KEEPING THE MARKET AFLOAT

If you don't pay attention to anything else I say about Egypt, at least hear this: you are going to get harassed.

You are going to get HARASSED AND BOMBARDED from the moment you leave your accommodations, to the moment you return, and it is going to happen with a frequency and an intensity the likes of which you have probably never known. Even if you've maybe been to Mexico or somewhere, and think you know what I'm talking about -- whatever you are picturing, now picture it ten times worse. There is no way for me to exaggerate here because I can't even imagine how the harassment could be taken to a more extreme level.

Some people are trying to sell you things, and some people are just begging for handouts, but the line blurs almost immediately, and it becomes impossible to tell which is which. You will walk down the street engulfed in a throng of desperate people, all pleading for your attention. Even if you are nowhere near a store or market, you will be approached and followed by fast-talking peddlers, as they try to get you to look at the items they are holding in their hands. The items could range anywhere from tchotchkes to scarves to just warm bottles of water, but add to this throng another dozen or so additional people who are just asking for charity donations, and now you are walking down the street in your own personal cloud of harassment.

This Harassment Cloud moves with you as you walk, kind of like a dueling hoard of paparazzi; but unlike the paparazzi, these people have no problem, whatsoever, with touching you. They will pull at your arm, tug at your clothes, or even attempt to turn your entire body to get you to face them. It is maddening, and it makes walking down the street all but impossible. No matter what you do or say, they are relentless. If you are out in public, you are fair game, and they will follow you for MILES. Again, no exaggeration here.

The only way to get rid of them is go somewhere that they physically cannot follow you, and even then, we had hawkers simply walk alongside the taxi or carriage, continuing their harassment throughout the duration of the ride. Or, they will simply wait for you to exit whatever building or store you might have entered, and then just pick right back up where they left off the second you emerge.

I remember once going into a bathroom stall to hide, just to keep from losing my mind. The harassment cloud is with you morning, noon, and night, and I would frequently find myself getting to a point where I'd feel like I was going to lose it, come unhinged, and accidentally punch one of these people in the face.

Before you judge me, you must understand, they are swarming all around you and often right up in your face. Not to mention, you get the impression that they are also on the verge of punching YOU -- just dropping the whole pretense that this is anything other than a shakedown, and just taking your wallet and being done with it. Once, when I accidentally turned down a dark, secluded alleyway (in a failed attempt to escape my Harassment Cloud), they just all turned with me, and I remember thinking that if they all stopped competing for my attention for a second and worked together, didn't they realize that there are enough of them to make quick work of this and just physically take every single thing I own by force?

You are told to ignore them, but sometimes the harassment would turn so hostile and aggressive, and the men so belligerent and angry at being ignored, that on multiple occasions, I found myself going through a mental inventory of what I had on my person: what do I have on me that could be used as a weapon, if the situation should start to escalate? Could I maybe bash someone over the head with this antique lantern I just purchased?

I could certainly talk here about the societal injustices and social malfunctions that contribute to an underclass so desperate and sick that this extreme level of harassment is considered the norm and allowed to go unchecked, but in the moment, all you want is for it to stop.

It is relentless and it is maddening, and you just want it to stop so you can walk down the street in peace and think your own thoughts for half a second. Store owners are so aware that this is happening, that they will put up signs in their windows declaring "No Harassment Here!" But I found this to be the most infuriating deception of them all! Because do you know what would happen? You'd enter into their store to find that not only were you immediately being harassed and bombarded once again, with more unwanted tchotchkes and mass-produced crap, but now you are trapped in the confines of their tiny store, and they are strategically blocking the exit! Every single time. They had this exit-blocking strategy down pat.

I once made the mistake of trying on a galabeya, which is the name of the garment traditionally worn by men in Egypt. The best way to describe it is like a cross between a long, narrow, tubular evening gown made of linen and a lose fitting, but very long, pajama shirt. Even though I did this to myself -- choosing to try it on, rather than just buying it outright like I probably should have -- I have never felt more trapped in my life. Not only could I barely walk in it and felt like my legs were constrained together like a mermaid, when I made it clear that I would like to take it off, suddenly the dressing room was unreachable, all paths blocked by artful employees. I quickly realized that the easiest way for them to get me to buy something was to make it impossible for me to take it off! Watching me hobble around in this constrictive foreign garment, I'm pretty sure they were also betting that if I had it on just a few minutes longer, the odds were exceedingly high that I was going to end up ripping the damn thing, just by trying to walk, and could then easily be bullied into paying for it.

