Ain Helwan

Saturday morning started out with breakfast at Leucille's with the Relief Society. There were over dozen of us squeezed in the back corner of the restaurant waiting for our omelets or french toast. Leucille's was apparently ranked to have the best burger according to the Time Magazine. After the breakfast, Nacia and I took off to see the wax museum. On the metro we got off at Ain Helwan and headed towards the museum. To our dismay, it was closed due to low visitations.

To make the day more exciting we decided to randomly take mini buses without knowing the destination. There is something about Egyptians that draw them to others businesses. People at the minibus depot tried to plan our trip and kept pointing us to tourist locations. They were confused that we wanted to be away from the touristy area and wanted to see other side of Egypt. People started to get frustrated and began raising their voices about our choices. I found that to be really amusing because they were so concerned about our experience in Egypt. We finally got into a minibus and got off on the last stop.

The first place we went was a community building. Locals would come and learn how to use the computer or just use the library. Besides this particular building and a market, there really wasn't anything else in the little town. The town was run down, dusty, and empty. People here seemed to be more down to earth than the people in the city although there was a young girl that threw a rock at me and young boys swearing at us. There was a man, probably named Mohamed, who was very nice and took us to the market. He used to work for the oil company but was fired because he was late one time and now he wants to become a taxi driver. He told us that Ain Helwan was mainly used for farming and it used to have beautiful springs but that all changed after an earthquake. Then the government decided to build plethora of apartments-go figure.

Since we had a little time left, we decided to go to one of the churches in Ma'adi where the Holy Family hid, and the place where they took off on the Nile. A Bible was found floating on the Nile near the church with pages opened to Isaiah 19:25, "Blessed be ye Egypt my people."After our little adventure, Aden and I went to CAC to see a volleyball match and finished the day with a McArabian burger. Yum.



How We Got There:
Took the metro line towards Helwan (1 EGP)
Got off on the Ain Helwan stop
There were few minibuses outside the metro (75 piasters)
Got off on the last stop

Trip Tips:
Don't wear flip flops just in case kids throw rocks at you

Good Stuff of the Day:
Not everyone is out to get you- whew

Make Room for Science:
The life span of a red blood cell is 120 days and its last nursing home is either the liver or the spleen. I personally would go to the spleen even if it has less space but if you're into drinking, the liver would be your choice.