I thought to myself, “I knew this was a bad idea”. I was stuck on top of a camel. Even after two weeks in this scandalous country, I had managed to fall into another obvious scam. A young boy had approached me at the base of the Great Pyramid in Giza, had sweet-talked me into climbing onto his camel for a picture. It seemed harmless enough, camels are pretty docile. I was not obligated to pay for a ride, just a quick snapshot and I would hop down, right? Wrong.

As soon as I positioned my bottom in the cloth saddle, the boy issued a command to the camel in a secret language that only the two understand. The blasted thing stood up. My feet dangled on each of its hairy sides, a desperate four feet from the ground. There was no graceful way to dismount or jump off, we all three knew that. So there I sat, with the boy standing on the ground a few feet away from me, holding my camera, showing me his yellow teeth like a before-picture in an electric toothbrush commercial.
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Ten minutes later, I was still on top of the infernal beast. Both of us were having a sweat marathon in the Egyptian sun, but there was no doubt his hump would win out over my beer-gut for hydration reserves. The boy refused to let me down until I committed to an expensive ride, or offered the equivalent in a bribe, known all over Egypt as baksheesh. I asked him to at least take my picture like he had promised. He agreed. So I held the reins with as much dignity as I could muster, turned my head sideways to look at the camera. I did my best to hide my rising blood pressure, to look like I was having fun. I mean, after all, I was at the base of the Great Pyramid, on top of a camel in Egypt!

The waiting game continued for another several minutes until finally the kid saw a look in my eyes that indicated an imminent explosion was about to occur. It was true, I was about to go into survival mode which included letting out my combat howl and snapping necks. I threw some coins at him after he let me down, wandered off to a safe distance where I could curse his mother properly without being distracted by someone else wanting to sell me something.

Having spent one month in Egypt, I would dig myself out of one predicament only to step into another one, within eyesight of the first. I considered myself a savvy adventure traveler. I had managed to blunder all over southeast Asia without getting myself killed or maimed, even surviving run-ins with reef sharks, bamboo vipers and Kiwi backpackers who had not washed their hair since the bungee operation had dipped them.

Egypt was different, though. Egypt was tough. There were hordes of low paid police officers walking around fully equipped with machine guns, black berets and a standard facial expression that showed all the enlightenment of a cow. They had thick black mustaches. I am convinced Saddam Hussein is living in Cairo as a police officer!

I learned early not to ask one of these guys for help. First, they spoke no English. Second, not only did they speak no English, but somehow, my request for simple directions to the bus station had been misinterpreted as something hostile. Was I that bad at charades – I ask for a bus and instead start a coup? Oops.

I don’t smoke but I happened to have a package of Marlboro Reds in my day bag. I didn’t have to ask if anyone smoked, I could see the officers’ lips quivering, circling me as I pulled the pack out. I passed the cigarettes around. Instantly, peace was made for whatever infraction I had committed. They were so happy at this point, I probably could have gotten away with saying something insane and harsh, like suggesting that women should receive a proper education!

Walking home from the museum that day, I met an Egyptian man wearing a stained gray robe. He was friendly and spoke some English, so we walked together and chatted a bit.

“Come” he said, “let’s go smoke shisha.”

I am an addicted, idiot backpacker. My head would pop off if I turned down any new opportunity to do something cultural with a local. And so we went to a little side street coffee shop nearby with plastic tables and folding chairs nestled outside right in the best street filth that Cairo could provide.

Smoking shisha is the national pastime in Egypt. Muslims don’t drink much, so instead, they sit around and smoke themselves to oblivion through huge, decorated pipes. The smoke is flavored and has a sweet pleasant smell. Only the men are allowed to smoke in public, but the women smoke every bit as much in the privacy of their homes.

I am convinced that the man I was with was a walking, talking shisha pipe. He had smoked so much that his teeth were nearly gone, his lips were black and every now and then as he talked, a wisp of smoke would pop out of his nose like a dragon – even when he wasn’t smoking! Luckily, he spoke good English, so I had a great chat about the Egyptian people and culture. He ordered up our pipes with a twinkle in his eye and when the waiter brought the tall, water-filled beauties, he insisted on paying.

“My treat,” he said proudly and with a hiss of smoke, “Welcome to Egypt”.

I thanked him many times and took a long drag from one of the pipes. I think my primary and my backup lung both decided to mutiny at that point, because I nearly coughed them out of my body. I had been expecting the usual tourist pansy flavors like vanilla or strawberry, but instead, had received a mouthful of old burning tire flavor. I should have known this guy would have graduated up from strawberry shisha, a long time ago – probably when he was eight years old!

“It’s delicious,” I lied, trying to preserve our fragile new friendship. “What is it?”

I could feel my teeth starting to loosen in my gums.. I can’t remember what his answer was, but he said that it was his favorite and that it was very strong tobacco. No joke.

Somehow I finished the shisha and thanked my host between coughing spasms for the cultural experience. I decided I had had enough of Cairo and made my way to the train station to purchase a ticket for Luxor, an archeologist’s dream way down the Nile in the south of Egypt.

A day later and I was standing in the famous Valley of the Kings in Luxor. Every now and then a cough or a sneeze would result in the escape of more smoke from somewhere deep inside my chest. I had been transformed into a shisha breathing dragon like the rest of them.

Valley of the Kings was an awesome experience. In fact, I enjoyed it much more than the pyramids, maybe because there were no touts or ill-tempered camels walking around. I became friends with two Swedish guys, we explored the tomb of Seti I together. Posted all over the outside were signs that read “no cameras”. The logic was that the paint in the hieroglyphics had not been exposed to light in thousands of years, idiot tourists would never remember to turn the flash off on their cameras. The Swedish guys had a nice SLR camera, had no intentions of leaving it in the hands of a stranger. We kept our cameras as we went down the stone steps inside.

Every inch of the walls were covered in colorful hieroglyphics and told a fascinating story. Call me the world’s worst backpacker, but there was no way I was bringing a camera in here without getting a picture. I made sure my flash was off, I started snapping sneaky shots of everything that I could. My buddy had the same idea with his SLR. Within minutes we had an angry Egyptian official standing in front of us and demanding our cameras. Busted!

I decided to take a gamble based on everything I had learned in this country. I said, “Baksheesh?” I said it in the form of a question. It worked. The man’s scowl was instantly replaced with a smile, we traded a few dirty Egyptian bills for our precious cameras. Baksheesh is not treated as something corrupt, it is more or less just a daily business transaction for these guys.

Then the man caught me off guard. I had assumed we would have to leave the tomb immediately, that we were officially on thin ice. Not quite.

“Anything else you want picture?” he asked me in broken English. He pointed around the tomb at various places of interest. Then it hit me. He wanted to make sure we got all the pictures we wanted! Now that is service. I chuckled a little under my breath as another wisp of smoke escaped my nostril!

I decided if there was ever a time to press my luck in Egypt, it was now. I pointed to the official who had confiscated our cameras. He gave me a flabbergasted look. Now I know it was a look of flattery, not disgust. He smiled, threw his arms around my two Swedish friends and posed for the ultimate picture which I proudly took. Who else can say they have a picture inside a tomb, surrounded by ancient Egyptian art, standing next to the person who gets paid to make sure no pictures are taken of that same art?

After one month of wandering around Egypt, in and out of trouble, I learned to survive. Always keep cigarettes, a pocketful of baksheesh money, beware of camels and mysterious shisha and keep your cool. People are people all over the world. A smile is the ancient secret to getting out of any predicament.

Book airfare to Cairo, find a hostel in Egypt or read our Egypt travel guide.

Check the author’s homepage for more pictures and mishaps from Egypt.