Third blog report, March 26, 2012

I write this message from my apartment in Iraq.  To state the obvious:  I have managed to return to Sulaimani uneventfully.  Walking into this apartment felt like being home after being in a hotel in Cairo for a week. While I intended to post more from Cairo, it was just too difficult to try to manage the Arab language version of Blogsite, even though I had more time then than I have now.  If you look closely at the last message, the periods of the sentences at the ends of paragraphs are all in the wrong place.  That’s because I tried to justify the paragraphs to the left side of the page, not the right side as the default was set up for Arabic.  I was unable to put the periods in the right place and  I could not read the tabs at the top of the page.  This is better.   

In this message I will say something about some of the sites I saw in Cairo.  As I mentioned in my last message, I employed a guide who stayed with me throughout the week.  [Note correction from my message of last week:  his name is Mina (pronounced Meena).]  On my first day, we traveled to Saqqara, the site of some of the earliest funerary monuments, called step pyramids, that date back to around 3,000 BCE.  There is an indoor museum containing hundreds of artifacts, but no photography is allowed, so you’ll have to trust me that I saw them.  The outdoor parts do not look like what I, in my ignorance, associated with these monuments.  The scale is much smaller than the huge pyramids at Giza, and what I am told exist at Luxor.  But they are “the first” in many ways:  first use of architectural arches, first use of post and lintel construction, etc.  It was a real learning experience since photos of Saqqara are rarely included in photos of Egyptian art and architecture.   

From there we went to Giza which now sits at the edge of greater Cairo.  At that site are three pyramids, one quite large, and two smaller ones.  Near the smaller pyramids sits the sphinx.  By paying $18.00 beyond the price of entrance to the pyramid complex, you can enter the largest of the pyramids and climb up into the inside of it, as long as you don’t have claustrophobia.  The passage ways are narrow and low in height.  Having spent a fair amount of time climbing around the interiors of large castles in England, I can say that there’s nothing that begins to equal this experience.  You just have to marvel at the ability of humans to engineer something when they put their minds to the task.   

On my second day, Mina and I walked through the Cairo downtown to the National Museum.  If you watched any of the video feeds coming from Egypt during the revolution last year, you would have seen this museum as it sits at the edge of Tahrir Square where the revolution began.  It is a large building built around 1900 of a distinctively salmon-colored stone.  It really stands out from the beige buildings around it.  The museum contains Egyptian artifacts that date from as early as 3,500 BCE to the time of Roman occupation – around 100 CE.  There is so much to see, but the crown jewels of this museum are the artifacts from the tomb of King Tutankhamen.  For many years I had in my library a book on the discovery and opening of the tomb by a British archeologist named Howard Carter.  In spite of the book’s wonderful color photos, they paled by comparison to the real things.  The golden mask of King Tut is truly guarded like the crown jewels in the Tower of London.  But the other materials including chariots, sarcophagi, and items from everyday life made the trip truly worthwhile.  Unfortunately no photography is allowed in the museum, so you will just have to come here some time to see it.   

On my third and subsequent days in Cairo, I asked Mina to take me to the most important sites for the early Christian and Islamic periods.  These included everything from the Coptic Church of the Virgin Mary, also called the Hanging Church because it is suspended over two foundations dating to Roman times, to the 19^th c. mosque and mausoleum for Muhammad Ali, the first modern leader in Egypt who broke from Ottoman rule and established a line of rulers that ended with King Faruk in the 1950s.  In between these two buildings chronologically were a number of mosques and schools (madrasas) that figure prominently in Egyptian and Islamic history.  Along the way on one of the days, we went to one of the first streets built in Cairo when it was established in the 10^th c.  Called al Mu’izz Street, it is in a larger shopping precinct called Khan al-Khalili, one of the largest bazaars in the Middle East.  In Khan al-Khalili is a famous tea shop on Al-Fishawy Street.  In this shop, the Nobel laureate winning Egyptian writer named Naguib Mahfouz sat, drank tea and wrote about life in old Cairo.  For many years I required students in my Middle East history course to purchase and read one of Mahfouz’s novels called Midaq Alley, so it was of great significance to me to be able to sit in the room where he wrote.  Unfortunately the shop owners of Khan al-Khalili are so in-your-face about trying to get you into their shops to buy things, it is almost impossible to stroll through the narrow streets and enjoying just looking at all of the products for sale.  They don’t easily take no for an answer. 

