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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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Unfinished Obelisk

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Category : Current Favorites, Family, Robin & Grandma's Visit, Travel & Sightseeing, Travel within Egypt

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 to pay a visit to the unfinished obelisk.  Let’s take a magical visit to antiquity together, shall we?

Now I know everyone experiences frustration and disappointment in life.  But please try to imagine you are working in the scorching hot desert thousands of years ago with no promise of an air conditioned home awaiting you after a hard day’s labor quarrying stone with ancient tools and no SPF.  Think about it.  You’ve just chipped and chiseled away at the granite bedrock for who knows how long.  The giant obelisk is coming along nicely, you at least have the satisfaction of knowing it is going to be the largest obelisk ever, hooray for human endeavor!  And then what’s that?  A crack?  Surely not.  And just like that, all of your hard work has to be completely abandoned.

Ugh, heartbreaking.

But at least it still attracts interest and awe thousands of years later.

Yikes.

Take a look at these chisel marks.  I can’t even  imagine how you’d quarry, hoist, and haul something like that. 

Amazing.

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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finally!

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Category : Cats

You may recall that Marti and Alie weren’t exactly friends when they were reunited in August (remember this?).  Now, not only can they tolerate being in the same room, it appears Marti and Alie are friends again.

Thank goodness!

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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Wadi Degla

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Category : Sightseeing in Cairo, Travel & Sightseeing

On Tuesday Brandon and I went to the Wadi Degla, a dry riverbed near Maadi.  It was a great place to hike, look at fossils, and fear wild dogs.  Here are some photos:

Fortunately we didn’t meet any dogs in the park.  However we did meet some on the long walk to find a taxi in the middle of nowhere after we left the park.  There is really nothing quite like a long walk in the middle of nowhere looking for nonexistent taxis surrounded by wild dogs.  Nothing like it.

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no place like Amrika for the holidays

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Category : Family, Food, in America and Elsewhere, Travel & Sightseeing

I went back to America in December.  It felt so good to be home!  But now it feels good to be home in Cairo.  Funny how that works.  I blame wanderlust.

I really enjoyed seeing family and friends and eating salads without a care in the world.  It was delightful!  I also got to spend ten days or so with my Mimi in Oklahoma.  We had lots of fun together.

What a beautiful country…

amrika

christmas donuts

We were lucky that the rest of my family arrived when they did, because a huge blizzard hit the midwest on Christmas Eve.

christmas ice

That’s the view on Christmas morning.  The snow was incredible.  Good thing we were all together!

Alexandria

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Category : Current Favorites, Meredith's Visit, Travel & Sightseeing, Travel within Egypt

Back in the day when Meredith was visiting, the three of us decided to get out of Cairo and visit Alexandria on the Mediterranean Sea.  We stayed at the Sofitel right on the Corniche (the street that follows the coastline), and enjoyed the semi-fresh sea air and semi-break from Cairo life.  Here is our hotel.  It was relatively old and had lots of charm.  I take that back.  It had lots of charm, but there is nothing “relatively old” in this whole region that isn’t about 5,000 years old.  Nevermind.

alex_sofitel

Here is the view from our hotel.

alex_night_coastalex_day_coast

Love that landscaping.  Love it.  I love when cities go the extra mile.  Thanks, Alexandria.  Plus, look how tidy everything looks!  I was loving it!!

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Saqqara and the Red Pyramid

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Category : Meredith's Visit, Travel & Sightseeing, Travel within Egypt

When Meredith was visiting we took a day trip to Saqqara and the Red Pyramid.  Here are some shots from the car.

saqqara car ride_small

egg truck_small

Yep, that’s a truck full of eggs.

After driving through agricultural areas and more small towns lining a canal, and going through vast, dense forests of date palms, the lush greenery abruptly ended and all of a sudden we were in the desert.

step pyramid at saqqara_small

The step pyramid at Saqqara is the oldest stone pyramid in the world.  Meredith and I really enjoyed the tremendously informative museum at the site.  It pointed out interesting details that I might not have even considered, such as the oldest stone frieze known to man and the oldest stone ceiling.  It was incredible and I enjoyed being able to see things like pottery and jewelry on site, rather than seeing everything from everywhere all together at the Egyptian Museum in Cairo. It was also a great refresher on some of the basic iconography.

Here are some photos from our visit…

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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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