In utter and complete shock...

Every now and then we head over to this cafe/restaurant/bar during the weekend for an afternoon of coffee and shisha. Instead of the usual afternoon shisha, we ended up heading over there in the evening.

As we approached the bar, I noticed a group of young people hanging out outside of the bar. When we got to the bouncer at the door, the manager/owner told us there was a private party, but he said he would let us in free of charge. The manager is nice friendly older man who has spent time in the U.S. and usually chats to us whenever we come.

As we walked in the crowd seemed to be really young. They looked like a bunch of 15 or 16 year olds who decided to reserve the place for a friends birthday. I looked around, no parents to be seen. No adults other than the manager and waiters. Things seemed a bit odd and it wasn't the typical Egyptian environment you would expect to see. Kids smoking and dancing. Having their bit of fun. So, that was a bit odd, but I wasn't surprised.

Then May pointed out that someone was taking a shot, then a waiter passed by with an ID Edge on a tray. The table across from us had a few guys with mixed drinks. As we glanced around, we noticed there were quite a few of them a tad drunk. This had to be the biggest shocker out of everything I've seen in Egypt. What are a bunch of teenage kids doing drinking at a bar in Cairo? How can the bar turn a blind eye to this. The drinking age in Egypt is 21 and these kids were definitely not 18. And NO way can this be culturally acceptable. Where are their parents? What are these kids going to do when they go home stumbling drunk?