Cairo is a crowded, at times dusty, at times trashy, at all times noisy, but endearing city.  The spread of wealth from very, very poor to very rich is quite evident.  On one of my several unguided walks, I met a fellow who had lived for many years in New York until the events of 9/11 killed his business.  He moved back to Cairo to be close to his family.  He has great admiration for Egyptian people, who, as he says, can get by on next to nothing.  After observing life in Cairo, I can understand his admiration. 

 Photos attached this time:  1, the step pyramid at Saqqara; 2, the large pyramid at Giza; 3, the Sphinx;  4, the National Museum;  5, the Hanging Church; 6, the Nilometer, a device used to measure theheight of the Nile when it flooded;  7, the mosque of Al-Hakkim;  8, the mosque of Ibn Tulun; 9, the madrasa of Barquq; 10, mosque of Sultan Qalawun; 11, the Muhammad Ali mosque; 12, night scene on al-Mu’izz Street; 13, the tea shop on El Fishawy.  (If you click on a photograph it will be enlarged for better detail.) 

I deliberately choose to write less than more about my travels, as not everyone wants to read a travelogue.  If you have questions, please feel free to respond and I will address questions.  As always, thanks for reading. 

Second Blog Message.  March 18, 2012

As I write this second message I am sitting in the dining room of the Windsor Hotel in Cairo, Egypt.  This hotel was built in the 1890s, and was used by the British staff who were stationed in Cairo.  You can almost imagine these fellows sitting around in the evening drinking gin and tonic and saying “Good job, old chap…” and things like that,  that Monty Python’s Flying Circus has so much fun parodying.  I arrived on March 16, and assuming that Iraqi Airways continues to operate I will leave on the morning of the 23^rd.  For a person who needs a hotel that new and nicely finished in all of the corners, this would probably not work.  It’s just too old for that.  But if a person can appreciate how well it functions in the 21^st. century, then it’s a great place.  The bathroom has recently been refurbished with new tile, toilet, and lavatory, and is really nice.  The knotty pine floor looks original, but is clean and wonderfully buffed from years of use.  The ceiling is probably 15 feet from the floor.  I could shoot basketballs in there if there were a hoop on the wall.  Overlooking the streets below is a small balcony accessed through two narrow wooden doors that are almost as tall as the room.  The sheets are clean, and the bed comfortable.  The hotel has an elevator that looks to be original.  No joke.  A 100+ year old elevator.  It belongs in an elevator museum.  The only problem I have with the room itself is that the lighting is poor.  The only other problem has nothing to do with the room, but rather with the fact that it is near a mosque on which a very loud loudspeaker is mounted. The muzzein’s call to prayer, offered five times per day, is amplified well;  I never have to wonder when, by Muslim tradition, it’s time to pray.  Overall, the place has a lot of charm.  I have stayed in far worse motels in the US that are 1/10^th the age of this place. 

I have attached below a few photos of the hotel. 

 

The only problem for the hotel is that there so few of us tourists staying here or elsewhere in Egypt.   I am dismayed at the effect of the revolution of last year on the tourist enterprise here in Egypt.  This morning, I sat alone in a breakfast room that could seat 30 or 40 people.  I came into the dining room at 8 a.m., when one other person was just finishing.  In the almost one hour that I sat there, no one else came in. This evening, as I write this message, I have been in the dining room lounge since 5:00 p.m. , taking advantage of the free internet service.  As I write, it’s now 8:30 p.m.  and during this time only two other patrons have come in to a large room which by now, should be full of patrons having a drink and ordering supper.  The fellow tending the bar has been at his business for 20 years, and he seems almost philosophic about the situation.  He says things have turned around in the past and he is hoping they will in the future.  I think I am only one of maybe three occupants in the hotel with 40 rooms. 

For the past two days, I have contracted with a guide, a young man named Ahmeen who does guiding for a living.  He has a degree from university in historic guiding.  He knows Egyptian history thoroughly, and can even read hieroglyphs.  His pay is about $40 per day for an eight hour day.  I paid a total of $60 for a driver and guide yesterday, all day and I was alone in the van.  I had my own personal guide, in essence.  And, until being asked to help me yesterday, he had no business at all for this week or last week.  At the first pyramid complex we went to, at Saqqara, there was one other tour company minibus in the parking lot built to hold many more buses and cars.  Today, Ahmeen and I walked to the large National Museum by the Nile River.  This place is big – think British Museum size.  Again, the number in attendance was small compared to what it could receive. 

