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Egyptian
Wonders My father was conscripted in to the Army after the second world war, at a time when there were British Army bases all over the world. He chose to remain in the Army after his obligatory two years and retired having achieved the rank of Colonel in the 1990’s. I was fortunate enough to have travelled with him on all his overseas postings from a very young age and my love of travel and moving about have remained with me all my life. I have always had ‘itchy feet’ and fortunately for me my husband does too! Together we have been fortunate enough to have visited many exciting places; we climbed a waterfall in Jamaica, watched the famous Blue Mountain coffee being produced and went crocodile watching on the Black River; we flew on a six seater plane from San Francisco to Yosemite Park and had the services of a Ranger for the day to show us around the various Indian sites and point out the wildlife. The wildlife that was running around the hotel restaurant tables during our lunch stop that day was an unexpected bonus! I would like to share our experience of tanks, armed soldiers and machine gun nests next to the deck chairs, on our cruise boat in Egypt. We had booked the trip with Thomas Cook a full year before the dreadful shooting at the mortuary temple site of Hapshepsut. This was to be a trip of a lifetime and, although we were very concerned about the events, we were both worried that the holiday would be cancelled. Fortunately, Thomas Cook was the only holiday company still sailing north of Luxor at this time, and although we could not sail down the whole Nile as planned, the itinerary was rearranged to allow us to see as much as possible. The security measures certainly made us feel safe, as well as making this a holiday to remember. We arrived at Heathrow airport to be met by Yasser Farahat, our Egyptologist and guide for the next two weeks. He was polite, welcoming and charming, and right from the beginning he held the entire holiday together in the most professional way, making sure that everyone’s needs were catered for. We flew on Air Egypt and were surprised when the plane landed at Cairo, because the entire cabin clapped and cheered as if a smooth landing was most unusual! We had booked a room with a Nile view and spent a really marvellous 4 nights in Cairo visiting the Pyramids, the Mosque and the Museum. We were met each morning by a tour bus and had a little taste of things to come when we visited the Museum because our bus was escorted by police cars. We had police protection both on and off the bus and into the museum, due to a previous terrorist incident there. I had read Howard Carter’s book of his discovery and seen the illustrations of the treasures from the tomb of Tutankhamun but was totally unprepared for the sheer beauty of the colours. The Cairo Museum does not have air conditioning and it can be very warm inside. However, the treasures are kept in an air conditioned gallery so it is like being hit hard twice when you enter. Once by the extremely cool air and again by the treasures themselves. I took away vivid impressions of the artefacts and also of a very humorous incident when our museum guide got into competition with a French guide. Both guides were trying to give a talk about the museum and each seemed to think the other was standing in ‘her’ place. They tried to shout each other into submission by giving the talk as loudly as possible, each in their own language, whilst exchanging ferocious looks. The two groups of tourists obviously enjoyed the unexpected entertainment and coincidentally we would meet up again further along on our travels for another very funny incident. The bus took us to Memphis, ancient capital of Egypt, then to the step pyramid at Saqqara. We lunched at the Mena House Hotel where the dining room overlooks the Pyramids. After an excellent lunch we took a camel ride up to the pyramids. George, the poor camel allotted to me, was sitting and eating when he was given a sharp poke with a stick to make him get up. He complained loudly and spat his grass at me which was a good start because I was terrified of him, but had to get on his back! I was warned that I might find the Pyramids disappointing, because of their size and proximity to the suburbs of Cairo. However, that was not the case. The base stones of the Pyramids were almost as tall as me and I found them fascinating. There are all sorts of wheelers and dealers at the site, but Yasser was excellent at making sure we were not bothered too much. If you go around one side of the Pyramids facing away from Cairo towards the desert, it is easy to imagine how the site would have been in ancient times. Very early on the morning of day four, we flew down to Aswan to join our cruise boat. Because of the fears of terrorism, the boat was much less than half full and there were only about 20 of us. The proposed holiday itinerary by contrast, was very full and every effort was made to welcome us and make sure we all had an excellent holiday. The first evening, after we had settled into our cabins we enjoyed a sail on a felucca, and then had a reasonably early night as we were flying down to the Abu Simbel Temples the next morning. The flight was great fun for two reasons. Yasser said that we needed to sit on the left of the plane if we wanted to see the temples as we flew down to the site. On arrival at Aswan airport, we found that the seating for the flight was not pre-allocated and sitting waiting to board the plane was the party we had encountered at the museum. It was obvious that our new friends from the museum had been told the same thing about the left hand side of the plane. What followed was hilarious. When the doors allowing access to the plane were finally opened, there was a skirmish across the tarmac to the plane and victory for our party! (I have to say that we did swap places with our friends on the way back so they had chance to see the temples from the air also). Secondly, the pilot flew the plane in the style of Biggles, and as we roared off down the desert, each of us feared for our lives. The plane was rocking from side to side, banking left and right and finally landed at what seemed a very high speed and a very strange angle. It remained a joke for the rest of the holiday and on each flight we made after that, we looked to see how the plane approached the airport, hoping it would not be Biggles. Abu Simbel is breathtaking. When you get off the plane there is a short walk from the air strip. You continue around a corner and suddenly the Temples are there, huge and magnificent. It is absolutely incredible that they were moved out of the reach of Lake Nasser and there is no sense of them being anywhere other than where they should be until the end of the tour when you go ‘behind the scenes’ and can see just how they have been reconstructed. I was amazed to see that the statues have British graffiti on them that was, in some cases, over 150 years old. Every time we returned to the boat after an outing, the crew were there to meet us with cold drinks and flannels to refresh ourselves. The crew also liked to play tricks with the clean towels and had perfected the art of what I can only describe as towel origami! We returned to our cabins to find towels shaped like animals and once a perfect little baby shape was laid out on the bed.
