Today was my one and only day in Cairo! While I’ve been dying to go to Egypt for years and years, this full-day layover came about due to flight scheduling difficulties rather than actual intention to travel here on this itinerary. I took the redeye from Heathrow to Cairo, landed at 5 am, and depart again at 11 pm. Thankfully, I learned upon arrival that Egypt Air provides complimentary hotel rooms to business class passengers with layovers of 8 hours or more. Hooray – I get to shower today! For a few minutes I was skeptical of the airline employee’s promises, thinking that they must be leading me into a trap of some kind (briefly experiencing flashbacks to my 2005 New Delhi airport experience), but it turns out that the airline does indeed provide this service. I take the shuttle from the airport to the hotel around 6 am, thankful to have a place to nap before my guide comes to pick me up for my tour.
Hooray for a layover not spent in an airport!
The drive to the museum takes a while, and I spend most of the time staring out the window at the city of Cairo. We drive past a few palaces (including one that is built using an Indian-inspired architectural style - weird), some statues of famous Egyptians on horses, and then some slums. The slums look pretty terrible – square buildings with blankets covering holes in the walls, and trash surrounding everything. Hecham told me that one of those apartments would probably cost about 200K Egyptian pounds to buy (or about $30K). No thank you.
I find myself comparing Cairo to my time in India. Prior to my arrival, I spent a lot of time
worrying about what to wear so as not to attract too much attention. A long skirt?
A head scarf? Baggy pants? Now
that I’m here, I see that most of the women seem to be Muslim and cover their
heads with scarves. Other than that,
though, they don’t dress all that differently from women in India. I’m relieved and feel pretty happy with my
choice of yoga pants, a long t-shirt that covers my ass, and a sweatshirt. I still notice men staring at me here, but
for some reason it didn’t bother me nearly as much as I expected it would. Perhaps I’m desensitized after my time in
India, or maybe it will just take some time to get to the point where I want to
start doing my best DeNiro “you talkin’ to me?” impression at an unwelcome
looky-loo.
Or a truck filled with them...
The Egypt Museum is a beautiful colonial building, built by
the French (who occupied Egypt before the Brits). Interestingly, outside the building are a line
of tanks with Egyptian solders manning them holding very large automatic
weapons. Apparently the museum is very
close to the square where the Muslim Brotherhood likes to protest and/or riot,
so the army is always nearby with tanks and soldiers to get things under
control quickly. In fact, everywhere we
went there were always policemen or infantry with very large and obvious weapons.
Hecham assured me that these were purely
meant to be deterrents for any hooligans, and that the guns should make me feel
safer rather than more at risk.
In this situation, would it make things better or worse for me to run around with my hands up screaming "I'm an American! I'm an American!"...?
Worse. Definitely worse.
The museum is filled with more artifacts than I could cover
in a day, let alone a month, so Hecham takes me on a “highlights” tour of the
collection. The darling of the
collection is obviously King Tut and all of his treasure, which I am happy to
say I have finally seen. There was a
period in 2007 (I think) where King Tut was on tour around museums in North
America, and it seemed that I would always arrive in a city the day or week
after he had just left to go somewhere else.
Finally! I get to see the boy
king who my sister Megan wrote a paper about in 4th grade! (Yes I know it’s weird that I remember the
papers my sisters wrote in elementary school, but let’s be honest – that’s not
even close to the weirdest thing about my brain). Thankfully – Tut did not
disappoint. The collection of jewelry,
furniture, amulets, statues, and other belongings that accompanied him to the
afterlife are breathtaking for both their beauty and the degree to which they
have been preserved. I couldn’t take any
photos in the museum, but my favorite items were the Russian-nesting-doll-style
sarcophagi, which were in turn placed inside nesting boxes. This guy was certainly well protected against
intruders, with all of that gilded wood surrounding him. My guide pointed out to me an artifact that
he claimed to be King Tut’s condom. Not
only did the piece of linen look more like a tampon than a condom, making me
question its effectiveness, why the hell would an Egyptian king need a
condom? Ramses II had hundreds of kids,
which is why they named a condom after him so that us non-pharaohs won’t end up
with a herd of children like he did. Am
I missing something here? Was King Tut
worried about STDs? Since they suspect he
died from gangrene at the age of 19, perhaps he should have been more worried
about antiseptics than contraceptives, but who am I to judge?