I discovered only one method at my disposal to avoid the Harassment Cloud, and that was to stay locked safely behind the door of my own room. This obviously wasn't a realistic or desirable option, however, it did make me think twice every time I considered venturing out on my own. How badly do I really need to find my mother an Egyptian leather pouf for her sitting room, and do I really need to find it at night?

When our room was located on a large riverboat that floated down the Nile, I found one other respite from the harassment brigade, and that was a small open-air swimming pool and sunbathing area located on the uppermost deck of the ship. This was a quiet, relaxing area of just lounge chairs and solitude, perfect for spending several hours alone with your thoughts. Even though it was consistently 100+ degrees outside under the Egyptian sun, it was surprisingly cool up on the deck and there was even a lovely breeze, thanks to the boat's forward momentum. But most importantly, the fact that this private pool area was on top of a moving ship, in the middle of the Nile River, meant that there was no conceivable way anyone could possibly reach me to harass me or attempt to sell me anything, right? We were in motion, and about a half-mile from shore on either side.

Wrong. I distinctly remember checking my phone's clock, just minutes before the surprise harassment attack began: I had been out here for exactly one hour. Jut one harassment-free hour, in the open air, outside of my room, before the startling thuds! started happening all around me, and the harassment started back up, once again.

I was lying on my back, eyes closed behind sunglasses, when unidentified objects started landing on the deck all around me. There were a few others up there lounging as well, and the thud! of these things landing on the deck, along with a few startled screams from the other sunbathers, jolted me awake, and I opened my eyes just in time to see one of these surprise bundles narrowly miss my face and hit the back of my lounge chair. More followed. They appeared to be small, colorful, packages, about the size of a shoe box, and they were being torpedoed onto our boat from below, emanating from some undisclosed location.

Everyone was up and out of their chairs now and rushing over to the side rails. Soon they were yelling loudly into the wind, and the wind was carrying the sound of some other, more distant, yelling back at them in return. I could barely hear all this commotion from where I was sitting, but it didn't matter, I could tell none of it was in English. Are we under attack? By pirates maybe? Are they hollering their demands, is that perhaps what all the yelling is about? But that seemed unlikely, so instead of rushing over to the side of the boat with everyone else, I decided to inspect the projectile package that had narrowly missed hitting me in the head.

It wasn't on fire, so that was good, also, if it was a bomb, it was wrapped quite beautifully in a colorful woven tapestry. I had barely tugged at a corner of the fabric when the whole thing quickly unfurled itself to reveal a lackluster lump of wood. Ah. I see, the wrapping's the thing. Not the wood inside it.

Still not understanding what exactly was happening, I joined the ever-growing crowd, over near the side rails that overlooked the water below. People from lower decks were making their way up to our level now too, I'm assuming to find out what all the yelling was about. Some were already holding a fabric bundle of their own, so I surmised a few tapestry torpedoes had been hurled onto the lower decks as well.

After taking a quick inventory of the situation and all the elements at play, I shall now describe to you what I managed to piece together: In a successful mission to ruin my quiet pool time with more harassment and aggressive salesmanship, men in small dinghies had paddled over to our riverboat and proceeded to launch their wares onto our ship. Following my dressing room debacle earlier in the week, I of course noticed instantly that they were all wearing galabeyas.

I am not a very strong swimmer, so as I watched them standing up in their boats (while continuing to hurl their fabric bundles up into the air and onto our deck,) I remember thinking how ill-suited and even dangerous their long narrow dresses would be for swimming, should one of them accidentally fall in the water. If you recall, I could barely walk in one, I can't imagine trying to swim in it! I made a mental note to ask our guide later if there was no Egyptian equivalent of a men's bathing suit, or some other more appropriate garment for a day on the water that they could have worn? If their clothing was religious in nature, surely their congregation would understand, and make an exception for them -- especially on days when they needed to go out on the water to harass people on riverboats boats with a prolonged barrage of scarves and shrill yelling, no?

