Job Discussion Forums

sciphoto · Joined: 11 Nov 2004 Posts: 29 Location: praha, cz

hello fellow teachers! I am currently teacing EFL in Prague, CZ and I am coming to Egypt in January to travel and possibly look for a teaching job for the follwoing year. Is there any reason to be afraid of travelling in Egypt now that Arafat has recently died and American/Isreali/Palestinian/Jewish/ possibly Egyptian?? relations are getting a little crazy?? or am i just being ignorant about what I read in the papers and hear around? Also what is the weather like in Cairo in January? Will southern Egypt be much hotter?? any tips on travlling in Egypt for a couple of weeks would be greatly appreciated for a fellow TEFL teach! peace

veiledsentiments · Joined: 20 Feb 2003 Posts: 17644 Location: USA

Hello

I answered your PM but you asked here about the weather. Cairo can be chilly in January, but coming from Prague, you should be OK. (no place has any heat, so it tends to be chilly inside buildings) Upper Egypt - Luxor and Aswan - will be much warmer during the day, but chilly at night. Think in terms of layering.

As I said in the PM, check out the Lonely Planet Thorntree site for tons of infomation on what to see. Do a search on it. (hopefully their search is working again.)

VS

Sekhmet · Joined: 05 Apr 2004 Posts: 329 Location: Alexandria, Egypt

As far as safety in Egypt is concerned - I and my American housemate have been living in Alexandria for the past 6 months, and not even Taba shook the city to any great extent. The most I have heard about the death of Arafat has been one of my students (a Palestinian, by coincidence), who was telling me about a protest he took part in in Cairo maybe a week ago. But that's about as far as it has touched our lives!!

The weather in Alex is starting to get cold. Being on the sea, it rains quite a lot here in winter, but hopefully in Cairo it is still a fair bit warmer. However, I was here first in February, and it was pretty cold, even in Cairo, especially when the sun went down. The south is, as VS says, warm during the day but can get cold at night. Unfortunately, I haven't spotted much in the way of heaters in hotel rooms (or homes!), so bringing some warm clothes is a good idea!!!
Have fun!!!