My dad's visit

The most notable thing which has happened in the past few weeks is that my dad visited! During his visit we stayed at the hotel Four Seasons, a completely different world to the rest of Alex! With a huge room, a lovely breakfast where honey was served straight off the honeycomb, and a pool and jacuzzi in the hotel, we were quite comfortable.

My dad wanted, as all parents say who come to visit their kids in Alex, "to see how you live", so of course I had to take him to my flat and introduce him to my flatmates. I also presented him to the lovely old lady downstairs, who is very interested in us and who I knew would be really happy to have met a representative of my family.

My dad and I in my flat

A lot of the time we spent chasing after Patriarchs. The seat of one of the five Patriarchs of the Roman Empire was in Alexandria, and due to the splits in the church which have occured since, there are now at least four different people who lay claim on the title Patriarch of Alexandria. We found the Coptic Catholic Patriarchate, the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate (where we actually saw the Patriarch, we just don't know which of the bearded men in black robes he was), and on the last day we stumbled upon the Coptic Orthodox Patriarchate when we were visiting a network of graveyards belonging to different faiths and denominations. For a graveyard, the one next to the Patriarchate was very much alive: bustling with people and hens and adorable little puppies whose photographs my dad is planning to make a fortune on selling. It was also so full of graves that it was hard walking around without stepping on someone's final resting place. Alexandria is crowded even in death.

We visited the Coptic Cathedral of St. Mark as well, which was situated in a courtyard inside some gates which house an entire little community. I bought a Coptic deck of cards which contains facts about personalities from the Bible, and my dad collected the necessary magnets. We also visited the synagogue of Alexandria, which is one of the largest in the Middle East, but the Jewish community here doesn't number more than 20 people nowadays, so it's unfortunately hardly ever in use. The last stop on our spiritual tour was the mosque Abu Abbas al-Morsi, housing the tomb of a Sufi saint for fishermen.

The Greek Orthodox Patriarchate - Church of St. Saba

My dad next to what we assumed was the old bell of St. Saba

Inside St. Saba

A relic of the last Patriarch

The Coptic Cathedral of St. Mark

The Coptic Orthodox Patriarchate

Puppies in the graveyard

Greek Orthodox graveyard

The synagogue

Inside the synagogue

Mosque of Abu Abbas al-Mursi

Inside the mosque

After quenching our spiritual thirst, our more earthly thirst needed quenching as well, and we spent quite a bit of time sitting in cafés drinking wonderful fresh juices. Sitting outside basking in the sun in February, overlooking the Mediterranean while sipping on a lemon mint juice....hard days, hard days.

Of course, when we had energy to get out of the hotel jacuzzi, we did pretty much all the obligatory tourist stuff as well. We visited Pompey's Pillar, which has survived since the days of the Roman emperors, and we also went to see Egypt's only Roman amphitheatre, which is nice but quite small, and must have been very intimate when gladiators were fighting in the middle. On the site around it a temple and what might be remains of Alexandria's ancient university are being excavated, indicating that there might be a lot more to see here in a few years. We also went on a long walk through some quite lively areas out to Alexandria's citadel Fort Qaitbey, and of the other mandatory tourist attractions we saw the Alexandria National Museum (which you can read about here), the library (see here) and the catacombs (which I wrote about here).

My dad by Pompey's Pillar

Me in front of a sphinx by Pompey's Pillar

My dad at the Roman amphitheatre

Fort Qaitbey

Of the less mandatory tourist sights, we visited the museum dedicated to the big poet of Alexandria, the Greek poet Constantine Cavafy. The museum is situated in his old flat where you can find some of his belongings and a lot of pictures of and information about him and his family and friends, and in addition it contains a very talkative and enthusiastic museum guard, happy to finally be able to share his knowledge with someone.

My dad outside the Cavafy Museum

On the last day we went to the palace gardens of Montazah, which used to belong to King Fouad. The perfect place for a stroll in the sun, with the view of some nice beaches, this was of course where we were surprised by rain and wind so heavy that we had to find shelter indoors.

Me in the Montazah gardens

The palace

A lot of the time we were just walking around as well, which was really nice as I don't normally walk that much in Alexandria. It was nice exploring some new areas and discovering some places. Being on holiday in Alexandria made me like the city a lot more again. We had time to do so much during my dad's visit - hard to believe he only stayed for four days. It was really great to spend some time with him . It was sad when he left, but I was still happy that he managed to change his ticket home - he found out when he got to the airport that his ticket was for a month later.

Me in the market in Manshiya which we walked through

My dad on the Corniche

In other news, I joined Rotaract in holding another outing for the street children, this time in a school where we played games with them. It was a great day, and I got to know some of the girls a lot better.

Valentine's Day took me by surprise here: it's astonishing how easy it is to miss when there's not a month of advertising beforehand. When the day was here, however, the Egyptians put heart and soul into the celebrations: hoardes of people in the streets were wearing red for the occasion, and many shops were excessively decorated, one with a gate of red balloons outside the entrance. But you know what, I can forgive the tackiness - Valentine's Day means free cupcakes at school!