Ramadan and Football... that is what Egypt does

Ramadan is now over, but before it ended I was able to fast for a day with some Muslim friends. I got several of my American friends to do it with us. Of course the Muslims have to fast from food, water, and tobacco during the sunlit hours every day during the month of Ramadan so they were excited for us to feel the hunger and thirst with them! We woke up at 3:45 in the morning and ate our last meal and drink for the day. Then we went back to sleep and went throughout our day. The hunger didn’t bother me because of the meal during the night, but the thirst was hard from walking around in Cairo all day (it was our service project day and the NGO I work at is a long ways away). We had planned to meet at a Syrian restaurant for iftar (the breaking of the fast). Once the call to prayer was sent out over the loudspeakers from the surrounding mosques, signaling the time to break the fast, we ate dates and drank water. The first drink of cold water made me really appreciate the month of Ramadan and why Muslims see it as a holy month of sacrifice. We ate a wonderful meal and it was a great experience!

On Tuesday, several of us guys were invited to attend a football match here in Cairo. It was the Egyptian league, and the two teams playing were ranked #2 and #3 in Egypt. The #3 team won and it was really fun to watch! The most interesting thing was the 900 riot police every 5 feet around the field. That really gives validity to all the stories you hear about the riots and violence over soccer in Africa and abroad. No such excitement happened at our game but the fans were pretty raucous and it was fun to see!

I will have a post ready in a few days detailing a few events that we have been to involving Muslim/Christian relations. It is a very different story depending on who you talk to regarding the way the two religions interact in Egypt. I have collected notes on my experiences with my Coptic friends and my Muslim friends and how they see the religious issues here. It should be a good post, so stay tuned for that in a few days!

Trip to Ancient Egypt

This weekend we went to Luxor, which is the location of the ancient city of Thebes and where all the Ancient Egypt sites are. We took an overnight train to get there from Cairo and spent most of the first day laying around by the hotel pool on the roof. From our rooftop perch we had a great view of the Nile and the Temple of Luxor. Our various teachers had laid a pretty heavy reading load on us for the trip (which for some reason, I don’t mind) and I spent a lot of the day relaxing and reading.

On Saturday, we began our two-day tour experience, and went to the Valley of the Kings. This is the site of 140 something tombs of Pharaohs and family. We were able to go into three of them, Ramses II, Ramses III, and Ramses IX. All of the artifacts and treasures had been removed from the tombs but the walls were still beautifully painted with scenes from Ancient Egypt. Most of the painting centered on death and the afterlife and the greatness of the Pharaohs.

We then went to the Hedu Temple, which was the temple of Ramses III. As was the ancient Egyptian custom, Pharaohs were gods and their temples were extravagant. The palace was adjoined. Most of the temples that we saw were fairly similar in that they had massive columns, a holiest of holies shrine, an altar for sacrifices to the Gods and many edifices and statues. The Hedu Temple was particularly interesting because it is widely believed that Ramses III is the Pharaoh from the Bible. If that is true, then that temple and palace would be the setting for all the visits from Moses and Aaron, the staff turning into a snake and the Let my People Go story. Pharaoh would have watched all the plagues from this site as well. Seeing this also gives a little more clarity on why the Pharaoh was so reluctant to let the Hebrew slaves go. They were building these temples and monuments. Our tour guide told about how long and how hard it was to build each temple with all the columns and stones being several hundred tons. I think now I understand a little bit more about why Pharaoh was so hardened to the idea of losing his slaves.

The next day we visited the temple of Karnak and the Temple of Luxor. Both were once again, extremely impressive and architectural marvels. What amazed me about everything that we saw, was just how much had survived since 1500 BC (when most of all this was built). There is a lot of hieroglyphic writings all over the walls, statues of Gods and Pharaohs’ and many of the structures are completely intact. This is a tribute to the solid stone that it was built from and the amazing quality of craftsmanship that was employed.

After a couple of days of tours, a day and some evenings by the pool, and a thorough amazement for ancient Egypt we headed home to Cairo by overnight train. We have a day to relax and get fully prepared for classes again (which is hours of reading!).

Thanks for Following!

