Koshari Heaven

Koshari – the national dish of Egypt

In my humble opinion, this is Egypt’s greatest national dish, and equally, it is the most delicious concoction of flavours to have ever graced my taste buds.

As you go through life, you may meet Egyptians that’ll tell you I’m over-exaggerating, but pay them no heed. Although this carbohydrate-loaded meal may not look like anything special, when you take a nice big spoonful of rice, pasta, lentils, chickpeas, tomato salsa and fried onions, what I can only describe as magic, begins to happen.

It’s not just the satisfying taste, but also the smell of the fried onions and the multiple layers of texture, that make every bite memorable. You’ll find yourself reminiscing with a close friend, ‘Remember bite 23? Ah, bite 23...’ But the soft rice and pasta, the slightly harder chickpeas and lentils and then the outrageously crunchy fried onions, really do leave you gasping for more.

If you happen to find yourself walking down any street in Cairo – as you do – and your stomach starts screaming for your attention, stick your nose into the air and locate that beautiful smell of fried onions. Next thing you know, you’ve hit Koshari Paradise!

Almost every Koshari shop in Egypt is identical to the next, and as one of the cheapest foods you’ll find in the country, eating in a Koshari shop will give you the perfect opportunity to spy on the natives.

The most famous Koshari shop in Cairo is called Abu Tarek, situated quite close to the heart of the city: Tahrir Square. Inside, it’s perpetually heaving with hungry Egyptians, and quite a healthy helping of tourists who are in search of a more memorable meal than their usual Big Mac.

Once you’ve seated yourself on the tin tables, a waiter will come quickly to take your order. Here in Koshari Paradise there is no need to furrow your brow over choosing what to eat – every dish is the same! - all you need to worry about is choosing small, medium or large. You can also order extra fried onions (recommended), lentils, salsa or anything else you fancy.

You’ll notice on the table two long wine-bottle-type bottles. In one of these you’ll find a red liquid and in another you’ll find a yellow liquid. Please, please don’t make the mistake of absent-mindedly pouring the red liquid into your bowl (as I have done before), as this is very, very spicy chilli sauce. The yellow liquid is something called Dakka, and it’s a mixture of vinegar, garlic and cumin.

In no time at all, the waiter will plonk onto the table your bowls of Koshari. If you wish to sample the red and/or yellow liquids, the way to do it is to stopper the top of the bottle with your (probably very grubby) thumb so as to leave a small gap (not the most hygienic invention in the World but at least it’ll boost your immune system). Gently lift the bottle, and pour the liquids sparingly, via said hole, onto your food.

Next it’s time to mix the bad boy up. Take the plastic/metal spoon that you’ve been allocated and carefully mix together all of the Koshari layers. Be careful because there’s usually not enough room in the bowl to mix it, so if you can do this without spilling half of the dish down your front, then please contact me as I’d like to learn from your superior wisdom.

It usually takes Egyptians on average 5.3 seconds to drain a bowl of Koshari, but I’d recommend that you take your time to savour the delicate nuances of the dish.

When you’ve crammed the last mouthful into your mouth, no matter how full you feel, you must try the traditional pudding served at all Koshari Houses – rice pudding. Then you can truly say that you’ve had a happy carbohydrate-filled Koshari day!

The walking dead

I got back to the airport at around 5pm. Boarding time for my flight was 6.15pm, and luckily this time I didn't miss it!

I'd walked around the majority of the Old City of Istanbul, visited many mosques, bought Turkish delight and drank Turkish coffee (although it was surprisingly disappointing compared to the Egyptian Turkish coffee I'd been used to drinking).

I really liked the diversity of the city and the fact that I could almost always hear someone speaking Arabic, even though it's not officially an Arabic-speaking country. I miss the comforting sound of Arabic when I'm in the UK.

Harrassment was practically nil, the weather was glorious and there were always interesting things to see and do.

But when I got back to the airport I was drained. I had to stand in line behind hoards of people once as soon as I entered the airport and another time for passort control.

It was in the passport control line that I had a series of intersting thoughts. 2 of these thoughts involved potential invention ideas.

The first invention was a collapsable chair with pull-out wheels that one could sit on when waiting in unbearable queues, and be pushed along.

The second invention/idea was that at the beginning of these long, long queues, there should be a metal-detector type machine that measures energy levels. Those with a low energy level score would be automatically bumped up to the front of the queue.

