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back in Cairoback in Cairo Everyone has been asking me if things feel or look any different here in Cairo after the revolution.  When I left, there were tanks in my neighborhood, a curfew, lots of gunfire, there was no internet, and Mubarak was still president.  Now, Mubarak is gone, the police are back on the streets, the tanks have rolled out,...

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from ancient to medieval in Cairofrom ancient to medieval in Cairo On Tuesday we started our day with a cab ride to Tahrir to see the Egyptian Museum of Antiquities. We spent a few hours enjoying the Tutahnkamun exhibit, Akhenaten collection, and other ancient art and artifacts of Egypt. We then took a taxi to the Citadel. The views of the city were stunning. We...

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weddles in luxorweddles in luxor This past week has been a whirlwind!  After seeing some sights around Cairo with Ryan, my parents arrived and we left for Luxor.  We arrived in Luxor around midday and decided to check out Luxor Temple in the afternoon sunlight.  It was incredible.  The city of Luxor creeps right up to the edges of these ancient sites,...

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Mount SinaiMount Sinai Last weekend we went on a faculty trip to Mount Sinai.  After a 9 hour bus ride through barren, empty, desert, along the eastern coast of Egypt and across the Sinai Peninsula, we made it to Dahab where the best thing about our hotel was the coral reef meters from our room.  Another 2 hour bus ride through a forbidding...

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Unfinished ObeliskUnfinished Obelisk Once we got to Aswan and after a crazy taxi experience that entailed some serious driver rivalry, keys stolen from the ignition, a chase involving a tire iron, and a group of tourists, ahem, us, quietly unloading our luggage and finding another cab... (yeah, I know, OH EGYPT!) Anyhow once we got to Aswan, we decided...

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the same in the rain or sun

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Category : Family, My Life in Cairo, Oh, Egypt, Uncategorized

Some of you may have heard the story of the Egyptified letterpress print I received manhandled in the mail recently.  I’m not ready to fully comment on it yet (or touch it), although I love it so much.  I really do.  And years from now, I’ll look back on it and think, whoa, I lived in Egypt. Crazy.  So when I am ready to photograph it in all its glory and write about that fateful day, this will all make sense.  So for now, long story short, the mail I have received thus far in Egypt (while thank goodness it makes it all the way from point A to B) isn’t always handled with tender loving care every step of the way.

After a package has been knifed open en route, and it’s contents (i.e. tiny fuzzy Easter chicks) were deemed safe and not of tremendous monetary value, the package is taped back together and sent on its way to my apartment.  It’s not unlikely for things (i.e. an unlucky and now maimed fuzzy chick) to get caught in the web of tape the mail handlers use to reseal the package.

So, when I received something in the mail from my wonderful sister last week, I didn’t notice this little surprise that must have befallen the same fate as the tape-maimed fuzzy chick and gotten stuck to the tape inside the envelope.  Anyhow, I finally got around to some tidying up around the house this afternoon, and as I was getting ready to throw away the envelope from last week’s mail (yeah, I know, it’s been sitting here all week), I found this delightful surprise.

I believe the cupcake pin is by cakespy (a really cute blog about sweets), and the little horseshoe, well, I guess I have that to thank for the intactness of my mail.  Thanks, Mer!

P.S. Mer, we have to get cupcakes and coffee this summer…!!

Pyramids to get us started

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Category : Family, My Life in Cairo, Robin & Grandma's Visit, Sightseeing in Cairo, Travel & Sightseeing

I thought I would get started catching up on posting some photos from Robin and Betty’s visit in Egypt.  While they were here, we saw the pyramids in Giza, five temples, four tombs, a whole lot of Nile, one giant museum, did some serious haggling at the Khan Al Kalili, had a few extraordinarily eventful taxi rides, and even made two apple pies.  Delightful, yes!  Busy, indeed!  So I will do my best to get caught up soon…  Here we go…

Ah, the pyramids.  Has man made anything in recent history that will be visited by millions of tourists in 4,000 years?  Anything anyone is going to marvel at? The pyramids are incredible.  If you can look past the hecklers and discarded chipsy bags and imagine what it would have been like to stumble across this place after nothing but a flat sea of desert, it is truly awe-inspiring.  Truly amazing.

Here are a few photos from our excursion…

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Portland to Cairo and back to Portland

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Category : Family, My Life in Cairo, Robin & Grandma's Visit

We had such a great time with Robin and Betty!  Here we are before the final wild taxi-ride to the airport.  Wild in that it required a total of four vehicles, one water bottle of gasoline, a good dose of confusion, and a lot of swerving and speeding.  In a way, a fitting departure that left us all thankful we’d left a little early for the airport.  Despite the misadventures, I think we all had a wonderful time!!

welcome in egypt

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Category : Family, My Life in Cairo, Robin & Grandma's Visit, Sightseeing in Cairo

Robin and Grandma are visiting us in Cairo!  A trip to the pyramids is on the agenda for tomorrow, but here are a few photos from the past two days:

Here’s Robin, Betty, and Brandon at a fruit stand in Maadi.  We picked up some grapefruits, local bananas, and melons before heading out to dinner.

This afternoon we did a little shopping around the neighborhood and then went to Al-Azhar Park to see the Cairo skyline at sunset.  The sun almost beat us down.  Here is a cow on the freeway.  Just in case you needed to see that.

