Walk Like an Egyptian: ShamShmarm

This blog comes to you from the relieved and refreshed of Kjrstin Berg who is now home from an amazing weekend at the beach =)

Last wednesday, at about 10pm, myself and six other AUCans headed for the bus stop in downtown Cairo to embark on our 6 hour drive to Sharm el Sheikh, a popular beach and tourist area along the Red Sea in Sinai (Did you see Moses?- my dad <3>

The bus was okay, it had air conditioning, we slept or tried to sleep most of the time. The strangest thing for me was being woken up at 4 or 5 checkpoints by a man with a gun demanding to see my passport. One man was actually taken off the bus because he didn't have a visa, that was scary. And every time I looked out the window I saw literally nothing but sand. But not like the beautiful rolling sand dunes, no I mean, just sand.

We eventually got there, but much earlier then our gracious host, so we waited seeeevvveral hours at a random hotel. A hotel we werent staying at. And we swam in the pool. And just hung out with our luggage. Hahah, so weird.

Finally, we met up with the rest of our group. We were soo lucky to have been offered a friend's house to stay at. Good ol' Wafa'i. Haha.

That night we went out to seafood (naturally I bought food at a different restaurant and brought it in, we know how I feel about fish, bleh!!) Then after walking around the area and looking at some shops we went to an upstairs lounge with hookah and drinks and pool tables. We went home pretty early that night and just ended up swimming at the house and hanging out.

Every day there we slept wayyy too much during the day and stayed up until 4 or 5am... but we're in Egypt, that's how it goes, TIA, hahaa.

Our second night we got to go clubbing!! We went to a really cool venue called Little Buddha. It was the same as any club I guess, low lights, really loud music, but this one was full of the funniest european tourists you could ever imagine... huge Russian muscle heads and German girls with bleached blonde teased hair and ridiculous shoes. All of Sharm was an awesome place to people watch. Very touristy though, not very Egyptian. We had such a fun night though just dancing and dancing until it closed for the night

Our next day in Sharm was incredible. We spent the day in the Red Sea after eating a big meal on the beach. The bay was gorgeous, the water was warm, they gave you towels, we spotted our first burkini (which some women who wear hijab wear while swimming in order to keep their heads and bodies covered). And the weather was gorrrgeous. Margaux, Sophie, Gwen and I swam out to the edge of the swimming area where we formed a sort of raft by holding each others' ankles and floated back down to the other edge. It was really nice. Just a normal relaxing beach day.

After a few hours of swimming, Said (Like sa-yeeed, like from Lost) suggested that we go parasaling and organized the whole thing for us. It was SOOO funnnn!!! Id never done it before and I was thrilled! Margaux and I went up together. They just strap you in and let you go, it looks a little unnerving from the boat, but its actually really peaceful. We were susspended in the air for about 10 minutes and we were lucky enough to see the sun set behind the Sinai mountains. It was one of the most beautiful things I have ever seen. The water was so blue below us and the air was warm and clear. And the sky was blue, and pink, and purple. The moon was a gorgeous crescent and the North Star was crystal clear beside it.

And Im not romanticizing, it was gorgeous. =)

We concluded our vacation with the event that initially brought us all down there- a David Guetta concert!! David Guetta is a DJ who mixes house music. And you know his stuff, I promise. The concert was AMAAAAZZINNNNGGG!!! Im not sure I would call it a concert, everyone was calling it "the party" as in "are you going to David Guetta's party?" The venue was incredible. Its a club called Pacha which is considerable famous in Egypt. It's not really indoor or outdoor... you walk in and there are shops and restaurants inside and then a huge open area in the middle with a DJ booth and stage, a huge dance floor, a number of bars and some tables set upstairs in the VIP area. And it was all standing room. I think there were about 5000 people there, all excited and happy and ready for a good time just dancing and being around each other. The concert itself was amazing too, people were fanatically excited every time Guetta said anything, and he was great. There were so many lights and the bass was loud, everyone was dancing like they'd never danced before. One of my favorite parts of the concert were all the extra dancers. On stage there were always at least two go-go girls, but that was only half exciting. A little bit into the show twirling dervishes came on stage with neon lights attached to their costumes. And from the ceiling came trapeze artists and other gymnasts. I cant figure out the term- the girls who just dance around hanging from the ceiling with two long pieces of cloth... like Circ de Sole status. It was amazing.