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There are many businesses in
Cairo that seek to please the tourist. Cairo is the center of the
Egyptian Perfume business which sells perfume oils to the French
Perfume industry. It is only natural that almost any place in
the city you can be enticed into a "perfume palace" for mint
tea, a presentation of local copies of famous fragrances and some
haggling over sales of perfume bottles or bottles of perfume
oils.
Many of the artifacts found in
graves were related to perfume oils. See
More...
But, the enterprising Egyptians
have developed all sorts of tourist products and experiences, some of the ones
we encountered were:
-- The Golden Palace
perfume shop, selling perfume bottles and essence
oils.
-- Souvenir shops
selling books, t-shirts, galabeyas, replicas of
antiques, fake scarabs, gold or silver cartouches
with your name inside, and anything else the
tourist might want.
-- Rug shops that sell
camel hair rugs.
--
Shops that demonstrate papyrus making and that
sell papyrus with hand painted scenes from the
tombs.
--
Street sellers selling jewelry, post cards,
papyrus with tomb scenes, fragrant necklaces of
flowers, replicas of antiques, head clothes.
--
Night clubs that have belly dancers.
--
Sound and Light shows at the pyramids (and also
at Karnak in Luxor).
--
Ragab's Pharaonic Village which explained the
gods and some of the ancient Egyptian way of
life, and also had a replica of a temple on a
small scale (with a soon to be constructed gift
shop in the shape of a pyramid).
--
Twilight boat trips with dinner, on the Nile.
--
Sailing on the Nile in a Felucca.
-- The
Kahn al-Khalili market with its canvas bags
(great bargain, near the Bab al-Futuh) ,
patchwork cushions and wall hangings, brass
works, and real antiquities.
-- Hundreds
of mosques, museums and Egyptian and Roman
antiquity sites. |
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If you can't
find something interesting to do in Cairo, you are
"tired of life" as Dr. Samuel Johnson said of
people who were bored in London.
Click
the thumbnail photos below to see full-sized pictures of
some of the tourist things we did in Cairo. The papyrus
scenes are typical of those available almost everywhere
in Cairo.
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The
Golden Palace is a perfume shop in Giza. It is
owned by Adel M. El Gabry who is a friend of a
friend, and who showed us great hospitality. His shop is
decorated in beautiful silks, colorful wall
hangings, and lovely hand carved furniture.
There are
hundreds of perfume shops in Cairo, as Egypt is a
major source of perfume oils for the Parisian
market. It is an industry as old as the Pyramids
and spending a afternoon in the cool rooms with a
cup of tea, sampling perfumes is one of the
pleasures of Cairo.
The oils
can be shipped to you, or sealed in bottles for
you to carry with you.
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