Egypt- Land of the Pharaohs (Day 17)

Day 17: Final Day, Nstionsl Museum of Egyptian Culture, Coptic Cairo , and the Ben Ezra Synagogue

We actually slept in this morning, getting to breakfast at 7:30.  We found out that the rest of the hotel eats at this time as well.  Early morning breakfasts were a lot quieter.  Sharif met us at 8:30 and off we went for our last day in Cairo.  We had planned to visit Coptic Cairo 1^st, but realized that Sunday Mass was going to put a cramp in our style, so we pivoted and hit the NMEC ist.

The National Museum of Egyptian Civilization—NMEC, for those of us trying to conserve syllables—takes on the modest task of explaining Egyptian civilization from prehistoric times through the pharaonic, Greco-Roman, Coptic, and Islamic periods to modern Egypt. Its emphasis is on how people lived, worked, worshipped, made things, and passed their traditions along to the next generation.

The museum itself took a while to become part of that history. A UNESCO-backed initiative began in 1982, the foundation stone was laid in 2002, and an initial exhibition opened in 2017. In a country where the exhibits are measured in millennia, this probably qualified as a rush job.

The museum’s best-known attraction is its Royal Mummies Hall. In April 2021, the spectacular Pharaohs’ Golden Parade brought 22 royal mummies—18 kings and four queens—from the Egyptian Museum in Tahrir Square to their new home. Even after several thousand years, these people still get VIP treatment.

The collection includes Ramses II, Seti I, Thutmose III, and Hatshepsut. After seeing their names on practically every available wall in Egypt, it was interesting to finally meet the management.

Photography is prohibited in this section, so you’ll have to use your imagination. Apparently, being dead for 3,000 years does not mean giving up control of your publicity photos.

There was a prosthetic toe from around 1000 BCE. Apparently, even three thousand years ago, people were looking for replacement parts. It is a remarkable reminder that ancient medical ingenuity extended beyond figuring out what to do with you after you died.

We also saw tikim, the ornate cases used in some Eastern Jewish traditions to house and protect Torah scrolls. Their elaborate decoration reflected the importance of what they contained. These were clearly not objects you picked up in the storage aisle at Home Depot.

Another striking exhibit was a mahmal, an elaborately decorated ceremonial pavilion carried on a camel in the Hajj pilgrimage procession to Mecca. With its pointed roof, rich embroidery, tassels, and metal finials, it was designed to make an impression. One hopes the camel received some recognition for its contribution to the overall effect.

Then there was the Nazlet Khater skeleton, one of Egypt’s oldest known human skeletons. The museum dates it to approximately 35,000 years ago, during the Upper Paleolithic, or later Old Stone Age.

To put that in perspective, when the pyramids were built, this man had already been dead for roughly 30,000 years. Finally, someone who could reasonably complain that Egypt had changed since his day.

From the museum, our exploration continued into Coptic Cairo, the historic district of churches and religious monuments built within and around the remains of the Roman Fortress of Babylon.

The fortress dates principally to around AD 300, during Emperor Diocletian’s reign, and forms the foundation—quite literally—for much of the neighborhood. Several churches were built over parts of the older Roman structure. In Cairo, even the foundations have a previous career.

The Copts are Egypt’s indigenous Christian community. According to church tradition, the Coptic Orthodox Church traces its beginnings to St. Mark the Evangelist in Alexandria. Christianity developed in Egypt centuries before the Arab conquest in the seventh century, and Egypt became an important early center of Christian theology and monastic life.

Our visit included the Hanging Church, dedicated to the Virgin Mary. It gets its name from its elevated position above the remains of the Roman fortress. You can look down through sections of the church floor and see the fortress below—an unusually convenient way to inspect two historical periods without changing buildings.

Inside are marble columns, religious icons, an eleventh-century marble pulpit, and a wooden ceiling intended to recall Noah’s Ark. Between the Roman foundations and the biblical ceiling, there is a great deal of history both above and below your head.

Walls of the Fortress forming winding alleys

The Church of Saints Sergius and Bacchus, usually called Abu Serga, has particular significance for Coptic Christians. According to Christian tradition, Mary, Joseph, and the infant Jesus sheltered at the site of the crypt beneath the church during their flight into Egypt. That association makes the crypt an especially important place of pilgrimage.

Nearby stands the large, round Church of St. George, which belongs to the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate of Alexandria. It is an Eastern Orthodox church, while the Hanging Church and Abu Serga belong to the Coptic Orthodox tradition.

The churches may be close neighbors, but their affiliations require a little more attention than simply following whichever building has the biggest dome.

Ben Ezra Synagogue stands in the same historic religious district, preserving the memory of the Jewish community of medieval Fustat, now part of Old Cairo.

The community’s history is much older than the building visitors see today, which was largely rebuilt between 1889 and 1892 on the site of earlier structures. On this trip, anything from the nineteenth century practically qualifies as new construction.

Local traditions also connect the site with Moses, including a story that he prayed there. These associations are part of the synagogue’s religious heritage, although they are not events that archaeology can verify.

Ben Ezra’s greatest historical importance, however, comes from something considerably less imposing than a temple or a royal tomb: a storeroom full of old papers, the Cairo Geniza.

A geniza is a repository for writings that should not be casually discarded because they contain sacred text or the name of God. Over the centuries, members of the community placed worn-out religious books and other writings in the synagogue’s storeroom.

