I took the train from Cairo to Alexandria on Thursday, and have been here since. Alexandria is north of Cairo, on the sea, and in the heart of the Nile Delta. The city was built by Alexander the Great (surprising, I know), and is still filled with influences by Greece, Rome, and Turkey. It's an amazing city - the entire city is built just off the Mediterranean, and feels more like a European city than an Arab one. The architecture is gorgeous, the food is amazing, and it's not nearly as busy and chaotic as Cairo. It's much cooler than Cairo, and in the summer is a resort for people from throughout the Middle East and the Mediterranean.
Friday morning, Nazek - one of the members of our assessment team - picked me up for a tour around town. We started at Montazzah gardens, the former summer home of the king. It's beautiful - on the sea - and enormous. They've built a few hotels and restaurants on the ground, and it was fascinating.
Next stop was for a famous Alexandrian drink made with sugar cane. In Alexandria (and maybe in Cairo as well - I'm not sure) you can get "drive through" at many stores/restaurants - basically, you pull your car up to the side of the road, and honk. Someone who works at the store/restaurant comes out, takes your order, and then brings out your food (more like Sonic than Burger King drive through). We did this for the sugar cane juice and for ice cream later (which was excellent).
After juice, we drove along the coast for a while and then went to Fort Qaitbey, built out of stones from ancient Alexandria (including from the lighthouse, one of the original 7 wonders of the world) to defend against Napolean (didn't work out that well). It's a really interesting building, with lots of small passageways and secret rooms. I took tons of pictures.
After the fort, we drove around for a while, and eventually stopped at the ruins of a Roman amphitheater. It was in very good condition, and they're in the process of excavating nearby ruins, so in a few years there will probably be even more to see.
Next was lunch - and this meal was a feast! We first walked into a room full of freshly caught fish - all kinds of fish, shrimp, crabs, squid... amazing. We picked out what we wanted (Nazek ordered enough for 4 people!) and they cooked it as they wanted. We started with appetizers and bread - baba ganoush, eggplant (Tony, you'd be so proud of me), fresh tomatoes, etc. Then the fish came out... grilled fish (don't know what kind) with a pico de gallo-like sauce, sauteed shrimp in garlic and spices, fried calamari, and crab (taken out of the shell) in a butter and garlic sauce. I stuffed myself silly (like you expected anything else).
After lunch, wewent to the souk – the Zan’ah, as the call it, because of the narrow passageways. It was my first time shopping in Egypt, but luckily Nazek was with me to help show me the ropes. We wandered around for a while and looked at lots of things, and I ended up buying 4 beautiful scarves. We looked at a silver store, where there were beautiful silver candlesticks for over $200. Not this trip…
We drove around some more after that, but we were both exhausted, so we went back and slept. On Saturday and Sunday, I was mostly busy with work, but I did manage to get a “backstage” tour (thanks again to Nazek) of the Library of Alexandria. The Library was built in 2002, modeled after the ancient library. The architecture is amazing… I don’t have pictures up yet, but I will soon. It’s a huge complex, designed to store 8 million books as well as an antiquities museum, collection of 30,000 rare and ancient manuscripts, and roving exhibits. They’re scanning all the books in their collection (they’ve already completed all the manuscripts, I believe, including translating everything into Arabic, French, and English), and it’s all available electronically. They also have internet access available – and all of this is open to the public. On top of that, they have 12 research centers spanning from reform in the Arab world to marine biology, and they also have a cultural center that has an orchestra and a theater group (I think). Pretty impressive…
Sunday night was a “workshop” with NGOs, held at a gorgeous restaurant on the sea. We’d held one of these in Cairo during the previous week, in which we brought a group of NGO representatives together, explained what trafficking is, and listened to what they do. It’s pretty amazing what these people are doing – dedicating themselves to thankless tasks that often put themselves in grave danger. I hope that through this assessment and future work we’ll be able to work with and support these fantastic people. If you have any questions about what exactly I’ve been doing, please email me.
