“It gets into your system … the force and power of nonviolence.” The above quotation is taken from a Guernica essay by Eamon Kircher Allen that was published in April this year. In April I had just returned from Egypt and was about to embark on a summer course through the International Center for Nonviolent … Continue reading »
The Nile flows northward and so when you travel down the Nile, you are in fact going North. This is why the south of Egypt is called “Upper Egypt,” and is one of the ways that you have to turn yourself around when travelling through the country. There is certain gravity to sailing along the … Continue reading »
Our trip begins in Cairo on a Sunday, which for most of the Islamic world (including Egypt) is the equivalent of the Western world’s Monday: start of the work week. We are woken around dawn, given a breakfast box and bundled into a landcruiser driven by a man given the name Teddy Bear. The roads … Continue reading »
“Everything is becoming really hard.” Badr Abd El Moghny is apologizing for raising the modest entry fee to his mud and sandstone, fairytale-like home and art gallery. Since the revolution and in the midst of uncertainty, he tells us, prices have risen and he has to pay more for the postcards of his work and … Continue reading »
Photo essay published at Matador Network. It is just after 5 a.m. and our tour group is being herded onto a boat for the second morning in a row. We had made the same trip across to the Nile’s western bank yesterday, but a fierce wind had prevented us from boarding our waiting hot air … Continue reading »
Here was something I was completely unprepared for: the police escort. It was bad enough, in my mind, that I was confined to a tour group itinerary, a tour guide and the company of the same people; a police escort made it all sound even more stifling. Egypt relies heavily, depressingly heavily, on tourism, and … Continue reading »
They say that the time it takes to get over a relationship is two times the length of the relationship itself. How long, then, to come to terms with the end of travel? And does three weeks really give you enough to miss a place? My three-week trip ended two weeks ago but I still … Continue reading »
Back with this and starting with a woman I should have written about long before. After Samira Ibrahim, along with six other women, was subjected to a so-called “virginity test” last March, having been arrested in Tahrir Square, she bravely came forward and spoke publicly, and in detail, about what Amnesty International calls “a form … Continue reading »
(Note: My trip to Egypt was sponsored by a partnership between Adventure Center and MatadorU.) The temple at Kom Ombo is unusual in that it has a double dedication — to both Haroeris and Sobek. Our visit was also unusual in that we had the whole place to ourselves. The temple lies along the Nile, … Continue reading »
Dahab is lazy. I am lazy here. The main drag is lined with restaurants with plaintive names and the same menus where travellers lounge on cushions and rugs only expending energy to chase away hungry kittens from the low tables. The more active go diving, with companies that go by the same effortless names: Aqua … Continue reading »
