Frontline World

EGYPT - Inside Cairo's Living Room, December 2003
a FRONTLINE/World Fellows project
Cairo's Streets: Sights, Sounds, Smells
Tall buildings and jumbled traffic
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We are on our way to the café. "It is a big puzzle," my friend Mohamed Essam says. The heart of Cairo is a jumble of asphalt and dust and one-way streets. The city has been both busy and overcrowded for more than 1,000 years. A walk across it is an exaggerated cautionary parable about the dangers of modern life. Take a wrong step and you'll get squashed flat. Breathe too deeply and you'll suffocate.
Cairo's Cafes: Go