I was really struggling to keep myself vertical. My back ached from the rucksack I'd carried around the city, not to mention the hills and countless steps I'd climbed. I just about managed to stop myself from sitting on the floor and asking the Ukranian girl behind me to kick me along as the queue advanced.

Thankfully I made it past passport control, found a chair to rest on and waited for my London-bound flight.

Help a woman make a phone call, she offers you her son to marry

I left the restaurant and headed for the connecting line that would take me to the city centre.

As I was walking, a woman came running after me.

'Excuse me, excuse me. Can you help me please?'

The woman was trying to use a phone card but wasn't able to make a call to her home in Iran. I tried for a few minutes, moving from phone box to phone box, but I couldn't get the card/phone to work either.

Just as I'd thought my work there had been done the woman approached me with (what I now think) was her real reason for running after me.

'My son is looking for a woman for marriage. He doesn't want to marry an Iranian because they are too... [insert a series of facial contortions and arm flailing]. He wants to marry a girl from England or Germany or Turkey'.

The woman continued trying to persuade me to give her my details, or if I could help them out and try to find him a bride. Conscious that my time in Istanbul was sifting quickly away and the fact that I quite liked this lady, I gave her my email address.

As I walked away I realised that maybe I could contact her son for a language exchange, since I want to learn Persian and he may want to learn English, so I'll try to keep the communication avenues open if I can.

 

Eating kebap

So, to get into Turkey I learnt a few things:

1. Turkey isn't in the EU and I needed to buy a visa ($20 or 15 GBP)
2. That means they also don't use the Euro, but use the Turkish Lira, so I had to find somewhere to get my money changed
3. No one speaks English!

For going into the country for a few hours I felt like I had to do a hell of a lot of things but it was really worth it in the end.

After I figured out how to use the metro, change money and get a visa, I made my way to the city centre. At the airport I had bought a book on Istanbul and was hurriedly flicking through it on the metro ride, trying to learn anything I can about Turkey (I realise I knew almost nothing before).

One of my first observations was that Turkish men were one of the most attractive men I'd ever seen. Dark, chiselled features and some had light blue or green eyes. I couldn't believe that I'd never heard this from anyone before.

When I got off the metro I looked on the metro map. It looked like I had to get on another line to get to the city centre. When I left the metro building, I looked for this illustrious other line and couldn't find it anywhere.

It was at about this time that I realised how hungry I was, so I looked for somewhere to eat.

I went into a kebap shop and was handed a picture-menu. The waiter didn't speak any English and after a few minutes of gesticulating we understood one another and I had ordered some meat-based dish.

When the kebap sticks finally arrived, they were served with salad and a pomegranate salad dressing that I'd never seen or tasted before. The dressing complimented the salad and kebap well. Apparently the kebap is the traditional Turkish meal.

After I'd finished eating, the waiter timidly handed me a post-it note. On it, in beautiful cursive writing he'd written: Beautiful dishes? :)

I smiled from ear to ear. I think he went to the trouble of looking up the translation on his iPhone then, unsure of pronunciation, thought it was best to write it down.

 

The Egyptian government made me miss my connecting flight! (tenuous link)

My flight from India left at 5.55am. I stopped for 4 hours in Kuwait then flew to Cairo. I was incredibly sleep deprived the entire journey so when I got to Cairo instead of spending the 8 hours with my family, I accidentally slept for 6 hours, leaving only 2 hours for my family.

At midnight my aunt drove me to various family members for me to say goodbye to. I'm not sure when I'll be back in Egypt again, (it's really dependant on where I find work), so these goodbyes were quite important.

I decided to wear the green sari that I wore for the Study India programme closing event as I was doing my goodbye-rounds. Just thought I'd bring a little India to the family and all. I also decided that I wanted to get married in a sari and have all the guests where saris as well!

I flew from Cairo at 3am and arrived in Istanbul almost 3 hours later. I was amazed at the disorganisation at Istanbul airport. People with connecting flights had to stand in a massive, disorganised and sluggish queue.

Now, I'll now try to justify the reason I missed my connecting flight from Istanbul to London. The main reason was that my watch was one hour behind Turkish time. Now I blame the Egyptian government for this.

One of the first things they did in 2011 when they took 'power' was to abolish the summer daylight saving time. What this meant for me was that although Cairo and Istanbul look geographically like they should have the same time zones (actually if anything Cairo should be ahead of Istanbul) Cairo is in fact one hour behind Istanbul. To make matters worse, the in-flight TV was telling me that the time at origin and time at destination were exactly the same!

