A Brief History of Egypt (in Less Than 300 Words)
First, a very very brief history of Egypt for the tourist to put into context some of the places I visited on this trip. The majority of the ancient monuments on the tourist circuit from Cairo to Luxor to Aswan to Abu Simbel, with the exception of a mosque or two in Cairo, were constructed in very short periods of time during the Pharaonic Times. It began with the unification of Upper and Lower Nile by Menes in about 3000 BC. It’s divided into the Old, the Middle, and the New Kingdoms. The early Step Pyramid of Saqqara was built in the 27th century BC by Old Kingdom Pharaoh Zoser. The pharaohs of this period ruled from Memphis, outside of present day Cairo. The three Great Pyramids of Giza were built by the last three kings of the 4th dynasty at the height of pharaonic power. After the Old Kingdom, there was the Middle Kingdom. After the Middle Kingdom, there was the New Kingdom, whose capital was Luxor. The pharaohs of this period were buried on the west bank of the Nile in the Valley of the Kings and the Valley of the Queens. The most famous of the New Kingdom pharaohs was Ramses II. A large number of the monuments and temples up and down the Nile from Abu Simbel to Memphis, were built by this one pharaoh. His mummified body is on display at the Egyptian Museum in Cairo. The Pharaonic Times ended at around 4th century BC when Alexander the Great came. Then the Romans came; the Arabs came; the Turks came; the British came. Then in 1950, after more than two millennia of foreign rule, Egypt was once again independent.
The rest of Egyptian history you’ll have to find out from somebody else.
The Solar Eclipse
(Wednesday, August 11)
There happened to be a solar eclipse on the day I left Riyadh, which was on the path of 60% partial eclipse. The Saudis had special prayers for the eclipse. A few meetings were rearranged. A few laughable rumors circulated. Saudia downgraded me from business class to coach. The flight was delayed for three hours. I was locked in the terminal. The sky seemed to darkened a little, but otherwise it was rather unexciting. By the time I got to Cairo, I realized that my parents had at a different terminal on EgyptAir from New York. They couldn’t get any information about my flight. They decided to come to my terminal at just about the time that I arrived and went looking for them. I had arranged airport pick-up and tours with Salah Hafiez, as recommended by LP. Sharif, our tour guide, was waiting for me. After some going back and forth, we collected everyone.
I never imagined that I’d be in Cairo twice in the span of three months. Cairo already seemed different from what I had remembered. I am sure it wasn’t because Cairo had changed much, but my memory and my impression of the place. The city didn’t look as rundown as before, probably because I had recently been to Delhi. Driving in Cairo didn’t seem to be as hair-raising as before either, probably because I had been in Saudi Arabia for a while longer than I should. The traffic into the city center was much heavier than usual, Sharif said. People were banned from coming into the streets during the eclipse, so now it seemed that everyone’s on the road just to make up. Sharif tried to steer us to a hotel on Pyramid Road. I was suspicious at first, but the hotel I planned to go to in the city center turned out to be a total dump, even though it’s rated as mid-range and recommended by LP. The one Sharif took us to was indeed nicer and not much more expensive. He turned out to be a fairly straightforward and earnest chap, so I would recommend these guys for anyone going to Cairo.
Memphis, Saqqara, and Giza
(Thursday, August 12)
Sharif was trained in Egyptology in college. He’s been a tour guide for several years. I was happy with the job he did guiding us. I actually remembered a lot of what he said because I had to listen to him very carefully and then translate for my parents. So everything he said had gone through my head twice. Still I don’t seem to remember much now. Sharif was very conscientious about his guiding. His choice of where to do the briefing needed improvement, though. He’s probably used to the heat, but standing in the sun in the desert in the middle of the day wasn’t the best way to keep our attention.
The day started with a visit to Memphis, the Old Kingdom capital. Very little is left there today, but a small open air museum and a huge statue of Rames II, one of the New Kingdom pharaohs. Ancient Egyptian capitals were always on the east bank of the Nile, where the sun rose, and the burial grounds on the west, where the sun set. Across the Nile at Saqqara lies the early Step Pyramid and the temple complex built by King Zoser and his chief architect Imhotep.
We went to the Pyramids of Giza in the afternoon. I thought that it’d be a repeat of my last visit to the pyramid. Interestingly enough, it’s a different experience. No camels or horses for me this time. Sharif took us to a vantage point to see the pyramids from afar, and then to the Pyramid of Cheops. I elected not to climb down its narrow passage way to an empty chamber. I visited the solar boat museum that I didn’t get a chance to see last time. Then it was to the Sphinx again – again for me at least – but with someone telling me a few good stories about it this time.
