This past weekend, we went to Alexandria. Alexandria is northern Egypt's premier summer vacation destination. The city was named after Alexander the Great, and was briefly the capital of Greco-Roman Egypt. Today, the city has a very Mediterranean (as opposed to Egyptian) feel to it--architecturally and culturally. Alexandria is more socially conservative than Cairo due to the influx of rich Saudis who vacation there (isn't it interesting that Saudi vactioners could actually make the city more conservative just by their presence?)
We left Friday at 3pm and arrived in Alex (as Egyptians call it) around 6pm. We stayed at a gorgeous hotel 2 lanes from the Mediterranean Sea, where Nabil & I had a balcony view of the Sea. We spent Saturday on a private beach, relaxing and playing beach soccer. An unflattering shirtless picture of me playing soccer is making the rounds on Facebook. Sunday we toured the Roman Catacombs (which nobody seemed to know existed outside Rome), the Alexandria Library (President Mubarak can build a library, but he can't feed his people...), and my favorite site, Fort Qait Bay. The weekend was really busy, so I didn't get much of a chance to take the city in properly, but walking along the corniche next to the Mediterranean was peaceful and beautiful. The smell of the sea was so invigorating, and was a great contrast to the smell of car exhaust and dirt that I've gotten used to in Cairo.
I gave Kodak 4 rolls of film to develop and create CDs full of pictures. Kodak gave me 2 CDs back, and 2 rolls of blank film. I know I shot 4 rolls, which means that Kodak screwed up developing 2 rolls. So I'm never going back to this Kodak. If anyone wants to buy me a sweet $800 digital camera, Christmas is coming...
Pictures will be up soon.
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