In 1983, a 20-year-old kid from California wandered into a marketplace in downtown Cairo, Egypt, looking for some eggs to cook for dinner. What he found in the Suq Bab el-Louq was a fascinating world of commerce, ritual, community, and personal drama - constantly changing, yet unchanged for decades upon decades. Truth is indeed more amazing than fiction. These stories draw the reader into an intimate connection with the people of a culture that few Westerners have experienced at this level, a culture that we must understand better as we seek to understand and live in harmony with the Arab world. The stories within are endangered. Much has changed in Cairo in the past thirty years, and the suq and its denizens have all but disappeared as the internet and world trade have altered the way we shop. In the pages of this unparalleled book, the suq lives on. This is a collection of stunning black and white photographs with a gripping narrative story of the Suq's denizens and how the place works. Economists, historians, travelers, political scientists, fans of the Middle East, and general readers will be entranced by this almost uncategorizable but unmissable gem of a book. Come inside. You will never forget what you find.
About the Author: Steve Farley is a visionary, motivational, highly entrepreneurial leader who in addition to being an award-winning artist and author is also an Arizona State Senator, although he hopes you won't hold that against him. He is a professional photographer and public artist with a national reputation for his large digital photographic murals (see stephenfarley.artistwebsites.com) and community-building large-scale tile murals (see Tilography.com). Farley took his first photograph with a Kodak Instamatic at the age of six. In the following decades he has traveled the world, finding engaging stories and imagery everywhere, and bringing it back to you. As a citizen activist he initiated Tucson's $189 million Modern Streetcar system from the ground up, organized residents and businesses, and galvanized an initially skeptical region to obtain funds from multiple sources to build a system that has revitalized a downtown that spent decades in decay. A true Renaissance man, he is also working on two historical novels -- one about the founding of Rhode Island, and another tracing the steps of his teenaged Civil War ancestor across the South, with a twist -- the setting is today. He has been honored in Arizona with awards including Best Debater, Best Elected Official, and Leader of the Year for Public Policy, and he is a father with two daughters successfully launched into the world doing amazing things.