Our car took a short cut down a crowded path bordered by market stalls to get us a little closer. Our escort grabbed both suitcases and led the way, constantly checking that Laura was behind him and I her. As we entered the station we were stopped by a craggy faced old man who proffered some kind of ID and took the cases, slinging Laura's holdall over his shoulder and my heavy suitcase onto his shoulder. The three of is followed him through the crowds around the end of a line onto a platform. A number of passengers didn't bother with this long route and simply jumped down, crossed the track and climbed up the other side.
Ahmed put us on the train. The crowds on the platform had disappeared into various carriages, but fortunately not ours. We sat in wide comfortable seats or facing forward similar in style to business class seats on flights in Europe. Each row consisted of two seats, an aisle then a single seat. Out fellow travellers consisted of suited and booted business men, the guy in front with the most annoying text notification which said in english 'you have a text message'.
Having missed lunch both Laura and I were hungry. A tunic clad waiter walked through the carriage holding a note pad floating in arabic what I took to be requests for orders. I let it past. About half an hour later he was back with a trolley service - this was going to be easy - I just pointed. To get around my lack of knowledge of arabic the waiter wrote down the price and I gave him the requisite funds nicely rounded up as I was just pleased to have had successfully completed the transaction.
Now when Ahmed put us on the train he has invested care of our cases to the carriage porter - each carriage appeared to have its own porter - who place the bags in a shuttered cupboard with no lock and gestured that he knew that those cases were mine and he knew who I was and where I was sitting. Ahmed explained that the train had just two stops and we should get off at the second one and my new best porter friend would put the bags on the platform.
The journey itself difficult purchases of two cheese rolls and two cans of coke aside was quite pleasant, the carriage nicely air conditioned and the seats being able to recline. The view from the windows didn't amount to too much, fields, donkey's carry men and crops punctuated by small towns of partly built blocks of flats from which washing hung.
On board businessmen greeted friends, colleagues or acquaintances as they walked down the aisle to have a cigarette in the spaces between the carriages. It would appear this was a favoured mode of transport of solid working businessmen.
The train pulled into it's first stop and has predicted by Ahmed the vast majority of people left the train leaving Laura, myself and maybe two or three others.
Our porter friend now sprung into action. Operating a lever he swung each seat around so it was facing the opposite way, ready for the return journey to Cairo. Working down through the carriage he soon reached Laura and me. Gesturing he took us to the back down the carriage past his completed work and through to the shuttered cupboard where our cases lay.
He started up a conversation, him in arabic, me in english, offered me then Laura a cigarette and explained that the train had stopped for a moment before entering the station to wait for another train to depart. He showed me the problem by opening the door and inviting me to lean out and look down the track. My porter friend then lift the cases making a noise indicating that they were heavy and opened his hand into which I placed two five pound notes. Checking that they were fivers and there was only two he gestured again, my protestations that I had no more cash lasted about five seconds and I gave him two more fivers. Satisfied the two one way conversations turned to football and the failure of Manchester United to beat Barcelona - by the time we pulled into the station we were giving each other high fives and waving goodbye like life long friends.
And so to Alexandria....
Peter Jackson
Mobile: +44(0)7887 794396
Sent from my BlackBerry from Vodafone- so please excuse the brevity and the typing mistakes!
Please reply to pj@rede2.com. Thank You
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