From what I’ve read in the media, Syria is an evil, evil place, full of machine-gun wielding suicide bombers waiting on every corner to do me in. As part of Gorgie’s ‘Axis of Evil’, Syria is apparently somewhere that the people are not all that nice, really.
In the 4 days I’ve spent here, I must say that I fully agree with the US; in the way that I don’t agree in the slightest. Egypt is cheap but most of the people you talk to want your money. In Jordan, the people are friendly, but they’ll just take your money in the form of high prices. In Syria there is the perfect combination of people and prices. The locals (except the taxi drivers, which is ubiquitous) are the friendliest I’ve met, always wanting a chat and inviting you back to their place for a snack and tea. They’ll buy you a shisha, and just be happy that you’re in their country and having a good time. Syria is great. In case I needed to tell anyone here, don’t trust the US in the Middle East.
First stop was the souq in Damascus. While not as big or cramped as the one in Cairo, it was well worth the visit just for the atmosphere. It ends at the Umayyad Mosque, which is the biggest in Syria. It is possibly one of the most expensive publicly funded projects in Syrian history, as the interior of its courtyard (which is huge) was inlaid with gold and precious stones and metals. The first photo is a section that’s been restored, and gives you an idea of the intricacy of the designs.
After dinner, I went along with a friend to a hamam (an Arabic bathhouse) for an outrageously relaxing experience. After chilling for a while in sauna-like bathing room, I got a full on, chiropractic-included massage that left me tingling. Somebody should really open one of these in Brisbane (business opportunity, anyone?). Apparently half of the tan I thought I’d developed was just dirt. Either that or I had just had half my skin scraped off. Oh I was clean.
I went for a day-trip to Bosra near the Jordan-Syria border. The main attraction is a fortress surrounding a Roman Theatre that seats 7 000. There weren’t any barriers anywhere, so I got lost for a few hours exploring the entire fortress. There doesn’t really seem much else to say about it, but it’s been a Syrian highlight.
The next day I went to Palmyra, meant to be Syria’s no. 1 tourist spot. They were ruins, and not really that impressive after the ones at Egypt. In all, it’s probably not worth the hassle getting out there, especially in the baking summer heat, it you don’t have your own transport. I spent a while talking to some of the guides, who had learnt their fluent English purely from tourists. Impressive, but a little disturbing.
I think the best part of Syria so far, and a highlight of the trip was my visit to Quneitra yesterday (parents, look away now. Maybe.). Quneitra, more popularly known as the Golan Heights, is a region that sits about 100 meters from Israel. The 100 meters is the UN-imposed international zone. No-one is allowed there but UN soldiers. Go figure. Israel pulled out of the Golan Heights in an agreement with Syria relatively recently, but made sure to leave nothing behind, bulldozing most of the village. Quneitra was the site of a massive Israeli offensive, as it previously belonged to Syria. The most dramatic site in the ex-village is the hospital-come-shooting range. I think the photo is pretty self explanatory.
Now, Syria is great, and I’m going to be spending a week and a bit more here, but I’ve decided to jump the border into Lebanon for a week. I thought, well, I’m in the area. And it’s a completely different type of place from Syria that I want to explore for a while. And they’ve got some fantastic food. So, next post will be a Lebanese expose of the most adventurous kind.
Nick
p.s. Parents, don’t freak out too much. The civil war ended in 1990.
Saturday, August 25, 2007
Wednesday, August 22, 2007
Nick of Arabia
Well, I’m no T.E. Lawrence, but I do feel that I got a lot out of Jordan in the few days I was there. I also feel like Jordan got a lot out of me, too. Namely, a whole lot of cash. Coming from Egypt, this place was like the inner-city Sydney of the Middle East. Damn tied currency.
The ferry getting there was painful. In a final swan-song, Egypt threw all the lack of organisation it had left at me. A tentative 3 hour trip to Aqaba in Jordan took 12.5 hours. But I did get a lovely ferry trip for 5 hours. But Jordan. This is a beautiful country, especially out of the cities. The three highlights were, of course, Petra, Wadi Rum and the Dead Sea.