Fortunately for historians, the material also included a remarkable amount of everyday paperwork: letters, business records, marriage contracts, shopping lists, and other documents that reveal how ordinary people lived.

The wider Cairo Geniza collection comprises roughly 400,000 manuscript fragments, with much of its documentary material dating from 950 to 1250 CE. Together, they provide an extraordinary glimpse into the lives, relationships, business dealings, and concerns of a medieval community.

After so many monuments devoted to kings and their accomplishments, there is something particularly appealing about history preserved through the papers of people who had groceries to buy, bills to settle, and relatives to write to.

I now have a much better answer when someone suggests that I clean off my desk: I’m giving the historians something to work with.

Ben Ezra Synagogue must truly be a holy place, because we witnessed a miracle here.  We were sitting and listening to Sharif describe the synagogue when Jeri whispered to me, “That can’t be Dave Wood?”  Sure enough, Dave came strolling into the Synagogue followed by Carole.  We jumped up and ran over to them, all of us with shocked expressions.  Dave explained that he felt compelled to see this synagogue in our honor.  We have dragged Carole and Dave to synagogues all over the world so I guess they would have felt like they missed something if they hadn’t come. We all agreed to get together after the trips were done to compare notes.

Sharif’s internal clock was telling him it was time to eat again.  On his recommendation, we decided to eat outdoors at a restaurant that overlooked beautiful gardens and The Mosque of Muhammad Ali Pasha in the distance.

After lunch we drove to The Mosque of Muhammad Ali Pasha and added one more mosque to our final tally.  

On the drive over, we passed an enormous cemetery whose zoning provides for crypts alongside the homes of the loved ones of the departed.  People live right in the graveyard to be close to their ancestors.  Pretty creepy.

The mosque is commonly called the Alabaster Mosque, inside Cairo’s Citadel of Saladin. Construction began in 1830. Its Ottoman architectural style explains the resemblance to the great mosques we saw in Istanbul.

 It is a prime spot for wedding pictures and we saw no fewer than 4 wedding parties being photographed here. If only the smog would lift for the brides. 

With our flight leaving at 5:30 am tomorrow morning, we elected to stay at the Meridien at the airport tonight.  It is too bad that they don’t rent the rooms by the hour since our wake-up call is for 2 am. We were happy to see that the Meridien was not the Yotel (Istanbul).  The room was actually quite spacious and there was no need to move luggage to get to the bathroom.

 

Egypt- Land of the Pharaohs (Day 16)

 Day 16: Reurn to Cairo and Cooking School

Early is getting earlier. Today’s wake-up was at 4 a.m., which made us seriously question the wisdom of staying overnight in Aswan specifically to “experience” the Old Cataract. At that hour, the main thing I was experiencing was regret. I had barely established a relationship with the pillow, and already we were being forced to separate.

By 10 a.m., we were back in the hustle and bustle of Cairo. The drivers had not used our week away to improve their skills. Lane markings remain suggestions, and the direction of travel appears to be settled by whoever feels most strongly about it. Of all the places we’ve visited, Cairo wins the prize for the absolute worst driving. I would not volunteer to deliver the trophy.

From the airport, we stopped briefly at the Four Seasons to drop off our luggage and grab a cup of coffee. We’d hoped to check in early, but the only available rooms were smoking rooms. Yes, those still exist. Apparently, you can still pay for a luxury hotel room and have it come with its own tobacco history. Molly’s lungs and mine were already unhappy enough, so we decided to wait.

A short ride took us downtown to meet Nur, our cooking instructor for the morning. Nur was a lovely young woman whose English sounded thoroughly American. It turned out that her mother had married a Texan when Nur was very young, and Nur had also spent a couple of years in the States. Somehow, she had acquired the English without acquiring the drawl.

Our class, run by Bellies En Route, took place in the kitchen of a small local hotel. The team consisted of Nur; Mona, the head chef, who spoke no English; and a third helper whose name I’m not sure we ever got. In my defense, I had been up since 4 a.m. and was doing reasonably well to remember my own.

The class was very hands-on, which is a charming way of saying that if we wanted lunch, we were going to have to do some work.

We made stuffed eggplant, zucchini, and peppers; salad; squab—pigeon with better public relations—and Om Ali, an Egyptian bread pudding. There was enough chopping, stuffing, and cooking to give us the dangerous impression that we might be able to reproduce all of this at home.

By about 2:30, after a hard morning slaving away in the kitchen, we sat down to enjoy the results. Lunch was delicious, and there was enough to feed a small army, provided the army hadn’t already eaten breakfast. Since we’d been awake for ten and a half hours, our stomachs were perfectly willing to accept this as dinner.

Our 6:00 dinner reservation at the Four Seasons had clearly been made by earlier, more optimistic versions of ourselves.

With recipes for an Egyptian dinner at home in hand, we said goodbye to Nur and Mona and returned to the hotel for a bit of R&R. We now had everything we needed to recreate the meal, except Nur, Mona, the helper, and someone else’s kitchen.

Molly and Dave, meanwhile, had been resisting a particular urge since our arrival in Egypt. They had made it through temples, tombs, pyramids, and several thousand years of history with admirable restraint. But with only one day left, they could hold out no longer.

There, in the lobby of the finest hotel in Cairo, they "Walked Like an Egyptian."

Thousands of years of civilization, and this was our contribution.

Fortunately, we didn’t get thrown out.

Tomorrow we spend the final day of our trip with Sharif, visiting Coptic Cairo. I’m hoping the itinerary includes a wake-up time that qualifies as morning.