After traveling through a long corridor, we were met by some guy from EF. It was one of the scariest experiences. See, if I hadn't heard all these things about how awful the country was, I would have had a different out look on the entire trip, but because so many people told me how dangerous it was, I of course assumed it. The first thing I learned was that the signs "no smoking" have no meaning. It's so annoying too because everywhere you went people were smoking and they just blow it in your face, not even thinking twice about it. The place, not just the airport, but the entire country is guarded with military. They have guns that are about the length of someone's leg, and sure it's supposed to make you feel extra secured, but again, I was told all these stories.

After we got our bags, we had a small group of six, two from Pittsburgh, one from Charolette, and one from New Jersey. The guy who met us there told us there were another forty-two people that had arrived earlier that day. We had to go through this guy, I guess he was the custom guy, I'm not sure, but he asked me what was in my suitcase, I told him clothes, although the thing must have weighed a good fifty pounds because it had my mom's and mine in it, hers was basically empty (needed something for all those treasures). So the guy who met us took my bag and dragged it to the bus, I still don't know why, but he did. We got into our little van, it's now probably one am, and we leave the airport. Not one of the people who live in the country (the driver or the other guy) talked to us. They sat up front and spoke Arabic the entire time. Next thing I know, we're less than a mile from the airport, and we're stopping. It turned out to be a flat tire, but did they tell us? No. We just see the driver and the guy leave, attmept to do something, then tell us to get out so they can fix it. We drive a little further, into a really bad neighborhood, I swear it reminded me of everything I saw on television about Kosovo, and does something under the hood, we're assumin he did something to the air conditioner and we're off again.

The actual driving is a totally different story. They don't use headlights because the streets used to be only two roads and the streets were to bright so they stopped using them. They say the streetlights are light enough. Lanes mean nothing, I remember seeing a guy just driving the opposite direction over four lanes. Turn signals do not exist, that's what your horn is for. There is no speed limit, and traffic signals? I have no clue what they are for because I remember someone saying they thought they saw someone go thru a red light, then I saw it for myself so it's true. There are no yellow lights, although there is a place for them, the lights just turn from green to red, no one stops, not even to slow down.

So anyway, we got to the hotel, it's basically two in the morning, we met our tour guide, Amr Osman, who asks us if we want to eat dinner. Sure, it's time to see how much we'll like it here. Well, the food just kept on coming. We got a tomato soup, then some salad, then the actual meal, breaded chicken with french fires and veggies, finally our desert which no one wanted to eat, but two people. It was some custard thing. Needless to say, we didn't eat all of it, mainly because we were told before we left not to eat uncooked things, ice and water. The guide insisted that it was ok, although he insisted on a lot of things during the trip and people still ended up being sick.

Eventually we make it up to our rooms and I get in bed around 3am, only to be awakened at 6am to meet the other forty-two people and have breakfast. After breakfast, we went to the airport, EgyptAir so we could be flown to Luxor. It took about two hours to actually leave, and then another two hours to get there. We became really friendly with the group we were originally supposed to travel with, a total group of seventeen, but because people dropped out, it was moved to a later date and combined with the other thirty-one. On the plane, I learned my first phrase in arabic, thank you, of course if I actually ever used it, I can't remember.

Oh, I almost forgot, my name, did it ever make a scene. As soon as the guide found out my name from my passport, I never heard the end of it. I had learned way back when from a chatroom that my name was Arabic for a beautiful olive color skin. Of course then, I never would have thought it would have come back to me in the future. So he told me that, and then he told every other person we met that it was. We were supposed to look for the music with my name and some type of gum called Samara, but we never actually did. It got really annoying all these people telling me this stuff because the truth of the matter is, I was named Samara not because it was Egyptian, but because it was Hebrew, and I needed my name to start with a "S".

