Egypt!!

Greetings everyone!!

I know, I know. It’s been a while since my last post, but I’ve been quite busy with everything that comes up in life. The bottom line is I’m in great shape. I’m moving to Tirana, the capital of Albania, next month: opera, symphony, museums, universities, and some blues clubs. Still have to scope out the apartments but I’ve got plenty of help with that. Really looking forward to it – though I will miss Elbasan too much. I’ll bring you up to speed when all that plays out.

Oh yeah, for all the loyal (and otherwise) readers – not in the Peace Corps anymore and despite experience and evidence to the contrary I was able to figure out how to change the title of the blog!! I had top (top) people help me sort this out. 

OK - here's the deal: the Nile flows from the south to the north, right? "Upper" is on the bottom, "lower" is on top. Pay attention - there will be a short multiple choice quiz at the end of this post.

In the meantime: I just got back from a trip to Egypt – connected with my good friend Nelson and we hit all the spots and most of the tombs – seriously. What follows are the pics – hope you like them. Alexis told me repeatedly to take a lot of pictures. Here is about a tenth of what I got! 

I arrived in Cairo on the 17th about 2am, to the hotel by 4am, woke to Nelson banging on my door at 9am - breakfast and off. 

So, our Egypt exploration started with a flight from Cairo down to Aswan and then four days by boat up to Luxor (ancient Thebes); a flight back to Cairo - four more days of exploring and then back home to Albania via Rome. I just pulled up all of my tickets: Aswan High Dam, Aswan Princes' Tomb, Deir al-Anba Sama'an, Philae Temple, St. Simeon Coptic Monastery, The Unfinished Obelisk, Edfu Temple, Luxor Temple, The Vally of the Kings, Tomb of Tut Ankh Amun, Komombo Temple and Crocodile Museum, Memphis Open Air Museum, Saqqara Step Pyramid, Iamhotep and Saqqara, Giza Pyramids, Cheops Boat Museum, The Sphinx, Egyptian Museum, and the Royal Mummies Hall. Whew!

All I can say is that if you're planning a trip to Egypt, get a hold of Nelson - he had it all worked out; I just showed up. What a blast!!

Getting into Aswan, we stayed at this little village on the west bank, just opposite Elephantine Island, checked into our rooms, unpacked, and took in the local village color. Zechariah took care of everything - tea, dinner, breakfast in the morning. And then after a great sleep we headed off to the Aswan High Dam.

A farewell to Zechariah (left) and an invitation from our hosts to come back and stay longer – great hospitality!

The first of many photo ops with the locals and off to the dam.

Headed with our guide Mahmoud to Philae Island.

Philae Island was the site for the Temple of Isis during the Ptolemaic pharaohs – the dynasty founded by one of Alexander’s generals, Ptolemy, in the 300s BCE and ending with Cleopatra and Antony in 30 BCE – remember the asp and the queen? What is equally amazing about the ruins on this island is that when Gamael Nasser built the Aswan High Dam in 1970, the original Philae Island was submerged and all of the ruins were moved to a renamed neighboring island – holy hell, what a task!! 

Temple of Isis, Philae Island

So funny, this budding personality just in front of me!

And then a trip to the “unfinished obelisk’: Aswan is the home of all the granite quarries in Egypt. This obelisk (ca. 1500 BCE) was discovered in 2005 and abandoned because of cracks. If completed it would have measured around 140 ft. and 1200 tons – making it a third larger than any erected in Egypt. There were about thirty Egyptian obelisks and only seven are still in the country – there are thirteen Egyptian obelisks in Rome!

To give you a sense of how immense this thing is, look for Nelson waving in the right pic!

Boarding “The Nile Queen” – think Hercule Poirot; it was just like that!

Yes! An office! Note the Albanian double-headed eagle – heart never far from home, right!

The next morning we got up early for a boat ride to the west bank to visit burial sites and camels (!) to the ancient St. Simeon Coptic monastery (10^th C. CE) on the edge of the Sahara. I especially enjoyed the close look at an ascetic’s cell. 

