Cairo is..

A dusty behemoth, shrouded in cars and buzzed humans in loud voices, warm.

A puzzle with smashed pieces and layers of history your mind cannot unravel without strain.

10 inches deep in dust.

A rage room during traffic hours.

Hundreds of miles of white and yellow sands stretching against blue-green water spreading into an endless horizon.

Too hot in August.

A historians dream and waking nightmare.

Pockets of Europe, potholes of Asia, a trench or two or Africa - mixed into a cocktail.

Friendly men, smoking in malls, sipping black tea at an ehwaa deep into the belly of the night, watching life teem by, a nocturnal beast.

Carrying a lot of change at hand.

Wearing your heart on your sleeve, personal affronts to formality, fighting over the bill, loud laughter.

A desert full of swimming pools.