Date: July 4th 2009 15:08h
Place: Restaurant at the Indiana Hotel

I just checked in the hotel where my tour starts, so far it seems Im the first one to arrive, but nothing is planned for today cuz we have to way everyone to arrive. Yesterday I spent pretty much the whole day walking..and boy I’ve walked, walked for hours, took pics of some boys jumping off the bridge into the Nile, very nice kids, they were so excite to pose for the pics. On the way back I turned into this street and after a couple of miles it turned out it was a dead end, the only way was through this 5 star hotel, I didn’t even think twice, put on a posh face and walked in as if a were a customer. Ended up running into the Hard Rock and since its easy to find beer around here I didn’t hesitate, walked right in and ended up splurging 300 pound s for a meal. Oh that Stella (not the Artois, but an Egyptian one), never in my life a beer went so smoothly down my throat, it was like a massage in my larynx.
After a couple o days here I realized that 9 out 10 Egyptians that strikes up a conversation with you are trying to sell you something. I met this boy, seemed like a nice guy, he asked about where I was from, told he had a gallery and him and his family did all the painting, and me trying to be a nice guy said – That’s cool, where is your gallery? – And his gallery was conveniently down the street. He introduced to his brothers and sister offer me a couple o tea. And all this time I’m thinking “Boy, Egyptians are really nice people. They were asking about my family and blah, blah, blah. In the end he pushed my 3 of his painting were he wrote my mom and my dad’s name. What happened? I didn’t buy, he asked to choose the paintings I like but I told him I didn’t want, and I kept asking about the price and he kept saying “Don’t worry a about price, money is nothing”. He tried to sell me all the three painting for 300 pounds, but I had only 90..hehe. Ended up leaving the store with a smaller painting for 90 pounds, and the original price was 80.
In the evening me, the aussie guy and the American went out to this terrace restaurant on a rooftop of hotel. Nice place, quiet, couple of alcohol drinking Arabics. We had a couple of beers, one shisha each cuz a guy misunderstood us, talked some shit and called the night.