Islamic Cairo - Darb el Ahmar

This time we ventured up the other side of Al Azhar St, namely from Bab Zuweila up Darb el Ahmar. We took the metro to Ataba, then walked along past the Islamic Art Museum to Bab Zuweila, one of the old city gates. This is a very old residential neighbourhood that developed outside the city walls in medieval times. It was a Sunday, so very quiet with most of the shops closed. The first monument we were interested in was the Mosque of Qijmas al-Ishaqi, completed in 1481. The caretaker was sweeping the entrance mat in preparation for midday prayers and eagerly beckoned us in. This mosque is another in the late Mamluk style and reminded us of the Mosque of Qaitbey in the Northern Cemetery. Although very plain from the outside, it featured a beautiful dome, striped archways, stained glass windows and beneath the prayer mats was an inlaid marble floor, Further up the street was the Maridani Mosque of 1339, which we visited when we were here in 2007. It is a beautiful, peaceful place with a courtyard and fountain and we stopped inside for a rest the last time we explored the area. Like many of the old mosques in Cairo, it has granite columns sourced from Pharaonic monuments. A little further on we came to the Madrassa of Umm Sultan Sha'ban. Sultan Sha'ban built the madrassa for his mother in 1368 after he became Sultan at the age of ten, but was murdered in 1376 and buried here himself. What we really came to see was the Blue Mosque (Mosque of Aqsunqur) but this one was under restoration, the entire building covered in scaffolding and a crowd of people working on restoration of the minaret. This is the scaffolded minaret visible from Al Azhar Park, normally white at the top. One wall of the mosque had a crack from top to bottom, perhaps damage from the 1992 earthquake and the outer walls were very dusty, almost obscuring the blue tiles from which the mosque gets its name. Next to the mosque is a delapidated structure labelled as a Palace, at least one wall had fallen down and exposed what must have been a beautiful interior. Since we couldn't enter, we had to make do with photos of the street around the mosque, by this time the midday prayers were on so we turned around to go back. We stopped at cafes along the way but they all said they didn't have apple shisha so we decided to go back to the one we found by the Khan last time. On the way we noticed that most of the shops in the area were closed, and postulated that it might be safe to explore the Khan. Right in the heart of the Khan is an area called the Badestan which features some beautiful archways and ancient gates, but to get to this area you have to "run the gauntlet" of souvenir shops. Erin calls this area "A--hole Alley" so I made him promise not to get angry with anyone. Unfortunately, the shops here were all still open but we didn't have much hassle at all. The shop owners were too busy perving at some tourist tart wearing a crop singlet and micro-skirt. While in the area, we decided to enter the Madrassa-Khanqah of Barquq but it looked like it was closed. We saw some tourists coming out of an adjacent mosque so wondered if we could tip a custodian to let us in. A man approached us and said that we could go in if I paid 20 pounds and Erin paid 10 pounds - far more than we intended to tip and like hell am I going to pay a white skin surcharge. Erin thought it was hilarious. Then we went back to the main road to sort out getting a taxi back home. On the way we had to run the restaurant gauntlet, and then the taxi gauntlet. One taxi driver followed us all the way from the Hussein square to the Al Azhar flyover. I stood in a doorway while Erin tried to hail taxis. None of them would stop for him - he didn't think it was hilarious this time - and he made me come out so a taxi would stop. We decided to get a white taxi to avoid a rip-off, and as we had noted the meter the last time we drove past here we expected to pay around 8LE. One k down the road Erin noticed the driver hadn't turned on the meter. He said he had forgotten, but refused to subsequently turn it on and insisted "no problem". Unfortunately we didn't have exactly 8LE so anticipated a fight over the price at the end. Imagine our annoyance when the driver not only didn't give us any change, but tried to make out 10LE wasn't enough! We told him he should have turned on the meter and got out. It is just so annoying having to go out of our way to avoid a rip-off, and then still have them try it on. I truly believe that most Egyptians don't try to rip off tourists, but when it does happen it is so irritating that you feel you have to constantly be on your guard to avoid a potential rip-off situation and go through tedious preparations such as always having the correct change, checking prices in advance and on payment of the bill and watching what Egyptians pay. As of today, we will be adding the tedious preparation of asking drivers to turn on the meter.

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Part of trip: Egypt

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