Between the two of us, I'd say the sphinx is the better judge...
The rest of the Egypt Museum is a whirlwind of sarcophagi,
jars filled with ancient organs, papyrus manuscripts, and giant statues. Distilling it down to a few interesting
tidbits, I learned:
- Men were represented as being brown in Egyptian artwork, and women were represented as being white. Of course, this has to do with the fact that men were expected to work outdoors all day and women were expected to stay inside like good little housewives.
- There were originally two kingdoms of Egypt – the Upper Kingdom (ironically in the south) and the Lower Kingdom in the north. One was represented by red, the other by white. One by papyrus, the other by a lotus flower. At some point a pharaoh named Menes combined the kingdoms, making all subsequent pharaohs lords of all of Egypt.
- King Tut’s dad was the first to introduce monotheism to Egypt, telling everyone to stop worshiping all of the gods except for Ra. He died and they went back to polytheism, but it's still cool that he tried.
- Animals were sometimes mummified as well as humans. There were four reasons that an animal may be mummified – it was a beloved pet, a sacred beast believed to be inhabited by a god, an offering of food to accompany someone to the afterlife, or a votive offering.
- There was a badass Egyptian queen (Hatshepsut) who stole the throne from her step-son and declared herself queen on the basis that she was descended from or otherwise related to Ra. She erected statues of herself around the kingdom designed so that she looks like a man with big muscles so that she would appear strong. Accordingly, all of her statues were brown, not white.
- The last time that Egyptian hieroglyphics were used as an active written language was around 400 AD. After that, foreign influences changed the local written language, resulting in the language being indecipherable prior to the discovery of the Rosetta Stone
- I saw a cast of Queen Nefertiti’s face, and even by modern standards, she was super hot
- The eyeliner that the Egyptians wore was meant to keep the sun away from their eyes (similar to football players today)
- You can tell if a statue of a pharaoh was made during his life or after his death based on the beard. If the beard is upturned at the end, it was sculpted posthumously.
- European colonists sure stole a lot of stuff from the Egyptians. There are some obvious holes in the collection ranging from the Rosetta Stone to the beard of the Sphinx.
After the museum, we drove past the new American embassy,
which could be recognized by the giant blocks of cement and plethora of cars
blocking any unwelcome rioters from breaching the perimeter. The memories of the 2011 revolution are still
very fresh in people’s minds, as evidenced by even some buildings right next to
the museum which were burned because they were owned by pro-Mubarak factions
and have not been restored yet.
Next we
drove to Giza and visited a few shops before seeing the pyramids. My favorite was the papyrus institute, which
is government run (and so quality and authenticity are guaranteed). There they use the ancient methods to create
papyrus and then paint artwork onto it.
As anyone who has seen my house would correctly guess, I bought a few J Our last stop before the pyramids was to eat
lunch at a local Egyptian restaurant. I
got a mixed grill platter of chicken, kofte, and a mystery meat that I chose to
not taste. This came with some delicious
mezze items, pita bread unlike any I’ve ever had before, and some tasty
vegetable soup. The food was similar to
a lot of other Mediterranean countries, though tasty in its own right.
Finally, we get to the pyramids! It’s slightly shocking to see how close the city of Giza comes up to the site of the pyramids. It’s not like they’re located in the middle of the desert and you have to take a camel to get there or anything. Instead you simply drive your car into the large parking lot and enter the pyramid grounds as if you’re entering Disneyland or the Grand Canyon. Anyway, today happens to be a very windy day in the Sahara, so Hecham is forced to give his spiel on the pyramids while we both are gallantly trying to ignore the buckets of sand being whipped into our faces.
Try to not let the sandstorm obscure your view...
That's better...
