Kairouan

This biography traces the complete arc of her extraordinary life.

Her early years as a merchant's daughter in Kairouan and her family's perilous westward migration to Morocco.

Her deep immersion in Islamic jurisprudence, fiqh, and her early married life in Fez.

The tragic crucible of sudden loss that sparked her transformative vow.

Her hands-on management of the construction site, insisting every stone and drop of water be drawn directly from her own land.

Her rise as Um al-Binin, Mother of the Children, building a world-renowned library and establishing a permanent endowment, waqf, that ensured her vision would outlive dynasties, empires, and eleven centuries of history.

Chapter one: The Child of Kairouan.

Before dawn touches the walls of Kairouan, the city already breathes.

But sometimes I should just shut up and let you see the proof for yourselves, because it couldn't be more obvious.

This is Kairouan in Tunisia.

Once this was a city of enormous power, the most important Islamic outpost in North Africa.

Now it's a marvelous place to visit for any true student of the Dark Ages.

Kairouan, they say, was founded by the great Arab warrior Sidi Okba Ibn Nafi, who conquered these parts for Islam just 50 years after the death of the prophet.

When Sidi Okba got here, this was all desert.

But something made him pause and look down at his feet.

And in that water, a golden cup which he'd lost many years before at the holy spring in Mecca.

Thank you, Alex.

I grew up in Kairouan.

It's about, uh, 140 kilometer from Sfax, where I teaching as a assistant professor.

I- in Kairouan, I started practicing gymnastic at the age of six years old, and judo at the age of 10 years.

I was Tunisian champion, national champion of judo on several occasion from, uh, between 2000 and 2003.

Then, uh, between, uh, 2000 and, uh, 2005, I was a member of, uh, the national, uh, judo team, where I, uh, participated in several international camp and, uh, tournament.

When I'm back, I'll be in Tunisia next week to do another group tour.

I'm going to visit her personally in Taiwan and see if we can get things back going.

But regardless, even without the Solis Terrace experience, this wandering through the 17 filming locations of Indy's Cairo is epic.

It is so cool.