CLINICAL MATTERS

Alexandria is a city in northern Egypt on the shores of the Mediterranean Sea. It is the second largest city in Egypt and is the largest city on the coast of the Mediterranean. It is named after Alexander the Great, who founded the city in 330 BC. Alexandria, with its port and easy access to the rest of Egypt, was a major center of Greek and Roman civilization. Nowadays, it is home to 6,000,000 people and remains an important regional economic and industrial hub due to its proximity to the Suez Canal. Unfortunately, it is not as popular a tourist destination as Cairo. This is a shame because such a great city shouldn’t be in the shadow of any other as it can hold its own with its storied history.

We included Alexandria in our itinerary because we had heard so much about the Lighthouse of Alexandria, one of the wonders of the ancient world, as well as the Library of Alexandria which was one of the largest and most important libraries in antiquity. The original structures are long gone, but we did want to see where they originally stood to understand why they were built and gather some insight into the people who created such amazing edifices.

Most tourists who come to Alexandria stay in hotels in the new part of Alexandria on the coast, with its modern conveniences and glittering malls. We opted to stay in the old part of Alexandria, in a hotel we self-booked across from the ruins of Kom El Deka and within walking distance from the world-renowned Greco-Roman Museum. The hotel looked sketchy at first since the first floor of the building was filled with market stalls, but there was a doorman on duty at the entrance to guide guests. We rode an antique elevator to the tenth floor where our room was located. The hotel and the room in which we stayed were well-appointed, clean, and spacious. The best part was our room’s balcony which looked over the Roman ruins and had a fantastic view of Alexandria. 

We were picked up by our driver and guide the next day and our first stop was the Citadel of Qaitbay. This is a 15th-century fortress on the island of Pharos. It is an impressive building, with thick stone walls and a mosque inside the structure. However, what really draws people to this Citadel is that it was built on the site of the famed Lighthouse of Alexandria. The Lighthouse was built in the third century by Ptolemy II and was said to have been more than 100 meters tall. Unfortunately, it was destroyed in a series of earthquakes despite efforts to restore it and was eventually abandoned until the Citadel was built. In 1994, some French archaeologists diving in the Eastern Harbor discovered remnants of the lighthouse along with wharves, houses, and even temples with statues from the area that were submerged by repeated earthquakes. Relics were transferred to Egyptian museums, but there are enough artifacts that were left in place to serve as an underwater museum. Diving to see the ruins is allowed with permission from the Ministry of Antiquities.

Our next stop was the Catacombs of Kom El Shoqafa. This is listed as one of the Seven Wonders of the Middle Ages. It is a necropolis with extensive tunnels and Greek, Roman, and Egyptian tombs. This dates back as far as the second century and features complex architecture with exquisite murals, reliefs, statues, and carvings. It was rediscovered in the 1900s when a donkey accidentally fell through the access shaft. The guide informed us that sadly, the unfortunate donkey died instantly after falling about a hundred feet which is how deep the tombs go. It was cramped and crowded inside with all the people, but the underground tombs were worth seeing.

From the Catacombs we had lunch and did a little bit of shopping. We then went to Kom El Deka, the Roman ruins we saw from our hotel. The ruins included public baths with heated water from underneath, as well as a temple complex, lecture halls, and a theatre. It also had Roman villas with some well-preserved mosaics which were quite exquisite. We marveled at the fact that a major archaeological site could be right in the center of a major city despite the high value of the land, but the Egyptian antiquities authorities maintain that these sorts of treasures really belong to the entire world and Egypt is just doing its part as a good steward.

We finished our day at the nearby Greco-Roman Museum of Alexandria. It is considered one of the best museums in Egypt with over 40,000 objects in its collection. We were lucky because it had just reopened the year before after 18 years of renovation. The museum is densely packed with statues of Alexander the Great, Cleopatra, Marc Anthony, and the Ptolemaic Pharaohs. There was also a reconstruction of what life looked like in a house in Alexandria during Roman times using restored artifacts. We walked back to our hotel and turned in for our last night in Egypt. Our flight wasn’t until 7:00 pm the next day and we still had half a day to enjoy more of Alexandria.

We woke up bright and early and our first stop was the Pillar of Pompey. This is a massive, 88-foot stone pillar erected by the people of Alexandria to honor the Roman Emperor Diocletian who saved them from starvation. It used to support a statue of Diocletian which has since been lost. The pillar is constructed from pink granite from Aswan, and scholars continue to debate how such a large and heavy pillar could have been brought and raised on this site.

Our last stop was the Bibliotheca Alexandrina which is a modern structure set on the site of the Library of Alexandria. The original library was built by Ptolemy II and was renowned in ancient times for its hundreds of thousands of papyrus scrolls. Archimedes was supposed to have come up with the idea of the Archimedes screw which transports water for irrigation while doing research in the Library. Eratosthenes, who first accurately calculated the circumference of the earth, was the third librarian of the Library of Alexandria and he was able to make his estimates and create maps based on source documents in the library. The original library may have been damaged by fire when Julius Caesar attacked Alexandria in the first century. Successive wars destroyed what was left by the third century. The current structure was a project conceptualized in 1974 and was built in partnership with UNESCO. The modern library is a huge structure incorporating elements from many different cultures with space for eight million books. We were given a tour of the library which highlighted its architectural elements and its different exhibits, and we were told that our entrance tickets allowed us to access thousands of books on the library’s website.

Before we said goodbye to Egypt, our guide told us about the search for the tomb of Alexander the Great. Its location is one of the enduring mysteries of the ancient world, and people have been looking for it for centuries. His coffin is purportedly made of solid gold, and he was buried with many other treasures. The only thing that is certain is that it is in Alexandria, and over a hundred attempts to find it have all failed. However, many clues have been uncovered and archaeologists have pinpointed a location with enough confidence that they are about to move an entire apartment hi-rise off the site so they can start digging. What a modern-day Indiana Jones tale that would make if they finally find it. With that cliffhanger of a mystery, we boarded our plane and said goodbye to Egypt. This was the trip of a lifetime, but it feels like this enigmatic country is not yet done giving up all its secrets.