I always wanted to be in Egypt, see one of the wonders of the world, see the mummies.. I expected the weather to be so hot that I would return tanned!! But I was in for a reality check!! From the day I landed till date I have't been able to go out without a pullover.. The temperature at a constant 17 degrees throughout the day n even colder in the nights!!
Alexandria a newer city when compared to cairo, was a clean place with huge roads, nice ppl, friendly.. The longest road by the sea, wonderful to drive by!
Some tombs to look at, a pillar, library, few other places to see!
A little more than 200 km from Alexandria, a 4 hour drive, takes u to an old city in Egypt, the biggest city in africa, which is not so clean, with pushy ppl, aggressive, some trying to rip u off for the simplest of things!! If u have't guessed yet, it's the city of Cairo!!
The city of the pyramids n Spinx, museum and the sound and light show (which dint amuse me That much)
All of us wanted to eat some authentic Egyptian food, so our guide took us to Abu tarek to eat koshari, a mix of various items, and sauces, something worth trying!!
Our tour guide, Mohammad, along with our driver, also named Mohammad, went to the market, called al khalil bazaar, where everyone falls behind u to buy stuff, shouting loudly India, namaste, Amitab Bachan, sharukh khan, kareena kapoor as we passed by, it was total chaos!!
We had another young tour guide who assisted along with the first, who was a nice, honest, helping man, someone who u can call a true Egyptian with values! I will let u guess his name, n I'm sure u will guess it right!!
Yea it is Mohammad!!
So he tells me every second person is called Mohammad, which is one of the names of the prophet and the only way to call the right person is to address them along with their family name!
A train to Aswan, the sleeping train they call it, was booked for our further journey.
Along with young Mohammad sipping coffee in a coffee shop by the train station, expectation of our train after looking at the other trains was very low..
The other trains looked like the general class coaches in India, the complete train!
After a long wait, the sleeping train arrives at the Giza station where we supposed to board it.
Well, there was noting to complain about in the train, a cabin with locks for two people, beds with pillows n blankets, air conditioning controls, bed lights, music too! That is what 60$ gets you(mine was 80$ cause I was alone)
It was a 13 hour Journey, Dinner and breakfast was served.
We arrived at Aswan train station, to be greeted by our guide, Abdul halim( for a change) who takes us to our cruise ship where we were going to spend the next three days!
Nile ruby, was the name of our cruise boat which was stationed on the river Nile, scheduled to depart to Luxor after two days.
The plan for the day was to visit the dams that were constructed to save Egypt from floods, a 3 km long dam it was.
Our guide offered to take us to a Nubian village for an additional 35$ per person (eventually agreed for 20$) which was not in our actual plan!
We took a felucca (a sail boat) around the island to go to a botanical garden ( which is an island ) from where we headed to the village..
The village mostly dependent on tourism sold a lot of handmade items, spices , sand bottles n some other stuff.
We were taken to the government school for the Nubian school kids only to learn Arabic alphabets and numbers along with Nubian numbers!
We moved through the markets to go to a house of a villager who was friends with the guide. They offered us hibiscus tea and something to eat.
Then the owner walked into the living room where we were seated with his pet in his hand, u will never be able to guess what it was, it was a 30-40 kg crocodile!! All of us took pics carrying the croc!!
As we were leaving couple Nubians approached the ladies addressing them as Indians and asked for their bindies, Mother India removed her bindi and put it on the Egyptian girl, she looked even more beautiful!!
They wanted more and they got a pack each, well Mother India is generous ;)
That night we witnessed a wonderful show by the Nubians in our cruise ship after the dinner. It was refreshing and a hint of how vivid the Nubians are!!
The next day was to start early for us, a wake up call at 3am and leave the cruise at 330am to a Nubian temple, Abu simble about 300kms away. We were given boxes with breakfast in it.
The interesting part of leaving so early was that there were many accidents in that high way in the past and also some security reasons. And even more interesting is that all cars and buses leaving to the temple were to leave at the same time, a convoy that was lead by security. It was something done to safeguard the tourists!
There were two temples built by Ramasis II, one for himself and one for his wife, were among the temples that was moved, yes u read it right, moved from it's original place because of the rising water that would have submerged the temple after the construction of the dam.
I was told that the whole Nubian village was relocated because of the dam and a lot of temples moved to different location, and the older generation of Nubians don't like the president who made it happen.( u must be wondering why even construct it, but if it had not been done, Egypt would not exist now as river Nile would have flooded the whole country! So they decided to relocate the Nubians instead.
While coming back from the temple we visited the unfinished obelisk ( obelisk is a huge pillar that is used to inscribe something on, praises, achievements, about the king etc)
It was a 1200 ton granite block, left alone only because it cracked in between, it was huge though!
Our evening had no plans, so our guide offered to take us on a city tour of Aswan for 10$.
We were to ride on a chariot like horse cart for about 5kms.
We started with a garden, with some history behind it.
We then went to a church, which looked completely different to me I must say when compared to the ones I've been to. We then went to a mosque, that previously used to be a military training ground, again with some history behind it.
I was allowed to ride the chariot by the owner and he certifies me as a good driver ;)
The last place we were to visit was the market, little like the one in Cairo, but expensive. Some could be bargained to a good deal n some were a ripoff, like a simple Egypt key chain was not below 120-150 INR.
The show for the night after dinner was a belly dance. All of us were waiting in the bar where the show was supposed to take place and then the lady walks in, she was probably in her late 30's or early 40's. But she was good.
She pulled me up on stage and made me shake it with her :D
Our next day started with a wake up call at 6am. We were to visit a village called Kom ombu( mountain of gold). It was mostly ruins. It had inscriptions about some king.
It also had a crocodile museum. I was astonished to see that they performed the mummification process on a crocodile too!! There were a few crocodiles preserved!!
The ship waits for more than an hour for the people to return after the visit.
We were back to have breakfast and our next stop was at 1230.
The ship docked at the port of edfu, where we were to visit the temple of edfu.
A huge temple that looked like the alphabet H, symbolizes victory or taking control of the situation.
That was our last outing from the cruse ship as the next stop was Luxor.
At about 6 pm we were asked to go to the upper deck to have a look at the esna lock, it is at the end of Aswan.
The lock is designed to make the ships sail easily as the level of water is different between the places. I wondered how it would work. As we were traveling from Aswan to Luxor, our ship has to be lowered, and ships from Luxor are raised.
So let me explain how it works!!
There are 2 gates. The first gate is closed. The ships goes in between the gates and the gate that the ship enters from is closed. These are hydroloc gates. The one in front of the ship opens to reduce the water level, lowering the ship. As we watched the ship went down about 15 feet, allowing it to pass through easily. Even thought I dint exactly understand the use of that, it was nice to watch!
That night was the last one on the cruise, so the cruise members were dressed in their traditional style and also egyptian food!! The ship docked into the Luxor port at about 10 in the night.We were to get off the cruise the next morning.We checked out of the cruise and hopped on to our car to visit a few more temples in Luxor.
Well by this time there was so much history, all of us were bored of it!!
Pointers!
l Egypt population is about 70% Muslims and 20% Christians.
l The main language is Arabic and English is spoken by a very less % of the population.
l More than 90% of the men smoke!!
l Egyptian Women are fond of Indians for their style of dressing!
l Egyptian pounds is the national currency. All major currencies are accepted in most of the shops, but it's better to have Egyptian pounds.
l The people on Egypt respect their country's wealth and have helped improved the tourism. I
l You need to have a good background of history to enjoy your visit!
