48 hours in Alexandria

A few weeks ago, four of us...


... took the train up to Alexandria for the weekend. The train is cheap (25 Egyptian pounds) and to my surprise, very comfortable. In fact, it is one of the most comfortable and clean trains I have ever been on. It must have been European (it isn't actually that unlikely; the metro here was designed by the French). It took just over 3 hours to make the trip from Cairo to Alexandria.

Map of the region for those who are unfamiliar :: Credit :: ...


We checked into our hotel which was just along the coast around 11 p.m. on Thursday and immediately went out to meet Mustafa, a friend from AUC that was home for the weekend. Alexandria is quite different from Cairo. The weather was better, it was quieter and the ocean brought in a cool salty breeze that was very refreshing. The hotel sat just a block away from the Corniche, a road that bordered the sea all along Alexandria. We met up with Mustafa and went out to a cafe where we had shisha and tried some tea called Chai Zarda. Apparently it is boiled rather than steeped, making it very strong. It is also very sweetened- there must have been 5 or 6 spoonfuls of sugar judging by how sweet it was. I liked it very much although I couldn't drink too much at a time.


The famed "Fancy Grapes" tobacco smoked by Mustafa...


It was getting late and Mustafa had to go home for the Suhur (pre-dawn meal, since this was during Ramadan) so we headed back to the Corniche which we walked along for a bit until Mustafa had to turn in for the night.




We ended up staying awake for the sunrise. Here's what came of it...


The next morning we woke up late enough to go straight to dinner. During dinner we got a call from Mustafa, "Hey Kayvan, Ahmed's family [another friend from AUC] is going to kill a cow for Ramadan... do you want to come watch?". I told him to hold on, "Hey guys you wanna see a cow get slaughtered?". We all looked at each other and started smiling, "Yah, Mustafa, where should we meet you?".

20 minutes later we were speeding down the Corniche in a taxi going to Ahmed's house. We got out and Mustafa led us down into the parking garage of a big high rise building. There was Ahmed and his brother with, you guessed it, a cow.


And yeah, they slaughtered it right there. Interestingly, she definitely knew exactly what was going to happen. She was shivering when we got there and this was before any of the "tools" were brought out. It was quite an eerie scene... you never imagine to see something like this in a parking garage with cars parked all around. The deed was also very gruesome, but definitely something worth seeing at least once in a lifetime (although I think once is enough). The neatly packaged beef in Styrofoam and plastic from Safeway just doesn't look the same afterwards.

They killed the cow in the Halal way, by slitting it's throat and letting the blood drain out to not contaminate the meat. The blood must be drained while the cow is alive. This took a heart-wrenching 10 minutes. The practice is quite a bit like Kosher except Allahu-Akbar is said upon the cut and it is supposed to be done facing Mecca (I'm unsure if this was the case here). I can't say it didn't make me a little queasy to watch. I'm definitely not a hunter. It did make me feel a little better however, that the meat would be distributed to the poor community in the area . Apparently this is a common practice during the month of Ramadan. If your family can afford it you either butcher a lamb or cow and give away the meat as a way of helping the poor.

After this we, meaning Mustafa, some of his friends and us went to the western end of the Corniche to Fort Qaitbay. This is a fort built in the 15th century and renovated later. Much of it's stone is said to come from the ancient Pharos (Lighthouse of Alexandria), one of the 7 ancient wonders of the world. Apparently one can still see red stone blocks from the Phalos sticking out of the water near Qaitbay but since it was nighttime I wasn't able to check if that was accurate.

Fort Qaitbay at night...


Drawing of the Pharos of Alexandria :: Credit :: ...


After this, we sat down at a cafe where we drank some tea and I finally beat Zeke at backgammon (he always wins).

Look as he tries to pretend it wasn't a devastating loss...


This was a great way to end the night, and effectively the trip since we left Alexandria the next morning for Cairo.