This is the translated version from a chinese article. Click Here to read the original chinese version.

Thud. The immigration stamp landed heavily on the paper. The customs officer, still fighting sleep, lazily tossed my passport back before slumping onto his desk in slumber. A visa sticker, bought for $25 in a shop, and an approval that took less than three seconds—this was Egypt’s way of saying “welcome,” simple and unceremonious. The dull echo of the stamp reverberated through the vast, nearly deserted arrival hall, as if the intellectual heart of the Arab world were still lost in its own dream.

Outside, Cairo was anything but asleep. The streets pulsed with chaos: donkey carts, cars, and motorcycles surged forward like a flood, racing one another as if echoing the spirit of Arabian horses galloping across ancient deserts. Pedestrians threaded through the chaos with a calm that belied the madness around them, their steady gaze serving as Egypt’s most reliable traffic signals. Pigeons spiraled between crumbling yet imposing tawny buildings, while sheep wandered the streets. Billboards towered above, their bright exhortations to consume standing as striking symbols of modern Egypt’s aspirations. Horns blared, voices called out, and the distant call to prayer wound through the cracks of the city, a rhythm only a Cairene could understand.

I searched for order in this tumult, but every face and moment that flashed past reminded me that here, disorder was the norm. Only by embracing the chaos could one hope to relax.

Jan Morris once wrote that Cairo was never still: “This place is forever in ferment, always extravagant, always on the move. Its sense of dignity is entirely derived from its river and its past, yet it brims with an almost unbelievable vitality and confidence.” Cairo, Egypt’s capital, bears the weight of both disappointment and triumph in the modern world. In the sweep of Egypt’s five-thousand-year history, Cairo emerged only in the last thousand years—yet it was the Arab conquerors, not the Egyptians, who took the lead. Cairo’s aspirations were born of Ottoman expansion, its modernization forced upon it by the absurdities of British colonial rule. Conquered into existence, and thriving in conquest, Cairo today is the largest city in the Arab world, a cultural capital weighed down by outsiders’ expectations. But when those forces withdrew, so did the belief that had sustained the city. Since 1956, Cairo has sought to find its place in the modern world, constantly expanding yet losing power with each passing day—growing vaster but ever more frenzied, vast but powerless.

Pyramids

Before flying into Cairo, I scanned the landscape from the airplane, searching for a glimpse of the Giza Pyramids. They appeared no larger than a fingernail, barely discernible against the yellow sands of Giza, standing defiantly before the sprawling enormity of Cairo across the desert. Yet, when I stood beneath them in the quiet of dawn, their towering forms overwhelmed me, and the contrast between distant expectation and immediate reality struck with a mixture of awe and fear.

The pyramids of Khufu, Khafre, and Menkaure loomed—no intricate carvings or lavish ornamentation, just immense blocks of stone and simple triangular shapes, each rising with an ancient ambition to pierce the sky. Humanity’s grandest achievements often take the form of such stark, unadorned geometry. As the early morning light stretched across the desert, Cairo blurred into the horizon, a distant mirage of grey and sand. The pyramids, however, stood solitary and eternal, proud sentinels guarding the desert for five thousand years.

As I neared the Great Pyramid of Khufu, the sunlight dimmed, and I was swallowed by its shadow. The massive stones, meticulously hewn with sharp edges, were stacked in ordered layers, forming uneven steps about a meter high. It is estimated that over 2.3 million limestone blocks, quarried from the cliffs along the Nile, comprise this colossal structure. Yet how these blocks were transported and assembled into a monument over a hundred meters tall remains a mystery—a riddle scholars still debate without consensus. Herodotus, writing in the 5th century BCE, claimed that it took one hundred thousand men twenty years to build the Great Pyramid. Even in Herodotus’ time, three millennia had passed since Khufu’s reign—just as distant to him as China’s Shang dynasty feels to us today. The truth, fragmented across centuries, can only be speculated upon, pieced together from scattered remains and whispered accounts. If Herodotus’ claims are true, then the pyramid was once the centerpiece of Egyptian life. It shaped the existence of its builders, defined the rhythm of their lives. Men labored under its demands, women awaited their return, and children grew up amid the constant sound of stone being carved and hauled. The weight of a single tomb, dictating entire lifetimes, is unsettling to ponder.

In the shadows, flashes of white caught my eye—the Egyptian tourist police. These figures, I realized, had become a symbol of Egypt’s vigilant, almost desperate, determination to protect its visitors. After a terrorist attack in 1997 left sixty-four foreign tourists dead in the Valley of the Kings, Egypt’s tourism industry plunged into chaos. Now, tourism is Egypt’s lifeline, with the silent grandeur of its pyramids and temples drawing travelers from around the world. Preserving the safety of visitors has become the cornerstone of Egypt’s recovery.

Clad in white uniforms and black caps, the police stood out against the tawny landscape. They perched on ancient stones and leaned against crumbling fences, passing time at a pace that felt as eternal as the monuments they guarded. Beneath the shadow of the pyramids, where time itself seemed to flow differently, boredom had bred an unspoken understanding—a quiet economy of survival amidst the ruins of an ancient empire.

