Main courtyard, al-Hakim Mosque, Cairo, Egypt (Michel Benoist Mbenoist, fr. Wikipedia, Creative Commons license.)

“Hello friend! Baksheesh?”

No beating around the bush here, the old guy in the faded djellaba robe got right to the point. “What for?” I said stupidly. He pointed to the ratty straw broom he was carrying. “Clean! Keep clean!” “Let me see first,” I said.

The roof of Cairo’s thousand-year old al-Hakim mosque on which we stood provides access to a host of wonders: a shabby but ornate minaret, looking like it needed more than a quick whisk from his broom; two huge fortified gates into the old Islamic city; and the remains of the old walls heading off east and west. All inviting exploration.

I headed towards the minaret, with my new bff in tow.

“Care! Be care!” He did warn me. (Barry Evans)

At the roof-level entrance, a good forty feet above street level, I peered into the gloom and saw spiraling steps going both up and down. He gave me a foxy smile, pulling a box of matches out of his gown. “Light. Need light.” “I’m OK,” I insisted, showing him my tiny but efficient MagLite. “That light?” he asked, unbelieving. “Aiwa,” (yes) I said, striding up into the darkness. “Care! Be care!” he shouted after me.

I’m fine, I thought irritably. Like, does he think this is the first time I’ve ever walked up a spiral staircase? I could probably do this without my flashlight if I had to, the steps are so evenly spaced. I bet they go all the way up to the top of the minaret. I even considered turning the light off to scare myself, imagining the steps ending in mid-air.

They did.

Counting from the very bottom, the 127th step is the trick one.* No warning, no railing, no nothing. you’re just happily heading up the lovely old stone steps, winding round and round, when they stop, dead.

I peered over the edge, trembling, mentally fantasizing other endings to my day. I dropped a stone over the edge, not quite believing that they hadn’t bothered to put up a rail. The stone clattered hard on the steps twenty feet below. I was so glad it wasn’t me clattering.

For the next couple of hours I was ten years old again, scampering up and down the many stone staircases built into the old gates, creeping like a fugitive down the long, windy tunnel connecting one gate with another deep in the thick city walls. Seeing just how far I could make it along the walls before it became totally impossible to navigate obstructions and openings. A great place for hide-go-seek, I thought, remembering how much fun Louisa and I had had playing the game with our nieces and nephews earlier in the year.

Finally I’d had enough. I walked down the final set of stairs to near the entrance of the mosque, where the gate to the outside was locked. “Yo!” I yelled, wondering what time they took off for the day. After a long pause, another guy to whom I’d given a little money earlier appeared and grinned at me through the door’s ornate wooden screen.

“Baksheesh?” he said, dangling the key a few inches in front of my eyes. At which point the phrase, “They get you coming and they get you going,” took on a whole new meaning.

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Barry Evans gave the best years of his life to civil engineering, and what thanks did he get? In his dotage, he travels, kayaks, meditates and writes for the Journal and the Humboldt Historian. He sucks at 8 Ball. Buy his Field Notes anthologies at any local bookstore. Please.