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Muhammad Ali (1769–1849), whose Childhood Home , now a museum, I had visited earlier, was born in Kavala . He went on to became the Khedive of Egypt and the founder of a ruling dynasty that lasted to 1952. In 1817 he established in Kavala an Islamic college for the training of imams. Although called the Imaret, it was known locally as the Tembel Hane , or “lazy man’s home”, since those who attended the school were guaranteed free pilaf daily and were exempted from military service. According to local sources the Imaret also operated a soup kitchen which fed up to 1000 indigent people a day. The buildings of the Imaret have now been remodeling into the five-star Imaret Hotel . It is a little out of my price range: the cheapest rooms are $350 a night; suites are well over a thousand a night. Even so, the place is often sold out. Make your reservations well in advance. Guided tours are offered to those to just want to look around without actually staying in the hotel.  Courtyard of ...

While in Kavala I wandered by the home of Muhammad Ali (1769–1849), who is often called the founder of modern Egypt. Muhammad Ali was born in Kavala and lived here until he was thirty. The house he lived in is now a museum. His family, who were ethnically Albanian, was involved in the tobacco business (one of the mainstays of the Kavala economy at the time) and his father was the commander of the local Ottoman troops. He himself entered the army and very quickly rose through the ranks, becoming Second Commander in the Kavala Volunteer Contingent of Albanian mercenaries that was sent to re-occupy Egypt following Napoleon Bonaparte's withdrawal in 1801. He quickly became the de facto head of Ottoman forces in Egypt and in 1805 the local ulema demanded that he be made the Wali or Viceroy of Egypt. It soon became apparent the Muhammad Ali intended to seize control of Egypt for himself, but Ottoman Sultan Selim III was unable to depose him. Finally in 1841, after he had attempted to...

From Thessaloniki I took a bus 100 miles up the coast to the city of Kavala. Two thousand years ago Kavala was known as Neopolis (New City). It was one of the main ports in Europe for ships arriving from the Levant. The  Apostle Paul , he of Road to Damascus Fame , first set foot in Europe here around A.D. 50. I do not know why, but I seem to keep visiting places where Paul had trod before. First there was Larnaka and Paphos on Cyprus Island, then Athens , Corinth , and Thessaloniki in Greece and now Kavala. This was not intentional, I assure you. I am not a Christian, and certainly not a fan of Pauline Christianity . Indeed, I am perfectly aware that many now consider Paul  An Insufferable Douchebag Or Wors e . However, I am more than willingly to entertain the idea, posited in the book  Jesus and the Lost Goddess , that most if not all the books in the New Testament attributed to Paul are forgeries and that he himself was a secret Gnostic: Of all early Christi...

After three months of semi-occultation in Zaisan Tolgoi , Mongolia, I flew from Ulaanbaatar to Istanbul. The plane left sixteen hours late because of a huge snow storm that hit Ulaanbaatar the night before. I was almost in a wreck on the way to the airport. The roads were horrific; cars were flying around like hockey pucks. Finally at one o’clock in the morning the plane took off. The flight to Istanbul took eleven grueling hours. Oddly enough for this flight, we encountered no turbulence,  not even over the Tian Shan . Because of the Recent Visa Flap  I did not go through Immigration in Istanbul, but continued directly on to Athens. As soon as the plane began its descent into the city we hit severe turbulence. For the first time in years I was overcome by motion sickness on an airplane. I would have hurled that there been anything in my stomach to hurl, but there wasn’t. Luckily I had skipped the in-flight breakfast. That would have been really gross.  I spent the night ...