First serious stop was Petra, the ancient city that wasn’t build but carved into the mountains surrounding a valley. Apparently this is one of the places my father is a bit jealous I was getting to go to, and with good reason. It’s awe inspiring: another one of those places where you think ‘I have no idea why they bothered to do this, but damn I’m glad they did’. To enter the city, you have to walk 1 km down a narrow natural gorge that the Romans had paved when the city was founded. Doing this early in the morning is amazing, when there are no other people around to spoil the quiet. It’s a bit of a mind trip. Then, emerging from the gorge you are brought face-to-face with The Treasury, the most famous of the buildings at Petra (photo). The historians think it was built as a tomb and then converted into a treasury a bit later. It gives you an idea of the type and scale of all the buildings in the valley. Some time during the first massive climb to a sacrificial alter on the top of a mountain my camera ran out of batteries, so I was unable to record the view from the top, nor of The Monastery, the second most famous place. Both required a painful, painful walk to the top. Which only made the 1 km walk back out of the valley all the more fun (sarcasm).
Wadi Rum was the other highlight of Jordan. Imagine central Australia without the shrubbery, but with huge cliffs stabbing into the sky. The best part of this excursion wasn’t seeing Lawrence of Arabia’s house, the rock bridges or the springs, but witnessing the expanse of the desert laid out before you from the top of a craggy cliff face. It’s the type of view you can imagine an epic battle unfolding in front of. Very biblical. Breathtakingly huge. After the few hours of jeep safari exploring the desert, we settled into a ‘Bedouin’ camp for the night, complete with goat-hair tents and a fire-cooked meal. We watched the sun set behind the orange mountains and lay staring at the stars to the sound of singing and an Arabic guitar (you can actually see the stars when you’re in the desert. All of them).
Now, for those of you who have been living in a box, the Dead Sea is so called because it’s saturated with salt, and so nothing can live in it. This is because sea water feeds into it, but doesn’t go anywhere. Thus when the water evaporates, it leaves behind the salt. The result is intriguing. Usually when I hold my breath in water, my forehead usually bobs at water level. In the Dead Sea, I was amused to find that the water stopped at chest height. Additionally, my legs no longer wanted to stay under me, so I spent around half an hour trying to stay upright. But it was good fun, even if I tasted salt for a while afterwards.
The day after the Dead Sea excursion I made a break for Syria. Jordan is great, but comparatively quite expensive, and along with the sights mentioned above I had explored most of the other things Jordan had to offer. So now I am in Syria a few days early, leaving me more time to explore this bigger, cheaper country. But Jordan was fantastic, especially the people. No hassles from street vendors or anything. What a change.
The ferry getting there was painful. In a final swan-song, Egypt threw all the lack of organisation it had left at me. A tentative 3 hour trip to Aqaba in Jordan took 12.5 hours. But I did get a lovely ferry trip for 5 hours. But Jordan. This is a beautiful country, especially out of the cities. The three highlights were, of course, Petra, Wadi Rum and the Dead Sea.
First serious stop was Petra, the ancient city that wasn’t build but carved into the mountains surrounding a valley. Apparently this is one of the places my father is a bit jealous I was getting to go to, and with good reason. It’s awe inspiring: another one of those places where you think ‘I have no idea why they bothered to do this, but damn I’m glad they did’. To enter the city, you have to walk 1 km down a narrow natural gorge that the Romans had paved when the city was founded. Doing this early in the morning is amazing, when there are no other people around to spoil the quiet. It’s a bit of a mind trip. Then, emerging from the gorge you are brought face-to-face with The Treasury, the most famous of the buildings at Petra (photo). The historians think it was built as a tomb and then converted into a treasury a bit later. It gives you an idea of the type and scale of all the buildings in the valley. Some time during the first massive climb to a sacrificial alter on the top of a mountain my camera ran out of batteries, so I was unable to record the view from the top, nor of The Monastery, the second most famous place. Both required a painful, painful walk to the top. Which only made the 1 km walk back out of the valley all the more fun (sarcasm).
