Festival City Mall
We were attracted to it like a moth to a flame. Even if we wanted to, we couldn’t escape a trip to Festival City, a massive modern mall in New Cairo. We found out about the mall because we were looking for a Decathlon to buy a pair of convertible pants for AY. It was just two weeks ago that we bought her a pair of new convertible pants in Johannesburg, but when we got home, we realized one pant leg was longer than the other. It was our last day in Johannesburg and we didn’t have time to make it back to the store, so since then, AY has been wearing pants where one leg is about 3 cm longer than the other.
The first time we went to Festival City, we didn’t have time to go to Decathlon. We were just stopping by at Carrefour, a hypermarket, to stock up on groceries before we headed to Fayoum. The parking lot is organized and well paved. Its exterior is entirely modern and you wouldn’t be able to tell the difference between this mall and any mall in the US. We could tell that there were lots of stores (over 300) including many international brands like Ikea, Carrefour, H&M, Marks and Spencer, Zara and a massive food court with Dunkin Donuts, Subway, McDonalds, Burger King, etc. We were short on time, so we went straight to Carrefour and didn’t explore the rest of the mall. The kids made us promise that we would go back when we had more time.
The second time we went to Festival City, after we got back to Cairo from Fayoum, we set aside time so we could spend the entire day there. We found out that an old friend from Shanghai, TW and his wife MW, were in Cairo too. Where better to meet than Festival City? TW and MW are on a retiree version of our one-year trip around the world. After retiring from their careers, they set out on a year of travel with the aim of finding a suitable place to retire and enjoy their sunset years. Coincidentally, they were finishing their travel in Egypt just as we were beginning.
For people like us who have been on the road for a while, we congregate at places like Festival Walk to satisfy our craving for western indulgences. We browsed through Decathlon because coincidentally, just like us, they also needed to buy some convertible pants. Then we decided on lunch at the food court to indulge ourselves on “American food” – carbs and sugar, while we had the chance. My mom and brother are always down for some fast food. We feasted on Subway sandwiches, Egyptian salads and McDonalds. We debated over donuts or cookies and ended up with Nutella cookies from Subway.
Waipo and Jiu Jiu took the kids to walk around while Leo and I spent a bit more time catching up with our friends. There certainly are perks to having a few more adults around. TW and MW are headed to Kenya next and we were thrilled to introduce them to David, our Maasai guide, who we spent more than two weeks with traveling in Kenya. AY drew a card for David, which we gave to TW and MW. They passed the card to David when they arrived in the Mara. From the photo they sent, I could tell David was happy to receive the handmade card and I hope he knows how special he is to our family.
After over an hour, we said goodbye to our friends and we found the kids with Waipo and Jiu Jiu enjoying ice cream at Coldstone. The kids wanted to browse around some toy shops which was next door to Claires, an accessories store from the US. Then we headed to Carrefour for some grocery shopping. In addition to groceries, we needed to buy some new pencils. We brought about 10 pencils with us from Shanghai and two months later, we have 5 pencil stubs and don’t know the whereabouts of the others. Now, we are well equipped with a new box of 12 sharp pencils, ready to be used for learning.
I don’t usually enjoy spending time at malls and the only kind of shopping I enjoy is grocery shopping. But on this day, our entire family had a great time at Festival City. It felt familiar and comfortable. There were no culture or language differences, the food and products were as expected and there was no need to haggle over prices. Nobody approached us other than to ask if we needed help finding anything and when we said that we didn’t, they just smiled and walked away. Sometimes it feels nice to be in a familiar place and just to be left alone.
SHARIA KHAYAMIYA (STREET OF THE TENTMAKERS)
A few days later, we experienced an entirely different kind of shopping in downtown Cairo. Not far from the al-Akbhar Mosque is a local market leading to the Street of the Tentmakers (Sharia Khayamiya). I had wanted to visit the Street of the Tentmakers because I read that it was not a typical tourist souvenir market. At this market, the artisans make and sell beautiful hand-embroidered wall hangings and carpets.
We dodged the oncoming traffic of cars, motorcycles, wagons, push carts and pedestrians to enter the narrow streets of a local market. Even more so than the street outside, the market was cramped with all manner of vehicles fighting for space with the pedestrians. Clothing, shoes and daily necessities were displayed to passers-by in front of each stall. A man riding a bicycle with an impossibly large wooden rack of fresh pita balancing on his head impressively swerved through the crowded street. It was tricky to navigate with the kids and luckily nobody got hurt.
We made it through the busy market and approached one of the Old Gates of Cairo. There are more than 20 old gates, showing where the outer walls of Medieval Islamic Cairo once stood. The old gates were built by the Fatimids in 1092 primarily for defense, but also to separate different social and economic classes and districts.
Just beyond the old gates is the Street of the Tentmakers. It was filled with colorful hand-made wall hangings decorated with floral, geometric and animal motifs. A wall hanging with scenes of birds perched on tree branches caught my eye but in the end I decided not to buy anything. Shop owners sat at the front of their shops, hand stitching the fabric cut-outs onto the cloth as they waited for customers. There were also many shops that sold sturdy canvas for tent-making, with miniature model tents on display. These tents would be used for camping in the desert under the stars.
We navigated the narrow streets back through the local market and stopped at a fruit juice shop for much-needed refreshment. Fruit juice shops are easy to identify because they usually hang their ripe fruit, ready to be pressed into juice, at the front of the shop – bananas, mango, melon, pomegranate and oranges. Our favorite fresh juices in Egypt are lemon mint, sugar cane and pomegranate juice. We stood on the side of the street contentedly drinking our juices as we were engulfed by the sights, sounds and smells of Old Cairo swirling around us.
11/11 開羅 節日城商場
開羅節日城商場，安檢槍狗嚴密防。
時尚店舖美食街，摩登現代齊西方。
11/13 開羅 帳篷街
開羅帳篷街逛舖，嘈雜擁擠崎嶇路。
傳統市場古城門，新鮮果汁路邊舖。