Articulation of Thoughts, US Foreign Policy and Luxor

We leave for Luxor in about 3 hours. For those of you unfamiliar with Luxor, it is where the ancient city of Thebes was and is near the Valley of the Kings and Valley of the Queens. Several Pharaonic temples are there and Luxor has more ancient Egyptian history than can be seen in 3 days. But we are going to try! I will be sure to give a huge post on Luxor and all the ancient Egyptian monuments we see when we get back. We leave tonight and take an overnight train to Luxor. After 3 days, we will be back early Monday morning.
As for this week, once we got back from Dahab, we heard a very inspiring talk from Hasam Baghat, which I already commented on. The next day we heard from our director, Dr. Heather Keaney’s husband, Jim Wright. He is a Cambridge educated lawyer who owns his own law firm here in Cairo. He spoke on cross-cultural living and how to live radical lives abroad. A lot of his focus was on how to show Christ in a Muslim city. He is very intelligent and his thoughts were extremely insightful. His talk really has helped me bring together my thoughts on the things I have been seeing around me. It has been a little bit disorienting at times seeing poverty, Islam, my own Christianity etc. in all new lights. I am starting to figure out what it means to be open-minded, have a solid core of belief and learn about what is around me.
We have had two long lecture sessions with our Islam teacher, Dr. Chahinda this week. She is a Muslim herself and has very moderate viewpoints on Christianity and inclusivism. It has been really interesting learning more about Islam and also seeing her brand of Islam, which I must say is very tolerant and loving. I know that not all Muslims share her view, but her Islam is inspiring!
Yesterday we had a political officer from the U.S. embassy in Cairo speak to us. His job is mainly watching the Egyptian government and making sure that American interests are being protected, as well as watching the human rights scene in Egypt. He came in and spoke a bit about his career and what it is like working for the US State Dept. He then opened the floor for questions. That began an hour and a half of us asking him tough questions. I feel bad for him because we bombarded him with well thought out and well supported questions about what our government is doing in the Middle East and why they are doing it. We covered Obama’s soft stance on Iran, America’s double standard on nuclear weapons, America’s special relationship with Israel, the turbulent political climate in Syria, America’s priorities in the Middle East, stability in Iraq, Afghanistan, Lebanon, and of course Egypt. He was very dodgy with a lot of our questions, as one would expect from someone working for the State Department. But while it was an exercise in patience trying to get a straight, direct answer out of him, there were many important things I learned about American foreign policy, our Middle East priorities, and the changes made under Obama. Some of my thoughts and observations and interesting nuggets from the talk:
➢ He ranked the American priorities in the region this way:
1. The peace process with Israel
2. Stability in Iraq
3. Economic Development
➢ Egypt is the most important state in the region to be an American ally as far as diplomacy goes, because they have full diplomacy resources with Iran, they can help negotiate with Israel and Palestine, and they also talk to Hamas.
➢ The relationship between the U.S. and Arabs has improved under Obama and are more willing to talk peace in the region (probably because Obama doesn’t push the democratization agenda the same way Bush did).
➢ Once Iran gets nuclear weapons, the belief is that Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Syria would soon follow, which makes Iran’s nuclear program all the more a pivotal issue.
➢ The situation in Afghanistan demands more State Dept. and Defense Dept. resources than any other situation.
➢ He was the most veiled about the American plan for Egyptian politics when the 81 year old president, Hosni Mubarak dies. He claimed that America would push for a democratic election to determine the next leader. I then asked a pointed question about a democratic election leading to an election of the Muslim Brotherhood (known as a terrorist organization; this situation would be very similar to Gaza’s fair election of Hamas, which the U.S. has not recognized as a legitimate government). He hardly even answered that question. My take is that the National Democratic Party will fix an election to get Gamal Mubarak into power and the U.S. will look the other way to keep the Muslim Brotherhood out of the government.
➢ He said that the U.S. has been on much better terms with the United Nations under Obama.

Every question and answer was very interesting. I think that I learned more about what it means to work for the State Department (having to promote American values, rather than your own values; having to give the public State Department opinion on everything etc.) than I did about America’s true plan in the Middle East. But, all in all it was a good session and everyone ended on very good terms and he finished by asking us what we want to see from our government (which we gave him a polite earful).
We leave soon for Luxor and I will give a full post once I get back.
P.S. Feel free to weigh in with an opinion on any of this stuff. I would love to talk a little bit about all this.

