Where's the Manna?

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  Nuweiba, Dahab, St. Catherine, Cairo, Aswan and Luxor, Egypt
Monday, September 5, 2005

The Israelites were subjected to hundreds of years of captivity in Egypt. Their faith was stretched and broken for 40 years while wandering in the Sinai Desert. We spent 10 days in Egypt with three days in the Sinai and we were sorely tested. At least the Israelites had manna from the sky; we had to subsist on diarrhea-inducing dirty local food. Egypt is full on.

We took the ferry from Aqaba, Jordan to the Egyptian port of Nuweiba. Getting on the ferry was like a wrestling match. We had to fight off a multitude of people carrying all their worldly possessions. When we arrived at the ferry terminal, we had to secure visas for our time in Egypt. We were the only ones who had to do this, so we left our group and followed our local guide, Mohammed, to purchase our visas which consisted of two stamps worth 15 US dollars. We cradled them gingerly in the palms of our hands and followed Mohammed to a random, nondescript back room

Children of Our Nubian Hosts

. As we stood in the dingy room with the other frightened tourists, we were told we were waiting for "The Man". After about 15 minutes, The Man arrived with all our passports in a plastic shopping bag. Mohammed tried talking to The Man, we think to convince him to let us go first, but The Man would have none of it. He started screaming in angry Arabic at Mohammed and banished him from the room. Mohammed left cowed and our hearts sank. When The Man finally called our names, we had to lick our own visa stamps and place them on our passports. Welcome to Egypt.

We made our way to Dahab, a coastal fishing village which means "gold" in Arabic. Call the police because someone has stolen the gold. The town has a very laid-back feel and the promenade is filled with beach cafes and Bedouin children selling handmade crafts. We took a day trip to the Blue Hole to swim and snorkel for the first time in the Red Sea. The Blue Hole is a sheltered coral reef with a sheer drop of 80 metres where we were able to see thousands of colourful fish swimming before the wave break.

We went to St. Catherine that night to sleep at the foot of Mt. Sinai. To watch the sunrise atop Mt. Sinai where Moses received the Ten Commandments from God required us to set out at three in the morning in order to reach the summit before 6 am. We made the climb under a blanket of stars. Walking up the mountain in the stillness of the night was a transcendent experience. The only thing that brought us down to earth was Mel's raging case of Pharaoh's Revenge.

We had done all we could to guard against diarrhea. Before we left Vancouver, we had taken Dukoral, a very effective traveller's diarrhea vaccine, which had kept us safe for three months in Western Europe through dodgy mussels and too much cheese

Feluccas on the Nile

. Our measures protected us through Jordan while most of our fellow travellers experienced "issues". Upon entering Egypt, we stepped up our precautions. We brushed our teeth only with bottled water and we avoided all raw fruit and vegetables. We refused ice religiously for all our drinks and we meticulously watched what we ate. On our first night, Egypt made a mockery of our precautions. Pharaoh's Revenge left Mel tootin' all the way up and down Mt. Sinai.

On arriving at the top of the Holy Mountain, the beautiful sound of a church group singing the hymn "How Great Thou Art" in Korean rang out to welcome us. We scoped out a spot on the rocks overlooking the cliff and waited for the sun to greet the morning.

The only disappointing thing about our visit to Mt. Sinai was that the St. Catherine monastery was closed so we couldn't see the descendant of the Burning Bush, which we are told is kept next to a fire extinguisher.

We left St. Catherine, drove through the Sinai Desert, crossed the Suez Canal into Africa and into Cairo. Cairo is a hurricane of swerving cars, aggressive vendors and neon billboards. We spent a day visiting the Great Pyramids, the Sphinx and the Egyptian Museum

Golden Dahab

. Seeing the Pyramids for the first time is a very bizarre experience. The Pyramids sit at the edge of the city. To get there, you drive through squalid neighbourhoods of roughly-built drab apartment blocks, and as you turn the last corner, the Pyramids appear out of nowhere looming over the city. The pharaohs' tombs are triangular behemoths which leave a weighty impression on the imagination. The Great Pyramid is made up of 2.3 million limestone blocks weighing two to five tonnes each, all set in place almost 5,000 years ago--well before Mr. Caterpillar started manufacturing his magical machines.

The Egyptian Museum is a large sweaty building that houses a collection that impressed even this pair of jaded museum-goers. Tutankhamen's golden mask and the mummified remains of Rameses II with his wispy blond hair and prominent overbite made each drop of sweat well worth it. Our childhood TV memories left us expecting Scooby Doo and Shaggy to wheel around the corner being chased by a reanimated mummy. No one else appreciated the snickering.

We arrived in Aswan after a 13 hour overnight train ride. Aswan is a significant city as it is located at the first cataract on the Nile, a rocky formation that stops trading ships coming from Africa from continuing further north

Our Wrestling Opponents at the Terminal in Nuweiba

. Consequently, Aswan was a historically critical trading city. In modern days, it is the site of the Aswan High Dam which holds back the Nile and regulates its flooding. The enormous Lake Nasser that the dam created in the 1970s resulted in the diaspora of the Nubians (half to Sudan and half to specified parts of Egypt) and the wholesale relocation of various Egyptian monuments.

In Aswan we visited the temples of Abu Simbel, Rameses II's egotistical tribute to himself and his favourite wife, Queen Nefertari. Amazingly, the original temples which used to sit on the banks of the Nile were cut into pieces and reassembled on higher ground to save the monuments from the backed up waters of the Nile.

