Recently I did an amazing trip to Egypt and what can I tell you, it is awesome. On top of the fact that I had an amazing time, I learned quite a while.
The mountains looks like artificial
It is true. Just because they don't have anything on their surface, it looks like they are not real.
It reminds me a creation of terrain from scratch in Unity 3D. If you're a programmer, you'll know what I'm talking about.
I haven't met any foreigner
So the first thing that is worth mentioning and it was quite weird for me is that there weren't any foreigners in Sharm El Sheikh at all. Right now the only country that is visiting Egypt is Ukraine. It is very odd.
I thought that people all over the globe have a desire to see those insanely fabulous fish, marvelous pyramids and ride on those good-looking camels. Turned out I was wrong. I still have no idea why.
Prior to that airline crash back in 2015 the majority of tourists were Russians, and I suppose January will be the month when they will get back to enjoy the palms and corals of the red sea.
A fun fact is that everybody speaks Russian. Even if you start a conversation on English they will probably answer you on Russian which is both cool and funny. I hope they at least know English just in case :)
Egypt economy is currently struggling
The absence of Russian tourists drove the economy nuts. The exchange rate of they local currency is changing every hour and I'm not kidding here. Each merchant will tell you the rate they are comfortable with.
Ukrainian are good tourists but they don't buy as much stuff as Russian do. That's why all of the local sellers are so grateful that at least some people are visiting their country.
Egyptians cannot travel abroad
This one just blew my mind.
Most of the people who work there earn just enough to survive. However those who earn quite a good amount of money still cannot get out of their country. It is so unfair. They deserve it, I don't really know why there are always some limitations to great people in this planet.
That's why most of the locals were looking at us as if we're rich people which in reality is not true.
All of the women in Egypt don't work
This is also very weird for me. I know that the vast majority of Muslims have this unwritten rule that women don't have to work. One of the guys even told us that if a man allows woman to work, others will call him an idiot.
I don't really get it. Maybe it's okay to sit all of your life at home with your kids, who knows?
Speaking about kids, on average they one family has about 5-7 children which is like a lot for me :)
Salaries at the hotels are extremely low
The average salary of bartender is about $40/month, animator -$200, waiter even less.
This is something I don't really understand. Why a person will work for such money in the first place? I bet there are a lot of better alternatives even for the same positions in different countries.
Probably they just love the environment.
In any case, I hope you got some value from this if you're planning to visit Egypt soon.