Was that my first brush with official corruption?

Or maybe it was just casual corruption.

My flight to Cairo was fine, uneventful. After the minor stress of getting my visa-on-arrival, changing some cash, and finding my bag at the airport, I met the driver I'd arranged through my hotel. I picked my hotel ahead of time because I'm only here for two days and didn't want to spend half of that looking for a place to sleep. And I arranged for a ride as well because it's simple and not expensive.

We walked out to the van and got in, no problem, when some guy in an official looking outfit came up to the driver and they started talking through the window. (I'm just assuming it was an official; I didn't get that good a look at him, but the way the driver responded it seemed that way. And he was wearing a beret, so he was either french or an offical.) After a bit of back and forth, my driver got out and showed the offical something from his wallet... driver's licence? Taxi licence? The conversation was in arabic, so of course I had no idea what they said, and I had to go by tone of voice and body language. They didn't raise their voices and they didn't look like there was going to be a fight, but there was, I dunno, minor tension. The whole time I didn't feel much personal concern; the official wasn't looking my way at all or signalling into the van or anything. But I was of course imagining being delayed or stranded at the airport. But after maybe two minutes from start to finish, my driver passed the official a bill, put his wallet back in his pocket, looked sullen, then we drove away. I asked what happened and got a short but incompresensible answer. Since he continued to look sullen I didn't keep asking.

So what was that? A bribe to not get a ticket? To keep special perks (like better airport parking)? Did they know each other? Strange, and I hope I don't see it again. Too awkward, even if it doesn't affect me.