Everyone I talk to says something to the effect, "go home and tell people it's safe to travel in Egypt."  The warnings in the US and elsewhere are apparently keeping people away, but for the life of me, I can't see the problem.   I know that I can be naive and thus might miss the warning signs, but I don't see the problem.  There were hundreds of US and European tourists in the National Museum (a place big enough to hold thousands) and they went about without apparent concern.  In front, there were tour buses unloading dozens of oriental tourists (Korean?  Chinese?   I can't tell the difference).  Somehow there is a disconnect between what their governments have been telling them and what the US and Australian governments are telling their citizens.   I walked to and from the museum through the busy streets of downtown Cairo, and hardly drew a glance from people.   You can tell that the government must be somewhat on edge when you see an armored personnel carrier parked prominently in a busy square, but other than that, nothing.  Of course, I still have more four more days here.  Perhaps I will change my attitude later.  Hopefully, I won’t.    

In my next message I’ll say more about what I have been seeing, but I’ll close for now. I have no idea how this will look. The directions and tabs are all in Arabic, and I am guessing.   Thanks for reading. 

First message, March 10, 2012

March 10, 2012.  First blog message.  Third time in Sulaimani, Iraq.  Yes, I came back to The American University of Iraq Sulaimani to teach.  I am here this time only because of the misfortune of a friend named Randall who was supposed to teach here this spring term.   About three weeks before the beginning of the term on February 26, he was told by his doctor that he needed to stay home and to have surgery to correct problems in his lower back.  So he resigned, and they invited me to come in his place.  I come with Carolyn’s understanding but not necessarily with her desire to see me out of the house.  One of these days, I will need to figure out what retirement is supposed to be about.  In the mean time, I am back here and, for the most part, enjoying my work.  I wish Randall and his surgeons every success in his making a full recovery. 

This term started on February 26 and will end on June 13.  I am teaching three sections of US history and one section of the history of fine arts.  The books for both courses were chosen by others and I am adapting to them, once again.  The same thing, that is using books chosen by others, happened in my first and third terms here.  Only once have I been in a position to choose the books I want to use in class.  Perhaps if I weren’t always pinch-hitting for others I could choose my books as other faculty do.  But that would require long-term commitment, something I have not been very good at. 

We finished the second week of courses yesterday and have one more week of classes before a week off for Nawroz, the major Kurdish festival that centers around the coming of spring equinox on March 21.  Once we return to classes on March 25, it’s a long straight march to mid-June with no more breaks except for Iraqi Labor Day on May 1.  Ideally, it would be good to have the week of spring break in the middle of the term, but that seems not to be possible here with the late start date of the beginning of the academic year in October.  It’s a bit early to know fully what my classes will be like.  I can see that I have some bright students who are able to summarize and discuss long text passages.  Others are working hard at copying into their notebooks sentences they barely understand.  

I will not be staying in town for the week of the Nawroz break as I will be traveling to Cairo, Egypt to do the tourist thing.  I have never been to Cairo and very much want to see what I can see in one week.  I am only 2 ½ hours from Cairo by air and do not know if I will ever be back in this part of the world again. Compared to the US and Europe, the relatively short flight is expensive -- $610 round trip – but the room in Cairo is cheap – less than $50 per night, including breakfast.   In Cairo, I know that I will be going to the Islamic quarter that contains some very historic mosques and markets.  (Cairo was one of the first cities established by the Muslims during their expansion in the 7^th century, so is quite historic in that regard.)  I expect also to go to the big National Museum that contains so many artifacts from pharonic Egypt, e.g., artifacts from King Tut’s tomb, lots of mummies, and more; and I hope to get out to some of the big pyramids near Cairo.  Beyond that I really haven’t planned a lot.  I have promised myself and my wife that I will avoid getting anywhere near political demonstrations.  Otherwise, I have been assured, the city is open and welcoming to tourists. 

My living arrangements this year are the same as last year.  I live in a 12 story apartment building that is owned by the university.  It is one of many similar apartment towers all built in close proximity to each other, and together they comprise what is called Pak City.  We AUIS faculty and staff who live here are transported by university buses that leave every thirty minutes in the morning, beginning at 7:00 a.m. to take us to the university.  Then in the afternoon, there are buses that bring us from the university back to Pak City.  It is conveniently located for stores and restaurants. 

I have attached a few photos to illustrate what Pak City looks like, what my living arrangements are like, and what I see from my balcony.  I will in future blogs report on the new campus of AUIS.  It is quite something to see and to work in. First photo is exterior of building I live in; second photo is of kitchen; third photo is of desk and study; fourth photo is of other towers in Pak City complex; fifth is of the large mountain to southwest of Sulaimani that dominates skyline.