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Wissa Wassef Art Center

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Category : Art, My Life in Cairo, Sightseeing in Cairo, Travel & Sightseeing

I have long admired a beautiful woven tapestry hanging in the faculty lounge at AUC, so when the opportunity arose to visit the art center where it was made, I was thrilled!  The Ramses Wissa Wassef Art Center is a remarkable establishment.  It was founded in 1952 by Ramses Wissa Wassef and is renown for wool and cotton weavings, batik, and stoneware pottery.  There are two generations of weavers at the center, most of whom are women.  The first generation of weavers began working at the art center as children in the 1950s, and the second group began in the 1970s.  These remarkably talented weavers continue to weave elaborate, original scenes and designs.  The center seems very committed to fostering creativity and therefore the works produced by the many artists are unique and never repeated.   Check out the Wissa Wassef website for more information.

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Fee gibna

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Category : Food, My Life in Cairo

Today is a beautiful day in Cairo. The torrential rain and hail storm we had a couple nights ago has cleared the air and magically washed the dust off of everything. We went for a walk and stopped in the cheese shop — truly an oasis of culinary delight in a desert of french fry sandwiches and fava beans.

At the recommendation of a friend, we picked up these…

Yogurt in terra cotta jars. Say what? I bet it is fabulous and can’t wait to try it.

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oh my goodness

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Category : Food, My Life in Cairo

So you may already know that one of my favorite things is ice cream.  I won’t get into it here, but I could talk for hours about gelato and ice cream, and probably shed a tear or two for the absence of pistachio gelato made with pure Sicilian pistachio butter in my life.  But as I said, I won’t get into it here.

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plants

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Category : My Life in Cairo

In the ongoing effort to make our apartment feel a little more like home, we recently got some plants to liven up the place.  It was a lot of fun walking through all the nurseries in our neighborhood.  Instead of cheap plastic containers, most of the plants seem to be potted in hand-formed clay or terracotta pots, and the plant nurseries felt a lot more like gardens than the nurseries back home.

Here’s our one and only flowering plant.

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baskets

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Category : Cats, My Life in Cairo

Today I decided to pick up some baskets to help with my ongoing efforts to get organized and de-clutter our space, so I headed toward the Maadi Grand Mall because that’s where the basket guy’s cart is usually parked.

Here it is.

Don’t you love it?  Car, car, car, car, basket wagon, car, car, car.  I love it.

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Picnic at Al-Azhar Park

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Category : Food, My Life in Cairo, Sightseeing in Cairo, Travel & Sightseeing

Today we packed a picnic and went to Al-Azhar Park.  It was absolutely delightful!

The park is beautifully landscaped and has truly incredible views of the city.  I had no idea exactly how wonderful the park was until today.  I first heard about it when I watched a documentary about an urban development/renovation project in Cairo this summer.  The park is located near the Citadel (I still haven’t been there yet, by the way) on the site of what used to be a “500-year-old mound of rubble in the inner city, between the eastern edge of the 12th Century Ayyubid city and the 15th Century Mamluk ‘City of the Dead’,” to quote the park’s website.

That’s the citadel.

And here’s our lunch…

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Kitties on the block

Category : Cats, My Life in Cairo

Do I even need to say anything about these adorable, teeny, tiny, tough guy kitties hanging out in the sunlight. omg.kittens

Catching Up…

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Category : Meredith's Visit, My Life in Cairo, Oh, Egypt, Sightseeing in Cairo

As you may have noticed, I am trying to catch up. I have about two million pictures I want to post, so I am just going to do it. They may be out of order, fair warning.

So here are a few from around Maadi. This is one of my favorites.

tree

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Priceless

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Category : My Life in Cairo, Oh, Egypt

Meredith captured the best picture of the day from our trip to Giza and the Solar Barque Museum.

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thankful

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Category : Family, Food, My Life in Cairo

I know I am way overdue on posts. There is just so much I need to catch everyone up on… the step pyramid Saqqara, the Red Pyramid which we got to go inside, the Bent Pyramid, pyramids, pyramids, pyramids, a long weekend in Alexandria complete with Greco-Roman amphitheaters with bizarre acoustic phenomena, catacombs, the sea, and all kinds of fun, lots of fun hanging out with Meredith, the choc-full Egyptian Museum of Antiquities, moomie, moomie, moomie, catacomb,… there is just so much. Soon, I will post pictures and catch you all up.

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Khan Al Khalili

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Category : Meredith's Visit, My Life in Cairo, Sightseeing in Cairo, Travel & Sightseeing

The Khan was amazing!  Built in the 14th century, there was plenty of amazing architecture, interesting carved buildings, and huge old doors.  Emily snapped a few photos on her cell phone after it got dark.  It was stunning!

dome

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E-I-E-I-O

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Category : Family, Meredith's Visit, My Life in Cairo, Oh, Egypt

Where do I even begin?  We were in the mood for a good old-fashioned family game night and thought we would see what we could round up.  We found a “De Lux [sic]” version of Scrabble which I think we can all agree lived up to its name… DEEEEEEEE-lux.  Check it out…

delux scrabble

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that’s right.

Category : Meredith's Visit, My Life in Cairo, Oh, Egypt

Camels on the freeway. Sorry the picture is a bit blurry. We were probably going like eighty miles an hour, haha. This is the highlight of our cab ride. Good thing since we ended up getting stuck in traffic for another hour.

camel commuters

and what did i see? PART 2

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Category : Current Favorites, Meredith's Visit, My Life in Cairo, Sightseeing in Cairo, Travel & Sightseeing

So then I saw the pyramids up close… They are amazing.

twins at the great pyramid

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