The personal and professional website of Douglas Van Bossuyt
The Ribat at Monastir. Many movies were filmed here including Life of Brian. Almost any film that has the city walls of Jerusalem in it is actually filmed in Tunisia.
President Habib Bourguiba’s Mausoleum.
“0000001” – President Bourguiba’s ID number.
His desk.
His suit.
The honor guards like posing for photos.
From Sfax, we traveled on to Monastir to visit the holy grail of Tunisian cinematography, as far as I’m concerned. The Ribat where scenes from Monty Python’s Life of Brian was filmed. Oh, and a bunch of religious shows and movies like Jesus of Nazareth were shot there. There’s also a little grave we visited. It’s the grave of the first president of Tunisia, Habib Bourguiba.
That’s some good Ojja Merguez! We found a restaurant in the Medina at Monastir to eat at. We also had octopus salad and mechuea (unsure on the spelling of that).
The Holy Grail of the Tunisian film industry, the Ribat at Monastir.
Yes, Xiyun is as big of a nerd as I am. She likes to read the travel books when she visits the sites.
The grand mosque of Monastir.
This is a very typical Tunisian work scene. They are taking down the old street lights to put up fashionable new lamp posts to make the corniche more attractive for tourists. The forkliftish yellow vehicle is broken down. The tractor with the bucket won’t start and the dump truck, trying to pass around on the sidewalk, has stalled out. This has backed up traffic in both directions quite a good distance. The taxi is trying to get through a completely blocked road rather than having to go around the very long way. It took them about twenty minutes to get the truck moved so they could push start the tractor to get the lamp post out of the way and then tow the forklift off the road.
Xiyun likes cannons.
Deep in the bowels of the Ribat. What a place! It is full of twisting and turning tunnels and passages and rooms. A person could get lost in there and never find his or her way out!
We saw a very odd sight inside the Ribat’s main courtyard. Chairs. Thousands of them! Pouring forth from an unseen source.
The Ribat is right in the flight path of incoming flights to the international airport in Monastir aptly named Habib Bourguiba International Airport.
LOOK OUT BEHIND YOU! THE CHAIRS! THEY’RE COMING!
Such a picture perfect grand mosque right by the sea.
These chairs are insane!
The graveyard.
Digging a fresh grave.
The funeral procession.
Burying the dead.
The coffin must be reused as the guys carried it away to the road. Later on a van showed up and loaded the coffin in the back.
The CHAIRS!!!!
On top of the watchtower.
ROMANS GO HOME!
The funerary complex of Habib Bourguiba.
The main chamber.
The big guy himself.
A closeup of the mausoleum. There was an interesting display of Bourguiba’s personal items including his passport and national identity card. His ID number is 00000001.
When we got back to Tunis I went over to Xiyun’s apartment where we had a lamb couscous. It was very yummy!