August in Cairo was an inferno. Nevertheless, to be on the cautious side I had asked my mother to wear neutral color long sleeve blouses and trousers instead of skirts. Caution was rather unnecessary. You should see some of the skimpy clothes the package tourists coming off tour buses were in – short shorts, bare back dresses – that got my heart pounding. I forgot that Egypt is just another vacation destination to many, so why behave any differently?
A Lesson for Them
Our late night EgyptAir 737 to Aswan had the smallest and the most tightly packed seats I had ever seen. Once I sat down, there was no room to move my knees forward because they already touched the back of the seat in front of me. There was no room to move backward because my butt was already against my seat back. We had the misfortune of sitting in the last row, probably because our reservation was mixed up and we were not in the system. The slightly inclined seat backs had to lean forward now so that their backs could be flush against the wall. Of course, they cannot be moved. It was the most torturous airplane seat I had ever sat in.
After a stop in Luxor, where most people unloaded, we arrived in Aswan at around midnight. There were still a lot of taxi drivers right outside the door. LP said that the fare to the city was about 20 pounds. I was surprised that the first offer I got was 20 pounds. Then someone said 15. Then someone said 10. Then someone said 7. Then someone said "free". I was incredulous about such lowball offers. The "free" guy sounded too fishy. I went with the 10 pound guy. Could LP be so far off? I verified three time with the guy that the fare was ten pounds.
It was actually a fairly long drive – about 20 kilometers – to town. We went over the cobblestone road over the old Aswan Dam. On some stretches of the road where there were some street lights, our taxi driver would turn off the headlights. Yes, turn OFF the headlights! Hey, if you can kinda see the road, who needs the lights? All along the way, it nagged me why the offer was so much lower than LP’s estimate, but I couldn’t figure out the catch.
The city of Aswan was actually wide awake at this time of the night. Quite a lot of people, many of them tourists, were on the streets. We arrived at Cleopetra Hotel. Across the narrow street was a water pipe joint, whose customers sat outside on the narrow sidewalk. I reminded my parents the standard procedure of getting out of the taxi and collecting all luggage before paying the fare. I asked the guy if he had change for twenty pounds. He said, "It’s ten pounds each person." So, … that’s the catch. How could I have not figured this one out? "No, you never said ten pounds each person." He still wanted his thirty. "No, I am not going to pay you thirty. You said ten, and it’s going to be ten." If it were the last time I was in Egypt just three months ago, I would have sheepishly given in or tried to reason with him. But I had been burned by the hustlers of Cairo and battle hardened in Delhi. I have paid enough tuition and learned too many lessons. I got down right militant this time. "Ten is what we agreed to, and ten is what I am going to pay you." I pointed to the hotel, "We can go inside." I didn’t know why, but he was reluctant. He accepted that he would get only ten. I paid him with all the small bills that I had. As we parted, I told him, "Don’t ever try to cheat us like this."
Mother thought that I had been a bit tough on the guy. I sort of agreed. Twenty pounds would have been fair, but he didn’t lose money with ten. This must have been the turning point in my battles against hustlers and taxi drivers. This was the first time that I thought I had turned table around, let them learn a lesson, and let them pay a little tuition.
Aswan
(Friday, August 13)
The cost of a vacation is directly proportional to the distance from which you arrange the package. Each step you are away from those who actually drive you around, guide you, and provide service to you is an added layer of profit. Tour packages marketed in the U.S. are likely to be in the high end and all inclusive. Break the package apart into local tours at each site and arrange transportation in between, the sum of the pieces is bound to be less costly. It was then understandable why no matter how Sharif structured the hotel-and-tour deals of Aswan and Luxor for me, the total was always way above the level of expenses for hotel and tours in Cairo. Besides, the Aswan portion included only hotel and airport pickup. I decided that we would take his Luxor package but do Aswan on our own.
Since the vast majority of tourists here were on some sort of a tour, for us the only way to get around was by taxi, the price of which I seemed to be able to bargain down to close to one pound per kilometer. We again drove over the cobblestone covered old Aswan Dam, which was built by the British at the turn of the century. In the 1960s, during the height of the cold war, the new Aswan High Dam was built with major help from the Soviets. A monument commemorating the friendship between the two countries stood not too far from the dam. We were the only visitors at the High Dam until a busload of vacationer emptied out. We’d of course again see them at the Temple of Philae.
The construction of the High Dam would have submerged the Temple of Philae, which had already been swamped six months out of every year because of the old Aswan Damn. UNESCO organized an international effort to move the entire temple to another island. That’s probably why the temple is in remarkably good condition.
