Camels are not actually indigenous to Egypt, as evidenced by their absence in ancient Egyptian art, which frequently depicts other animals. Endearingly awkward and teeming with personality, the beasts of burden were most likely introduced to Egypt by the Persians. Typically I make fun of camel jockeys, but that day I was one. My camel, Michael Jackson, was slightly stubborn and handled like a three-wheeled Hummer with blown struts. We sauntered (at times galloped) Ali-Baba style around the complex and nearby Sphinx over the course of a couple of hours and I became increasingly convinced that my next car should, in fact, be a camel. I’d love to see that DMV registration.
Class: SUV
Year: 2002
Make: Syrian
Model: Twin Hump
Color: Brown
After a lunch of koushary, an Egyptian dish featuring several types of chopped pasta, lentils and chickpeas, we traversed the city’s madness to reach the Citadel of Saladin, a large fortress complex that today houses an enormous, imposing mosque built by Mohammad Ali in the 1850s. The pyramids were originally even more spectacular, coated with a layer of gleaming limestone that shone with prismatic radiance in the sun. Ali, being a douchebag, plundered the stone to build his monument. The mosque’s interior is intricate and opulent, a sort of middle-eastern corollary to St. Peter’s Cathedral in Rome. Its patrons are an interesting bunch, half praying Muslims and half tourists photographing praying Muslims.
The day was grueling, highly exhausting, but one of few I know I’ll never forget.
1/23
I was to meet the mothers and Ahmed at the Egyptian Museum at 9 a.m. sharp. My guidebook advised an early arrival to avoid the afternoon crowds, so I figured an arrival at the museum’s opening time would provide a leisurely perusal of some of the world’s most spectacular artifacts. On that morning, however, Japan invaded Egypt. Dozens of tour buses adorned with Japanese symbols opened their doors as the clock chimed 9 and a sea of diminutive, chattering beings emerged. They say ants can bear up to 10 times their body weight. The Japanese can do the same with Nikons. They’re culturally oblivious to the concept of personal space, and I was so thoroughly groped in the ticket line that buying me dinner beforehand would have been only polite
Once inside, I was simultaneously awed and depressed. Performed by removing all internal organs (heart and kidneys excepted) and bodily moisture, mummification is designed to preserve a corpse as thoroughly as possible. Egyptians believed that keeping the body intact aided in the transition to the new body in the afterlife. The same principle is applicable in Egyptian art; the side-profile was utilized to present the body’s elements in their entirety (especially the eye). Pharaohs and other wealthy denizens had their servants and pets ritually slaughtered upon their death and (along with other riches) buried with them so that they could be served and entertained for eternity. Their culture and religion dictated that life be spent preparing for death, yet who knows if their obsession with the afterlife is at all founded. They were polytheists, heathens by Christian and Islamic standards, so either this entire ancient civilization is rotting in hell (as Christianity teaches Jesus opened the gateway to heaven about 2000 years ago), or modern day theists have the wrong idea about what happens after we inevitably pass away.
The award for most remarkable museum content undoubtedly goes to the burial artifacts of King Tut. He was a little-known, largely unimportant boy-king who died at the age of 18 after a less than 10 year reign. What makes him the face of Egyptian antiquity is the discovery of his burial chamber intact and unspoiled by Howard Carter in 1922. Among the spoils on display are his 25 pound gold burial mask and a sarcophagus adorned with enough bling to make any rap mogul green with envy. The runner-up prize goes to the animal mummy room, which has an impressive collection of preserved cows, baboons, birds, cats and yes, even Nile crocodiles. Animals’ internal organs were not preserved, but liquefied and removed via a turpentine enema shortly after death. Yum.
The Egyptian mom, Sohar, treated us to a lunch with her nieces aboard a Nile riverboat. Eating above my means was the upside of traveling with three older women. Shopping was the invariable downside. They were keen to peruse mass-produced, made-in-China garbage from tourist trap souvenir stores. Egypt T-shirts. Sphinx-themed magnetic tea saucer sets. Scarab paper-weights. Pyramidal jewelry boxes. Stuffed camels with “I Love You” sewn across them. I guess it’s the thought that counts, but why not bring people back something real? If you go to Berlin, for example, get a crumble from the wall. If you go to Zimbabwe, get a tiny denomination of the local currency. Get anything that has or once had relevance in regards to your location. Two hours and 136 “special price my friend”s later, I bid final farewell to my brief companions and concluded the day.