So after we got off the plane, which needless to say I had some kid throw up directly behind me, we went to the cruise ship, Montatressor I believe was the name. We put our stuff away and then went to the Karnak temple. It was so hot and I felt so sick. I mean, there are no clouds and no humidity, but it's still hot. Of course, at that time I wasn't really used to the heat, my mom and I were in the better of everyone else because we had been used to heat from home, and not many people had. If you're from the North, I guess you just can't tollerate everything that a southern can, just like I can't do well in cold. I have never been so hot in my entire life. I mean, the sweat on my clothes, I could litterally taste the salt on my face. My hair just felt like it just came out of a swimming pool or something.

We went back to the ship for lunch. We weren't allowed out again for a while. That's the way everything went, we got up at the crack of dawn, came back around noon and had lunch, took a nap, and then went back out late at night. We had our safety tip lesson at six pm and at 7:30 pm we went to the Luxor Temple. It was nice, but the wind was incredibly hot, and the sand, uck. We came back around nine pm and had dinner. On our way out of the first temple in Karnak, some of the vendors outside took 65 pounds from this kid, so it took forever to straighten out. First thing we learned, never take your money out, of course, I would have thought people would have already known that.

Our second day we went to the Valley of the Kings. We had to get up at five am and be ready to leave around 6:30 am. You had to pay an extra forty pounds to see King Tutankamun's tomb, which was nothing like I expected, of course, what I expected was to see the jewels and everything still in the tomb, but they had moved them to the Cairo museum for safety and all. His tomb was basically a hole with two holes inside, one with a painting around the wall with one layer of his coffin and another hole that I guess held his treasures, but all that was in it was a stool and a bucket.

Then we were gudided into Ramses XIII's tomb which was much larger with tons of engravings and color. It's said that the longer a king lived, the more extensive his tomb was and they could never actually finish a tomb before the king died so they took forever on them, which is why King Tut's was so plain because he died so young. It is believed that King Tut was actually murdered because they found a huge hole in the back of his head where they took his brains out and the normally took the brains out through the nose so it doesn't ruin any of the facial features. Then we wre allowed to go into two more tombs out of the twenty-three. We we to Moses III (don't ask me his actual name because I wouldn't know where to start) which was way up in this hill, a good one hundred stairs to climb, and then another good one hundred stairs down into the mountain. The ceiling was low, not nearly as low as the pyramids though, and then all of a sudden the lights went out. Well all those rumors I heard about before started to come back. I swear someone was going to jump out of the corner on top of me, of course, no one could see a thing, I ended up being grabbed by my head by some Arab with a flashlight off the stairs till the lights came back on. When we got down to where his tomb actually was, you saw drawings, not engravings like in Ramses's tomb.

Our final one was to Ramses III which was elaborate as the first Ramses's but much more than the other two. It had the same style of pictures, and there were two rooms upstairs that I guess held treasures too, but we'll never know because of all thoe wonderful robbers way back when.

Then we went to the Valley of the Queens, which I do believe was only for one queen, in the Thebes. It was a temple with three levels. There was this guy with this huge needle squeezing this white liquid into a crack and he kept telling us to come look, but freaked as we were, we didn't. Amr said he was trying to preserve the stone or whatever, they do it often so someone can take a picture of them. Let me tell you, if you take a picture of someone you better tip them. I have never seen so many people so grabby for money in my life. I mean, the exchange rate for us was really good, one dollar equaled 3.41 pounds, but still.

We went to this place where the make statues out of rock and stones. We got a scarub for my brother, and then I had some guy give me a little one for good luck. I have never had so many people follow me ever and then when they found out my name, they never stopped talking to me. Our final stop was to an Egyptian American bank and then back to the ship. At five pm we had tea time on the deck and the ship actually left the dock and traveled down the Nile. We ended up talking to this kid, Kevin, for two hours who is exactly like my brother, and soon became our best friend. There was a group of eighteen from Kentucky, a group from Portland, OR, some from Missouri, and the others we already met.

At 8pm we were supposed to have cocktails with the captain, but he was sick. We had dinner and from there we went to the deck again where people in small boats came up and threw cheap goods for people to buy. It's really kind of wierd, you'd have to throw a bag back with the money if you wanted it or not, I thought the people were extremely trusting to do such a thing. My mom ended up being hit twice by the flying bags, bunches of them had landed in the pool. We ended up waiting forever for the boat to go into the lockes, and eventually we gave up and went to bed because it took forever.