Wadi Rum was the other highlight of Jordan. Imagine central Australia without the shrubbery, but with huge cliffs stabbing into the sky. The best part of this excursion wasn’t seeing Lawrence of Arabia’s house, the rock bridges or the springs, but witnessing the expanse of the desert laid out before you from the top of a craggy cliff face. It’s the type of view you can imagine an epic battle unfolding in front of. Very biblical. Breathtakingly huge. After the few hours of jeep safari exploring the desert, we settled into a ‘Bedouin’ camp for the night, complete with goat-hair tents and a fire-cooked meal. We watched the sun set behind the orange mountains and lay staring at the stars to the sound of singing and an Arabic guitar (you can actually see the stars when you’re in the desert. All of them).
Now, for those of you who have been living in a box, the Dead Sea is so called because it’s saturated with salt, and so nothing can live in it. This is because sea water feeds into it, but doesn’t go anywhere. Thus when the water evaporates, it leaves behind the salt. The result is intriguing. Usually when I hold my breath in water, my forehead usually bobs at water level. In the Dead Sea, I was amused to find that the water stopped at chest height. Additionally, my legs no longer wanted to stay under me, so I spent around half an hour trying to stay upright. But it was good fun, even if I tasted salt for a while afterwards.
The day after the Dead Sea excursion I made a break for Syria. Jordan is great, but comparatively quite expensive, and along with the sights mentioned above I had explored most of the other things Jordan had to offer. So now I am in Syria a few days early, leaving me more time to explore this bigger, cheaper country. But Jordan was fantastic, especially the people. No hassles from street vendors or anything. What a change.
Friday, August 17, 2007
Egypt: A Retrospective
In my first post in Cairo, I made the statement that Cairo was Calcutta minus the Indians and Hindi, plus Arabs and Arabic. This is an observation that I still support today, with a couple of qualifiers. Cairo, the ‘Mother of all Cities’ as some know it, I guess is like the capital cities of developing countries everywhere. Hectic, crowded, a bit smelly and polluted. But at the same time, it offers a whole lot of fun if you know where to look and what to do. I don’t think I had quite sunk into Egypt enough until I returned from Alexandria to look at Cairo with any objectivity. Afterwards, I grew to like it even more.
Alexandria was a pleasant way to spend a few days. There are a couple of sights, but it is most renown for being the beat of a few notable writers and poets, such as Cafavy. There is definitely something about Alexandria that’s different from the rest of Egypt. Somehow the fact that they are still living out of buildings built under the British pre-World Wars doesn’t seem to matter so much here. It fits a bit better than in Cairo, where you just wonder whether there has been a building strike for a few decades. Or a demolition strike, more pertinently.
The Nile Valley south to Aswan was both fantastic and painful. Upper Egypt (Luxor and south) was jam packed with history; tombs, temples, you name it were everywhere. As were markets and street merchants. While Upper Egypt was quite magnificent (and damn hot), the experience was diminished somewhat by the constant, constant stream of touts and invitations into peoples shops. People physically holding your arm while smiling and directing you to their wares was not uncommon, nor was the greeting ‘my friend, my friend’. After a day of this, I worked out how to say ‘Sahibi? Sahibi? Anta laysa sahibaka’ (My friend? My friend? I am not your friend). It seems quite rude, but if people are going to be grabbing my arm and trying to rip me off at every bent, I really don’t care all that much.
Middle Egypt was so different from Upper Egypt: a completely different vibe. As the centre of the violent actions of the Muslim Brotherhood in the 1990s, there is a strict security regime. In exchange for a better travel advisory from Western governments, the Egyptian government instituted a policy under which whenever you’re not in your hotel, you are accompanied by a police officer. They rarely spoke English, which was both a blessing and a curse. From the minute you step off the train, you are followed. I managed to escape a couple of times without their knowing, and had a great time around two of the monasteries with two locals I met in Sohaj, but other than this, Nick’s travel guide rates Middle Egypt as a ‘don’t bother’ destination. The hassles far outweigh the benefits. Upper Egypt = good, Middle Egypt = painful.
