Our second morning in Cairo began with breakfast. While eating a piece of toast I (Corey) suddenly noticed what seemed like a seed ... or maybe a nut? ...were there nuts in this bread? I don't remember there being nuts in this bread. No, it turns it was a tooth - a crown, actually. A molar crown had fallen out. This was NOT on the itinerary. We are only two days into a twelve week adventure and I was concerned that this could put a wrinkle in our plans.

I rinsed off the crown and tried to contact my dentist at home, but, of course, it was the middle of the night there so no luck. Our tour guide said she would do her best to find someone in Cairo that would have an opening today, but wasn't sure on such short notice and during Ramadan.

Although the place where my crown had been was very sensitive to air and hot or cold liquids, the pain was minimal so we just decided to launch into the day as planned, including the pyramids, the sphinx, the museum, etc. During the day the pain started to get a little worse so I was grateful when, by the afternoon, our tour guide said she had found someone who would see me and then my dentist was able to call from home and talk me through likely scenarios and options.

We learned in the meantime that dentistry is so highly regarded in Egypt that people from other countries, including the UK and USA take "dental holidays" to come and have major dental work done because of the quality and cost. At 6:00 p.m. we arrived at Dr. Kareem's office where he took me back right away. His kind and gentle manner put me at ease as he quickly determined that a cavity had developed under the crown which likely led to it being detached. Over the next half hour he filled the cavity and put my crown back in place and then we got the bill for whole procedure ... $48.

It is good to have a reminder, right from the beginning, that guardian angels, kind and generous people are found everywhere even when they are not on the itinerary.