Getting to the island proved to be a little problematic. You have to hire a boat to reach the island. Never mind that the only people going to the island are tourists who have already paid the entrance fee and passed the gate. Never mind that there are posted rates for the boats. Never mind that if it were anywhere else the boat ride would have been included in the entrance charge. Here, you have to separately bargain with the boat captains. It isn’t exactly economical to hire a whole boat for the three of us, so I spoke with the tour guide of a small Italian group and tagged along with them. Fearing that we’d ditch him, the boat captain wanted me to pay up. Fearing that he’d ditch us, I paid him half the agreed to fare. That was a rather interesting tactic that I could have never thought of without the bargaining experiences rapidly gained in the last few months. He found the arrangement to be perfectly acceptable. I needed to know when these guys planned to return, but the Italians spoke zero English. Somehow I found out from their Italian-speaking Egyptian guide that they were on their way to the airport right after this, so we’d only have a hour on the island. As luck would have it, we’d bump into her in the Egyptian Museum in Cairo a few days later.
The Temple of Philae was dedicated to Isis, the Egyptian goddess of "healing, purity, and sexuality". I lifted this out of LP, since following the Italian group was no help to understanding what I was seeing. The temple was built between the fourth century BC up to third century AD by the Greeks and Romans, so it is, in relatively terms, much younger than the other monuments we saw on this trip.
I felt so left out when everybody returning from the temple boarded their bus and left. We seemed to be the only people traveling around by ourselves today. I had to wait around for a few minutes to find a taxi. On the way back to Aswan, we stopped at the Unfinished Obelisk, one of several ancient granite quarries. Most monuments in Egypt were built out of sandstone, which was more readily available. Granite could only be found in Aswan and must be brought in. This particular obelisk was abandoned, apparently because it cracked as it was being carved out of the quarry.
Back in Aswan, after resting a little in the hotel, we went out in search of food. If it were not for all the cruise ships and tourists, Aswan would have been a sleepy little town on the Nile. Having all the package tourists meant that everyone in town seemed to speak five European languages plus Japanese, that everyone seemed to be perfectly used to the skimpy summer clothes the tourists wear, and that everyone seemed to be selling the same set of trinkets. Going down the street towards Sharia as-Souq, the street markets, was like walking down a video game of Mortal Combat. At every turn, at every other step, a guy would shoot out in front of you to try to get you to look at something or to buy something. You’d have to say, "No, thanks," or "Laa, shuklan," and actively ignore him until he gives up and moves out of your way. Yet on the other hand, we had an awfully hard time finding a descent restaurant. I didn’t dare eating in the greasy dirty shops. We ended up at an Italian restaurant in some hotel along the Nile.
One and Only Way to Abu Simbel
(Saturday, August 14)
The chief reason that we came to Aswan was to see Abu Simbel, where the four huge statues of Rames II, along with the temples, were cut up and moved block by block to higher ground, when the building of the new High Dam threatened to submerge it. When Sharif told me that the only way to Abu Simbel was to fly from Aswan, I was incredulous. That was the only way years ago, but a road was built in 1985. The problem was that the fourth edition of LP I had was three years out of date. Since then, the rash of attacks on tourists led to the closing of this road. Understandably, the lone desolate road in the desert makes tourists easy targets. Today, the only way to Abu Simbel, a mere 50 kilometers north of the Sudanese border, is to fly the 280 kilometers from Aswan on various small operators for $85 per person. Any hotel in Aswan could find me a few seats on some Mickey Mouse airline. The one we ended up with was Luxor Air. We filled three seats the Italian tour groups couldn’t fill on the plane.
Our morning flight was of course late. It also deserved the distinction of being the hottest flights I had ever been on. The most painful part was the boarding and taxiing, when the cabin was hot like an oven with no AC at all. Because of the delay in departure, our time in Abu Simbel was shortened. Once the airplane landed in Abu Simbel, the only way to go was to board the waiting tour buses to the temples. This was a first – the bus transfer from airport to the temple was free, well, in the sense that there was no separate charge like the boats at the Temple of Philae. The tourists were given a hour or so to look around while the airplanes waited. By the time we left, another huge group of people arrived at the site. It’s actually a lot of money spent on very little time at Abu Simbel. The setup completely isolates the visitors from the locals. Between the airport and the temples, we passed through the town, but never set foot on it or spent a single pound there.
I came to Abu Simbel because it is so famous. The hoards of package tourists probably came for the same reason. Today it was some large contingencies of Italians and a few small groups of Germans. No English could be heard. I pissed off the one potential guide who followed us to the temples from the entrance. I thought I had declined his service; he thought otherwise. So yet again, like in Philae, Abu Simbel had to be self-guided.