The Suez Canal region was chilled, and is OK for a couple of day, especially if you like duty free shopping. There is not much of note there however, except a big bit of water that ships float through. It’s not awe inspiring until you sit in front of it and think about it for a bit.
Dahab. It is not Egypt. It is Goa transplanted in Egypt. It’s Hawaii with better diving. Diving, expensive food and wares, and a Western atmosphere, just to save you from mixing with the local culture. The best part is the excursions on offer to Mt. Sinai (which I’d definitely recommend climbing) and the St. Catherine Monastery. Unless you love diving (which I definitely do after my intro dive), Dahab’s appeal is limited to it being the best place I have yet found if you are getting into the down phase of culture shock. You can forget you’re in the Middle East, and enjoy the world’s second best diving site at the same time.
I feel I should also mention a few points of note about Egypt overall, for the general interest of listeners at home.
The traffic. Exactly the same as India. The next time people complain about Middle Eastern taxi drivers being crazy, I’ll really have to censor them. The ones in Australia drive like they’re in a road safety video. I cannot ascertain whether road rules exist in Egypt, or whether they are limited to ‘blow you horn every few seconds so I know where you are’. Also, pedestrians rule. The way to cross a road is to step out at a convenient time, and walk (not run. Running people are unpredictable). They will go around you or stop. But it takes some practice.
There are no bins in Egypt. Rubbish is thrown on the ground, and collected by an army of street cleaners. You will feel bad about throwing things on the ground for a while. I’m still not used to it. But there aren’t any bins, so you have to.
There are superfluous police everywhere. I have wondered whether it is a hangover of Nasser’s socialist policy that everyone with a university degree was guaranteed a job in the public service. Either way, they are about every 75 metres on every street in Cairo, and only slightly scarcer elsewhere.
It’s obvious that Egypt is trying to Westernise like crazy. Conspicuous consumption rules the day. However it seems to be being done in the wrong order. I have not yet met a man (and few women) without a mobile phone, including the people begging for change on the street. Most people have nice clothes and jewellery, but terribly dirty homes and old, old cars. It seems the rich can isolate themselves in a bubble of affluence, popping from one air conditioned spot to the next, but the less well off are trying to flaunt wealth they don’t have. There are satellite dishes on the roof of every house. People put phones before food.
The final point of note is either really fun, or really annoying, depending on your mood. In Egypt (and I think in most of the Middle East) there is a game called ‘who can horde the most small change’. There are very few coins, so everything is exchanged in notes. ATMs only give out 50 and 100 pound notes, which pose a problem when things are rarely that expensive. I have come to be quite accomplished at the small change game, and it adds an extra dimension to haggling. Yet it seems that once you have amasses a small fortune in 1 pound notes, they will all disappear in a day due to a bad stream of people who don’t actually have any change, or through having a bad day in the game.
I have exhausted my mind for the moment now, but I think this post has covered the major points of interest about Egypt. No doubt I’ll look through my photos and remember other stories, but these can wait for another time.
Ma-Salamah Egypt.
Alexandria was a pleasant way to spend a few days. There are a couple of sights, but it is most renown for being the beat of a few notable writers and poets, such as Cafavy. There is definitely something about Alexandria that’s different from the rest of Egypt. Somehow the fact that they are still living out of buildings built under the British pre-World Wars doesn’t seem to matter so much here. It fits a bit better than in Cairo, where you just wonder whether there has been a building strike for a few decades. Or a demolition strike, more pertinently.
The Nile Valley south to Aswan was both fantastic and painful. Upper Egypt (Luxor and south) was jam packed with history; tombs, temples, you name it were everywhere. As were markets and street merchants. While Upper Egypt was quite magnificent (and damn hot), the experience was diminished somewhat by the constant, constant stream of touts and invitations into peoples shops. People physically holding your arm while smiling and directing you to their wares was not uncommon, nor was the greeting ‘my friend, my friend’. After a day of this, I worked out how to say ‘Sahibi? Sahibi? Anta laysa sahibaka’ (My friend? My friend? I am not your friend). It seems quite rude, but if people are going to be grabbing my arm and trying to rip me off at every bent, I really don’t care all that much.
