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Africa Armenia Dubai Egypt Iran Iran Israel Jordan Lebanon Libya Morocco Oman Saudi Arabia Saudi Arabia Syria Tunisia Turkey Yemen Yemen
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The Caravan-Serai Team

Rita Zawaideh
Caravan-Serai Tours, Inc. wholly owned by Rita Zawaideh. Rita is an Arab-American who has lived in the United States since emigrating here at an early age with her family. She is an international business woman in addition to small business owner and certified travel counselor. She holds a Masters degree in Arabic studies from the University of Washington, and since graduating, has written extensively on the Middle East and North Africa. Rita has lived and traveled in many of the countries of the Middle East and North Africa as well as Europe.

Rita founded Travel Express, Inc., the precursor to Caravan-Serai Tours, in 1984 as a full service travel agency after having been in travel agency outside sales for several years. She built her clientele based on travel to the Middle East and North Africa, and thus Travel Express became known as the US travel experts to these regions. Today the vast majority of our business is to overseas destinations.

Because our reputation for such travel spread by word of mouth from the many satisfied individuals, businesses, organizations and educational institutions, Rita responded to the demand for tours to the Middle East and North Africa by founding Caravan-Serai, Inc., a wholesale land tour company which designs tours for individual travel as well as groups, including many varieties of special interest groups. The focus of these tours are the countries of Turkey, Syria, Jordan, Lebanon, Israel, Palestine, Egypt, the Gulf States, Tunisia, Morocco, Iran, and Yemen. In order to provide the best tour service possible, she maintains offices in several of these countries.

With her frequent travels to the Middle East and her discerning eye for quality products, Rita began bringing home products and objet d'art not available here in North America. Originally for her own personal use, then growing to include client's and friend's requests. In September of 1998, "The Souk" was born. "The Souk" is the Arabic word for "market" and in Seattle is also a subsidiary of Caravan-Serai Inc. "The Souk" currently holds North American distribution rights to a number of Middle Eastern products.

Outside of her office duties, Rita participates in activities which educate the public about the Middle East and North Africa, particularly their cultures. She founded Arab Film Distribution and Salaam Cultural Museum. She frequently lectures to schools, organizations, business and travel groups.

Maha Sarhan

Maha Sarhan is a Travel Agent with Caravan-Serai Tours and is an expert in booking international travel. A native of Egypt, she has lived in the US since the early 1990's. Maha occaisionally leads groups to Egypt and Jordan and she has traveled throughout Europe. She is fluent in French, in addition to Arabic and English. Before joining Caravan-Serai Tours, Maha worked with KLM Airlines for 5 years. Maha's main focus is international air bookings as well as independent tours and vacation packages and cruises to popular destinations like Southern California, Hawaii, Mexico, Las Vegas, and Florida. Maha enjoys vacationing with her family in Mexico, Canada, and Lake Chelan.

Brenda Pierce

Brenda Pierce is a Tour Coordinator with Caravan-Serai Tours. She helps coordinate the land tours and markets them to travel agents and clients. She prepares the pre-departure materials and assists with obtaining visas for groups and individuals. Brenda creates all of Caravan-Serai Tours brochures and fliers, and email fliers.

Brenda has traveled to Egypt, Morocco, Syria, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, and Israel, as well as to many European countries including Scotland and England. She also enjoys visiting the Big Island of Hawaii and Mexico.

Brenda's interest in international travel started with a year spent as an exchange student to New Zealand. This was followed by a 2-month solo trip to Europe, backpacking across 8 countries with a Eurail Pass. She eventually earned a degree in International Studies (with a focus on the Middle East) from the University of Washington and moved to Washington, DC to work for a non-profit educational organization that promoted the strengthening of US-Arab relations. She managed several of their educational programs, including the University Model Arab League and the Malone Fellowship programs. The latter allowed her to travel twice as deputy escort to Saudi Arabia with groups of professors. It was also through the same organization that she traveled, as a student, to Syria and Morocco, studying Arabic and the history and cultures of those countries.

Brenda also teaches snow skiing on the weekends during the winter months and travels to Whistler BC and other western ski areas each spring.