It’s amazing that when I sit in Cambridge, Massachusetts with my computer and my thoughts I have no problem writing volumes about Cairo. Now as I sit at eleven o’clock at night on a couch in the guest house where we are staying, the cool night air busy with the sounds of horns, shouts of vendors and others on the street,and the hum of the city that never sleeps, I am struggling to put my thoughts into words and words into font.

Part of it is the understandable desire to live in the moment, knowing the moments are going all too quickly. They are speeding by like the cars and taxis on the corniche in Alexandria as I stand like a pedestrian trying to stop these moments like I try to stop the cars rushing by. And yet the other wish is to communicate the moments so that I have them next week as life settles into the more normal and the new year takes over with its demands.

So what are the moments? A speedy train to the city of Alexandria on the coast of the Mediterranean Sea; a city with a mixture of Middle Eastern and European flavors that breathes a rich history. Eating lunch at the Metropole Hotel in Alexandria where the ghosts of Christmas past linger in both the decor and methodical slow service of the staff. Walking on the Mediterranean Sea with the sea and palm trees to our left and minarets and old buildings on our right. Cappuccino at the Athineos hotel, known to seasoned travelers as number 47 in the list of 147 things to do in Alexandria, Egypt.  A taxi ride to find a hotel that seemed real online but a figment of the internet and my excitement of a “cheap but beautiful” hotel as we drove…and drove…and drove, finally finding it off a dark alley called a street. Our fears that this would be a dive never materialized – the hotel was as beautiful as represented and the owner even more so. If you’re ever in Alexandria look up Alexandria Mediterranean Suites. And then the moments of talk and mint tea – moments that will be treasured a life time.

These are the moments.  These are the moments to live in fully alive and present, the moments where there are no regrets.

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