Middle Egypt was so different from Upper Egypt: a completely different vibe. As the centre of the violent actions of the Muslim Brotherhood in the 1990s, there is a strict security regime. In exchange for a better travel advisory from Western governments, the Egyptian government instituted a policy under which whenever you’re not in your hotel, you are accompanied by a police officer. They rarely spoke English, which was both a blessing and a curse. From the minute you step off the train, you are followed. I managed to escape a couple of times without their knowing, and had a great time around two of the monasteries with two locals I met in Sohaj, but other than this, Nick’s travel guide rates Middle Egypt as a ‘don’t bother’ destination. The hassles far outweigh the benefits. Upper Egypt = good, Middle Egypt = painful.
The Suez Canal region was chilled, and is OK for a couple of day, especially if you like duty free shopping. There is not much of note there however, except a big bit of water that ships float through. It’s not awe inspiring until you sit in front of it and think about it for a bit.
Dahab. It is not Egypt. It is Goa transplanted in Egypt. It’s Hawaii with better diving. Diving, expensive food and wares, and a Western atmosphere, just to save you from mixing with the local culture. The best part is the excursions on offer to Mt. Sinai (which I’d definitely recommend climbing) and the St. Catherine Monastery. Unless you love diving (which I definitely do after my intro dive), Dahab’s appeal is limited to it being the best place I have yet found if you are getting into the down phase of culture shock. You can forget you’re in the Middle East, and enjoy the world’s second best diving site at the same time.
I feel I should also mention a few points of note about Egypt overall, for the general interest of listeners at home.
The traffic. Exactly the same as India. The next time people complain about Middle Eastern taxi drivers being crazy, I’ll really have to censor them. The ones in Australia drive like they’re in a road safety video. I cannot ascertain whether road rules exist in Egypt, or whether they are limited to ‘blow you horn every few seconds so I know where you are’. Also, pedestrians rule. The way to cross a road is to step out at a convenient time, and walk (not run. Running people are unpredictable). They will go around you or stop. But it takes some practice.
There are no bins in Egypt. Rubbish is thrown on the ground, and collected by an army of street cleaners. You will feel bad about throwing things on the ground for a while. I’m still not used to it. But there aren’t any bins, so you have to.
There are superfluous police everywhere. I have wondered whether it is a hangover of Nasser’s socialist policy that everyone with a university degree was guaranteed a job in the public service. Either way, they are about every 75 metres on every street in Cairo, and only slightly scarcer elsewhere.
It’s obvious that Egypt is trying to Westernise like crazy. Conspicuous consumption rules the day. However it seems to be being done in the wrong order. I have not yet met a man (and few women) without a mobile phone, including the people begging for change on the street. Most people have nice clothes and jewellery, but terribly dirty homes and old, old cars. It seems the rich can isolate themselves in a bubble of affluence, popping from one air conditioned spot to the next, but the less well off are trying to flaunt wealth they don’t have. There are satellite dishes on the roof of every house. People put phones before food.
The final point of note is either really fun, or really annoying, depending on your mood. In Egypt (and I think in most of the Middle East) there is a game called ‘who can horde the most small change’. There are very few coins, so everything is exchanged in notes. ATMs only give out 50 and 100 pound notes, which pose a problem when things are rarely that expensive. I have come to be quite accomplished at the small change game, and it adds an extra dimension to haggling. Yet it seems that once you have amasses a small fortune in 1 pound notes, they will all disappear in a day due to a bad stream of people who don’t actually have any change, or through having a bad day in the game.
I have exhausted my mind for the moment now, but I think this post has covered the major points of interest about Egypt. No doubt I’ll look through my photos and remember other stories, but these can wait for another time.
Ma-Salamah Egypt.
Wednesday, August 15, 2007
The Gospel of Nick: Revelations, verse 7.
I needed a change, and got just this. Having survived the mainland Egyptian experience, I thoroughly enjoyed the change of scenery that awaited me at the Suez Canal. While there isn't much to do in the towns themselves, Port Sa'id and Suez were a nice, relaxing way to get my head back together before moving on to other parts. I've posted a picture of the southern entry to the canal.