Though it may look like I know what I’m doing, Ahmad was always nearby to pick me up if I fell off! He kept telling me, “You are a good driver!” Funny.

Then a night cruise and up early to the Temple of Edfu (ca. 240 BCE). 

Back to the boat for a trip to the ancient city of Thebes (ca. 3200 BCE). Luxor was renamed at the time of the Islamic Caliphate expansion in the 700-800s CE – the word means “palaces” – and there are a lot – two thirds of all the great Egyptian monuments are located here. An evening visit:

With an innocent bystander - she wanted her picture with the Americans!

And more!!

 So, a wonderful, almost magical evening. I'm waiting to take a shot of this amazing group - waiting for the couple to leave. But no.....this young lady and her boyfriend are taking selfies with each!! All around the world people are really the same, aren't they?

The next morning we hit the Valley of the Kings:

Is the red light on? OK, good. No pictures allowed beyond this point. Bummer. But the Tomb of Tutankhamen was worth the entire trip!

And then off to the great Temple of Queen Hatshepsut (ca. 1478 - 1458 BCE).

After a very full day, a dash to the Luxor airport and on to Cairo.

Nelson set us up at the Semiramis InterContinental, right on the banks of the Nile. What a view, great suites, outstanding food!!

The next morning we connect with our new guide, Hassn, and head off to the Memphis Open Air Museum. 

The Colossus of Rameses II (ca. 1200 BCE) is about 36 ft. in length and weighs 83 tons of red granite – prone, but pretty damned impressive!

And then off to the Saqqara Step Pyramid and a couple of burial spots on the way - guys, we saw so much that I can hardly keep the sights (and sites) straight.

So, I walk by these guys and they invite me over to take a break. A bit of English and a nice visit. Of all the photos on the trip these are my favorite.

 We finish our visit to the Step Pyramid and tell Hassn that we need to find some stuff for friends and kids. He takes us to this great shop – hand-crafted papyrus (not the typical banana-leaf), and hand-worked art. We got the luck of the draw with Fatma – a delightful young lady that evidently knew her stuff! Yes, photo-op with the finished product and a bit of a tough time getting my hat back! 

Then off to lunch at the famous west-bank El Dar Darak for great Egyptian fare.

The Great Pyramids of Giza next on the schedule. Nelson set off to climb to the top; I told him I’d save his place. Constructed around 2600 BCE, the Great Pyramid (Cheops) was completed in about twenty years: a base of about 570,000 sq. ft., 88,000,000 cubic feet, for a total of 5,900,000 tons of granite. So, 800 tons of granite put into place every day! All transported from Aswan, 500 miles upriver! Amazing.

The famous Cheops Boat Museum next: OK, now check this out: the Khufu ship was discovered in 1954 within the Pyramid complex. The boat was part of the goods that the pharaoh would need for his journey into the afterlife. Now, the dismantled parts were located in this massive pit covered by forty-two beyond-belief limestone slabs and the pit was opened to the smell of cedar. It took ten years to put together the 1224 perfectly preserved pieces – the boat is 145 feet long and 20 ft. wide. It is the oldest boat ever – I was talking to one guy who was taking a close look: I assumed that the boat went back to the time of the pyramids; he told me that tests have been done on the wood to indicate as far back as 10,000 years – seriously? Well, I’ll let you guys do the research. Here's to research!

Off to the Great Sphinx! Carved out of bedrock around 2500 BCE, it’s about 240x20x20 ft. Massive. I was talking to Hassn about Napoleon coming to Egypt and feeling a bit of ego and hubris ordered cannon shot at the face. I told him I always thought that this was unimaginable. He laughed and agreed – “Napoleon would never do something like that, just wind and sand.” OK. I feel better.

"Hassn, see those birds? They're ruining my shot!!"

Left the Sphinx by way of the markets and stalls – and this munchkin is probably the greatest salesperson in all of Egypt – what an amazing kid! Nannosa doesn’t go to school; she knows enough English that her family has her spend her days selling to tourists. Tough. Her English is pretty damned good and she’s quite precocious – when I told her that I had spent all of my Egyptian pounds, she gave me two papyri drawings for a couple of my grandkids – Parker and Hayes, this little girl sends you a gift from the pyramids.

