Finally got internet in the apartment via a thumb drive. Spent the last two afternoons in a relatively upscale coffee house. RE MB info: Morsi's eerily Castro-esque rhetoric thus far is extremely popular with the people in my neighborhood (other denizens of said coffee house and also randos who gather around TVs on the street to watch his speech). On the flight in, we saw the "million man" protest or whatever in the square on Friday. It was pretty impressive. People appear fairly optimistic right now (although I haven't reached a level where I can directly broach such things with my neighbors yet unless they bring it up).
Also, Egyptians are really friendly. Probably the friendliest of any country I've been to. You speak a little Arabic, and they cover you up with tips and advice and food recommendations and warnings about how to avoid paying too much to your baawab (gatekeeper at the apartment) or taxis. I've spent most of my time in underdeveloped areas of the city so far, but these are good dudes by and large (I did have a group of adolescents try to heckle me with english profanity; I took the time to correct their "eff your mother" taunts to the proper version and they seemed appreciative and undoubtedly enthusiastic about this new knowledge).
I've only seen one fight so far, but it's the reason I didn't get a pic of the street food I was eating. Some fisticuffs broke out over bread prices at the sandwich shop, so I split.
Next month, I'm thinking of earning an extra katpak jar by joining the Tahrir protesters but carrying a "goEMAW.com" sign. If it works out, I'll give you a heads up so someone can record it. I've already slapped a few 'what is emaw" stickers around my neighborhood.
So far, I've only been hassled by the police once (when I got busted taking pics of the Cairo terminal; sorry SD, they were deleted not quite at gunpoint). That dampened my pic-taking mood somewhat. But I get my dip passport back on Tuesday and I can pretty much go to town once I have that.
