Ailsa’s travel photo challenge: Transportation

Someone is going out in style in what must be a Christian funeral, the carriage decked with a cross and angels, moving past a mosque!  This is the first mosque built in Heliopolis, the present-day outer suburb of Cairo which the Belgian Baron Empain built out of the desert in the early 1900s.  The mosque was built in 1911 in Mosque Square (Midan al-Gami).

The photo shows a pretty blend of Islamic and Christian ‘architectural’ embellishment, particularly the rooftops, the parts closest to heaven…  I also couldn’t help noticing the Egyptian religious tolerance of the 1940s.

Egyptian funeral, c1941
Egyptian funeral, c1941

Thanks to Ailsa for proposing this transportation theme for a photo challenge this week.  Everyone should see her fantastic shots taken from plane windows:  http://wheresmybackpack.com/2012/12/14/travel-theme-transportation/

7 Replies to “Ailsa’s travel photo challenge: Transportation”

  1. One of favorites, For me it looks more like a wedding cart. There’s something written in Arabic above the boy’s head, if u have a better quality I’d tell what exactly it is 🙂

  2. I’ve enlarged the photo in the post, but I don’t know if the detail will be better. If you zoom in on it you might be able to read it.

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