Blog 4 Luxor

My train to Luxor arrived promptly at 9 PM. I found my way to cabin number 17 and was greeted by a small, smiling Chinese man named Raymond who was, unbeknownst to me going to be popping in and out of the rest of my trip through Egypt. Raymond spoke limited English and laughed like a sensei in a 1970’s kung-fu movie, if you don’t know what I’m talking about you should watch more kung-fu. I thought him a very strange and funny man, and I’m sure that the feeling was mutual. First off, I felt it necessary to explain to him that the three bags I was lugging around weren’t out of excess on my part but because I was going to be living in Amman, Jordan for five months after my trip through Egypt. He laughed and said that he had been away from his home in China for 3 months and he only brought four changes of clothes and a toothbrush in one tiny backpack. In the three months that he had spent in the ME Raymond had only liked one thing, which I think from his explanation, was a Sufi mosque in Syria. Everything out side of men in dresses and strange hats twirling around in circles while on lookers cried at the sight had failed to impress the 40 year old securities broker.  He didn’t seem bitter about not liking anything else, maybe it was just the language barrier but he was the most matter of fact person I’d ever met. When dinner came it was coffee, yogurt, and three pieces meat, strategically burnt so bad that it was impossible tell if you were eating veal or cat. I quickly ran out of things to talk about with Raymond, so we retired to our separate bunks. Every bit of energy had been sucked from my body and it took seconds for me to fall asleep.

I woke at about 6 AM the next morning to the sun rising over the fertile Nile valley. The world outside my window was so removed from the chaos of Cairo that I felt as though in my sleep I’d travel back in time 100 years. Not a whole lot has changed in that part of the world. From what I could see the whole length of the river is populated. I’m sure that there isn’t a single mile between Cairo and the Sudan that isn’t being harvested for every bit of resources that the alluvial soil will provide. Men and women transported goods by donkey, little herds of sheep wandered down dust village streets unattended, and Egyptian children swam in the river and its irrigation cannels. I watched it all pass by the train window as I ate another three pieces of blackened meat for breakfast.

I arrived in Luxor at about 8:30 and was immediately surrounded by a wave of men tugging at my bags trying to do anything for me that would warrant a few Egyptian pounds. However, after my experiences in Cairo I had become, for like of a better term, an asshole and refused virtually all assistance for the rest of my trip. Not sure were my hotel was I sat in front of the Luxor train station and examined my travel guide, trying to orientate myself. As I was about to start my trek toward the hotel, which was about a twenty-minute walk from the station, a man approached me and asked, “Nefertiti Hotel?” That being the hotel I’d made reservations with and knowing approximately were it was supposed to be, I followed the guy. He of course didn’t work for my hotel and tried to get me stay at his naturally much cheaper and more luxurious establishment. I asked him why he had lied to me. He apologized and walked me the rest of the way to the Nefertiti. On the way there we stood at a street corner for fifteen minutes as a funeral procession passed us by. I don’t know if that was a normal occurrence but a group of about 50 Arab men chanted as they moved through the city blocks carrying a coffin on their shoulders draped in a large black cloth with beautiful dark green Arabic script decorating it. I safely arrived at my actual hotel with the help of my new friend and managed to make it to my room after an hour of listening to the man working the front desk gush about his newly born daughter. The pictures were cute, but it was fucking hot and my room mere steps away, had AC. I dropped off my things and decided to wander about town a bit, half way looking for the international student travel office were I was supposable able to get an ID card that would grant me “unspeakable” discounts on sites according to Raymond. 

The streets of Luxor are quite different from those of Cairo. Aside from the fact that there are millions less people, the city of Luxor is so unprotected from the vast desert that stretches out on either side of the Nile that little piles of sand build up around everything. I can only assume that, minus the one McDonalds, cities have looked more or less just like Luxor all across Arabia for centuries. I meandered down side allies, not of the three feet wide variety found in Cairo, but ones wide enough that the donkey carts of many generation could pass though them. During my time spent exploring I saw maybe two other tourist in what is often considered the number one tourist city in the country. It was off-season and for good reason. The temperature that day had inched up to 120 F. However, I had become somewhat accustomed to it and with plenty of water and sunscreen I made the best of the empty streets. Some houses were vividly painted in pastels of blue, green, and red while others showed the wind lashed scars of the desert. On a disturbing note, the district dedicated to the selling of meat had shop after shop with their products, often the full carcasses of cows or freshly plucked and bleed chickens, on display in the withering heat. The whole street stank of death and dried blood, but the flies seemed to like. I never ate with impunity though, it being Ramadan I had to take what I could get and luckily I didn’t once get sick. I finally stumbled across the student travel office and was pleasantly greeted by Raymond who was diligently trying to convince the receptionist that although he was 40 and didn’t have a school ID he was in fact studying whatever from wherever. It worked and both Raymond and I left the office satisfied with the fact that we would be receiving 50% discounts on everything the rest of our trip. So, with that going for me I was off to Karnak.

The temple complex of Karnak is an absolutely massive site that, for me, was more interesting then the pyramids. The reason I say that is at the pyramids it’s impossible to picture what an ancient Egyptian might actually do at them. They are these huge piles of stones that at one time had some died bodies in them. Amazing as they truly are they give you little insight as to how this civilization might have actually functioned. However, at Karak you can walk the colonnades of ancient Thebes and explore the countless arteries of the administrative center of the Middle Kingdom. While feeling dwarfed by the massive walls and pillars it’s easy to image the most powerful nation of its time governing from those halls. And the best part is amidst all the pomp and grandeur is, at least to the modern visitor, humor. And particularly of the penis variety. Countless walls are adored with erect leaders confidently going about daily business unclothed and quiet excited. There are also midgets, apparently revered in ancient Egyptian society for their short stature and penis hats. This along with little statues of baboons everywhere just gave the whole place an air of lightheartedness. However, since there was virtually no shade in the entire facility I was forced to see the sight in haste. After about an hour and a half I was ready for a nap.