We also spent a day on the Nile on a felucca, a traditional sailing boat with no motor manned by Nubians. We floated down the Nile and had a simple Egyptian lunch onboard. We stopped at a shallow enclave to swim but the several bloated dead fish that drifted by us previously told us that there would be something in the water that would disagree with us. A couple of daring Australians took the plunge with no immediate side effects but three-legged children in the future are strong possibilities. That night, our felucca made a stop at a Nubian village where we had dinner on the flat roof of one of the local houses

Sleeping on the Overnight Train

. The poverty is quite evident. It appears that the Nubians are like the aboriginals in Canada in that they are a distinct racial group which faces systemic indifference from the government and wider society. However, when asked, our hosts told us they were content with their lot and had much hope for their future, but perhaps this was whitewash for the tourists. The conditions we saw gave us a small glimpse into what would face us in Africa next summer. We hope we will be ready, not only to see such poverty, but to have the strength to serve in such circumstances.

The security thrown up around tourists in Egypt is ever-present but its effectiveness is questionable. Bleary-eyed tourists police with antiquated weapons kept together with Scotch tape languished in the heat on almost every street corner. Every hotel had police and a metal detector at the front door. However, no one was ever stopped, searched or questioned and it appeared that the metal detectors were only there to confirm that everyone was carrying metal. The government has also implemented police convoys in order to safeguard tourists travelling between major destinations. Tourists buses would gather to meet these convoys which would leave at predetermined times, usually ludicrously early in the morning before 6 am. Tourists are not allowed to travel between major destinations except with these convoys. This appeared to us to be gift-wrapping a whole bunch of tourists at a preset time for the terrorists.

We departed Aswan in one of these police convoys to head to Luxor, the former capital of Egypt. Along the way we stopped at a number of ancient temples (Kom Ombo, Edfu and Karnak Temples). They were very well-preserved but, sadly, most of the images had been defaced by Coptic Christians when they were using the temples as refuges from persecution

Sunrise on Mt. Sinai

.

In Luxor, we visited the Valley of the Kings. Trusty donkeys transported us seven kilometres to the Valley. There were 16 of us and each of our donkeys wanted to be first. The jostling, spurts of galloping and banging of knees made for a wild ride. We didn't totally understand why the donkeys insisted on being first, but maybe the fact that a number of their compatriots suffered from explosive diarrhea was incentive enough not to be in the line of fire. Halfway to the Valley, Gunner screamed as her leg was hit. Gunner insisted that we save ourselves and leave her, but the unavoidable tight maneuvering between the donkeys ensured that the donkey's gift to Gunner was spread evenly amongst the group.

Paul's donkey was a bit of a maverick. It liked galloping on the wrong side of the road into oncoming traffic. It was also a little on the runty side so Paul's feet almost touched the ground and he looked like he was riding a dog.

The mountain above the Valley of the Kings formed a natural pyramid. Therefore, it became a prized burial place for the pharaohs who hid their tombs within the Valley, hoping to fool tomb robbers

The Great Pyramids

. The tombs are carved deep into the rock face and because of the protection that the deep caverns provide, the reliefs are still startlingly colourful and vibrant.

On our last day in Luxor, we had hit the wall and were ready to leave Egypt. We had a free afternoon before we were to board the overnight train back to Cairo so we spent almost eight hours hidden away in an aptly-named cafe called the Oasis, a place where the rare Egyptian animals--cleanliness, ice cubes made with filtered water, toilet paper and hand towels--could be found in abundance. Our kindly waiter kept warning us to be careful during our travels. A few days after we were to leave, Egypt was to have its first openly-contested presidential election. Egypt's long-standing President Mubarak was not expected to lose but the military was on alert for any troubles.

We boarded the overnight train for our last couple of days in Cairo. In our last morning in Cairo, we were pulled from unconsciousness by a loud BANG! and the acrid smell of smoke filling the room. We struggled in a sea of sleepiness as our shocked brains grappled to draw clarity from the confusion. We soon realized that the air conditioning unit above our heads had exploded. We rushed to pack our bags, angrily stomped to reception in our PJs and demanded a new room and a refund. Upon reflection, we realized there were no smoke alarms and our Cairo hotel was a death trap.

Final thoughts about Egypt: (1) Tipping will get you anything in Egypt. With a few Egyptian pounds, some of our fellow travellers went to the Giza Zoo and were allowed to hold flapping eagles by their wings and to have boa constrictors draped around their necks

The Sphinx

.

(2) Overnight trains have two ticket checks--once when you get on and once after you're unceremonially shaken awake at 5 am, well before your 9:30 scheduled stop. If you had ordered breakfast, they will wake you again at 7 to dump a box of bread in your lap.

(3) The ancient Egyptians built towering monuments with exacting precision that have lasted thousands of years. Modern Egyptians can't build plumbing that accepts toilet paper, forcing you to dispose of your used TP in wastepaper baskets dangerously multiplying the amount of human fecal matter circulating in the environment. What happened?

(4) Egyptian vendors will grab, push, shout and pull to get you to buy their wares. Some vendors have tried to differentiate themselves by advertising their stores as "hassle-free", a point which proprietors vehemently hassle you to recognize.

(5) The apartment blocks in Egypt are unfinished brick edifices. This is a result of a weird tax law which only taxes completed buildings. They accomplish the unfinished look by leaving the top floor open with the steel support girders left out to rust

Unfinished but Occupied Buildings in Cairo

.

(6) Eating and drinking in Egypt is dirt cheap. A full meal for two at a sit-down restaurant with live entertainment can cost as little as two Canadian dollars.

(7) Cairo has a KFC run by the hearing-impaired. Everything is done by pointing and it's great because the hearing-impaired can't hassle you.

(8) Beyond the hassling and the unsanitary standards, the sights are the most amazing we've seen and the Egyptian people are unfailingly friendly and hospitable.

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