Street

No one can deny that Egyptian pedestrians crossing the streets are a constant challenge and threat to car drivers, especially in the crowded streets of Cairo. We all face that challenge every day and struggle to go through trips without causing any casualties. As we put our nerves and driving skills to the test daily, we finally succeeded in categorizing those pedestrians into the following main categories

1. The Confident Pedestrian

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This is the most common type of pedestrian in Egypt. This is usually a person who has complete confidence that you can see him, and that you’re an amazingly skilled driver with fast perception reaction time. He also sometimes sees you as a brother or a father who would never hurt him, so based on this confidence, he starts crossing the street with steady average speed steps towards his target without even looking. He knows you can dodge him and you can hear the noises of the cars braking behind him, but his steps remain steady.

2. The Suicidal Pedestrian

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This is one of the most difficult types of pedestrians to handle; this type usually crosses highways and roads where the average car speed is above 100 km/h. You see him standing on the curb watching the speeding cars like a predator watching his prey. Suddenly, when you least expect it, you see him running like a cat on fire, dodging the cars, smiling to the drivers’ curses and usually raising both hands in the air. Science has not yet discovered the relationship between this suicidal run and raising the hands in the air, unless of course he’s praying to the Gods of the Asphalt to help him cross safely.

3. The Family

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This type consists mainly of a father, a mother, an aunt, grandparents, sons, daughters, cousins, aunts, … all holding hands and crossing the street at the same time. This type consists of 2 subcategories called The Rugby Team and the Dying Chickens. “The Rugby team” is a family who walks shoulder to shoulder at the speed of their slowest member, and this is the good type. “The Dying Chickens” cross the road as if a bomb just exploded in the middle of the street. This type of family crosses the first 2 meters of the road together before one of them freaks out and they start running everywhere. The father runs crossing the street, the mother runs back, the grandparents stay in the middle of the street, the kids start running towards the cars as if it’s a challenge,… etc.

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4. The Hunter

“The Hunter” is a person who is probably an adrenaline junkie; he runs towards your car, and when you’re a few centimeters away from him he jumps towards the next car, and then the next car, until he crosses the streets. This person is probably an ex-ninja who is not used to normal walking so he tries to train himself and improve his skills and your reactions at the same time.

5. The Psychopath

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“The psychopath” is a bit different than “The Hunter”. At first, he gives you the impression that everything is under control. He can see you, you can see him, you think he will cross safely, until you are close enough, and then the psycho side appears. He starts jumping left and right in front of the car like a goalkeeper trying to catch a ball. You steer right, he jumps right; you steer left, he jumps left. After a minute of acrobatics, you start to loose hope in dodging him and decide to kill him and end his misery and yours.

6. The Businessman

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This one crosses the street while texting, sending emails, solving word problems, or anything that involves looking at his phone screen and not caring about his life or yours. He’s so busy looking at his phone that you may see him going round in circles in the middle of the street thinking that he’s still crossing.