On the 21st we got up at 7:30 am and were docked at Edfu. We went into the city by horse and carriage where we were hounded by vendors. One guy gave me a scarf which he ended up taking back on our way back even though he said it was a present. We then went to the temple of Esna built by Plotemy XIII. Then at noon we went back into the bazaar where I was pulled by all these people until we met the people who gave us the scarves. The guy offered to buy me for five million camels, by far the best offer, but of course, we refused. I ended up getting a galaba and then we went back to the carriage. We got back onto the ship and had lunch. We went to Komo Ombo around seven pm and then back to the ship.

That night we had a galaba party. Everyone, well mostly everyone, wore one. After we had dinner we had a party where we played some games. The first one had almost everyone on the floor and you would dance. When the music stopped someone would say a number and you'd have get into that number of people. It ended up being me, and two other people and I knew they would group together. The dance floor was in a shape of the rectangle, their sides being closest together and since they're engaged, hmm, I wonder. Still, I tried, I ran my hardest and I almost had her, but again, all she had to do was take a step towards him and grab his hand and they were together. Either way, we all won a prize, I chose a little camel.

The next game we played was like musical chairs, except there were spoons on the floor that you had to grab. I didn't really want to play, but they only wanted females and there weren't that many us there so I had to play. I figured I'd get out asap because I was so tired, but I didn't. It ended up being me and this other lady who basically cheated. We were supposed to stay on the outter lines of the floor, but she basically circled the spoon and she won. Fine, I already won one game. Then they played three other games, a couple game, kissing game, and one where three guys had to his a potato wrapped around his waist with one on the floor. So funny.

We got up five minutes to eight for breakfast. We docked at Aswan and drove over the dam and then into the uncompleted obuless which should have ended up looking something like the Washington monument. Then we went to the western side of the Sahara desert and got some sand. It's nothing like I thought it would look like, it has piles of volcanic rock all over it. We then went over a bridge guarded by military people which had Lake Nassar on one side (an artificial lake) and Lake Isis on the other. On our way back to the ship we stopped at a perfume place. They made/had all the oils that perfumes are made from. We got a rose scent. They also did henna so I got a flower tattoo. It's rather large, and it should go away in three to four weeks. At 5:30 pm we went on the falueca which was a boat of twenty people that moved when two or more people paddled. It took forever to go up the Nile and then we had someone get really sick on us while we were there. Since we were in the land of Nubians, the friendly people, we had kids come grab onto our boat and start singing to us. Plus we had some guy on the boat try and sell us stuff. We ended up having dinner really late and the waitors were very slow so we had to hussle to the Philae sound and light show which was on an island that had three temples, one of Isis, Hathor and the Philae temple. We had to get their by boat and for some reason, we always have the luck to get the boat that has problems. It took forever to start and was the slowest thing on earth. When we got back to the ship, they had belly dancers that we went to watch. My luck again, I was chosen to dance. Thank god no one had a camera.

We ended up waking up really late on the 23rd. We had someone pounding on our door and we rushed to get ready in five minutes. We had signed up for an optional tour to go to Abu Simbel. We left at 8:15 and ended up waiting two hours for the airplane to come. We couldn't even get on the plane either because we had these French surround us so we couldn't move so their group could leave. The plane ride was about thirty minutes and we had to walk around the temple to the front. The temple had been lifted out of the water I tihnk 65 feet, otherwise, Lake Nassar would have fully engulfed it. We had a Nubian guide take us around the two temples who, in the end, contradicted everything Amr had told us. After the two temples we had to leave thru an artifical mountain (it was supposed to symbolize the original affect of the temple). The plane was actually there on time, but we were again the last ones on it because of the French. When I got on the plane, the stewardess asked me if I wanted to sdit in the cockpit. A little confused, I said sure. It was hotter than hell in there, I sat behind the captain. He told me a bunch of stories when I was there, I still have no idea whyI was chosen to sit there because there were only five seats in there and there were six people so I guess the person's seat I took had to stand. I took a picture and on my way out, he gave me a signed pound because it had a picture of Abu Simbel on it.

