Now we visit Egypt, a transcontinental nation that links northeast Africa to the Middle East. There are around 115 million people living here, and the capital is Cairo, a massive, vibrant “city of a thousand minarets” located on the banks of the Nile. The official language is Arabic.

Egypt covers about 1,001,450 square kilometers (386,660 square miles). To imagine its size, the country is roughly the same size as the state of Texas and New Mexico combined in the U.S.. It is larger than France and Germany put together. Almost the entire population lives along the narrow green strip of the Nile River, which accounts for only about 3% of the total land area.

The most popular sport is Football, with the national team (the “Pharaohs”) and local clubs like Al Ahly enjoying massive fanbases. Their national animal is the Steppe Eagle, which appears on the national coat of arms as a symbol of authority and strength.

The flag consists of three horizontal stripes of red, white, and black with the golden Eagle of Saladin in the center, where the red represents the period before the revolution, the white symbolizes its peaceable nature, and the black stands for the end of the oppression of the Egyptian people.

The food is savory and steeped in tradition. You must try Koshary, a unique and filling mix of pasta, rice, lentils, and chickpeas topped with a spicy tomato sauce and crispy onions. Another staple is Ful Medames, a dish of slow-cooked fava beans that has been a breakfast favorite since the time of the Pharaohs.

Egypt is home to the Great Pyramid of Giza, the only one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World that is still largely intact. It was built with such precision that we are still studying how the ancient engineers achieved it! The Nile River, the longest in the world, is the lifeblood of the country, providing water to a desert landscape for millennia. In the south, the city of Luxor is often called the “world’s greatest open-air museum” because it contains the ruins of the temple complexes at Karnak and the Valley of the Kings. Egypt also controls the Suez Canal, one of the most important waterways in the world, which allows ships to travel between Europe and Asia without sailing around Africa.

From the golden sands of the Sahara to the colorful coral reefs of the Red Sea, Egypt is a land where ancient history and modern life flow together like the Nile itself. Shukran! That means “Thank you!”