Well the overnight train, what an ordeal. But before I get into that I forgot to say yesterday one of the most bizarre sights in Cairo was the herd of goats and other animals right in the middle of town. What they were doing there I don't really know but it was a funny sight all the same. Anyway so I woke up so many times in the night and then sort of woke up more permanently about 6am and the sun was just coming up so I got out the camera and took some photos.This is Darren showing how it's done - sleeping on the sleeper train.
And here's a dawn pic I took.
So broken sleep - well that's not really a big deal, however, when the tour leader Sam came with our breakfast at 9 and informed us that the train was 4 hours late and we might miss out on seeing the sights, well I wasn't too excited about that.It was a long time to be on the train and when we finally arrived at 1pm or something we were all a bit worse for wear. And I'm not even going to say anything about the toilets on the train - will just say that our first stop after the train in Aswan was to the hotel for toilets! After the toilets we did head straight for the sites. We first went to the High Dam. It was interesting but I have seen a lot of big dams in my life and so it was really no more impressive than any of them. Plus I was really tired - but it was good to see - and the Aswan dam too. I guess most interesting was the amount of security around the dams. You were only allowed yto take normal photos, no big zoom lenses and no videos - armed soldiers enforced this. Also around Aswan and the dam there is 10% of Egypt's military - amazing.
Then it was back on the bus (we have been getting on and off buses a lot) and we drove to a see bay in Lake Nasser with tons of wee boats moored. We got onto one to go to the Island where the Temple of Philae was relocatedto. Now would be a good time to talk about the Nubians as this was when Sam told us about them. So we're now really in Nubian country and the Nubians all run the boat ferries and feluccas around Aswan, the women don't work but to contribute make beaded necklaces. On the boat the men were selling these necklaces and they were gorgeous. I bought one with big red discs that was 30 Egyptian pounds - nice! It was so exciting to see some Nubians as the book I'm reading that is set in Sudan has described them in great detail.
So the temple of Philas was beautiful, all the more because of the beautiful island setting. Very lush and green and very interesting rock formations too. So Philas Temple was built by one of the Ptolemys (Greek rulers in Egypt) so not nearly as old as some of the things but still very beautiful, and still very old. It was on this beautiful peaceful island we got to watch the sun set. Bliss.
Temple of Philae.
Sunset view from Philae.
Me on the way home on the boat looking back at the Island.
It was back to the hotel (very decent) for a shower then headed out for abrief trip to the markets during which we went to the most strange duty free shop ever. The tour was very well planned, for those who didn't want to go to the market (boys) they could all sit and have a coffee and sheeshah pipe (tobacco typically flavoured with apple and smoked through water). It found some girls to head into the market with and found a gorgeous pashmina. Aswan is famous for cotton so it was a must buy and I'm proud to say with the help of my new friends we got the price down from 400 to 70 Egyptian pounds which I was thrilled with. And it's so beautiful.
Then back onto a boat to go to dinner at a Nubian restaurant on an island. It was a really nice dinner apparently cooked in a special copper or stone pot. I had vegetarian and it was with rice and some grat spiced fried vegetables. Yummy! And there was this awesome Nubian dance show with really really loud drums. It was great fun, a couple of dances had big puppets and one a guy with tribal dress on. There was tons of audience participation - I even got up for a big group dance at the end. Then back to the hotel around 10.30om for sleep before a 3.30am wake for Abu Simbel!
Nubian dancing at the restaurant (I'm second on the left).
:)
Mindy
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2 comments:
Hey Mindo, weren't the ptolemies macedonian? They were put there by Alexander the Great. Did they talk about Alexander much on your trip? That would be cool- you should read the Manfredi series I have, it's really good. Darren would probably enjoy it too.
That dancing looks like fun but how come none of you have your arms out like the man does?
Oh sorry Ame, my guidebook didn't distinguish between Macedonians and Greeks and keeps calling Cleopatra Greek so that's where my confusion came in. Alexander was probably decended from Greeks anyway though :)
They only talked about Alexander a little - the tour leader thought he was very intelligent compared to other foreign rulers of Egypt because he actually embraced Egyptian religion etc so they Egyptians were happy to follow him.
Um not sure why we're not the same as the dancer at this moment, though I have lots of other photos when we were - maybe he'd told us just to keep doing that (not that he spoke English - just yelled at us in Nubian till we understood!).
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