When I did my planning, I had not expected the trip to Abu Simbel to finish so quickly. I was worried about not being able to get back to Aswan early enough to catch a train to Luxor. Now my problem was to find something to do. Hanging around outside was unbearable in the hot and uncomfortable afternoon. We tried the newly built Nubian Museum, but it was closed for the afternoon and wouldn’t open again until 6 p.m. There was nowhere else to go before our evening train to Luxor. Without AC the Cleopetra’s lobby was a horrible place to kill a long afternoon. I stole a few hours taking a dipping in the small pool on the roof top.
The majority of the passengers in the first-class compartment of our train to Luxor were foreigners. As we approached our car, this big dude in what looked like railway uniform, "helped" us finding our seats. I let him put up our small bags onto the luggage rack. I tested my bargaining theory. Give half of what I think I should give. He would surely ask for more. One affirmative data point. We boarded fairly early. As I sat waiting, I observed how the guy demanded tips from everyone and how every single one of them had a very unpleasantly expression while reluctantly giving him the money. Two or three people absolutely refused to give anything, griping afterwards how the "service" had been forced up them. The big dude didn’t seem to mind too much moving onto the next person. Such is the cultural clash …
The West Bank
(Sunday, August 15)
The pyramids, as impressive as they were, were big signs that advertised, "Here’s the treasure. Rob me." The tombs of the New Kingdom kings and queens were dug into the rocky desert hills on the west bank of the Nile across from Luxor. Through the eons the majority of them never escaped the fate of being robbed clean. What remained are the wall paintings, which all looked the same to me except the bits and pieces that I had read a little about. The interesting part of a tour was the stories a good guide could tell. Stories our guide told. Unfortunately, he wasn’t nearly as thorough as Sharif in Cairo. The best preserved paintings in the Valley of the Queens are in the Tomb of Nefertari, the favorite wife of Ramses II. We didn’t see this one since only 150 people are allowed in daily to keep the humidity low in the tomb and the visit had to be reserved well in advance.
The Temple of Hatshepsut is where Islamic fundamentalist terrorists, bent on destroying the Egyptian government by destroying the tourist industry, massacred a lot of tourists a few years back. Hatshepsut was the first woman to rule as king. The temple is still being restored by groups of artisans and laborers. They sang songs as they lifted and pulled stone blocks, all with muscle power alone. It seemed to be a tourist attraction in itself, as the tourists stood in the shade against the walls and watched. The temple had been severely damaged throughout history. Shortly after the queen’s death, her successor, who had to wait for twenty years to rule Egypt, defaced the temple and removed all references to and images of the woman pharaoh.
One of the best known tomb in the Valley of the Kings is the tomb of the boy king Tutankhamum, which we did not visit. What’s so special about this tomb was that it had never been robbed before it was discovered in 1922 by Howard Carter. Its fabulous treasures, including the gold mask and the exquisitely made marble jars for organs, are on exhibit in the Egyptian Museum in Cairo. It could only be imagined what treasures were once buried in the tombs of the far more powerful pharaohs.
On the way back, we stopped by the Colossi of Memnon, the only remains of a massive mortuary temple built by Amenophis III, who also built the Luxor Temple at the peak of New Kingdom around 15th century BC. They were already ancient monuments when the ancient Greeks and Romans tourists visited and admired it. Imagine that!
I thought a tour of the Valley of the Queens and the Valley of the Kings would take the whole day. But we had left early in the morning at around seven to beat the noon heat. We were done by eleven o’clock. We took the afternoon off to rest in the hotel. I had a cool dip in the hotel pool. At around dusk, we went out to see the little Luxor Museum. One could tell that this museum had been very professionally done. No wonder, since the displays were arranged by the Brooklyn Museum. Even the camera check stand sported a "No tips" sign. Compared to the warehouse look of the Egyptian Museum in Cairo, which we would later visit, every piece here was carefully chosen and clearly labeled. It’s small enough that I could take my time to look at everything.
Luxor
(Monday, August 16)
The two main attractions in Luxor, on the east bank of the Nile, are the Karnak Temple and the Luxor Temple. Both were temples for the sun god Amun. The Karnak Temple was initially built during the Middle Kingdom and then added and rebuilt over the next 1500 years. The most awe inspiring and recognizable part of the temple is the stone pillars of the Great Hypostyle Hall, begun by Amenophis III and finished by Ramses II. I guessed that the ancient Egyptians hadn’t discovered the concept of the arch, for otherwise the pillars need not be so huge and so densely packed to support the stone blocks for the roof.