Back to the Semiramis for another great meal and conversation…

…and then our final day at the amazing Egyptian Museum. Now guys, there is so much history here that I won’t even try to explain. Most of this stuff (with better pics) is on-line anyway. Just a few comments here and there.

Now, for me this is the oddest couple – Akhenaten was the revolutionary 14th BCE pharaoh who tried to turn Egypt from its polytheism to the worship of a single god - he changed his name from Amenhotep to incorporate his devotion to Aten. I always thought he looked a bit like a horse, while his wife, Nefertiti, was without a doubt the most beautiful of Egyptian queens. Some consider Cleopatra, the last pharaoh, but I am reminded of Marc Cohn’s line “your foreign car’s absurd [Cleopatra was a Ptolemy – Macedonian descent], me, I wanna go down in a Silver Thunderbird.” I know, weird connection. The sculpture you’re probably familiar with is the one on the right, in a museum in Berlin. So many pieces, some of the great ones, outside of the country. Anyway, I remember reading a book called The Egyptian, which I enjoyed – about as old as me, but sure there are more recent takes on Ancient Egypt. I got interested in ancient history (Latin, Greek BA and Ancient History MA) after I read Colleen McCullough's stuff.

On the left: Menakaure, Hathor and a Goddess (ca. 2490-2472 BCE) – Old Kingdom, in the Valley Temple of Menkaure: the king (middle) is wearing the tall white crown of Upper Egypt, with Hathor (left), the great sky goddess – the Nome goddess on the right is giving to the king “all good things that come from Upper Egypt.”

The triad on the left is falcon-headed Horus and jackal-headed Seth crowning Rameses III (1184-1153 BCE); and on the right, of course, King Tutenkamem – we made it inside his tomb in the Valley of the Kings trip the day before - or was it three days before?

Pretty sure the ox is Hathor taken from the tomb of the chief scribe, Psemtik (ca. 6th C. BCE); sculpture of scribe from about the same time; cool snake.

One of my favorites: from the left, white upper kingdom crown, blue lower crown, combination in the middle and then for the last two you’re on your own. I know that arms crossed for a mummy means royalty (pharaoh and queen, I think); in the figures like this, could be gods -  Nelson would know.

Well, after about six hours – and not even close to enough time, the museum was clearing out.

The guy walking had just told me it was time to go – “Where’s your friend?” (!!! – the fact is, I think he said, “where’s your son?” – Funny, Nelson and I were born on the same day – OK, ten years apart.) I said, “I think he’s checking out the mummies for the last time” – then the guy gives me a “don’t-loiter” look and takes off to look for Nelson.

Nelson ties with these guys to be the last to leave the museum! Totally (!!!) like our trip to Istanbul a few months ago and our visit to the Hagia Sophia!

Completely fitting that the last pic of the Egyptian adventure was one last photo op with a bunch of kids. Check out the duck-face on the right - kids, the same all over the world!

Well, that’s it. One more night in Cairo – with a bottle of Double-Black (!!) Johnnie Walker. Great taste, Nelson.Thanks for the trip, buddy. XOXO

And back home in Elbasan on Christmas day…good to be home; good to be back at my office and the kids at the Coffee House.

One last note: Nelson and I were quite the item in Egypt (a lot more photo ops than what I’ve posted here). Not too many Americans, maybe some students – but we found Egypt to be as safe as anywhere. The kids’ concern that I would show up on YouTube with a green flag behind me hanging with some other locals proved to be unfounded. (But it would have been a hell of way to go out, wouldn’t it?) Looking forward to a return trip – I have been dreaming of temples, tombs, sculptures, pyramids, obelisks, and museum pieces for five straight nights now. Got an email from Nelson a couple of days ago: "What do you think about Israel in the summer?" Totally up for that!!

                                                                      

My best to all of you! Holiday greetings and great new year from the CH kids - Gramoz, Linda, Klajdi, and Diana!! (Better pic tomorrow!)

XOXO