Sultan Hussain in B & W

Some of the black and white photos from my visit to Sultan Hassan and Al Rafaii mosques

A View between the two mosques

A door to one of the Madrassas in Sultan Hassan

One of the new windows in Al Rafaii mosque

Lamps in the Beautiful Sultan Hassan

Koranic inscription, Sultan Hassan
Doorway, Sultan Hassan

A door in the Sultan Hussain Mosque

The pathway between the two mosques looking towards the Citadel

Carving Detail on the door of the Sultan Hussain mosque, they knew how to make 'em in the 13th Century....
The lamps in the mosque

A Double Mosquer

Another Satur

day morning, another mosque. Well two actually. I had spotted these two great building on the way down to Ibn Tulun and so decided they were worth a visit. There are two fantastically large and dirty building siturated close to one another, you would think they are the same aged but one is about 600yrs older than the other....Cairos ability to cover everything in dust and dirt means they look alike.

On the way down the autostrad was its usual entertaining self (man sitting on meat)

This was the first mosque I had to pay to get in, we had a laugh with the little lady in the ticket office, I apparently do not look like a student or a muslim so had to pay the 25EGP to get in! I read up on them before I went so was ready and armed with lots of info. The first was the Sultan Hassan Mosque, built in 1356AD. It was very atmospheric and I actually saw another tourist! Only one! The main mosque area built around the Sabil has 4 large arches with some great very long hanging lanterns - very hard to get a decent photo. In each corner there was a door for a madrassa (school) for each one of the 4 Sunni schools of islam, Shafii, Malakii, Hanafi and Hanbali. This is one impressive building with some very nice carvings on the walls, Ahmed helpfully told me they were "from the Koran" when I asked what they were. The great arches and lanterns are very photogenic but I needed a real wide angle lens which I don't have yet (hint hint!). I went black and white on some of the good photos Ill post them later.....

Outside of Sultan Hassan

One of the arches and the laterns

More lanterns

More lanterns outside the mosque

More lanterns

The impressive facade of the Sultan Hassan

Sultan Hassan with the Citadel in the distance

The sabil

We then cross over to the Al-Rifaii mosque built in the late 1800s till 1912. Again an impressive building. The little boab (guard) sensing a little Beksheesh coming his way (tip) opened the mausoleum in the back which has some interesting tombs, including Farouk the king of Egypt and for some reason Reza Pahlavi, the last Shah of Iran. Parting with a little Beksheesh we came back out into the sunlight and back home for some rest from the growing heat.

This is going to cost me some Beksheesh....

The late Shah of Iran

Farouk, King of Egypt

Egyptian wiring! Dating from 1890!

Ibn Tulun Visit

Saturday morning at Ibn Tulun Mosque without the tourists was great for me, but not for the ecomony! I decided to start visiting some of the lesser known sites every weekend for a couple of hours before it gets too hot, and alway wanted to come to Ibn Tulun as it features in James Bonds A spy who loved me. We headed down the autostrad dodging normal Cairo traffic towards the citadel area.

The Muhammed Ali mosque - the Citadel, in the distance.

Ibn Tulun is incredibly picturesque in a photographic/architectual way, a really beautiful buidling in Islamic Cairo. Its apparently Cairos oldest, or oldest unchanged Mosque, but as always in these things theres always a bit of mosque-up-man-ship and there are quite a few oldest mosques in Cairo. This one has a good case being from at least 868-884 AD, which even europeans say in an America accent “Gee thats old”.

Street view old Cairo

We found our way there by Ahmed the Driver knowing it was in the shadow of the Citadel and me looking at google earth before setting off - which was good as Ahmed does not know his Sultan Hassan mosque from his Ibn Tulun so we have arguments in the car like an old married couple, We passed some of the other sites i was scouting for later trips - there some really nice builings in this area, and stop first at the recently burnt out police station.

Apparently the mosque was constructed on a small hill called Gebel Yashkur, "The Hill of Thanksgiving."and according to some this is where Noahs Ark ended up after the flood. Well I can tell you now he would have trouble parking an Ark today, it was difficult enough finding a spot for a small 4x4.

The mosque is constructed around a courtyard, with one covered hall on each of the four sides. This set up give plenty of options for tasty “corridor” shots with the mosque laterns heading off into the distance.

It was very all photogenic and cool in both a "cool" and het cool sense! In the centre of the square is the 13th Century Sabil (place where the water is to wash, now empty apart from a few coke bottled and crisp packets).

The little chap at the door asked Ahmed if I would like to go up the minaret. The minaret is famous for having the steps on the outside in a spiral, one of only two in the world and according to the Great Guru wikipedia is from 1296. In 38oC it was quite a climb but worth it for the view of over the mosque and the Cairo negihbourhoods, Ahmed, like many egyptians, is not the fittest and was puffing by the time he got to the top! sure he was not in any fit state to do the call to prayer.

We also looked down into a small mosque or Madrassa from the minaret that looked interesting so we headed there next, and they two little boabs (guards) welcomed us in. It was called the Madrassa Sarghatmish. It was much more like the Syrian mosques with lots of cooling marble and large lamps. The boab took us into one of the little locked rooms off the courtyard which are individual Madrassas (schools).

Certainly one of my favourite trips to do in Cairo.

Super star Amr Diab Live in Concert....

Last night we went to a party to celebrate 100 years of Shell in Egypt at the Dusit Thani Hotel, not far away. Apart from being "dry" it was a super party, well over 1000 people, including ministers etc so lots of security and pleasantries, very good food and nice entertainment. Highlight of the evening was the famous Egyptian singer, Amr Diab and

his band, played for about 1.30hrs. Most expats had never heard of him, but Ahmed the Driver plays his CDs alot in the car so we know him well. Great stuff, even though we could only understand a few words the music was really good and we recognised some of the songs (Egyptian chart CDs are really cheap - 20 EGP, approx 2 english pound So we had a great time. Nearly missed the main course as we sneaked out to the bar in the other part of the hotel and found most of the other expats hiding out there like 6th formers sneaking out for a quick drink! (and Mrs T also took in a bottle of "water" of the Bombay Sapphire variety and seem to order quite a few tonic waters!). Of course the only thing that could out-do Amr Diab as the main attraction was the tombola.....cultural difference eh?