Exploring Islamic Cairo and Visiting The Citadel

Rise and shine as the consistent beeping of car horns continues in Cairo. Oh wait, it never ends! As our taxi driver in Giza once told us “The beeping of horns while driving is Egyptian music”.

Our new friend Mostafa excitedly offers to show us around Islamic Cairo, but only if we get up early and spend the early hours of the morning there in order to beat the heat. It gets hot here, very hot! Once noon hits, you’re sizzling. Your best bet during the summer months is to get things done early!

We jump on the metro at the Nasser station within 5 or 10 minutes, we arrive in Islamic Cairo. Mostafa walks with us through the beautiful stone streets as we visit a jewish temple, the hanging church, and stop off quickly to haggle for a bangle type bracelet for Liz along the way. The street vendors offer to Liz at first is 65EGP ($11.44 USD). I walk up and say no, too expensive. I say 20EGP ($3.52 USD). He says no, this is very nice I will do special price for you… 40EGP ($7.04 USD). We leave with the bangle for 20EGP. This is why you HAVE to haggle when purchasing most items in Egypt. Water, food (at stores, not restaurants for the most part), snacks, items at markets, etc). The original price is usually at least 3 times what they’re willing to sell it for. Sometimes the cost can be up to 10 times more. My advice for you… haggle, haggle and HAGGLE again!

Off we go to our first visit to a mosque, Amr Ibn Glass Mosque. Mostafa explains that we will need to take our shoes off at the door and not to give them to the front desk, just hold your shoes in your hands as we walk around.  If you check your shoes at the door you will be expected to give baksheesh (tip) to the staff at the entrance. We take our shoes off and Liz is handed a green hobbit looking costume that she will need to wear to cover any skin that is showing during our time inside the mosque.

We cross the beautiful marble looking floor of the mosque and enter the other side. At this time we pretty much have the mosque to ourselves as it’s not prayer time at the moment. We sit down and Mostafa shows us how he prays and explains to us the history of this mosque.

As we walk to the exit we slip our shoes back on and Liz is approached by a woman selling shalls, or arabic headwear.

Within seconds we see a large group of people storming towards the entrance of the mosque. People are screaming, crying, pushing and shoving as they approach us. We have no idea what’s going on. As they approach we see 15 to 20 men all running with a coffin overhead. Mostafa explains that someone has just passed away and the family and friends of the deceased are extremely upset. We step back a bit to give them their space and watch as they enter the mosque. What an experience…

Dodging cars and buses is something we’re well accustomed to at this point. We cross the busy street to head over to a street stall that sells traditional Egyptian breakfast (Ful, and Tamya). We sit quickly and devour our sandwiches. Filling is not even the word for how we’re feeling at this point!

Before we jump in our taxi to our next stop Mostafa is bribed by what he calls a corrupt man that stood in front of the mosque we had visited earlier. See, in Egypt you have to have a license to show foreigners around. This means that if you’re an Egyptian and you have friends visit from other countries you’re not allowed to show them around anywhere without this special license. It’s 100% absurd and the corrupt guards, security, and sometimes police will often bribe Egyptians that they see walking around with foreigners by asking them to show their license. In Mostafa’s case, he did not have a license so he had to pay an unknown amount of money (he wouldn’t tell us) to this guard in order for the guard not to call the police on him. We felt extremely bad for Mostafa but he explained that it’s okay and that it’s his pleasure to bring us around. He does not believe in this ridiculous rule and neither do we! He plans on getting his license soon to avoid the persistent hassle that he encounters when hanging out with foreign friends.

Our taxi picks us up and we head off to our next stop, The Citadel. We weave in and out of the 4 lane highway but in Egypt there is no “lane” per say. This 4 lane highway is now actually about 8 or 9 lanes. We approach this structure that sits way up high on a plateau that overlooks the city of Cairo.

We make our way through the different parts of The Citadel; the military museum, national museum, and most importantly the Mohamed Ali Mosque. Mostafa spent some time talking with us about the Mohamed Ali Mosque and before we knew it we entered the most beautiful mosque that we’ve visited so far.

Mostafa loved taking pictures for us, and he took some really good ones! What would we do without him!? He also joined in for a couple of group shots along the way.

After our visit to the Mohamed Ali Mosque we headed towards the Egyptian Museum here in downtown Cairo. Unfortunately photos were not allowed so we had to check our cameras in the front office. In saying that, we were probably better off by leaving our cameras behind because we really got to focus on what Mostafa was educating us on when it came to different artifacts in the museum. Mostafa is a certified Egyptologist and he spent 1 full year studying in the Egyptian Museum. I can understand why now because as a visitor you could wander around there for days. The amount of artifacts that are housed here is nothing less than amazing.

If you ever visit Cairo and you want an official Egyptologist to show you around to any part of Cairo, please contact me and I will give you my friend Mostafa’s contact information. He’s an extremely smart young guy who truly loves his country, culture and making new friends from all over the world. His dream is to one day temporarily move abroad so that he can work and save enough money to open his own desert camp down in the Oasis that he was born in here in Egypt. Mostafa is a great friend that we will truly miss him once we leave here. Feel free to contact me if you need any assistance when traveling to Egypt. Mostafa is your MAN!

To see more photos from our trip to Islamic Cairo, and The Citadel please check out the Cairo, Egypt album