Another Cairo day

A little weary to start, but it turned into a magical day. Omnia had organised a minibus to transport us to and from the Islamic area, and a wonderful guide - a professor in Islamic medieval history and architecture. We left early - you have to pick the moment here, after the school traffic (school starts at 7am) and before the commuter traffic..Pinpoint timing, and our drive was relatively easy - i.e. not standstill gridlock. Met our guide, and she led us through such interesting buildings, with history and background that we would never have found or known. The mosques we were hoping to see were closed for renovation, but there are so many amazing buildings anyway, with beautiful Islamic decoration…a complex which was mausoleum, hospital, school…

We stopped for a tea break at one point, and were each delivered a little pot of tea and a plate of fresh mint….just delicious! We finally ended with lunch in the same place where we ate on the tour’s Islamic market day (so we knew what we wanted to order from past experience!) and it is all amongst the bazaar shops and we did a little shopping after before getting the bus back to the hotel. Angela sadly was feeling a bit seedy and didn’t come (sad as she would have loved it)…most people have had a touch of the funny tummy, but Omnia and Amr are handing out pills, and most not too dramatic! I had a little way back, but it started in Italy, so can’t blame Egypt!! All totally fine now…

We got back in the early afternoon and everyone did their own thing for the rest of the day. Omnia, Amr and I went to visit the wife and daughter of their cousin who we will be visiting in Kuala Lumpur next week. They are back in Cairo as the daughter is in university here in her final year. Had a wonderful home cooked meal with them and a very nice visit. We took an Uber there, and got a taxi back as it was easy to hail one…a hair raising ride - no seatbelts and we were actually speeding between intersection jams…as I said before, getting round in Cairo is a complicated and difficult business!!Read more