“Hello, China?” was the greeting I heard most often from the tourist polices during my stay in Egypt.

Not wanting to get drawn into what would inevitably turn into persistent haggling, I waved them off and hurried on. One of them followed, not too fast, not too slow.

“I’ll take you to see the tombs. No charge,” he called with a grin.

Whether guards or police, everyone seemed eager to turn their positions into opportunities for guiding. A casual gesture, a quick word, and soon after, some form of compensation. For Egyptians, wages are meager, and any job that brings them into contact with foreign tourists is a blessing. With a few words, they could earn what amounted to a day’s pay. Yet, the relentless, sometimes overwhelming enthusiasm to “help” can leave one drained. There’s no real danger here, only the exhaustion of navigating endless offers of assistance.

Behind the façade of this ancient civilization, the old, familiar struggle for daily survival persists.

Next to the Pyramid of Menkaure, three unfinished smaller pyramids remain. From the grandeur of Khufu to these lesser monuments, the evolution of Egyptian aesthetics, burial customs, and beliefs is etched into the Giza Plateau. Beyond these pyramids, the desert stretches into infinity—boulders and sand, camel caravans in the distance, horse-drawn carriages moving with a simple, rustic grace. At the horizon, where Cairo meets the desert, I noticed a shadow bobbing toward me. An old man on a camel had spotted me from a kilometer away. He stopped beside me, offering a ride. I smiled and declined. Disappointed, he turned his camel and rode off, leaving a cloud of dust in his wake. Against the towering backdrop of the Great Pyramid, he seemed small—yet his pace, full of life, reminded me of many Egyptians today, navigating the whirlpool of chaos with a graceful endurance, like sardines darting through the current.

The sun was now high, and the Sphinx gleamed pink under its harsh light. From where I stood, it was perfectly framed between the pyramids of Khufu and Khafre. Its human face rose between the two like the sun cresting mountain peaks. This same sun once illuminated the wisdom of an ancient civilization, guiding the lives of millions. Today, it shines on a modern city—a city whose rhythm is as frenetic as it is timeless.

The people of modern Cairo share no direct bloodline with the ancient Egyptians. They inherit the glory of that distant past but are left to grapple with the countless questions history has abandoned. When they turn away from the noise of the city and glance back at the vast desert, the pyramids rise with an imposing weight, towering over the low-rise sprawl. How the Cairenes will bear the burden of this legacy remains an open question, one they continue to wrestle with, alone in the shadows of their monumental past.

Khan al-khalili

I came to Egypt in search of traces of the ancient Silk Road. In Alexandria, I glimpsed the ruins of the legendary lighthouse and felt the intellectual legacy of the ancient Library echo faintly through the streets. Yet upon arriving in Cairo, I found myself engulfed by a city overtaken by modernity—Westernized and compromised by the forces of the present. The thousand-year sweep of Arab history seemed hidden, buried beneath the towering structures that dominated the skyline.

“Go to Khan el-Khalili! That’s Cairo’s oldest market!” my driver exclaimed, his enthusiasm cutting through my quiet lamentations. Egyptians, warm and effusive by nature, are quick to throw themselves into animated conversation, whether or not they know you.

As we neared Khan el-Khalili, the wide avenues narrowed into winding alleyways lined with countless stalls. From the car window, I saw a black mass of people stretching endlessly, a flowing river of humanity—pushcarts, buses, horse-drawn carriages, and donkey carts all jostling together in a chaotic search for a way forward. By now, I had grown accustomed to Cairo’s congestion and crowds, but the scene at Khan el-Khalili still astonished me. To my right, a magnificent building rose above the street, its colossal stone gate nearly three stories high, intricately carved with ornate patterns. Beyond the gate, the market seemed to stretch into an endless depth, swallowing people as they entered. Sunlight streamed down, making each head glow beneath its beams. It was everything I had imagined Damascus might be—a bustling Arab souk, filled with life and wonder.

Khan el-Khalili is not merely a market; it is a vast district. The part I was passing through catered to the daily needs of locals, but the real treasures, meant for tourists, lay at the southern end. When the Fatimids moved Egypt’s capital to Cairo in 973, the city blossomed under subsequent dynasties, becoming the heart of the medieval Middle East. By the 14th century, Cairo had reached its zenith, with Khan el-Khalili at its center. Although modern Egypt unfolds along the Nile, the spiritual and historical pulse of the Arab world once beat here.

Inside the bazaar, the alleys twisted and turned like a spider’s web, leading into shadowy corners. Shops brimming with Middle Eastern curiosities lined the streets—textiles, lamps, silverware. Yet, upon closer inspection, the merchants would confess that much of it had come from Yiwu, China. Vendors stood proudly in their doorways, tirelessly calling out to passersby, while corner cafés retained a faded elegance from the last century. Lanterns illuminated ancient doorways, and the smell of Turkish coffee drifted through hidden nooks. I could almost conjure the glory of the Silk Road—Arab merchants gathering here, their stalls laden with exotic goods from the East. Chinese porcelain, Southeast Asian spices, and Persian Gulf pearls must have once spilled onto these cobblestones. Languages and faces from across the world converged here, driven by a hunger for discovery. Cairo, the “City of Victory,” must have been a place of triumph for merchants, a city where dreams of wealth and success materialized.

