Holy Camel

Luxor is beautiful. We arrived Tuesday night in time for dinner at our Sheraton Hotel which was right on the Nile River. Can a trip get any better than that? (Actually it could, if we were allowed to eat the fruit and vegetables or drink the water. Only meat and bread for a week, as well as a somewhat constant state of nausea is rather unpleasant. So it goes.)

Wednesday morning was spent in the Valley of the Kings. Becky, I thought of you quite a bit on Wednesday morning -- we got to go inside the tombs of Kings Ramses III, Ramses IV, Thutmose IV, and (of course) King Tut. King Tut is still inside his tomb, which is actually the most attractive feature of that particular tomb, because the tomb itself is not all that spectacular. But the other three were incredible. Unfortunately, you are not allowed to take pictures inside the tombs. However, the hieroglyphics were amazing, with so much detail and a lot of color. I was impressed with how well the colors have survived over time. Our guide said that to "paint" the walls they used natural resources and colors from rocks rather than paints, which would fade. Again, it was incredible to see how much work was put into these tombs, that one person could be considered important enough to spend 20 years constructing such a monument to house their monstrous sarcophagus and all of their possessions.

After the Valley of the Kings we stopped at the Funerary Temple of Ramses III as well as the Colossus of Memnon. Again, I was impressed by the preservation of everything, as well as the detail they put into the temple. Example for you:

This is on one of the walls of the temple. During battles in Ancient Egypt, the pharaohs would figure out how many of the enemy they killed by cutting off and counting the hands from dead bodies. This wall depicts the scene: the first guy has all the hands, the one behind him is recording numbers, the one behind him is checking to make sure he has the numbers right. It's a little gruesome, but I guess it's effective. They instituted this method of tracking so the pharaohs wouldn't cheat and say they had killed more people during the battle than they actually did.

After lunch at the Sheraton we rode falukahs down the Nile River to our CAMEL RIDE through Luxor. We rode for an hour and got to see a lot of the city. I really enjoyed this for a few reasons. First, I was on a camel. Second, it was cool to see the people in the city and how they lived and how happy they seem to be even though they live in blatant poverty. Some camel riding pictures...

This next one is of me with my camel, Bob Marley, and my camel driver, Muhammad.
Wednesday night and a good part of Thursday we went to the bazaar in Luxor. It was quite incredible, and we met some really nice people. There was one man, Nasser (like the president of Egypt after King Farouk was taken out) who owned a papyrus store that we talked with for probably an hour. He told us about living in Luxor and all about his papyrus store. It was really cool, and we enjoyed getting to know him and look through all of the papyri that he had. He had a 16-year-old assistant, Mahmoud, who really enjoyed talking with us and taught us some Arabic phrases. The bazaar itself was rather dirty (although not as dirty as in Cairo) and everything that we all bought has a distinct bazaar smell; it's easy to wash any clothing purchased, but a little more difficult with things like the small bongo drum my roommate bought.

On Thursday before spending the afternoon in the bazaar (or the pool, or napping as it was rather hot and we were going, going, going all the time) we visited the Karnak and Luxor Temples. They were beautiful, and again I was impressed by their structure and longevity. It's mind-blowing, really. I can't quite grasp the fact that everything there is so old.

Thursday night we took a sleeper train back to Cairo, which brings us back to the Cairo post on Friday. I'd never ridden a real train before, but I'm quite certain that this was the dirtiest train I will ever have to experience. The dinner was sketchy (thank goodness for the foresight to bring snacks!), there was dust everywhere, and the little sink did not look capable of washing anything. I used a scarf I purchased earlier that day to cover the pillow so I wouldn't have to actually touch it with my head. However, even in its dirtiness, it was quite a cool experience. I slept a lot better than I expected to, and I was not attacked by any Russian assassins or SPECTRE agents. (For those who do not understand the reference, several James Bond movies have scenes in sleeper cars, and inevitably Mr. Bond is attacked in his tiny compartment that looked exactly like mine.)