The Citadel of Salah Al din
As mentioned earlier. I was listening to the tales of the Ottoman Empire while getting ready for my trip. I knew Alexandria was part of that Empire but I didn’t know that Cairo was too ! My trip to Egypt was totally unplanned by me: I was just piggybacking on to Anna Shetty’s family vacation. So I didn’t pay any heed to the itinerary etc. I just decided to go with the flow.
So when Tifa told us that we were going to visit the fortress or the walled city of Salah Al din, around 15 to 25 minutes from Downtown Cairo, I was quite excited. Since we were far out in Giza , it took us at least an hour to get there .
On the way , we passed many houses that looked abandoned ( not the high rise ones but low lying ) which turned out to be cemeteries . These were truly citadels of the dead where families had buried their loved ones in family tombs .
The Mokkattam Hills , the highest point in Cairo was the obvious place to build a fortification and it was only natural that Sultan Salah El-din ordered it to be built there in 1176. However , he died before it could be built and it was completed by his successor of Al Malek El Kamel . Many of the building blocks we’d taken from the stones of some small pyramids in Giza .
Muhammad Aly Pasha, the father of Modern Egypt made many changes in the citadel, chief among them being the Alabaster mosque fashioned in the style of Hagia Sophia in Istanbul. It is now known as the Muhammad Aly mosque.
Reading several blogs upon my return from Egypt, I found that many of the facts of our guide Tifa were fanciful but I suppose seeing the children in our group, he decided to make the commentary more interesting than merely factual.
The children loved the display of planes, tanks and cannons in the courtyard of the Military Museum but were quite scared of the exhibits in the Police Museum – they were especially disturbed with the gory story of the two sisters Raya and Sakina who were notorious serial killers. They couldn’t imagine women upto such awful acts.
The Coptic Church
The latter half of the morning saw us in another historic part of Cairo – the Christian part. Cairo is seems was the place where the Holy Family stayed in for 3-4 months during their flight to Egypt. They stayed in a cave over which is now a church.
According to our guide Tifa, the church is normally crowded but because of the conflict in Gaza, there was a slight lull in tourism. But walking thourh the narrow alleys, we came across a priest and one could almost imagine we were back in medieval times.
The higlight of this visit however was of a very personal nature when we three senior citizens from our group , intimidatd by the steps leading to the chapel, decided to take the lift little knowing that we would spend two minutes going up and down, bewildered and slightly terrified of being stuck and trapped till somebody discovered us! I was in a fit of giggles while the other two were itching to possibly slap me!
By this time we were ravenous and insisted on eating in one of the roadside eateries. Of course Tifa was most reluctant to deviate from the plan but we were equally keen on trying more authentic local cuisine so we plonked ourselves on the pavement cafe and enjoyed our local fare. The kids of course stuck to the tried and tested hamburger and cola which somehow tastes the same the world over while I went for the koshyari. This delightful rice dish turned out to be vegetarian !
The rest of the afternoon was spent in the Khan Khalili market which none of us were really keen on visiting because quite frankly it was no different from the markets at home with its warren of streets. But Ms. Papaya wanted to buy a Magic Lamp so we indulged in some bargaining which resulted in a small little lamp for her. Of course we found out that this lamp was made in China and a similar one was gifted to us from a visitor to Singapore!
Ciao and see you soon
Twenty- five Seven 