Rest of Egypt

So I went to Siwa, Cario, Aswan, and Luxor after Dahab. Here is a quick summary:

Siwa:

This is a city built by an oasis in the western part of Egypt just a little bit away from Libya. I spent my time in Siwa hanging out with Jen, whom I met in Jordan.

Siwa is a very cool city. It has more donkey carts than cars. When we got there, we wanted to stay in a hotel that was 4km outside of the city, but it was really expensive to get there because the guy in the donkey cart didn't want to ride back by himself in the dark. As such, we stayed at a cheap spot in the city.


The most exciting thing I did here was go to sand dunes and spend two nights in the desert. The sand dunes where really amazing to see and riding around in the jeep over them was crazy. We also stopped by a cold natural oasis and swam. At the cold oasis, a wind picked up and blew sand into my camera and broke it. You'll notice between that point and Ben coming to Thailand, I don't have that many pictures because I didn't have a camera. As for the cold oasis, it was a really nice swim. The warm oasis we went to was kind of gross though. It had weird stuff growing in it, and felt like a lukewarm bath. There were also like 20 people in a 20 square foot pool of water, just gross.

That first night we stayed in a camp site just outside of the city with a bunch of locals and a few travelers. It was a lot of fun. Spent most of the night hanging out by the camp fire telling stories. We ended up sleeping outside by the fire despite the fact that we had beds in huts. Around 3am, it got really cold so I somewhat regretted that decision.

The second night, it was just Ahmad (our awesome guide), Jen and I in the middle of the desert. This was a lot cooler because we had no light around us except for our camp fire. The stars were amazing. During the night, a mouse attacked me after I went to sleep. I was terrified (for no reason at all) so I lit a candle and watched for a little bit. After accepting the mouse had run away, I went back to sleep. Ahmad thought I was ridiculous. It was a very cool experience being in the middle of the desert at night.

Cairo

Cairo is the busiest(traffic wise) and one of the dirtiest cities that I've ever been in. After a lot of reflection, I've determined that I really didn't like it. The museum is great and the Pyramids are cool - the Spinx is very cool - but outside of that I didn't like it. Tourist are always being harassed by people trying to sell stuff - more aggressively than other places. I think the bigger problem I had was that they were always trying to sell me crap. A couple people trying to sell me perfume were super aggressive and one called me a "very bad man" when I refused to buy anything after he had so "graciously" shown me his shop.

Quick story

So I "befriended" this guy that gave camel rides around the Pyramids. He gave me a free ride to a good view point and invited me back to his place for dinner. This was a really cool experience - and despite other people "befriending" me and later asking for money - I was not going to close myself off to this type of opportunity.

His house was poor. It didn't have a roof over all of it, and there were goats and chickens grazing on the second floor. There was also an amazing amount of flies. His parents and friends were very welcoming though, and dinner was good. I then talked to one of his friends who was complaining about how the government didn't do anything. Towards the end of the night, he suggested that I could give him my ipod and that would be okay. I thought it would not be, but I did end up giving about $20 USD to him as I left to cover dinner and whatnot. Still very cool experience.

Luxor and Aswan

So the only reason I went to Aswan was to go to Abu Simbel - an acient Egyptian temple close to Sudan. You can only go to the temple with a 4am and 11am convoy. Normally, the overnight train from Cairo gets you there at about 10am so it's perfect to catch the 11am convoy. But I was on the train that was traveling on the day that they switched to (or from - I never know) daylight savings time. I lost an hour on the train and missed the temple. I ended up going around Aswan a little and saw a lesser temple, but it was still a failed trip. At 3pm, I went back to the train station to go to Luxor.

Luxor has a number of great acient Egyptian temples and was a lot of fun to go around. I don't really have any good stories from there or any pictures because I had no camera, but it was a good time.


That was Egypt - next stop Thailand.

Pictures

Just so you all know. All of my pictures are here.

Dahab

Dahab is a small town on the Red Sea in Egypt. It has some of the best diving in Eygpt and is a fun place to hang out. For my first three days in Dahab, I accomplished very little. I did a lot of chilling in the sun, swimming in the sea, and enjoying the local Egyptian brew "Sakara." Despite this, I do have some cool stories - at least in my opinion.

Let's start at the beginning. I came to Dahab from the Taba border crossing between Israel and Egypt. Sitting at the bus station in Taba, I was attacked by flies. When I was in Eilat, about 3km from Taba, there were no flies at all. How did the Israelis keep the flies from crossing the border. It amazed me and the girl that I sat at the bus station with.

Once on the bus, I met a very friendly but somewhat odd Egyptian guy. His favorite line was "I love you too much." I feel like something was getting lost in translation. The ride to Dahab was long, but it was cool just riding through the desert.

My first night in Dahab, I met a little Bedouin girl that taught me how to play Backgammon and a Bedouin game that involved rolling the die, but no real strategy. She beat me at both because she cheated. (I'm not sore, I'm just saying) She gave me a little ankle bracelet for playing with her though. (Mom you're getting a present) Then we made a bet on the next game. If I lost, I had to buy another bracelet, if I won I got it for free. Needless to say I had to pull out my wallet, but I got a scarab(luck symbol) bracelet that I've worn everyday since so it's not so bad.

