Alabaster Mosque Star

A late afternoon visit to a mosque gave me a tiny taste of what Justin Bieber's life must be like.  I couldn't understand why these young women were so eager to have my picture taken with them.  "They're not used to seeing blondes with green eyes," explained Shaimaa after several chased me, shouting my name and begging for individual selfies.  "You'll be a star on Facebook tonight!"

Remember, this is a city where goats graze in the highway median, safe from the crazy automobile traffic.

We saw the Alabaster Mosque from a distance, and passed the quarry from which it was built.

Muhammad Ali, an Albanian and the progenitor of the last royal lineage in Egypt, built the grand mosque less than two centuries ago.

It's located within the Saladin Citadel which offers terrific views of the densely populated city with hundreds of other mosques.

We had to cover our shoes before we could enter the interior courtyard.  

King Louis Phillipe exchanged the brass clock in the tower for the Luxor obelisk that now stands in the Place de la Concorde.  It has never worked.

It smelled funny inside.

 

I took full advantage of my temporary celebrity status to photograph the super friendly, mostly young Muslims.