented to textiles, but I might be biased by the few opened stores by the time I visited it.
After exploring all these empty streets Mustafa took me to a nice cafeteria: El Fishawi Cafe. The cafeteria is still inside the market Khan el-Khalili. This place is very famous for being one of the oldest cafes in Egypt. It was established back in 1797. The place is very well decorated and its terrace is located in the patio between two buildings. Handmade arabesque furniture enhances the place together with very fancy wall decorations consisting on mirrors and lamps. We both had an unfiltered Turkish coffee. It was delicious and the environment made it even better. This place took me back in time to a hundred years. After we finished we headed inside the cafeteria and Mustafa showed me the interior of the place. The interior looked very aged and old wooden furniture decorated the place. For some reason, the place was filled with mirrors and wall art decoration. The owners devoted a special room only for showing pictures of famous people who visited the place.
'One day they will hang our picture, Mustafa' I told him while we took a picture together.
After finishing the coffee we walked a bit more around the area. At some point the police stopped us and asked him for identification. I am still surprised by the amount of security in these touristic centers. It made me feel safer and it should do to others too. This place is heavily guarded and Egyptian authorities take this safety very seriously.
My visit to the market brought me security and trust in downtown Cairo. It gave me confidence and opened the door to explore all this region by myself. This place looked much safer than Giza. It also showed me that, even though people are desperate during these hard times, storeowners are persistent and have patience. They all reply with the same sentence when they are asked about the revival of tourism: "Insha'Allah", which would mean "I hope, if god wills".
It was almost a year ago when Egypt closed his doors to international travel. Now the national government is trying to boost the national tourism by introducing great discounts on local flight tickets. I hope that these measures, in addition to the opening of the international borders, bring back hope and turn back this place into what it once was: a historic cultural site.
