Pictures from Cairo

Well, here is the first set of photos from my trip. I took around 1500 so this is just sampling, but it will give you a feel (I'm so tired now that the idea of pulling all these together for a scrapbook is overwhelming!)
Robin Palmer and I standing before the Great Pyramid.



And here is the entire Round Table Group (minus our facilitator Mitchell Williams who was unable to go with us.) Alice Syltie (Huntsville Unitarian Universalist), Bob Hurst (Huntsville United Church), Jim Roberts (Hope Presbyterian), Robin Palmer (Grace Presbyterian), Me, Jeff Ballon (Temple B'Nai Sholom), and David Freeman (Weatherly Heights Baptist).









Bet you didn't know I could hold the Great Pyramid in my hand! (By the way, this was my first of two camel rides.)

Entrance to one of the churches where it is believed that Mary, Joseph and Jesus stayed during their sojourn in Egypt. Below this church is a cave where they may have lived for a time.






Here is Bob Hurst standing before one of the paintings inside the tombs at Saqarra. Notice how bright the colors are in this painting despite its very great age!








Stepped Pyramid at Saqarra








Here is Mohammad, our security guard. And he truly did have an Uzi in his back pocket. We got a glimpse of how the President and others must feel with their secret service guys with them. At Saqarra, there were only three of us--Jeff, Bob, and me, and yet wherever we went, he followed.

This folks is a Whirling Dervish and he did whirl for what seemed like forever. It is truly something to see.

Cairo!

Well, we are here safe and sound. We left Huntsville at 4 p.m. on Wednesday and arrived here at6:30 p.m. Thursday Cairo time. That amounts to 17 hours of travel time with plenty of time changes. We flew from Huntsville to Atlanta to Paris and then to Cairo. We arrived on time and only one of us has lost luggage (not me!). But it was late so by the time we checked into the hotel and had a (wonderful) dinner it is now time to crash. So all I've seen so far is the airport, so I don't have any pictures to share yet.

It is Ramadan here and tomorrow is the last day so we get to be here for the big celebration at the end of the holiday!

One neat thing we did see today. As we were going through customs at the Cairo airport, a group of men had gathered for evening prayers. They stood, they chanted, they knelled and they chanted. All the while they were gathered under the customs sign which read, "Something to Declare."
Well, tomorrow we will see the great pyramids so hopefully, I'll have pictures to post.