cairo’s neon heartbeat: 359900 and 1818181272 lead to chaos

so yeah i ended up in cairo last week and let me tell you it felt like a fever dream stitched together by 359900 and 1818181272. i don’t even know what those numbers mean but they kept popping up on receipts and train schedules like some digital witch. the weather app said it’s 22.18C now which is exactly the temperature of a lukewarm latte but way more humid than i expected. i just checked and it’s this weird perfect 22C thing right now, hope you like that kind of thing.

walking around i passed a vendor selling *mint tea in a plastic bag and thought maybe i’d buy one but then i remembered the friend from the east end who swore it’s just sugared water. funny thing is i heard that someone told me that the same vendor once sold fake yogurt that made people hallucinate. not sure if true but if you ask me cairo’s got more secrets than a bad hotel review. speaking of which i saw a review on tripadvisor that said the sphinx was ‘dobby-coated’ and i’m not even exaggerating. another person said the metro at night is like a rom-com but with more rats. yeah. glue.

the neighbors here are a mystery. i asked a guy selling eskimo pie if he knew anyone from amman and he just shrugged and said ‘rome is two buses away if you’re feeling reckless.’ i don’t even know rome’s buses but it felt like a secret code. if you get bored, giza or london are just a short drive away. i heard that from a drunk guy at a licorice stand so take it with a grain of sand.

there’s this place on yelp called ‘moonlight café’ where everyone says the coffee is ‘spiritual’ but i tried it and it tasted like regret. maybe that’s the point. another café had a wall of dates and a sign that read ‘we don’t hate you’ which is either very poetic or very manipulative. i’m leaning toward poetic. i put it in my pocket and later realized it was expired. oops.

i took a million photos of donkeys because that’s what i do. my camera battery died and now i’m just staring at a wall wondering if i’ll ever see that donkey again. i also tried to buy a pyramid keychain from a guy who spoke only in hand gestures. he pointed to his tea and then to my wallet and i left crying. it’s okay though. i’m a freelance photographer and this is art. right?

someone warned me about the lucknow bridge at night but i ignored it and ended up crossing it during a sandstorm. not fun. the sand felt like tiny grains of regret. i also saw a group of tour guides arguing in a café and one of them threw a receipt into the air like it was a ticket to heaven. don’t ask.

i found a map online and it’s this broken iframe that zooms in on 29.5647,31.2811. just a bunch of lines and a street that doesn’t exist yet. i translated the coordinates to greek and it said ‘go home’ but i’m in cairo so that didn’t make sense. maybe it’s a joke. maybe it’s a virus.

links: for breakfast try goat cafe if you like black coffee. desert views has the best sunset photos. local board is full of people arguing about whether the pyramids are real.

i’m writing this at 2am because i couldn’t sleep after drinking mint tea. the neighbours outside are playing some kind of bagpipe jazz and the humidity is keeping my socks glued to my ankles. somehow i’m still here. maybe i missed something. maybe the numbers 359900 and 1818181272 are trying to tell me something. maybe they’re coordinates to a secret hammam. who knows.

p.s. if you’re reading this and you have a saffron pillowcase*, tell me about it. i need answers.

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