"The most gorgeous medieval buildings are being painstakingly restored in Islamic Cairo and discerning tourists are walking past Khan Al-Khalili into a medieval city of wikalas, through mighty Fatimid gates and sitting down to rest inside the Hassan Mosque, where Crusader knights were once chained for their sins. . . . In the Bayt El Suhaymi Area, urban regeneration has transformed apartments and has pedestrian-friendly streets into the most attractive urban environment that wouldn’t be out of place in Paris’s Latin Quarter.
Random tour guides will happily lead you into the madrasas (Islamic schools) and mosques, including that of Sultan Zahir Barquq, where for a small ‘donation’ you can climb to the top of the minaret and get a real sense of the beehive nature of the community where Naguib Mahfouz was born and wrote about so often.
Possibly the next project may be to restore Naguib Mahfouz’s birth place. It is next to the Mosque-Madrasa of Amir Mithqal, where a tunnel turns into an alley that runs to Fishawis, the famous coffee shop in the Khan Al-Khalili."
Random tour guides will happily lead you into the madrasas (Islamic schools) and mosques, including that of Sultan Zahir Barquq, where for a small ‘donation’ you can climb to the top of the minaret and get a real sense of the beehive nature of the community where Naguib Mahfouz was born and wrote about so often.
Possibly the next project may be to restore Naguib Mahfouz’s birth place. It is next to the Mosque-Madrasa of Amir Mithqal, where a tunnel turns into an alley that runs to Fishawis, the famous coffee shop in the Khan Al-Khalili."
See the above page for the full story.
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