Bombing in Khan el Khalili

I don’t know if anyone has heard, but just in case, I figured it’d be a good idea to let everyone know I’m alive and kicking. There was a bombing in Khan el Khalili, which is the really famous bazaar in Cairo, only a 15 minute cab ride from our apartment. It’s the best place to find jewelry, scarves, herbs, spices, trinkets as well as numerous populated café’s and mosques. The place is full of people out till all hours of the night bumbling through tiny winding alleyways.

Anyway, the story is that two masked women, and possibly another man either planted or tossed a bomb into the square in front of Hussien mosque, killing four and wounding 18, mostly tourists. No one has accepted responsibility for the attack so there is a lot of confusion as to the purpose of the bombing. You can read about it here.

Basically it seems like everyone is really pissed off right now about the whole Gaza-Israel thing. It seems like we’re constantly hearing about people marching or protesting for Egypt to open its borders or aid Palestine. The Muslim Brotherhood is taking every opportunity to stir up trouble. A lot of other countries back Israel, so who knows. We’ll just have to wait and see what information the government here chooses to release.

I keep reading the Egypt Daily News and its scary the amount of stories you hear about people being taken away by plainclothes policemen and put in unmarked vans with license plates obscured just to reappear out of nowhere days later. An article recently was published about AUC students protesting to have ministry officials removed from campus because they interfere with there freedoms as students. All very strange, unnerving, and not to mention frustrating.

Paul and I actually had a very strange run in with some unmarked police. We were walking to Paul’s house pretty late one night, nothing out of the ordinary, managed to hail a cab on the mostly empty street, when two guys stopped the cabbie before he could pull away. They were wearing civilian clothes, but the one guy turned around and pointed at his gun in his holster and said “police, police”. They spoke no English, and our cabbie, who hardly spoke any English, had to try and translate. They asked for our passports, asked us where we were from (they had our passports at this point), asked if we were married, and then tried to tell us they were expired, to which we replied, “uhhhh...no”. Took a few minutes but they let us go on our merry way. Totally random experience. Our Egyptian friends said it’s typical for police not always to be in uniform, but that they were probably hoping something was up with our passports so they could blackmail us for some money. Crazy. I will not be letting go of my passport ever again.

Anywho, Obama said he plans to speak somewhere in the middle-east within his first 100 days in office, and it’s been rumored that his top spot may be Cairo. Paul and I are crossing our fingers that the rumors are true…because, c’mon…how cool would it be to be able to see Obama speak in Cairo? However, I’m mildly concerned the recent bombing could be a slight deterrent, but only time will tell.

Wishing everyone lots of peace, love, and harmony.