Alexandria - losing history and identity?
Trip Start
Apr 10, 2006
1
6
47
Trip End
Jul 24, 2006
Alexandria,
Egypt
Thursday, April 13, 2006
I had decided a while ago that my first few days of travelling would be better served by having a guide, and that once I'd settled into the journey and learnt a few of the hidden secrets and rudiments to backpacking I could possibly relax and go it alone. So I met my guide Ahmed, at the hotel in Cairo and we set off for Alexandria by car, a 200km route through the desert.
I soon realised why there had been so many drivers hooting and honking horns during the night and once again this morning; quite simply there are no laws of the road! It's a bloody free for all, with cyclists, buses trams, lorries, horses, cars, and even pedestrians all vying for position on the road. Even the rudimentary driving on the right seemed to go out of the window at times; miss a turning no problem do a U turn and drive down the wrong side of the road until junction reached
Alexandria
. Come off the wrong slip road; easy, stick it in reverse and accelerate back into the oncoming trafic! - and I thought the Spanish were bad drivers.22 million people are crammed into Cairo, and any sense of this being a romantic city on the Nile, was lost on me. All I could see was a mess of entwined incomplete buildings, unfinished roads, litter, smog and checkpoints. Then suddenly out of the smog appeared a Pyramid, then a second and a third - wow! The first Pyramid the largest of the three and was quite breathtaking, far, far larger than I had actually imagined.
The pyramids were for another day.
En route to Alexandria we stopped at a service station, and here is where I made another stupid mistake and am still furious with myself several hours later. On exiting the bathroom I was asked for a tip, I opened my wallet to extract a small note, but pulled a 100, the attendant grabbed the note and offered to give me change, which he did - it was only later I realised how little change he had actually given me - it was a very expensive toilet break!
So the new Mark Trowbridge guide to avoiding being ripped off is: 1) keep a few small notes for tips separate from your wallet, 2) Take a moment to look at the currency you have and recognise the notes - in Egypt the roman numerals are only on one side, so it is easy to pull the wrong denomination, 3) Find out what the conversion rate is 4) Find out what is a standard tipping amount 5) Find out what the standard cost for bottled water, coffee etc is
Alexandria - Catacombe
. and lastly learn the local expression for "No Thank you" - "La a Shukran" - don't know how to spell it but now know how to say it.Egypt has a population of circa 70million, but because of desert conditions in most of the country, the population lives in just 5% of the land. Alexandra has a normal population of around 5 million, which swells immensely in the summer months as it becomes the vacation centre for many Egyptians and foreigners alike. Whilst not appearing to be particularly deep, I was staggered to learn that Alexandra runs for 25km along the Mediterranean coast, and most of that frontage appears to be hotels, apartments and coffee houses. Apparently, many Egyptians move out of their apartments in the summer months able to let them to incoming Spanish tourists at hugely inflated prices, who in turn have let their Spanish properties to Brits at hugely inflated prices....welcome to the money go round!
8 Lanes of road 4 in each direction divide beach front from city, and it was part way along this road I learnt how Egyption politics works - when expanding the road system, the local government needed to demolish a group of buildings. An owner of one of the buildings; a restaurant, refused to allow his restaurant to be demolished so he paid for the road to be diverted and a new bridge to be constructed
Alexandria - Elmontzah Palace
.At our first stop, the ..... palaces, I was bemused at how many young people there were in the gardens. It seems Capitalism is strong and sound in Egypts dictatorial society, as I learnt of how a tourist organisation bought the rights to the palace parks, and then set about ensuring through agreement that no police were present on Mondays and Thursdays, they advertised the fact and numbers increased. Why? Well under Egyptian law only a husband and wife may kiss in public, and police can arrest those who defy - simply put; young lovers now have a new petting ground!
Alexandra was a huge disappointment, I had expected what the Hollywood studios had lead me to believe - fabulous historic buildings set beside the the beatiful Medieranean sea. A jewel. Instead I found a drab and dreary place, overcrowded and it's not even summer, congested and polluted. The beaches were ok, but I've been spoilt with living in Costa Blanca, Spain, with some of Europes finest beaches,
I then learnt why Alexandras beach front was so different from what I expected, the city had grown over the centuries, but not inland, it had reclaimed land from the sea and now where the main temple of ...
Alexandria - Elsamlek Palace
. was once just a mere 100yards from the sea it is now some 1/2 a mile.So it was we visited Alexandras top archeological sites. The first the Catacombes - wow what a staggering feat of architecture and design building tomb's 3 and 4 story's below the ground, and then man handling huge and extremely heavy sarcophagus down and then along passageways into their final resting place. Seeing carvings 1000's of years old, and looking at a piece of history that has always intrigued me was exhilarating. Unfortunately no cameras were allowed so I only have a couple of shots of the entrance
Then onto the temple of Pompey. Poor chap, Pompey fled to Egypt after a spat with Julias Ceasar, only to be beheaded by the Egyptians who were at the time trying to get back into Ceasars good books. If only Pompey had had Bush and Blair advisors!
The temple is still under excavation, I think. Well there were lots of men in blue overalls digging and karting earth around the site. The remains uncovered thus far, outline an absolutely enormous place, with huge pillars made of stone imported from Abyssinia a 1000 miles away, and whilst the place would have been literally littered with statues only a few now remain
Alexandria - Pompey
.Again, it was fabulous to see at site first hand and get a small glimpse of what it would have been like back in Ancient times, but I couldn't help think how all of it will be lost forever, if something isn't done to better preserve the sites. Both sites were flanked by squalid residential areas, and both sites allowed a total freedom for the tourist, which included touching. With the 1000's of tourists these site must receive, it is inconceivable how this constant flow can't erode the fabric of the sites themselves, and certainly there was little color left on some of the original hirogliphics through there constant touching by the modern day tourist. A huge percentage of Egypts relics are in Museams scattered throughout the World, preserved in climate controlled conditions. Whilst viewing is contrived and there is nothing better than standing and looking at the real thing in situ, the important word is preserved, and I think the artifacts around the world should stay exactly where they are until Egypt can afford to look after it's heritage better. I really do fear for the sites I saw today -