After Suez (and the painful bus ride from), things got a whole lot happier. I arrived in Dahab (in Sinai) with mixed expectations. On the one hand, it's meant to be the Goa of the Middle East, which promised fun and frolicking. On the other hand, it's meant to be the Goa of the Middle East, so it also promised a very touristy time. But I quickly got over this. After having one plan foiled, the days got ridiculously good. Much to Lucy's envy, I went diving in the Red Sea. This in itself is not so amazing, but the Red Sea is reputed to have the second best coral reefs in the world, second only to the Great Barrier Reef. And it really was very spectacular. My only wish is that I knew more about fish so I could name a few of the things I saw. But I can't, so I won't.
Then, the day got even better. See, the plan that had been foiled was to climb Mount Sinai and see the sunset, which hadn't ended up happening. What DID end up happening instead was climbing it at night, for 3 hours, sleeping for an hour at the top, and seeing the sun RISE over the Sinai and Saudi Arabia. And that was quite extraordinary. No revelations, unfortunately, but it was interested following in Moses's footsteps. Additionally, the monastery near the bottom of the mountain houses the descendant of the burning bush (yes, THAT burning bush). I was a little bit disappointed with it, as it wouldn't light no matter how hard I tried. So I settled with taking a photo, which is attached.
Following a day of recovery where I made up the lost hours of sleep, I said goodbye to Egypt. And now, I sit in an internet cafe in Aqaba, Jordan. Please, don't ask me about the 'two hour' journey from Dahab to here. It will be a sore point for many days.
I plan on posting an Egypt retrospective shortly, but at the moment I am too tired. After dinner, I may feel happier, but I will probably not post again for a day or two. Tomorrow I head to Petra for the day, which is meant to be amazing. But I'll keep you posted.
Hope Brisbane is still the party centre of the southern hemisphere.
Nick
After Suez (and the painful bus ride from), things got a whole lot happier. I arrived in Dahab (in Sinai) with mixed expectations. On the one hand, it's meant to be the Goa of the Middle East, which promised fun and frolicking. On the other hand, it's meant to be the Goa of the Middle East, so it also promised a very touristy time. But I quickly got over this. After having one plan foiled, the days got ridiculously good. Much to Lucy's envy, I went diving in the Red Sea. This in itself is not so amazing, but the Red Sea is reputed to have the second best coral reefs in the world, second only to the Great Barrier Reef. And it really was very spectacular. My only wish is that I knew more about fish so I could name a few of the things I saw. But I can't, so I won't.
Then, the day got even better. See, the plan that had been foiled was to climb Mount Sinai and see the sunset, which hadn't ended up happening. What DID end up happening instead was climbing it at night, for 3 hours, sleeping for an hour at the top, and seeing the sun RISE over the Sinai and Saudi Arabia. And that was quite extraordinary. No revelations, unfortunately, but it was interested following in Moses's footsteps. Additionally, the monastery near the bottom of the mountain houses the descendant of the burning bush (yes, THAT burning bush). I was a little bit disappointed with it, as it wouldn't light no matter how hard I tried. So I settled with taking a photo, which is attached.
Following a day of recovery where I made up the lost hours of sleep, I said goodbye to Egypt. And now, I sit in an internet cafe in Aqaba, Jordan. Please, don't ask me about the 'two hour' journey from Dahab to here. It will be a sore point for many days.
I plan on posting an Egypt retrospective shortly, but at the moment I am too tired. After dinner, I may feel happier, but I will probably not post again for a day or two. Tomorrow I head to Petra for the day, which is meant to be amazing. But I'll keep you posted.
Hope Brisbane is still the party centre of the southern hemisphere.
Nick
Friday, August 10, 2007
When a man loves a pharmacist
Oh how I wish I wasn’t so stubborn. My last post witnessed me frolicking in the Egyptian sands, dancing as water cascaded around me, thrown from pitchers born aloft by belly dancing women. Or so I remember it. Since then has been significantly more difficult, but I have gained some solid abs for my effort. Why they don’t build busses with toilets is beyond me, especially when these busses travel for 5 hours between rest breaks. But more on that later.
