TUNISIA, DAY 3: TUNIS - THE BARDO MUSEUM

 March 22, 2024

On our way to our next destination, we passed by the Tunisian Parliament building.  Its style really seems to fit what we had seen of the country. I love it.

Somewhere near there we picked up our guide Feker's cousin (on the right next to Stan, below):

There are multiple gates to the old town/medina of Tunis still standing, and this is one of them: the Bab Saadoun gate, first constructed as one arch in 1350 and reconstructed in 1881 with three arches to better handle the traffic. The wall it was once part of is gone, but the gate remains as the central feature of a modern roundabout.

Wikipedia has a picture of what it looked like with one arch in 1880:

. . . and another photo from 1940 showing what it looked like when the wall was still there.

TUNISIA, DAY 2 CONT.: KAIROUAN - MAUSOLEAM SIDI ABID AL-GHARIANI, ZAWIYA OF SIDI SAHIB, THE EL JEM AMPHITHEATER, COUNTRY ROADS, THE MEDINA, AND A PARTY AT OUR HOTEL

March 21, 2024

As we walked deeper into the old town section of Kairouan, we came to the Mausoleum of Sidi Abid Al-Ghariani.

This building was built as a madrasa (school for studying the Quran) in the 14th century by a Kairawani scholar known as Al-Jadidi. After he died while on a pilgrimage to Mecca in 1384 AD, his disciple Sidi Abid Al-Ghariani carried on his work. When Sidi Abid died in 1402 AD, he was buried here, and ever since the school has borne his name. 

It is a spectacular example of the local architectural style.

Check out this amazing craftsmanship:

I think this must be the tomb, but we were not allowed to go into the room itself and this photo was taken from the door.

TUNISIA, DAY 2: KAIROUAN - AGHLABID BASINS AND THE GREAT MOSQUE

 March 21, 2014

After a non-descript buffet breakfast in the hotel, our guide Feker picked us up at our hotel. This is the courtyard in front of our hotel, accessed by a wonderful stone gate.

A sign on the gate says a whole bunch of stuff in Arabic, and Porte de France, 13/03/1912 in French.

The gate marks the separation between the old medina and the new city.

From our room's balcony, which overlooked the square, I had seen a man strewing seed in the plaza. There were plenty of pigeons there scavenging for leftovers about half an hour later.

When Feker arrived, of course he took twenty or so photos.

TUNISIA, DAY 1: TUNIS, SIDI BOU SAID, HOTEL ROYAL VICTORIA

 March 20, 2024

Tunisia was never on my list of Travel Dreams, but it has been on Bob's for a while.

We have traveled in Morocco and Egypt, Israel, and Jordan, so I suppose it was time to hit a central North African country. It is, in fact, the northernmost country of Africa.

Here is a zoomed in view of the map that gives perspective on the relative size and location of Malta.

According to Wikipedia, Tunisia is about the size of Wisconsin but has twice the population (11.7 million compared to 5.9 million). After a revolution in 2011 that overthrew the president of 24 years, Tunisia became the only democratic state in the Arab world in 2014, and that lasted until a bit of slippage in 2020, but it is still considered a "hybrid" regime. It has one of the highest per capita incomes on the African continent.

The flight from Valletta to Tunis was only about 40 minutes long--about the time it takes to take off and land with a few minutes of flying in between. 

One note on getting cash: We usually withdraw money from an ATM in the airport in the local currency. At this airport, we were only able to withdraw 200 dinar--about $70. Chris and Stan couldn't get their card to work at all, so we withdrew dinar for them as well. This is a trick we learned about in Indonesia. If you can only withdraw relatively small amounts, you'll have to withdraw funds more often, which means you'll have to pay their bank fees more often. Very annoying.

We were picked up at the Carthage Airport by the local man who would be our guide for the next three days, Feker. We quickly discovered the Feker likes to take photos.  The first thing he did was line us up in front of the terminal for a picture.

MALTA, DAY 3: DAPHNE GALIZIA MEMORIAL AND VALLETTA'S CO-CATHEDRAL OF ST. JOHN

 March 20, 2024

On our last day in Malta, our first stop was at a makeshift tribute to Daphne Galizia. Before the trip I had read the book A Death in Malta by her son Paul Galizia, so I was excited to see the monument. 

Daphne Galizia was an outspoken investigative journalist and activist who spoke out about financial and political corruption in the Maltese government and other places. She was also known for her investigative reporting on the Panama Papers, which exposed international financial graft, fraud, and tax evasion involving many prominent figures worldwide, including many Maltese officials.

Galizia was extremely popular and respected. Her blog attracted over 400,000 views, more than the combined circulation of all the country's newspapers. Tragically, her popularity got her killed. In October 2017, Galizia was killed by a car bomb just a few meters from her home. She was 53 years old.

This memorial to her is placed around the base of the Great Siege of 1565 Monument, a bronze created in 1927 by Maltese sculptor Antonio Sciortino to honor the successful resistance of the Maltese Knights when the island was invaded by the Ottoman Empire. The three figures represent the virtues of Faith, Civilization, and Valor--appropriate virtues to relate to Daphne Galizia.

One corner of the memorial included photos of Alexei Navalny, a Russian who similarly fought corruption in his own government and who died while in a Russian prison, presumably at the hands of his captors.