An avenue of human-headed sphinxes once linked the Karnak Temple to the Luxor Temple. Over the centuries the Luxor Temple was covered up by dirt and debris. The Arabs built a mosque on top of the temple in the 14th century AD. The mosque still stands today. It looked as if hangs in midair with its backdoor opening into a ten feet drop. At the entrance to the temple once stood two pink granite obelisks. There is only one now; the other you will have to go to Paris to see.
To avoid a repetition of the horribly long and boring afternoon in Aswan, I decided to get our flight back to Cairo changed to Tuesday morning. It was a wise decision as our tour of Luxor turned out to be a half-day tour also. The travel agent who picked us up at the train station Saturday night made all the arrangements for us. I thought it was a little unusual that he asked me write a letter about my experience in the end rather than asking for a tip, but I was glad to write a few paragraphs.
Islamic and Old Cairo
(Tuesday, August 17)
Surprisingly, our morning flight to Cairo was on time, which meant that we had to wait for Sharif a little, since he always expected the flights to be late. Our tour today covered several sites in Cairo, all of which came many centuries after the pharaohs, and none of which could compare with the magnificence and the grandeur of the far more ancient monuments.
Our first stop was the Egyptian Museum. It’s in a European style building constructed in 1858 to house the large number of archeological artifacts. Today it looked more like a huge warehouse crowded with exhibits and visitors than a museum. The value of its collection with respect to the condition of the museum is indicative of a country whose cultural heritage far exceeds its current fortune. Mummies of the once mighty queens and pharaohs like Ramses II are packed into flimsy glass cases in one small dark room. The situation is not all that different from what I had seen elsewhere – priceless treasures exhibited in cheap glass cases secured with padlocks in China, or Rembrandts hung right next to open windows in the Hermitage in St. Petersburg. I have yet to see the Egyptian collection at the Museum of Art in Boston, which has the most state-of-the-art techniques for housing their collection.
After the Museum, Sharif took us to see several sites in Old Cairo, all of which were religious sites. The exception was the Fortress of Babylon built by the Romans. A ruined round tower remains today. Not too far is the Hanging Church of Al-Muallaqa. a Coptic Christian church. A set of steps leads to the entrance, which sits on top of some old house, giving it the appearance of hanging in the air, and thus the name. Some renovation work seemed to be going on, but the church was otherwise well worn. Through some narrow and winding back alleys, we went to the Church of St. Sergius, built on a site where Jesus and Mary supposedly stayed on their flight from King Harod. Sharif then took us to the Ben Ezra Synagogue. I was goaded into buying a postcard and a pamphalet for a dollar, which I hope went towards the upkeep of the place. Understandably, there are very Jews left here. None of these places looked particularly impressive, but the significance to me was that they had been preserved at all.
We drove by the City of the Dead, which I remembered from the last time in Cairo, on our way to the Citadel. The Citadel fortification was initially built in the twelfth century to defend the city again the Crusaders. The most imposing structure of the complex, the Mosque of Mohammed Ali, was much more recently built at around 1848. Into the courtyard two tourists walked with their shoes on, sending the keeper screaming. Mohammed Ali gave the French one of the two obelisks in front the Luxor Temple for the big mechanical clock in the center court that never worked. The mosque itself violated three rules of mosque building. People are not supposed to be buried in mosques; Mohammed Ali was. People in the mosque are supposed to be able to see the pulpit; the original pulpit was at a place that could not be. Mosques are not supposed to be decorated; this one was garishly done with chandeliers and all. Sharif excused himself for a few minutes to pray.
And, … that was it. After the Citadel, Sharif took us to the airport.
Terrence
Riyadh
November 21, 1999
p.s.
I must be commended for bravery for flying on EgyptAir. First of all, there was the interesting encounter with the captain on my flight from Athens to Cairo. (See story "Threatened by the EgyptAir Captain".) I had by now sat in the most torturous airline seat on EgyptAir from Cairo to Aswan. Having visited Egypt twice, I thought I wouldn’t have to hear about the airline ever again, but no. It had to get itself into the newspapers. An EgyptAir plane was hijacked from Istanbul to Germany not too long ago. Now EgyptAir 990 crashed off Nantucket. Suspicion of suicide by the co-pilot? Need for better pilot screening? Why am I not surprised? Oops, I put my parents on EgyptAir 988 from JFK to Cairo. Sorry, Mom and Dad. Hey, I did put them on a TWA flight from Cairo back to New York. Now that’s another great airline…