Heat, dust, an incredible sense of length of history, phases of building and destruction, renewal and decay, these cliches don’t come anywhere close to giving you an idea of my first and ongoing impressions of this country. I suspect it will be quite a while before it gets into some kind of perspective. Jenny Bowker and her husband Bob are doing their best to ensure we come away with a lot of varied experiences to help that perspective crystallise. Just outside our hotel is this ivy encrusted building… I wonder what is holding which up ….

At the museum in front of the fabuous gold jewellery and other artefacts from Tutenkhamon’s tomb I had another watery knee, emotional experience in the vicinity of the magnificent outermost death mask, the one everyone has seen and which has become a an icon for the fabulous wealth of Egypt’s past – in itself it is 11kg of gold inlaid with finely crafted lapis…. the craftmanship on this ancient stuff is breathtaking, literally. We have had our first wander down a small part of the khan or market, but will be going back in the company of some other textile people, quilters, yet to arrive, and then we’ll focus on the tentmakers district. ( see Jenny Bowker’s blog for fabulous pictures and information on these textile workers) Last evening we had a lovely sunset felucca ride on the Nile observing the many faceted city from the water. We visited a glassblowing business where Jenny is clearly a frequent visitor and found ourselves at a project among the Zebelin, the garbage sorters, where the innate sorting skills of the young girls in that part of the community alongside the City of the Dead are being chanelled and educated into literacy at the same time they learn/hone weaving, papermaking and other productive skills to improve earning capacity in ways that are comfortable and acceptable to husbands and families. It has been clearly illustrated how well-meaning aid or assistance from outsiders can be anything but helpful without these factors being taken into full account: and this project is totally locally generated and run. We were so impressed – and happened along just as a local TV crew were doing a segment there – and Jenny found herself unexpectedly being pressed into being filmed as part of this doco. What a trouper – in a small crowded room with the outside temperature somewhere way over 100F, and one ineffective fan bravely churning on, wiping her sweaty brow and gathering a few well chosen words together, Jenny gave an excellent impromptu endorsement of the value of the work being done in this project, one in which she herself has given teaching time, sharing and passing on some of her textile skills to be absorbed and used by the organisers and participants as the range of skills and products grows and widen. Among other things I bought some wonderful little stitched note cards, and have ordered a wallhanging in a tufted weave using offcuts from textile manufacturing processes; it will be ready before we leave, taking only a couple of days.

While en route to several very interesting mosques we visited the City of the Dead and found it to be a fascinating, very positive place; not at all macabre. There we spent some time with several other of Jenny’s extensive network of friends around the city, the spinners, a little appreciated group of men who spin together single loosely plied threads of silk that comes to them on cones, producing fine silk cords. These are then passed on to garment makers and couched in lively swirling patterns onto blouses shirts and the long loose kaftans called gebalayahs that many wear. Early in the day and in the evening they spread out the threads in long arrays between the houses in the dusty streets of this city within a city, and using marvellous recycling of cycle wheels, pieces of timber, wire and all manner of other simple equipment, spin the cords together. Photos and descriptions of this craft will form the subject of another post when I can get some blog time together in this crowded amazing trip, or maybe not until after it.