Mt. Sinai, Dahab, The Blue Blue Red Sea, and Human Rights Activism

This weekend we visited Mt. Sinai and Dahab, Egypt! We traveled 7 hours over the Sinai desert to arrive at Mt. Sinai by 2 AM. All I can say about the desert of the Sinai is that I can understand why it was a curse for the Israelites to live there. 40 years of wandering there would be quite a punishment. We arrived in time to start the trek up the mountain with enough time to reach the top by sunrise.

Side note: No one really knows for certain which mountain Moses’ received the Ten Commandments on. This mountain is proclaimed to be the Mt. Sinai because it is the most likely mountain and historians have pegged this as the best possible answer to that geographical question.

We begin our journey and Bedouin tribesman are constantly offering camels for the ride up (for a nice sum of money of course). At first it is a nice walking trail but as we get into the mountain range and start going up the side of the mountain it begins to get to be a bit of a nice, little hike. It took us 3 hours to get to the top, but it felt great to do some physical exertion and not breath the polluted Cairo air for a change. The stars were beautiful and the mountains were breathtaking in the bright moonlight that God offered us.

At the top we find a good place to sit to watch the sunrise. It is quite cold and windy at the summit, which we were prepared for. As one can imagine, the sunrise was astounding and it was one of the most peaceful, quiet, and surreal things I have ever seen. It was one of those moments that I thought, “How can anyone doubt God’s existence?” Its almost a disgrace to post a picture to represent what I saw, but I guess I have to!

We visited the monastery at the bottom of the mountain, where the “burning bush” supposedly is. The bush was just a normal, living bush, which I didn’t even deem picture worthy. There are cooler ways to project a burning bush fabrication, I believe.

Then we go to Dahab on the Red Sea coast, on the southern tip of the Sinai Peninsula. It is a small beach town, that is overshadowed by Sharm al-Sheik, the major resort city about 40 miles away that is much more crowded and popular (and where President Hosni Mubarak spends most of his time). The highlight of the 3 days we spent in Dahab is easily snorkeling at the “Blue Hole”. The “Blue Hole” has been named the #2 best snorkeling and diving spot in the world (behind Australia’s Great Barrier Reef). I had never snorkeled before so this was an especially great experience. The rest of the time was spent hanging out by the Red Sea, eating at interesting Egyptian restaurants and playing cards with each other.

Couple of notes on the Red Sea:

1. It is the Bluest, Clearest water you will ever see.

2. It has a high salt content and is effortless to float in.

Today, we had Hasam Baghet speak to us (just the 30 MESP students) about Human Rights. It is a pretty amazing thing that I got to see him in such a small arena. He is an extremely respected lawyer who runs an NGO specializing in challenging laws restricting human rights. He has won several high profile cases that overturn discriminatory laws, which is no small feat considering that Egypt is an autocratic, military state run by a dictator and corrupt government. He is only 30 and appears regularly on political talk shows and has been quoted in a lot of the reading that we have done so far on the social conditions in Egypt. So hearing him in such a small environment was pretty cool. He had some mind-blowing things to say about conditions in Egypt, what is being done about it, the dangers of standing against the government, the U.S role in Egypt and its development. He is a hot commodity in the burgeoning global human rights arena, so it was quite inspiring to hear him speak.

Weekend Plans

So tonight we leave for the Sinai Peninsula. We will be driving through the night and arriving at Mt. Sinai in the middle of the night. It will be about a 3 hr hike to the top which will be followed by an amazing sunrise from Mt. Sinai. Yeah, let that sink in.

After the hike back down we will drive about an hour to the Red Sea coast. We will be in Dahab, a little beach town that is famous for being one of the best snorkeling spots in the world. Supposedly, they have the "blue hole" which is literally a hole in the sea with coral and wildlife on all sides.

I will have an update once we get back. Thanks for following!

Mosque Tour

So today we had our first Islam Thought and Practice class in which we spent the day visiting mosques in Cairo. Our teacher is Dr. Shahinda, an Islamic architecture professor at American University in Cairo. She is a devout Muslim although she is unveiled (a touchy subject in the Islamic world).

We visited 3 mosques from different time periods. The first was the Tulun mosque in the first picture. It was once the central and royal mosque of Egypt. It was built in the 9th century and is a real masterpiece of architecture.