I woke at the 7 or 8 PM and headed across the street to the Temple of Luxor. At one time an imperial walk way ran North/South connecting Karak and the Temple of Luxor and East/West connecting them both to the Temple of Queen Hatshepsut. Luxor Temple was more or less the same thing as Karnak except not quiet as grand. However, unlike Karnak, which is lit up at night like a scene from Tron or a Pink Floyd concert, Luxor Temple is tastefully illuminated, casting shadows across the ancient stones and recreating what torch light might have done to the sight thousands of years ago. However, after an hour or so I left, admittedly more excited for my first skype date with Alex then anything else.

The next day I got up early and headed off on my first guided tour in Egypt, the West Bank. In Luxor the main city and all the hotels are located on the East Bank of the river, while the West Bank remains predominantly agricultural and poor. It has been organized in this fashion since Egyptian times because life and success was associated with the raising of the sun and death with its setting in the West. So with that dualism in mind the ancient Egyptians also set about burying their dead in the mountains and valleys that extend form the Nile to the Sahara. First stop, the Valley of the Kings. After a good dinner, conversation with the girlfriend, and a comfortable nights rest I was ready for the sights, however, this couldn’t be said for the six or seven hung over French 20 somethings that were also on the group. As they looked for every opportunity to sit down in the shade I ran after the tour guide who was, at least at the beginning of the day, more excited to see things then I was. The major sights in Egypt are quiet developed and as you enter the valley a silly trolley is there ready to escort you up to where the burial chambers begin. However, as this vehicle moves up the valley you see that it not only serves the purpose of hauling tourist too lazy to hike, but also to indiscriminately plow through the swarms of souvenir salesmen in waiting. Each visitor is only allowed to view three tombs a day and no pictures are allowed, but despite this the experience was amazing. Made even better by the fact that the tombs are a good 15 degrees cooler then outside. Each cave is set up, more or less, in the same fashion, Ramses II being the grandest. You walk in an initially small tunnel decorated on both sides with scenes from that particular rulers life. Then the tunnel opens up to a large room with detailed wall carvings and statues, often still colored as they first were 3,000 years ago, preserved by the total lack of humidity. Then back into another small tunnel this time with scenes depicting gods and a hopeful blueprint for the ruler’s afterlife. Finally, ending in the largest room with an absolutely massive stone sarcophagus that has been chiseled from the mountain and remains attached to the ground but rising up 10 or 12 feet.

After the Valley of the Kings, our group was off to the Temple of Queen Hatshepsut and the Valley of the Queens. The Temple of Queen Hatshepsut is a massive structure entirely cut out of the side of a mountain. It is the burial place of one of Egypt’s most controversial rulers, which is illustrated by the giant statues of a woman with a strap on beard. Queen Heptashut ‘s son felt that he had been cheated out of numerous years of pharaohness by his mother and therefore went about trying to erase her name from the sight and Egyptian history in general, failing quite miserably. Nevertheless, the temple is really amazing with an immense stairway dividing the structure into three different levels. However, the whole thing is made less memorable by the degree to which it is restored. Although, it was refreshing to see a sight restored to something resembling what it might have looked like in ancient times. The archeologists took great liberty reassembling the structure and might have gone to far with many pillars and walls cemented to perfection.  Finally, the Valley of Queens, as one might expect, was similar to the Valley of the Kings except on a smaller scale. However, the painted scenes in many of the tombs were better preserved then their more famous counterparts and lack of fellow tourist made the place rather refreshing. However, by this time it was about 2 in the afternoon and well above 120 degrees. Our tour guide being a good Muslim had not ate or drank so much as a sip of water all day and collapsed in the sand as we were walking back to the van. The driver told us it was ok and we left him unconscious in the desert.

Actually, we didn’t really leave him there to die but he did pass out and two guys and myself had to haul him back to the van where he finally came to during the ride back to our hotels. I was completely exhausted by the time I got back to Luxor, but I unfortunately didn’t have a room to nap in because is was heading to town called Dahab, which means gold in Arabic, in the Sinai Peninsula that evening on a bus. So, I was once again faced with dragging myself and all my shit through the scorching sun. I quickly tired of this and went to the bus stop two hours before I was to leave. In a little shwarma restaurant that over looked the bus stop I meet two 25 year old German guys who were making their way by motorcycle from Cape Town South Africa all the way back the Germany. They said that most nights they simply slept in a tent on the side of the road, and I believed them by the look and smell of their clothes. Little encounters like this constantly reminded me throughout my trip that although I was staying in 5 USD a night hotels in Egypt, I was far from sleeping on the side of the road in the Sudan. My bus came, surprisingly, on time. However, unsurprisingly there weren’t enough people to fill it so we were moved to a different bus that looked like those prison transportation vehicles you see in movies based in the 30s and 40s. Sort of like a yellow school bus that had spent most of its 50 years of existence transporting dirt and had at one time caught fire or something. Needless to say it was uncomfortable, but an adventure non-the-less. And finally, as the bus was leaving the station, who else but that little smiling Asian came running and pounding on the windows. Almost missing another opportunity to enjoy my company on a cross Egypt trip.