Middle Egypt was significantly different from its Upper, southern neighbour. Where Upper Egypt had tourists, heat, scams, attractions and over-zealous street merchants, Middle Egypt had heterogenous friendly non-English speakers and a calm only broken by the sound of my feet galloping to the nearest toilet. Oh, and it had police. The same friendly, non-English speaking, superfluous police that are everywhere else in Egypt. Except that these ones have the order to escort you whenever you leave your hotel. This is amusing for a little while, but soon quite frustrating as they double the time it takes to do anything. It took me an hour and a half to assemble breakfast from the streets around my hotel, as my entourage insisted knowing where I was going, why, to where, for what purpose, how long I would be, whether I would need any help, before giving it to me anyway, and trying to translate everything from me to the local street vendor. Remember, the cops spoke as little English as the store-holder. Go figure.
The best part of the rest of that adventure was spending a day with two novices at the White Monastery outside Sohag (Emad and Atef). These guys were famously hospitable. They paid for everything for me, including a boat up and down the Nile for a while. We gate-crashed a Coptic engagement ceremony, but nobody seemed to mind, including the future bride and groom (see picture). I was sitting up with the priests.
Got back to Cairo and wasted a day trying to get a Turkish visa, before being told that they could not issue me one as I’m not Egyptian, but that I can get one at the border. However I had to wait for an Embassy official to tell me this (after the 2-hour wait) as nobody else spoke English.
I’ve bid farewell to Cairo and am now at Port Sa’id, the northern entry to the Suez Canal. In 2 days I’ll head to the Sinai, but for now I’m just going to relax here and in Suez. And bask in the radiance that is antibiotics.
Middle Egypt was significantly different from its Upper, southern neighbour. Where Upper Egypt had tourists, heat, scams, attractions and over-zealous street merchants, Middle Egypt had heterogenous friendly non-English speakers and a calm only broken by the sound of my feet galloping to the nearest toilet. Oh, and it had police. The same friendly, non-English speaking, superfluous police that are everywhere else in Egypt. Except that these ones have the order to escort you whenever you leave your hotel. This is amusing for a little while, but soon quite frustrating as they double the time it takes to do anything. It took me an hour and a half to assemble breakfast from the streets around my hotel, as my entourage insisted knowing where I was going, why, to where, for what purpose, how long I would be, whether I would need any help, before giving it to me anyway, and trying to translate everything from me to the local street vendor. Remember, the cops spoke as little English as the store-holder. Go figure.
The best part of the rest of that adventure was spending a day with two novices at the White Monastery outside Sohag (Emad and Atef). These guys were famously hospitable. They paid for everything for me, including a boat up and down the Nile for a while. We gate-crashed a Coptic engagement ceremony, but nobody seemed to mind, including the future bride and groom (see picture). I was sitting up with the priests.
Got back to Cairo and wasted a day trying to get a Turkish visa, before being told that they could not issue me one as I’m not Egyptian, but that I can get one at the border. However I had to wait for an Embassy official to tell me this (after the 2-hour wait) as nobody else spoke English.
I’ve bid farewell to Cairo and am now at Port Sa’id, the northern entry to the Suez Canal. In 2 days I’ll head to the Sinai, but for now I’m just going to relax here and in Suez. And bask in the radiance that is antibiotics.
Sunday, August 5, 2007
Nicholas of Nazareth
Everything in Egypt is big. Big monuments, big festivals, big train rides, big touts, big water consumption or, alternatively, big dehydration.
A catalogue of today's beverage intake:
4 1/2 litres of water
660 ml of coke
500 ml tea
500 ml of karkaday
300ml mango juice
300 ml tamarin juice
It's now 7:30pm (ish), so the day's not yet over.