We had a ride in a horse drawn carriage to have tea in the Old Cataract Hotel, where Death on the Nile was filmed, and the next morning visited the Unfinished Obelisk and Philae Temple. We cruised from Aswan to Luxor stopping to see the historical temples on the way. When we arrived at Luxor there were tanks and soldiers waiting on the riverside. We all made jokes about waking up to find machine gun nests on the decks, but that was exactly what happened! During the night, without disturbing anyone, the soldiers went to work and the next morning there were machine guns attached to front and rear of the boat. From Luxor onwards, every time we got off the boat we had an armoured tank and two Jeeps with armed soldiers to escort us. The people North of Luxor make their living from tourists and had been seriously affected by the lack of visitors. I was very worried about how we would be perceived by the locals because we must have seemed aggressive ourselves. The tank sounded its siren, clearing the road for our bus to pass and the soldiers in the Jeeps waved their machine guns at everyone every time we went out. I was relieved that the locals came out to wave at us and shout their thanks to us for coming to Egypt. In one town, they brought all the children out from school to wave. My husband’s relatives had visited the area in previous years and advised us to take plenty of paper and pencils to give to the children. I added hair ribbons and beads for the girls and some cheap toy cars for the boys to my bag of goodies and all the fellow passengers were similarly prepared. The children were delighted and we had some memorable encounters with some who rushed off to round up their friends to bring back to us and one child who halted the tour bus by kneeling on the ground angelically pleading for a pencil. The driver let us off to give him paper and a pencil and he ran alongside the bus blowing kisses to us. We visited some truly stunning places. Temples and tombs with vivid wall paintings. The most beautiful tomb is that of Queen Nefertari and it is worth the extra it costs to visit because the colours are fresh and glowing inside. I was overawed with the size of everything we saw. Yasser took a picture of us standing next to a stone bird and we are very small against the bird. Then we took a photo of the same bird next to the temple and the bird is dwarfed. This gives some idea of the perspective which is missing in the photographs that you usually see. To walk in the Valley of the Kings was something I had dreamed of doing from childhood and when I had read Howard Carter’s book, I never imagined that I would ever actually stand in the tomb of the boy king myself one day. There was a very touching moment when we arrived at the site of the massacre at the Temple of Hapshepsut. I had not realised that the site was completely open and that there would have been nowhere for the tourists to hide to protect themselves or shelter from the terrorists. On the day we visited, there were men with machine guns sitting on camels all around the site and in the hills above. Yasser told us he was on the tour bus the day the shooting happened. He said that the stall holders who sell stone scarabs and souvenirs tried to help the tourists by throwing their carved stone goods at the gunmen. He had not unloaded his bus, but quickly turned and drove away, taking the tourists back to their boat. He said they were all offered the opportunity to be flown home but the majority chose to stay. They were all deeply touched at the reaction of the Egyptians, who genuinely do not want the tourists harmed and who apologised wholeheartedly to them for the incident and the behaviour of the terrorists at every possible opportunity. We finished our cruise with the fancy dress party where everyone dressed as Egyptians. All the women had bought beautiful clothes from the various bazaars that we had visited and even all the men had made the effort and looked wonderful in their white galabeas. We enjoyed Egyptian music, dancing and food and the waiters sang for us. I have spoken to many people who are understandably worried about going to Egypt but I would love to go back. The history and the buildings are magnificent and the people are friendly. We returned loaded with beautiful examples of the talent of the Egyptian craftsmen and women, but also with a different outlook on life. The memory of the beautiful, serene, dignified faces of the villagers we met will always stay with me and will remain thought-provoking. We were given
a free football when we bought a roll of film at a hotel shop in Luxor.
Not wanting to carry it back to the UK, we waited until we saw a group
of boys on the bank of the Nile and kicked it off the boat to them. The
breeze caught it and the ball landed back in the Nile. The boys dived
in the water and swam out to retrieve it, not without some difficulty,
and took it back to the shore with great hilarity and lots of blowing
of kisses. This started a bit of a debate amongst the fellow passengers
about the wisdom of giving the boys the ball. Would it make them fight?
We were of the opinion that you need more than one boy to play a game
of football and from what we observed the boys knew that! I would like
to think they are still having fun with it. So if anyone sailing up the
Nile sees the replica ‘World Cup’ First published in VISA issue 53 (December 2003) |