Flying into Cairo from Amman felt like crossing into a different world entirely. Jordan’s ancient desert landscapes gave way to the sprawling gray-brown expanse of Africa’s largest city — more than 23 million people packed into the valley of the Nile. We had read the statistics, but nothing quite prepared us for the sensory reality: the haze of exhaust and desert dust hanging over the skyline, the wall of sound from traffic that never stops, and the particular thrill of realizing you are standing in a city that has been continuously inhabited for over 6,000 years. Pharaohs built monuments here. Napoleon invaded here. Somewhere beneath the chaos and the pollution, that layered history runs very deep.