Yes, Luxor is hot, as Aswan (Egypt's southern most centre) was a few days ago. It's been 5 days since my last confession. I ended my trip to Alexandria with a bus trip back in the direction of Cairo on which nobody else spoke English. Slap-dash Arabic saw me somehow arrive at my destination of Wadi Natrun monasteries, which had an air of calm I have not again experienced in Egypt. I completed the trip to Cairo and hung out with some other travellers, which was the first time I'd done this since setting out. The next day I got to the Cities of the Dead in Cairo; two massive cemeteries that also house some 500 000 people. I've attached a photo.
That evening I set out on the Nile valley leg of the Egypt trip. After a 14-hour overnight train trip I arrived at Aswan in scorching heat. However I still managed to get to their "world-famous" bazaar, where every two steps (literally every 5) you are accosted to buy something, but with lines like 'hey, you dropped something', 'hey, can you help me write this letter in English', and other similar things designed to get you into their shop. This was a good introduction for the Luxor I am currently in.
Went to the Aswan sights: nothing special. On my way to Luxor on the 2nd I managed to cram in visits to Kom Ombo temple, which I think has the best position on the Nile of any I have yet seen, and Edfu temple (photo attached. The ants are people). Edfu was an astoundingly huge and meticulously detailed cult temple to Horus, fronted by a massive relief of Ramses II attacking some enemy or another. Ramses II was a bit of a meglomaniac, it seems, and his stuff is everywhere.
Yesterday I went to Abydos, which was good but not worth the effort of transport there and back (10 hours in the end). Today I saw Karnak temple, which apparently covers the area of 10 great cathedrals. The highlight is a hall containing 134 columns roughly the size of 20 people standing on each others' shoulders (photo). Big. I also saw the Valley of the Kings via the medium of donkey. In a strange twist of fate, I think I got more enjoyment out of the 4-hour mountainous donkey ride than the Valley. Cest la vie.
Tomorrow I head to Sohag, further down the Nile (north) on the 6:30am train. And now I go to watch belly dancers.
Nick
A catalogue of today's beverage intake:
4 1/2 litres of water
660 ml of coke
500 ml tea
500 ml of karkaday
300ml mango juice
300 ml tamarin juice
It's now 7:30pm (ish), so the day's not yet over.
Yes, Luxor is hot, as Aswan (Egypt's southern most centre) was a few days ago. It's been 5 days since my last confession. I ended my trip to Alexandria with a bus trip back in the direction of Cairo on which nobody else spoke English. Slap-dash Arabic saw me somehow arrive at my destination of Wadi Natrun monasteries, which had an air of calm I have not again experienced in Egypt. I completed the trip to Cairo and hung out with some other travellers, which was the first time I'd done this since setting out. The next day I got to the Cities of the Dead in Cairo; two massive cemeteries that also house some 500 000 people. I've attached a photo.
That evening I set out on the Nile valley leg of the Egypt trip. After a 14-hour overnight train trip I arrived at Aswan in scorching heat. However I still managed to get to their "world-famous" bazaar, where every two steps (literally every 5) you are accosted to buy something, but with lines like 'hey, you dropped something', 'hey, can you help me write this letter in English', and other similar things designed to get you into their shop. This was a good introduction for the Luxor I am currently in.
Went to the Aswan sights: nothing special. On my way to Luxor on the 2nd I managed to cram in visits to Kom Ombo temple, which I think has the best position on the Nile of any I have yet seen, and Edfu temple (photo attached. The ants are people). Edfu was an astoundingly huge and meticulously detailed cult temple to Horus, fronted by a massive relief of Ramses II attacking some enemy or another. Ramses II was a bit of a meglomaniac, it seems, and his stuff is everywhere.
Yesterday I went to Abydos, which was good but not worth the effort of transport there and back (10 hours in the end). Today I saw Karnak temple, which apparently covers the area of 10 great cathedrals. The highlight is a hall containing 134 columns roughly the size of 20 people standing on each others' shoulders (photo). Big. I also saw the Valley of the Kings via the medium of donkey. In a strange twist of fate, I think I got more enjoyment out of the 4-hour mountainous donkey ride than the Valley. Cest la vie.
Tomorrow I head to Sohag, further down the Nile (north) on the 6:30am train. And now I go to watch belly dancers.
Nick
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