If you would like to learn what I now know about what the Muslim women get to swim in, you can do so HERE. If you'd like to read about how I somehow always capsize and end up in the water when I go out in my own little boats, you can do so HERE or HERE. Maybe the trick is to always carry with you a boatload of mass-produced tapestry-scarves? For balance?

I also recall thinking that at least two of these boat dudes had an insanely impressive throwing arm on them. Their aim was impeccable! Every single package they threw rocketed high up into the air, and then made a perfect arc before plummeting back down to land squarely on our deck. (There was also one man who wasn't so great -- I don't know if he wasn't taking the wind into account or what -- but his little packages kept missing our boat entirely and just landing in the water, but no one seemed to be too concerned about it; maybe they get deducted from his paycheck, or maybe they'll retrieve them later?)

Their yelling was constant and ever-escalating, and I soon learned that, of course -- even from several yards away, standing in small dinghies, in the water, alongside our massive riverboat -- they were attempting to negotiate. To haggle. They were yelling, "1,800 Egyptian pounds! Pick your favorite! 1,800 pounds!"

I did the math, that was about 60 dollars. Okay, well there's no way any of us would pay that, these cheaply made scarf-tapestry things were probably worth about 10 dollars, maybe 20, MAX. Plus, we have the upper hand! We have them already, up here on the ship with us! What were they going to do if we just decided to keep one? Not to mention, were we just supposed to throw fistfuls of bills over the side of the boat and watch them all flutter down into the river water?

I had out my phone and was typing a lowball offer into my currency converter app, when I see this overly-loud German woman (who had irritated me previously on this trip, on several other occasions), shove a wad of bills into the small wooden box found at the center of each fabric bundle, and hurl it over the side of our boat. Huh. The wood thing wasn't just to give the fabric weight for throwing, it was also a box. As odd as it seemed, I got the uncanny impression that maybe this German woman had done this before.

"All I have is 2,000!" she yells back at them, as her little box plops down into the water, not too far from their boats. Okay, maybe not. She seemed to know what to do with the box, but clearly not how to negotiate. So much for us having the upper hand! She has now set the going rate for scarf-things at about 7 dollars more than what they were asking. Great going, Crazy German Lady.

By now most of all the scarfs have been splayed out on the deck and weighted down with water bottles and lotion tubes, so that everyone can shop, and other people start following the German lady's lead . They are putting their monies into the boxes, throwing them down into the water (with varying degrees of accuracy), and the men below are fishing them out with their paddles and nets. I even notice that their position has changed slightly in the water, to allow the one guy with the bad throwing arm to fish out all his poorly-aimed, floating projectiles. This whole operation defies all logic and should have never worked, and yet...

So many people are purchasing these tapestries that I realize these guys are probably making a killing. I also realize that not only was this more fun than the sunbathing I had planned for the afternoon, but that this has hands-down been my favorite shopping experience thus far, in all of Egypt.

Against all odds, did these guys somehow find a way to collectively hassle an entire riverboat full of people all at once, from the water, several yards away? Yes. Could you say that these men were, technically, harassing and following us while selling unsolicited merchandise we did not ask for or seek out? Yes again.

However, there were some very notable differences: I could walk away from them at any time (and I mean truly walk away, even go back to my room if I wanted to), they weren't up in my face (except for the bundle that almost hit my head), and most importantly, there was no possible way for them to PHYSICALLY TOUCH ME. Well done, Floating Fabric Peddlers, it was lovely doing business with you!

Now that you guys have shared some of your culture with us, maybe I will buy some of your cheap but overpriced fabric and share some of my culture with you! I will use your scarf things to sew all of you a nifty, new, less dangerous outfit for boating and swimming. A swimsuit, we'll call it. You are going to love it, trust me! Think how much easier it will be to harass people when your legs aren't constrained in an ankle length tubular gown, and also, how much more quickly you could fish out all the merchandise that one guy keeps pitifully throwing into the river.

Hey, seriously though. What's up with that guy? Is he new or something?

Later, when I went around to the other side of our boat, I looked over the rail and saw that there were soooooooo many more scarf bundles floating in the water than what I originally realized, ones that had missed their mark by a long shot. Talk about some liquid assets!

Thanks, I'm here all night! Don't forget to tip your waitress...

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By Land and With Hands:

Prefer your harassment on land and with 1,000% more touching? Try THIS story!