After I made it out of the queue I thoguht that I still had time to wander around the shops. Of course I was gravely mistaken and as I was debating whether to buy a book on Islam or one on learning Turkish, my plane was already in the air.

When my watch informed me that it was probably time to check the TV screen again, I was horrified to find that my flight was not even showing up on the screen. I frantically ran to the help desk where I was greeted by a woman who was half-asleep. Through half-opened eye lids she told me the gate number of my flight.

I tightened the straps of my rucksack so that it wouldn't swing right and left as I ran through the airport. I began cursing Istanbul and the Turkish and the Egyptian government and watches and slapping my head repeatedly.

I got to the gate and it was completely deserted. Only the cleaners were left.

'Finished madame', one of them said to me.

I didn't give up. I ran back to the help desk but a long queue had formed. I pushed to the front.

'Excuse me but could you get some more people to work behind the desk'. There was only one woman and a queue of 10 or so people waiting to be seen.

'There's another desk downstairs she whispered'.

Like a crazy fool I ran downstairs, right, left dodging people and bags as I went. I asked the woman at the desk and informed me of the fact that I'd missed the flight by at least an hour.

After taking a few deep breaths and clearing my head I asked if I could reschedule my flight.

'The only flight with space is in the evening, at 7pm', she said.

Dissapointment at having to wait for almost 12 hours gave way to excitement. This meant I'd be able to see Istanbul! And that's exactly what I did.

The girl with the twig in her nose

It was only during the last 10 minutes in Varanasi that I truly understood (and enjoyed) the city.

I had bought a bag from a small shop in one of the alleyways near my hotel. After a day's walking around the city, when I got back to the hotel to pick up my bigger bag I found that the outer layer of the bag I had just bought had been torn and the inner lining was poking out from the bottom.

I had an hour and a half before my train was due to depart from Varanasi to Delhi, so I had enough time to go back to the shop and complain about the bag.

The shop owner had shoulder-length hair and spoke in a slow, relaxed, calm way. I tried my best to stay calm as I pointed furiously at the gaping hole in my bag. Gently he took the bag from me and agreed to fix it.

He gestured for me to come into his shop (more like an extended cupboard in the wall) and I sat and waited.

A few minutes later a little girl walked up to the front of the shop. She had a very cute face and looked a lot like the girl that had sold me the body paints when I was waiting for the fire ceremony on the Ganges. Her English was also excellent.

'Do you want to buy my postcards', she asked.

'No thanks', I said automatically. She tried a little harder but in the end gave up and sat down next to me. After I asked her what she did with the money she earned, she told me that she gives it to her mother to pay for her school.

We kept talking and as we spoke more and more I felt like giving her the entire contents of my bag.

As I said before, she reminded me of the girl who sold me the paints by the river. I was determined to give this little girl in front of me as much confidence as I could so that she could go through the rest of her life believing in herself. I made sure compliment her on her language ability and her humour, which she made note of.

'You came to my shop very angry', the shop keeper told me. He continued to talk to me in a very relax, calm way. It was then that I realised I had come to Varanasi with completely the wrong mentality. I had come with the 'Delhi-city' mentality. The one where you have to constantly watch your back in case someone was about to put a knife into it (not literally). I had come to Varanasi very high strung and worked up about nothing.

'Life is easier than this', I thought to myself. Instantly I relaxed.

The little girl had edged closer to me and was leaning her little left arm on my leg. I got out my passport so that she could flick through it. As I looked closer I realised that she had a very small twig in her nose. I asked her about it and she told me it was because jewellery (and nail polish) were not allowed at her school.

A while later a tall, pale skinned man came to the shop, looking for the shop owner. He gave the little girl and me high fives then what followed was a few minutes of hilarious banter between the man and the little girl, covering topics like basketball and school. I was amazed at her incredible wit, at such a young age.

The tall man kept saying 'yalla' and 'habibi' but I didn't really register what he was saying until he was about to leave.

'You speak Arabic?' I asked. He told me he was Lebanese.

It's been only 3 weeks that I haven't been in a completely Arabic-speaking environment but it was a shock to the system to jump right into Arabic again. He told me he was in Varanasi for a month, waiting for his friend to make him a tatoo. He was also as laid-back and relaxed as the shop owner and I began to realise that this was the predominant attitude in Varanasi. Then I began to notice that everyone in Varanasi was actually a lot more gentle and easy-going than Delhi.