We
start by walking around near the base of the Great Pyramid. We didn’t have enough time to go inside, so I
have resolved that next time I will go back and play archaeologist as I explore
the tunnels underneath the structure. Instead
I climb around on the outside of the pyramid and Hecham takes about 300 photos
of me with windblown hair and sand in my mouth, trying not to fall (or be
blown) off the edge and break my neck.
Not awkward. Not awkward at all...
There I learn that there are 3 large
pyramids in the area, but 9 total because the other 6 were built for the wives,
mothers, and favorite daughters of the first two pharaohs. The women’s pyramids are much smaller of
course, but at least the men loved them enough to spend their afterlife as
neighbors.
Howdy, neighbor...
Our second stop in the pyramid park is the “panorama”
viewpoint, where Hecham held a photo shoot with me pretending to do various
things to the pyramids, which look small in the distance. It was during this shoot that I checked a
to-do off my life: walk like an Egyptian in Egypt. Donesies.
I could have paid to ride a camel at this point, but with the sand whipping everywhere and the camels throwing me some serious shade, I decided I’m ok with not jumping onto a humped, spitting beast. Still, I got some pretty cool photos of them.
You should see the rest of my to-do list...
I could have paid to ride a camel at this point, but with the sand whipping everywhere and the camels throwing me some serious shade, I decided I’m ok with not jumping onto a humped, spitting beast. Still, I got some pretty cool photos of them.
Hey may look calm there, but immediately after I took this photo the camel turned around and hissed at me...
Lastly, we go to the other side of the pyramid park and see
the Sphinx. The purpose of this statue
was to scare off intruders from disturbing the royalty that lie beneath the pyramids. At 60 meters in length, I would say this
statue would be hard for any grave robbers to miss. Hecham and I took some more silly photos with
me kissing the Sphinx, petting it, and putting my sunglasses onto it. I tried yelling out at the Sphinx “THE ANSWER
IS MAN!” on the off chance that the answer to its riddle would cause some kind
of Indiana Jones-esque revelation to occur, but alas, nothing happened. Someone must have beaten me to it. Curse you, Oedipus! (On second thought, he’s probably suffered
enough. And for some reason I think his sphinx was in Thebes rather than Cairo,
but whatever.)
Was this photo worth the sand-burned retinas? Why yes it was...
We end the day with a visit to a local perfumery where they make pure “essence” oils that are used to make perfumes, and a quick trip to Starbucks (for a mug for dad). On the
car ride back to my hotel, I ask Hecham about the revolution of 2011 and his
role in it. I figure we’ve developed
enough of a rapport that he won’t freak out at me asking him a politically
sensitive question. Surprisingly, he
tells me that he wishes that the Arab Spring had never happened and that he was
happier under Mubarak’s regime. In his
mind, Mubarak had his faults, but the economy prospered and tourism was booming
during his time. By comparison, these
days tourism is struggling to regain a foothold after so many Westerners were
scared off of visiting Egypt because of safety concerns. According to Hecham, oil prices are up since
Mubarak, which drives up the cost of everything else. He admittedly said that the new regime hasn’t
had enough time to institute positive change, so he’s hopeful that their
current plan to expand the Suez Canal will indeed bring in more money to the
economy. As for his role in the 2011
revolution, he said he spent that time sitting on his couch because he didn’t want
to have anything to do with it.
As I enter my hotel room and shake out what feels like half
the Sahara from my shoes, I’m thankful for the shower I’m about to take. Side note: did you know that Sahara means
desert in Arabic? So basically the
Sahara Desert is a redundant name. Silly cartographers...
The accommodations were marketed to me as a 5 star hotel, but in all
reality I’m staying in a 2 star room within a 3.5 star hotel. The carpet has not been vacuumed in a while and has a mysteriously large wet
spot in the entryway, the shampoo in the shower has been expired for 2 years, there appears to be a large dead beetle in the trash can, the room phone has no buttons, and the whole room
smells like a cacophony of unfiltered cigarettes, mildew, and stale sweat. But hey – at least there’s a free buffet dinner?
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