Sweet or Sour

George has car a game that he has played for years, Sweet or Sour. He smiles and waves to people from his car or bus window. If they smile and wave back, they're sweet. If they see him and don't wave back, sour. He discovered that he had a very high sweet strike rate when we were coming into Cairo in our little bus. He was especially happy with the sweet armed guards in their dull turrets. They always gave him a smile and wave back. Sometimes he even got a thumbs up.

He had a great time playing Sweet or Sour on the way back from Cairo to Sharm El Sheikh because we got stuck in a traffic jam just after we came through the tunnel under the Suez Canal. (no photographs are allowed at this tunnel) There was a truck or something that had overturned on the Sinai side of the Suez tunnel blocking traffic in both directions. It was very backed up. We had wondered why it took us so long to get through the tunnel. There were a mixture of western tourists, Egyptians on their own holidays, and ordinary commercial traffic going in the other direction.

This is what things looked like on the Sinai side of the tunnel while George was playing his game. People were getting out of their cars and busses to see what was going on and to get some air. It was towards the end of the day so thankfully the teeth had gone out of the heat. George got loads of smiles and waves, so much so that his hand and arm were getting tired. He even got a wave from some high ranking Egyptian Army guy (lots of stars on his shoulders and had his own driver) who came to organize the mayhem (perhapsh he was stuck in this traffic too) but he wouldn't allow his photo to be taken.

It helped that we had a beautiful blonde 17 year old girl in the bus. She was a star attraction. People (young men) would walk along side our bus to smile, and admire her. Here are some of Emily's admirers.

By the time we got passed the accident George got 102 sweet waves. Our driver put some Egyptian music on and it was a real party atmosphere. We celebrated getting passed the jam by having the chilled melon that we got at the fruit stall earlier. It tasted of pears. Odd but not unpleasant. Suez sunset