Day 7

We planned to leave the house this morning at 10am so around 11:30 we finally made our exit. Today we headed to Coptic Cairo which is the Christain hold out in Cairo. This part of the city dates back to the 6th century BC and it is thought that Jesus, Mary and Joseph frequented the area on vacation from time to time. The Copts are Egyptian Christains who have been around since right after Jesus. I really don't feel like going into the details of coptic Cairo, so if you want to know more, go here:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coptic_Cairo. There is some violence against the Copts in this area, so there were a lot of guards and military police. In 1992 there was an earthquake in Cairo andmany of the buildings in Coptic Cairo suffered major damage. We went first to the Hanging Church which dates back to around the 3rd century AD. Its called the Hanging Church because the middle is suspended over a below ground fortress of some sort. It's being renovated so we didn't get the full effect but it was cool anyways. Parts were being repainted by those scientist/artists who repaint ancient things. I can't think of what they are called at the moment. Here are some cool pics though:

From there we went to the convent and church of St. George which was rebuilt after a fire in 1904. Much of the Coptic art and propaganda is reminiscent of that of Latin Catholics. Here are a few pics from the courtyard and from the street outside as well as one of the most fantastic discoveries I've made thus far - apple Fanta!!!:

Once we got our Jesus fill for the day (which didn't take long)we decided it was time to go shopping. We went to a little silver shop Sarah has been to before where we haggled our way into a pretty sweet deal. I got 2 pairs of sterling silver earrings and a sterling silver pendant for about 200 Egyptian Pounds which comes to about $35 US. AWESOME. For dinner we ordered pizza - mushroom and oregano - delicious!!!! Tomorrow we are headed to Islamic Cairo to see the Citadel and Mosques, better break out the Burqa!