What is wrong with using the packaged version, with full Ubuntu support?
http://packages.ubuntu.com/python-cairo
Python bindings for the Cairo vector graphics library
http://packages.ubuntu.com/python-gi-cairo
Python Cairo bindings for the GObject library
The "latest" way of using Cairo should be via gobject introspection (second package):
from gi.repository import cairo
which uses mostly auto-generated API from the GI repository that is consistent across various programming languages.