The second mosque, shown in the 2nd and 3rd picture is from the 13th century and was built by Sultan Hassan and is a massive, massive structure. It is close by the Citadel and was built as an Islamic school as well as a mosque. Obama visited this mosque on his Cairo visit, so a lot of things had been tidied up and the carpet was new.

The third mosque was right across the courtyard from the Hassan mosque. It is a 19th century mosque and was built fully enclosed, Turkish style. There are some interesting tombs in this mosque of Egyptian kings and the shah that was overthrown in the Iranian revolution (he was related to the Egyptian royal family).

One interesting tidbit is that there is a bit of a controversy in this mosque over a set of windows on the north wall (pictured). One idea is that the French, Christian architect built this in as a Christian icon. Another idea is that it is an innocent arrangement of windows. My thoughts are that if a mosque is trying to avoid anything resembling a cross, then how is this not a deliberate act? Either way it is interesting to see and think about.

The Conflicts of the Arabs, Naima and Necessary Arabic

So this past weekend was mostly reading and housekeeping around our flat, with a pretty awesome Citadel visit mixed in. We cooked our first meal in the flat, as most days we eat with all the people from the program at the MESP villa, where Kareema, an Egyptian woman cooks for all of us. Most nights we are on our own but my flat mates and I almost always go eat at Naima’s. Naima’s is this great little restaurant on the Nile that is ridiculously cheap and serves really good native Egyptian food. When I say cheap, I mean you can get filled up on less than $1 American. So far I have only had a couple of things from there, mainly because the menu is all in Arabic and they all speak only Arabic. So until my Arabic improves I will probably stick to my comfort zone in choosing food items. My two staples here in Egypt at Naima’s have been fuul, which is basically a bread pocket of spicy, salty beans (goes for about 25 cents USD) and kofTa which is basically a Philly cheese steak sandwich without the cheese and with lamb. So not like a Philly cheese steak at all.
We had Arabic this morning and about 3 hours of lectures on Middle East history. As mundane as that may sound, I really love classes and studying all of this stuff. We have a reader on Iran and Egypt, one on Syria, Jordan and Turkey, and one on Israel – Palestine that stands to a total of about 5 inches thick of paper to be read this semester. I am pretty excited and what I have read so far!
Lately we have been focusing on the Arab world as a whole and how un-united it is, even though all the countries seem to have common problems. Oil is a curse, Israel is a distraction and governments are authoritarian. But they seem to have tried everything from uniting the Arab world, applying a European model of Modernism, opening up to free trade, but nothing has worked for them economically. So the new idea standing in the gap with a proposed solution for the Arab world? Islamism

The Citadel from the Outside

One wall of the Muhammed Ali mosque

View from the Citadel of the Al-Nasr mosque

Inside the Muhammed Ali mosque - The view from inside here is one of the most amazing things I have ever seen

The Citadel

Today was the first day of our weekend. We have Fridays and Saturdays off, Class on Sundays, Mondays, Wednesdays, Thursdays with Tuesdays as a Service Project Day. We have quite a bit of homework this weekend from Arabic as well as reading for Culture and Change in the ME and Peoples and Cultures of the ME.

So, with our first off day since we have been there, a group of us (consisting mostly of my flatmates) decided to go to the Citadel. For those of you unfamiliar with this astounding work of history, it is a huge stronghold/castle built by Sal'adin in the 10th Century in the Crusades. It has been improved over several centuries to include the Muhammad Ali mosque, his palace and numerous underground dwellings for soldiers. Egypt was ruled from the Citadel for several centuries. It was breathtaking to see in person and I have posted pictures that do not do it justice.

Tomorrow we go to see the Pyramids, so there will be another post just as excited as this one tomorrow!

Classes have started and we have been learning Arabic, Islam, and Politics and Cultures in the Middle East. We have huge books to read and many papers to write. This will by far be my most challenging semester and the one in which I learn the most!

The first day of class, my flatmates and I decided to dress up shirt and tie style and bring the class on the first day of class. It was fun!

Today we began our study of Islam with some videos on jihad and extremism... just to get that elephant in the room started. There was some interesting discussions!

As the homework begins and a rigourous class schedule starts, I will have to find a comfortable balance between the experiental education on the streets of Cairo and the in class education through books and academics.