Photos from al-Alamein

here's the link to photos from a trip i took yesterday to ruins of a Coptic monastery at Meri Menos and the WWII battlefield and cemeteries at al-Alamein:

http://tufts.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2058413&l=e6048&id=1707686

The trip was really nice, especially our stop at the ruins. The ruins are situated near a present-day Coptic monastery, so we started our trip there, where we ran into hundreds of Coptic pilgrims who were there attending mass. We then hiked out about 20 minuted from there across desert-ish terrain, where we ran across a herd of sheep and then a herd of camels, very exciting. We finally reached the ruins, which were a lot more extensive than I was expecting based upon the description I had been given by one of the guys with us who had been there before. The ruins were actually of an entire pilgrim town where this monastery had been in the 3rd century (if I'm remembering my history correctly), including the town's hostel that had hot and cold baths. The town had a bit of the feel of Pompeii, although on a much smaller scale. And sadly, the ruins are not all that well preserved (you're allowed to climb all over the ruins if you want). There is, however, a guide who showed us around a bit. He was very nice, and I was excited because I was able to understand a lot of his explanations about the history of the monastery in Arabic. Unfortunately, he seemed to take a liking to me, and after he told me my Arabic was good and that I was beautiful, we felt like it might be time to go before he got the chance to ask me if I was engaged. (Which, for the record has happened on a few occasions now...and more than once I've pretended to be engaged so as to not be hassled any further.)

After that, we continued on to al-Alamein, the site of the famous WWII battle, which was considered a turning point for the Allies. As I was with 3 guys who are really into history, I think they might have been a little more excited about this than I was. But I definitely enjoyed it - we visited the museum, where we were allowed to actually climb onto the tanks used in the battle (the guys I were with suddenly turned into 5 year old boys playing tanks), and then visited both the English and German cemeteries. All in all, a very enjoyable, if exhausting day.