1/24
Alexandria, on Egypt’s northern coast, is positively teeming with history. The ancient library, founded sometime in the first half of the 4th century, contained a wealth of knowledge from all over the known world. All ships entering the port were obligated to surrender any manuscripts on board for copying and cataloguing. Nobody really knows the extent of information contained there, but there have been glimpses that suggest it was highly advanced. The Piri Reis map, for example, was likely conceived using information from the library. The Pharos of Alexandria (better known as the lighthouse) was one of the 7 ancient wonders of the world. It was the world’s tallest structure at the time, and may have housed the world’s first lens, used both to magnify ships in the distance and concentrate sunlight to burn enemy vessels. Unfortunately, both structures were destroyed (the former by fire, the latter by earthquake), but I still wanted to visit Alexandria to imagine and bask in what once was. So I did.
Due to a computer snafu, all my pictures from today were mysteriously deleted. I'm in the process of procuring copies, and I’ll edit them in as soon as I get them.
I met and banded together with a fellow hostel dweller, Hans (German), and we wiled away the 3 hour train ride sharing stories. Reaching our destination (and with no Ahmed to ferry us around), steam locomotion gave way to bipedal. It was an absolute nightmare. Crossing the street is like real-life frogger (see: “If you can dodge traffic, you can dodge a ball”). The highlight of the day (by far) was the modern library that occupies the spot of the original. It takes the form of an enormous disk slanted and wedged into the ground at an angle. An impressive stone relief serving as part of the building’s façade is imprinted with symbols and words from every alphabet in existence. Inside is extensive and immaculate, an absolute contrast to the filth and squalor of the world outside. Was it worth 6 hours in a train to see two buildings that don’t exist anymore? Yep.
Schoolwork is terrible. I stayed up most of the night perfecting and expanding a scientific paper on principal-agent theory in the telecommunications sector. Will this have any use in the future? No. Did I want to write it? Certainly not. Does my professor want to read it? Uh uh. Then why am I writing it? Uh…
1/25
I slept most of the day as a result, but felt like I’d pretty much accomplished Cairo at this point. I (barely) survived the walk to the train station and spent an hour and a half trying to purchase my ticket for the overnight train to Luxor. Hans proposed we watch the big soccer match that evening, Egypt vs. Cameroun in the Africa Cup of Nations tournament, and we trudged around trying to find a venue. Muslims are prohibited from consuming alcohol (which is actually an Arabic word), so bars take the form of coffee shops where the boys get together for a few water pipes and a game of backgammon. Hans and I settled in at one of these cramped and crowded establishments and adhered ourselves to the tiny tube television hanging from the ceiling. The small shop buzzed with energy, and any activity in favor of Egypt was met with fist pumping and enthusiastic Arabic from the hometown crowd. Egypt 3-1, in overtime.
Hans and I parted after the game and, amazingly, I was briefly alone for the first time after 4 days in Cairo. For security reasons, tourists are relegated to one train daily from Cairo to Luxor. In my cabin I encountered Brian. Originally from Salt Lake City, his devout Mormon parents kicked him out of the house when he was 17. He migrated to Los Angeles and began satiating his lust for travel by satiating the lust of others. The petite, effeminate man-slut is now 29, lives in Berlin, uses occasional DJ gigs as his sole source of income, and continues to spend any excess on travel. This guy’s been to more than 60 countries. His knowledge of geography and “the way the world works” is staggering, and his current choice of light reading is a book surveying 20th century world history. He’s what most people would call “cultured," and he got that way by selling himself. It’s an interesting story, to say the least.
Tomorrow I’m headed to the fabled Valley of the Kings, never a dull day in Egypt. Never.
No comments:
Post a Comment