Egypt Pt. 2

And now for the thrilling conclusion ...

As aforementioned, the next two days were not as historically thrilling as the first, but they were certainly not without there fascinating finds.  On Saturday, we took a three hour trip to Alexandria, which turned out to be a four and a half hour trip due to two factors :
First, the highway was shut down due to the same typical fog experience at Giza
and Secondly, the Egyptian police implemeneted a traffic management technique in which two patrol cars block the highway and drive one kilometer every five minutes ... I have yet to understand how this is efficicient, but my recent experience has given me faith in Egyptian logic and engineering.  Furthermore, Sabrina and I were passed out in the back of a van, so what do we care.
Finally we reach Alexandria and the first sight of the day : The Roman Amphitheatre!

Unearthed in the early sixties, the "Ampitheatre," dated to the 2nd century A.D.,  may not have been an theater at all.  It's proximity to the ancient Roman street is an unlikely location for theatrical performance, but would be ideal for the openly democratic Senate of ancient Rome.  Whatever the function,  the presenter (whether actor or politician, but really, what's the difference) was given an ingeninous advantage.  At a marked point in the middle of the circle, the acoustic resonance off the pillars is such that one's voice fills the area with an almost eerie fulness.
The rest of the sight was an ancient university (the bottom left corner of the photo).  As well as the classrooms, the excavation also revealed a written syllabus of some of the course material.

After a quick lunch at Mo'men, the Shwarma  equivalent of McDonald's, it was on to the Library of Alexandria, which is built on the location of the most significant ancient library in history, constructed some 2300 years ago.  The new building embraces a more modernist aesthetic than the first.

               Note : this is NOT my photo, as I have not yet mastered unaided flight
In accordance with ancient Egyptian sun worship, the main building represents the sun, while the dome on the right (which holds an Omni-max style cinema, and is in fact a full sphere in a large hole) represents the orbiting Earth.
Another fascinating architectural point (not properly represented in this photo) is that each window in the "sun" has a slatted awning, which mimics the human eyelash, and prevents too much direct sunlight from penetrating the reading and research area of the library.





 Inside, as well as a beautiful library, is several art exhibits, including one of modern Egyptian art, which I found to be fascinating in it's combination of traditional and modern styles.













After the library, we hopped back in the van and headed back to Cairo, napping much of the way.

Day 3 :
Our last day in Egypt was to be spent in Cairo, where there is no shortage of touristic time-killing.

First we visited Coptic Cairo.  The Coptics are a Christian sect of Egyptian origin (of which our guide is a member) and have some beautiful churches in old Egypt, the most famous of which is the hanging church.  Dating back to the thrid century A.D., the church is almost entirely suspended above an ancient fortress gateway. 

            The floor of the church

After seeing a little more of Coptic Cairo, we headed to one of the true treasures of Egypt, the Cairo Museum.  Tragically, cameras are not permitted inside the museum, so you will have to take me at my word.  The museum is massive, and as we only had a couple hours inside, we focused on two exhibits.  

The first was that of King Tutankhamun (Tut to his friends), the young prince, crowned at age 9, who was evidently murdered by his chief adviser at the age of nineteen (the same age at which he no longer legally required a chief adviser).  The museum is full of the artifacts found in his tomb (famously discovered by the British Howard Carter in 1922).  Here we learned of the Ancient Egyptian ritual of entombing the royal mummy in a lavishly decorated sarcophagus, which was then put in a slightly larger sarcophagus (equally lavish) which was then put in a larger still sarcophagus (ditto).  The three sarcophagi were then put in a big box (lavish, gold, jewels, what have you) which was placed in a bigger box (more gold, more jewels) which, finally, was put in the biggest box of all (and therefore, the MOST lavish!).  It's like a Russian doll, except the smallest doll is an embalmed corpse.

Speaking of embalmed corpses, for an additional 100 Egyptian Pounds (which is less than twenty bucks) we got to tour the mummy room!  Can you guess what's in the mummy room?  It was awesome ... and freaky ... and awesome.  Here's some more photos I didn't take :

After shaking off the willies, we left the museum and headed to our last "must-see" sight :  The Souk, Cairo's marketplace.  As I have already experienced in Tel Aviv, the marketplace is where I feel the most middle-eastern.  The streets are narrow and crowded and everyone is yelling in either a completely foreign language or something that resembles English, but not quite.  




After helping us haggle with the locals, our guide led us down several small alleyways, ultimately sitting us down at a cafe and treating us to Turkish coffee and Shisha.  The perfect ending to a wonderful trip, this is one of the few photos I got of Wassim, my favorite part of Egypt :

I hope you enjoyed my Egyptian adventure.  I'm heading back to Canada in a couple weeks, but I'm nearing completion on a couple music videos which I hope to post before I leave.
Furthermore, Sabrina and I are leaving for a ten-day excursion to India in the new year, so stay tuned.

From all of us here at TheDonyShow, I wish you good friends, good health, and good night!