Cairo: the bazaar.

One afternoon, Yasmin, Will, and I went to Khan El Khalili, the big bazaar here. As it turned out, Yasmin was right that the afternoon is the wrong time to go - all the sellers have far too much energy still and really try to get you to come into their shops. One guy really really really wanted to polish Will's shoes and followed us all the way to the café. While we were at the café, men were constantly coming by and trying to sell us cushions, Rolexes, and Oakleys [helpful hint: the last two were not real].

Walking through the bazaar was like running the gauntlet. [Side note: I just looked that phrase up on wikipedia to make sure it was "running" and not "walking" (see the effort I put forth for you guys?), and the entry included this sentence: "It is also called 'running the gauntlet' when one runs on top of a large row of porta-potties while bystanders proceed to throw trash at him or her." Ohhhhhhkay.] On either side, all the salesmen were standing outside their shops, smiling and saying set phrases to try to get us to come in:

"I don't know what you want, but I have it!"

"How are you tomorrow - I mean, today?" [Uh huh, sure, that was an unplanned trip-up, not a cute mistake designed to make tourists go "awwww" and catch their attention...]

"Oh, lucky man, two wives! How many camels for one?" We heard that one several times - it was cute the first four or so times, but then it felt a little overplayed...especially when Will started asking for 15 camels. Just 15?!? We were very offended.