In this week's New York Times, one headline in particular caught my attention: "A City Where You Can’t Hear Yourself Scream". Immediately I thought of Cairo, Egypt.
And I was right. The article cites a study done by the National Research Center that spent five years measuring noise levels throughout the city of Cairo. Their conclusion? "...the average noise from 7 a.m. to 10 p.m. is 85 decibels, a bit louder than a freight train 15 feet away."
85 decibels? Oh, I believe it. With 18 million people all crammed together, this city indeed makes a lot noise. The most constant offenders are car horns. When I first visited Cairo, I was quite uneasy with the amount horn honking we encountered on a simple drive to a museum. It never stopped. We were always receiving blaring series of honks from other cars. And when we weren't-- our driver was doing the honking. It took me a couple days to realize that the intent behind all the incessant honking doesn't mirror that of New York or even Los Angeles, where honking is clearly done to express anger or discontent at other cars.
Cairo is different.
Locals tend not to ever use their turn indicators when making any lane changes or turns. Instead they just honk. Everyone there is quite comfortable with it. Passing a car? Just honk at them. Turning left? Honk away! Turning right? Honk, and honk again if no one heard you. Honking in Cairo is basically the equivalent of letting everyone on the road know, "Here I am! I'm coming!". But it isn't just one car. With over 2 million cars on the roads in Cairo, it is every single car on every road, in every traffic jam, on every commute. Car horns honk in unified alarm throughout the entire city for the entire day, well near midnight.
It's the sort of noise that doesn't soften when you close the windows or shut the door. It just is part of the Cairo background. All you can do, really, is turn on some other noise to help drown it out. Like turning on the radio or TV at a decent level.
The NY Times article also noted that often the noise reached levels higher than 85-- often 95, which is the same level noise a jackhammer reaches.
That was the word that took me back to Cairo as I read through it. "Jackhammer." It is the perfect word to capture the jarring, unceasing, maddening level of noise in Cairo. It just gnaws away at you, to your core. And all you can do is either hold your hands tight over your ears and frown or, you can what the Caironese do: You can cheerfully accept the noise as life. You will never, ever hear an Egyptian in Cairo complain about the noise. They just talk louder and louder until everyone is practically shouting to each other on the street.
Life makes noise! After all, there will be more than enough silence afterwards.