To the east of the bazaar, mosques and medieval-style wooden houses came into view. This part of the market felt open and calm compared to the bustling souk. In the scorching afternoon heat, people sat cross-legged at the foot of towering mosque walls, whispering to one another. Vendors on tall bicycles skillfully wove through the crowds, while young boys balanced trays stacked with loaves of bread, maneuvering their bikes with one hand. Outside shops carved into stone walls, traders huddled in groups, sipping tea and playing chess. Pigeons fluttered above, and a chaotic tangle of electrical wires sprawled across the rooftops. While modern Cairo is defined by Western influence, here, in this small quarter, I felt a deep gratitude that a piece of history had been preserved. Whether through deliberate protection or sheer neglect, this half-kilometer stretch of road embodied the medieval Cairo I had longed to see—a place of mystery and distant echoes, yet imbued with a cosmopolitan spirit of openness.

On my way out of the market, I stumbled upon El Fishawi Café, one of Cairo’s oldest coffeehouses. Naturally, it had become a pilgrimage site for those seeking to capture a glimpse of the past. The café retained its early 20th-century decor, with two entrances merging into the bustling market, blurring the boundary between bazaar and café. Seats outside were scarce, as elderly musicians strummed traditional Arab melodies. They lacked the deep, resonant voice of Umm Kulthum, but simply being there was enough to satisfy my fantasies of Cairo.

A Garden on The Niles

I’m standing on the balcony, gazing out over the Nile. Egypt’s ambitions for the new world unfold before me—skyscrapers rise in neat rows along the riverbank, their gleaming facades punctuated by luxury hotels and restaurants. Four silver bridges stretch across the water, their lights flickering in the dusk, linking the ancient heart of Cairo to its modern edges. The relentless flow of traffic over these bridges breathes life into the city, while beyond, hidden beneath the shadow of thick trees, the quiet grandeur of Western architecture murmurs stories of a long-lost elegance.

In the middle of the Nile, a small, verdant island lies like an emerald embedded in a ribbon of blue—the island of Gezira, home to Zamalek, Cairo’s historic quarter of wealth and privilege. During Egypt’s European era, the city’s economic and cultural heart began to drift from the Islamic quarters around Khan el-Khalili, westward to the Nile, eventually taking root on this island. Since its development in 1905, Zamalek has come to symbolize Cairo’s modernity and cosmopolitan allure. Villas, luxury apartments, embassy gardens, and chic restaurants—all the trappings of contemporary Cairo’s progress—find their place on this tiny island in the river.

Though the summer heat was oppressive, the coolness of the river and the shade of the trees made strolling through Zamalek one of my most cherished experiences in Cairo. The leafy riverbank seemed to form a barrier, insulating Zamalek from the city’s relentless noise, leaving it peaceful and unhurried. As I wandered the narrow paths running north to south, I passed young people emerging from art schools, exuding an air of openness and confidence—both men and women. Fashionably dressed figures sat outside cafés, laughing into their phones, while passersby no longer stared at me. The islanders had grown accustomed to foreign faces, their lives steeped in the familiar rhythms of modernity. In chic boutiques, shop assistants were dressed no differently than those in New York or London, and behind second-story windows, galleries displayed the works of Egypt’s contemporary artists. The trees shrouded these cosmopolitan buildings, which, after years of neglect, showed signs of wear and age—chipped facades and faded paint. Yet the delicate carvings on their doorways whispered of a time when Western dreams and desires had converged on this land.

In all my imaginings of Cairo, it had always appeared as a city with a Cold War detachment—an elegant tension born from the clash of East and West, a place riddled with contradictions and moments of reflection. Cairo, to me, should have been like a middle-aged gentleman—dignified and refined in a tailored suit, having seen the world’s splendors, nostalgic for lost times, yet guarding a quiet grace in his silence.

Zamalek, I realized, is like that gentleman—seated on the banks of the Nile, staring proudly yet pensively at the generous river. The island’s melancholy and depth are etched into his face as he contemplates the gains and losses of his first half of life.

Later that night, as I passed Tahrir Square, I could not help but recall how, only twelve years prior, the city’s youth had gathered here, their voices rising in desperate calls for a new future. From the car radio, the soulful voice of Umm Kulthum filled the air—her mournful, resonant tones embodying the world’s earliest impressions of Cairo: melancholic, profound, carrying the unmistakable cadence of the East. The people of Cairo, spinning endlessly in the whirlwind of history, seemed to find solace in her music—a rare source of energy, a connection to their identity in a world that often overwhelmed them.

As her plaintive voice lingered, I spotted a man in a gray galabeya, riding a tall bicycle, pausing alone in the darkened square. He looked back toward the old city while I continued my journey forward. In that fleeting moment, Cairo’s loneliness and romance crystallized into a single, bittersweet instant.

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