Motorcycle Crash!

OK, so I forgot one very very interesting/terrible story from the weekend....I was standing along the corniche (road that runs along the nile) in Garden City (district in Cairo) when a man and a woman on a motorcycle/scooter kind of thing got too close to the curb trying to pass a car, rode up on the curb, wiped out, and were flung onto the pavement, almost into a tree. One of the scariest things I've ever seen so close up (like 20 yards from me). They had to have been going 25mph --no helmets. The man, who was driving, was cut and limping, but he jumped up immediately to help the woman who did not get up. She was bleeding and had broken her hand or wrist or arm. Everyone rushed to help them, including police, however, no ambulance was called. After a few minutes, and once the woman decided she could stand up and walk around, the two of them got back on the motorbike, bloodstained clothes and broken bones, and drove away. Wow. Honestly, this scares me because I regularly see families (Dad driving, mother sitting sideways on the back with up to two children sitting on her lap) riding on similar motorbikes in similar traffic conditions.

Oh, and an update on my taxi situation. I've got it down well enough that I can tell the driver where I need to go, and I usually remember to bring exact change so that I don't have to haggle--I just hand them the money and walk away. But, the taxi drivers never let me put on my seatbelt, even when I'm in the front seat. I reach for it and they tell me "no, no, you don't need." All of this is perfectly acceptable behavior for cars, taxis, motorbikes, whatever. I don't write this to complain about Egypt. I write this as an example of the many striking differences from the world that I grew up in, and the world that I now have been living in for 1 month (to this day). Life here is more relaxed. People don't get as stressed out over things. They're not as uptight. It's actually quite nice coming from an American university where life can be hectic and tiresome and stressful. Most of the time I just see people as being more chill about things here, but sometimes I see it as blatant carelessness. I guess there's a trade-off for everything.