Hurghada - A Visitor's Impressions

Mosque from the Marina

One of the good things about having a visitor is that you get to see some of the things that you’ve already taken for granted in your new setting. Although I try to capture most of the differences between here and Europe in this blog, sometimes I just don’t get round to mentioning some things if they don’t fall within topic and, to be honest, at other times I simply overlook them.

Geraldine was surprised at how large El Andalous was when she arrived (she described it as a palace, but given all the complaints from owners here, I think she was maybe being rather polite!) and also at the size of Sahl Hasheesh as a resort. Sahl Hasheesh spreads over something like 12km of coastline, I think, so it’s perfectly possible to stay in a hotel here and be nowhere near where I’m living, even though not all of it is developed yet.

It’s the same with Hurghada. Hurghada is spread out along the coast (but unfortunately is built up so that it’s not always easy to see the coastline, which is a shame), so if you stay in a hotel in North Hurghada, you can be quite a way from South Hurghada. And Sahl Hasheesh is itself yet further South (El Gouna is to the North of Hurghada). Anyone holidaying in Hurghada would need a taxi to visit me and would need to set aside pretty much at least a half hour drive.

As I think I’ve said in earlier blogs, there are many half-built buildings just waiting for the economy here to pick up before being re-started or sold to a developer. For now, they are just a sad testament to the problems that Egypt has had over the last years.

Taxis are always a good topic of conversation / provide room for adventure. Esmat drives well, is pleasant to talk to, and is reliable. Having warned of the dangers of other taxi drivers, we ended up having to get a random taxi at one point for a short trip within town and actually ended up with someone who was very good. The car was of good quality, the driver was quiet, and did not argue over how much we should pay. If only it were always like that!

Anyway, I think Geraldine was surprised to find that many cars in Hurghada don’t have safety belts. Well, they do, but there’s nothing you can click them into – no clunk click, just a band that slides and has nowhere to go. I don’t think twice about this now, but it’s really pretty common.

It used to be that no one in Hurghada used their headlights at night either because it was standard belief that if you used your lights, your battery would run low. Consequently, I’ve been told by many, you’d drive down roads in pitch black without knowing whether a car was approaching you in the opposite direction. This practice has now been made illegal, and everyone has to use lights at night, so fortunately it’s not something I’ve really had to experience.

Geraldine wondered why they thought that the lights took up battery energy but not the car horn, which Egyptians use liberally at every opportunity (it’s mostly taxis touting for business, or cars tooting to warn you that they are coming up behind you; Lena and Holger also commented on all the tooting here, but allegedly it’s a lot less than it used to be).

Esmat said that they’ve recently passed a law to ban people from driving if they get too many points on their license, similar to Europe. It will be interesting to see whether driving habits change at all.

Anyway, on one occasion Esmat couldn’t make it to take us back home one evening, so he sent a friend of his to fetch us. In Egypt, “friends” are invariably also relatives (as are spouses, come to that), so he was also Esmat’s cousin. He was an extremely pleasant guy, but he seemed to think that speed bumps were there as a challenge to speed and then break in quick succession and he spent rather a lot of our journey turning round to us in the back and showing us pictures on his mobile phone of all the huge fish he’d caught at various points in his life rather than focusing on the road. It was a very Egyptian experience.

Another difference that Geraldine picked up on was the ring pulls on diet coke cans. Here, a bit like the toothpaste that dries up as soon as you squeeze it out the tiny hole at the top of the tube, it’s a return to the 1970’s. The ring pulls are those that you pull right off; they don’t bend back and stay on the can. This probably also fits in with the generous, free use of plastic bags that I’ve mentioned before at the supermarket. There’s not much consciousness of keeping the environment clean here, although that is allegedly also something that may be marked for improvement over the next few years. Let’s see!