Suddenly, the skies above us turned grey. A huge monsoon storm was about to hit the city. My bag was fixed so I said goodbye to the Lebanese man, shop owner and sweet little girl. Before I left I bought a postcard from her then held her shoulders in my hands, looked into her eyes and told her she was very intelligent and that she had to go to school and learn lots of things. She agreed and smiled. The Lebanese man high-fived me and I made my way to the train station, with a completely new appreciation and understanding of the city.

As I walked the road to the rickshaw station, the sky grew darker and darker. Suddenly, a roar of thunder resonated across the skies and the skies opened. I never knew a road in India could be cleared so fast but almost instantly people, rickshaws and animals ran for cover under the shop roofs. I had no choice but to run in the rain, otherwise I'd miss my train to Delhi and who knew when I'd get back if I did.

With my green scarf over my head, I ran down the street. After a few attempts I found a rickshaw. He overcharged me ridiculously, considering there were five people in the rickshaw, but I didn't care. I just needed to get to the train station.

I was lodged under his left armpit, another boy similarly lodged under his right and three people and their luggage were squeezed into the back. The storm was getting stronger and stronger and each time the lightening struck the sky , the sky was completely lit up.

Thankfully we got to the station in time, I found my bed and slept until Delhi.

Bulls, cobras and water

I feel like I have writing diarrhoea (not a nice image, I'm sorry!). I haven't written in so long that everything I see or do in Varanasi feels like a writing opportunity.

I can't stop scratching my nose! Also, on the train journey to Varanasi I ate an apple that I thought I had previously washed. As I was eating, I felt like there was something on it but I ate it anyway. A few hours later I developed a rash on my top lip that has left my skin peeling. I'm also continuously scratching my mosquito bites, so as I walk down the street I'm having to do a strange solo dance that involves bending down to scratch my feet, scratching my nose then sometimes my back. It's really uncomfortable.

I took a cycle rickshaw to a restaurant called Madhur Milan, which was recommended  on the Lonely Planet website. For one reason or another I always seem to chose elderly rickshaw drivers. I'm amazed at their strength though! I laughed to myself as I was riding the rickshaw, when a man (clearly seeing that I as already   on a rickshaw) offered me to ride his rickshaw. What did he want me to do? Fall in love with his face then jump from my rickshaw into his arms?

When we got to the restaurant I paid him 20 rupees, but he wouldn't take one of my notes, saying that it was no good. I thought to myself, this isn't a car you're buying, this is a ten rupee note and if it has a staple through it no one's going to lose a little sleep over it! He wouldn't budge so I ended up raising my voice a little and leaving him the offending 10 rupee note on his rickshaw.

The restaurant was packed. I was put in a very tight space in front of two Indian men tucking into their dosas (stuffed deep-fried pancakes). Behind me, two British girls looked utterly lost in the chaos inside and left, without ordering anything, as soon as I sat down.

I ordered a masala dosa, aloo dam (spicy potatoes) and banana lassi. I realised my attempts at getting the waiter to explain the content of each dish is absolutely futile since he could barely string together the sentence 'What do you want'.

As I sat waiting for my food I got more and more irritated by the Indian men opposite me. One of them was coughing all over the table, making no attempt to guide his cough particles anywhere else. The other was letting out long, drawn-out burps then tapping himself on the stomach as if in congratulations. Under my breath I muttered a thousand Arabic curses, hoping my strange murmurings might alert them to my growing discomfort - it didn't.

The food came very quickly and it was delicious! The dosa in particular was very nice. Inside the deep-fried pancake was mashed potato and peas, spiced with masala. The lassi was also very nice, and really helped to extinguish the masala-enduced flames in my mouth.

On the way out I decided to buy some water. The water here is always 'packaged drinking water', never mineral water. If you're lucky you might pick up a bottle of 'packaged drinking water with added minerals', such as the one proudly sat in front of me on my desk.

After I bought the water a little boy with a turban started to follow me. 'Ma'am, hey ma'am'. I ignored him. He kept following me. Then to my horror I noticed what he was holding in his hands. He was holding the circular box that is used for carrying cobras.

'Oh crap!' I thought, if I don't give this kid money he's going to let his cobra out on me. I tried walking faster but in front of me a huge bull was blocking the road. The bull was very angry, tossing its head to the right and left and swatting its tail aggressively. I did a quick 360 and disappeared into a narrow lane, safe from bulls and cobras.