Egypt Museum & City Sights

Today, our first stop was the Egyptian Museum. This is one of the most visited places in Egypt and contains thousands of artifacts. Our tour guide for the day, Zezo, told us the history on a numer of specific pieces…but nowhere near a majority of the items. We saw sarcophagi, statues, sculptures, papyrus, and the highlight…the King Tut exhibit. (We also saw a famous actress touring with a guide and her mom (Gina Gerschon)).

The museum is amazing. The size of the sculptures is sometimes enormous and sometimes tiny (the only one of Cheops is 7.5 cm tall). King Tut’s mask and burial coffins were beautiful. There were tons and tons of burial coffins, an overwhelming amount. Some of them were wood with minimal writing, others were full of artwork, and some were gilded with gold.

The photos included here are the outside of the museum, no cameras are allowed inside.

We left the museum and headed to the Citadel. The Mohammed Ali Mosque is the large mosque within the Citadal walls. It is very large, heavily visiting by tourists, and the interior was very interesting. You can see the numerous domes as seen from the outside; the interior ceiling is painted a dark green that looks black and contains designs. At the top of each of the four pillars, there is a circle containing some Arabic writing. From the ceiling, hangs a large chandelier and ‘rings’ of lights that resemble candle lighting. This mosque is one that allows non-muslims to enter, but you must follow tradition and remove your shoes.

We then went to Old or Coptic Cairo. Here we visited two Christian churches; the Hanging Church and Church of St. George. Our guide explained that only about 20% of the people in Cairo are Christian.