We got back really late, three pm, and we had to leave by 4:15 pm, so I showered, ate a snack because I had no lunch and we were on our way to the train so we could go to Cairo. It was different, the bathrooms were the pits. At one am, the train came to a complete stop and I heard some yelling in Arabic outside. They bolted the doors shut and when I looked outside, there was a huge German shepard. I was told it was a drug dog, so your guess is as good as mine is, we still don't know what happened. We had breakfast at 4:30 am, another piece of dry bread, and we left at five am.

We went back to the original hotel we stayed at the first night, Hotel Les 3 Pyramides, but our room wasn't ready so we couldn't leave any of our stuff. We left around 7:50 am to go to the pyramids. We got there before anyone else and before it opened. Amr talked a little about them and then we went into the biggest one, the Great Pyramid. He kept insisting the stones were bigger than they seemed, and of course I didn't believe him till I got there and the stone was just a little shorter than me. We went inside, and there was this hall, maybe 3 feet, Iattempted to crawl, cause my hade kept hitting the roof, but it just hurt more so I hunched my way through. There was one hall that I really didn't want to go into because it was so small, but it's one of those things that if you don't go, you might regret years from now. I could have lived without it though.

Then we drove by the other two pyramids which had three "mini's" around them for their wives. Then we went to the Great Sphinx. We had to walk into the temple and were told exactly hor to mummify a person and what they did at the burial ceremony. Finally we waked out to a closer view of the Sphinx. Some of us then got to ride a camel. My camel's name was California, along with everyone elses. It's a lot higher up than I expected. My camel was tied onto the back of another and when mine would stop, it would have to run to catch up with the other. Not fun, I kept yelling, don't run (did it listen?) and everything thought that was funny. We had to drop some people off at the hotel because were sick and then we went to the bank, but they wouldn't cash travelers checks. We had lunch at McDonald's, believe it or not it was cheaper than home, but much saltier. Then we went to the old capital, Memphis. There were a bunch of statues of Ramses II and a small sphinx which is all located in the Sakkara area. Then we went to the step pyramid and got some more sand.

Then we went to a carpet school where nine to sixteen year olds, mostly girls, make rugs for two hours to make money. The girls we saw said they were thirteen and fourteen, but didn't look more than eight. Our final stop was to a papyrus place where they make it. We went to the hotel and had to walk up the stairs to the fifth floor because there were too many people waiting for the elevator. On our way down to dinner the elevator didn't work and we got stuck in it. My mom had to pry it open with her hands and we went back down the stairs. Then we realized we forgot the key and had to go back up with a guy who insisted the elevators were fixed on our way back down, but again, we got stuck and manually had to open it. Plus, we had these massive mosquitos in our room, and guess who got bit.

Our last day in Cairo we went to the Cairo museum. We saw a bunch of famous statue and King Tut's jewelery. After lunch we went to a coptic church and saw the oldest synagogue in Cairo. Then we went to a jewelery store and got some cartushes. Our final stop was to the mosque of Mohammud Ali. We had to take off our shoes inside and all the ladies had to wear somthing on their heads. Plus, we had to be covered, no shorts or short sleves. Then we went to the Cairo bazaar. I didn't think what I thought I felt I actually did feel, but when I realized there was no one around me I understood I was being touched in places I didn't appreciate. It's a worse feeling that I could have imagined. I had some kid blowing kisses at me and it wasn't in that cute kind of way. We went back to the hotel for dinner. I was so sick of walking up and down the stairs. We had to get up at 5:30 am the next day and be ready by six am to catch the plane back home. The rest of the group went to Alexandria for an additional three days while thre rest of us went home. We got to Orlando around eleven pm, and my day was an additional seven hours longer. We had to fly from Cairo to Heathrow to New York to Orlando. To think, I'll be flying again in no time.