Hurghada - First Time in Mosque

Columns Outside Hurghada Mosque

Someone (hello, Holger!) misinformed me that Hurghada was the only mosque in Egypt that didn’t allow foreigners inside. Either I misunderstood or things have changed because, to my surprise, I discovered that foreigners, and even women, were allowed to enter the building.

I started off showing Lena the outside of the mosque, which I’ve seen now on several occasions, while we assessed whether the rumour that we could go in was true. The public square outside is huge and it’s good to wander round anyway and observe the impressive building, funded by the people of Hurghada. Anyway, as we were walking about, somebody stopped us and said that we had to wear a galabaya, obtainable from a cabin at the other side of the mosque. This was news to me, since on no previous occasion had this been required.

Not wishing to argue, we went over to the booth and dressed appropriately (although neither of us was skimpily clad in the first place). Now looking like two good Muslim women, we re-entered the square, taking photos of each other. A guy beckoned us to indicate that we could go inside if we wished. We took our shoes off and went in.

The mosque was clearly set up for tourists  as inside there was a model of the mosque and free brochures explaining various aspects of Islam in a number of languages. The large rug covering the floor indicated where the men needed to kneel to pray (women had a separate building). I believe any text on the walls was passages from the Koran. Once we'd finished looking, we returned to the cabin to hand back our galabayas. Again, the guy inside helped us and we did our best to ensure our t-shirts didn’t walk up our backs as the galabayas came off. I went in second and gave the man our baksheesh.

As I exited, Lena was waiting for me outside,open-mouthed. She informed me that a random guy sitting just outside the cabin had “got his tackle out” to show (wave at?) her on her way out! Right by the mosque and in broad daylight! So much for the women having to cover up! He’ll be lucky if he doesn’t end up getting his thing chopped off!