I’m currently in Aswan – I transited today over several hours from Alexandria to Cairo to Aswan. I’ll be here for 2 days, sightseeing in the morning and holding meetings with NGOs in the afternoons/evenings. I don’t have internet in my room here, so I’m not going to put up pictures – or update this again – until after I leave. On Thursday morning, I fly to Luxor, where I’ll be until Sunday or Monday. Then back to Cairo for a few days at least…
Friday morning, Nazek - one of the members of our assessment team - picked me up for a tour around town. We started at Montazzah gardens, the former summer home of the king. It's beautiful - on the sea - and enormous. They've built a few hotels and restaurants on the ground, and it was fascinating.
Next stop was for a famous Alexandrian drink made with sugar cane. In Alexandria (and maybe in Cairo as well - I'm not sure) you can get "drive through" at many stores/restaurants - basically, you pull your car up to the side of the road, and honk. Someone who works at the store/restaurant comes out, takes your order, and then brings out your food (more like Sonic than Burger King drive through). We did this for the sugar cane juice and for ice cream later (which was excellent).
After juice, we drove along the coast for a while and then went to Fort Qaitbey, built out of stones from ancient Alexandria (including from the lighthouse, one of the original 7 wonders of the world) to defend against Napolean (didn't work out that well). It's a really interesting building, with lots of small passageways and secret rooms. I took tons of pictures.
After the fort, we drove around for a while, and eventually stopped at the ruins of a Roman amphitheater. It was in very good condition, and they're in the process of excavating nearby ruins, so in a few years there will probably be even more to see.
Next was lunch - and this meal was a feast! We first walked into a room full of freshly caught fish - all kinds of fish, shrimp, crabs, squid... amazing. We picked out what we wanted (Nazek ordered enough for 4 people!) and they cooked it as they wanted. We started with appetizers and bread - baba ganoush, eggplant (Tony, you'd be so proud of me), fresh tomatoes, etc. Then the fish came out... grilled fish (don't know what kind) with a pico de gallo-like sauce, sauteed shrimp in garlic and spices, fried calamari, and crab (taken out of the shell) in a butter and garlic sauce. I stuffed myself silly (like you expected anything else).
After lunch, wewent to the souk – the Zan’ah, as the call it, because of the narrow passageways. It was my first time shopping in Egypt, but luckily Nazek was with me to help show me the ropes. We wandered around for a while and looked at lots of things, and I ended up buying 4 beautiful scarves. We looked at a silver store, where there were beautiful silver candlesticks for over $200. Not this trip…
We drove around some more after that, but we were both exhausted, so we went back and slept. On Saturday and Sunday, I was mostly busy with work, but I did manage to get a “backstage” tour (thanks again to Nazek) of the Library of Alexandria. The Library was built in 2002, modeled after the ancient library. The architecture is amazing… I don’t have pictures up yet, but I will soon. It’s a huge complex, designed to store 8 million books as well as an antiquities museum, collection of 30,000 rare and ancient manuscripts, and roving exhibits. They’re scanning all the books in their collection (they’ve already completed all the manuscripts, I believe, including translating everything into Arabic, French, and English), and it’s all available electronically. They also have internet access available – and all of this is open to the public. On top of that, they have 12 research centers spanning from reform in the Arab world to marine biology, and they also have a cultural center that has an orchestra and a theater group (I think). Pretty impressive…
Sunday night was a “workshop” with NGOs, held at a gorgeous restaurant on the sea. We’d held one of these in Cairo during the previous week, in which we brought a group of NGO representatives together, explained what trafficking is, and listened to what they do. It’s pretty amazing what these people are doing – dedicating themselves to thankless tasks that often put themselves in grave danger. I hope that through this assessment and future work we’ll be able to work with and support these fantastic people. If you have any questions about what exactly I’ve been doing, please email me.
I’m currently in Aswan – I transited today over several hours from Alexandria to Cairo to Aswan. I’ll be here for 2 days, sightseeing in the morning and holding meetings with NGOs in the afternoons/evenings. I don’t have internet in my room here, so I’m not going to put up pictures – or update this again – until after I leave. On Thursday morning, I fly to Luxor, where I’ll be until Sunday or Monday. Then back to Cairo for a few days at least…
1 comment:
I thought the library was one of the seven wonders of the world not the lighthouse. Can someone enlighten me (been hanging around Michael too long).
Meg
Post a Comment