I also met a fair number of interesting people while diving and learned that all dive instructors smoke ciggs. One of the most interesting from my point of view was this mining engineer from Australia. He had mined silver, gold, nickel, etc. He had just been in South Africa to buy an engagement ring for his girlfriend. He had interesting stories about mining, but also on the diamond industry. He basically said that the crack down on "blood" diamonds was a lie, and that they enter the market easily and unnoticed.

Finally, on the last day I went scuba diving. This was an amazing experience for me. The whole being able to breath underwater thing was kind of shocking. The reef was also amazing. I thought it was kind of going to be like when you go camping expecting to see a ton of animals because that's what you see on National Geographic, but when you go you're lucky to see a couple deer. This was completely like National Geographic though, there were so many fish of different colors and sizes. Great time. Stayed in a great resort "Red Sea Relax Resort" for only $12 a day. Dahab was a great start to Egypt.

Bethlehem

For those that don't know, Bethlehem is the city that was the birthplace to Jesus. It's just south of Jerusalem in the West Bank. I remember telling a girl that was staying in the hostel with me in Tel Aviv that I was going to Bethlehem, and she was like "By yourself, I heard it isn't safe." After going, that seems like a ridiculous statement. I took the West Bank bus to Bethlehem and got off a little over a kilometer (yep-I've been out the US for a while) from the Church of the Nativity. I didn't really have any idea where I was going, typical for me, so I asked around and everyone was helpful and nice. Any fear of the average Palestinian, at least in my experiences, appears to be completely unjustified. It is true that every once in a while someone does something bad, but middle school kids in the US shoot up a school every once in awhile too. I'm not going to be scared to go to a middle school anytime soon. But I digress once again.

So I get to the church. I have to duck down to get in the front door. The church is very beautiful. It's got some really good paintings on the walls - though my pictures of them do not do them justice. There's also a little place where you walk down to where Jesus was actually born. The first time I walked down I was unaware of what I was looking at. I was just wondering around the church. Then I got to talking to one of the priest and he told me how a little star marked where Jesus was born. I think to myself, "I've got to get a picture of it." Mainly for you guys. So I go back down to where it is, and there are two tour groups of like 30 people lined up to get their picture taken next to this little star. I stand to the side and wait. While I'm waiting, another tour group gets in line, and I resolve to the fact that I'm going to have to join the tour group line. I end up waiting in like like 30ish minutes, but finally get my picture and got to touch the place where Jesus was born.

Masada and the Dead Sea

As I'm sure you all read in my last post. My first attempt at going to Masada and the Dead Sea ended with me being very sick. I thought I was out some money, but the guy at the Jaffa Gate Hostel was able to get the tour company to take me two days later without charging me any money at all.


So first we went to Masada. This is a fortress in Israel where a bunch of Jews killed themselves rather than be taken prisoner in a battle with the Romans. The site is very cool and has some interesting structures. What I didn't like about it, was how it was presented in the video before hand. Before you went up to the fortress, you watch this 15 minute or so video explaining the historical significance of the fortress. It was somewhat informative, but also felt very nationalistic which I didn't like. But I digress.

What I found most amazing about this fortress is that it was on top of a plateau in the middle of a desert. How did they possibly live here? Well, they had these giant rooms built that collected water whenever it rained to allow them to survive. (And no, I didn't take my headphones out for the picture...) Other than that, it was similar to many other Roman period ruins, but still cool.


Next, we went off to the Dead Sea. This was really cool. The first thing you see when you get near it is this grey mud that looks so gross, and it becomes obvious that nothing lives in the water. It really took me a minute to get past the grey mud, but before long I had covered my upper body in it and began floating in the sea. You really do float effortlessly. I could have taken a nap if the current didn't keep pushing me into people.

Jerusalem

Disclaimer: This post will talk about places of religious significance. I don't know a whole lot about most religions so I may something slightly wrong. I do not mean to offend anyone with these transgressions. Feel free to comment and request a correction if I got something wrong, and I will gladly change it.

So I now see why Jerusalem has been so fought over for so long. The Jews (maybe others too, I'm by no means a religious scholar, I just know what I read there) believe that Adam and Eve were created there, Jesus was crucified and buried there, some believe the Mary was born there, and Muhammad ascended to heaven there. That's crazy! All that in one city. And now, Rob Aikins has been there.... (I know, not as important)


My approach to going around the old city was just to wonder aimlessly until I found something cool. The first thing that I found was the Western Wall. I knew I was about to go some place special before I got to the Wall because I had to go through a metal detector to continue down the little ally I was walking. When I first saw the wall, it'll really just seemed like a wall. But you could sort of feel how important it was to those praying at it. For those that don't know, the Western Wall is the only remaining part of the Second Temple which was a Jewish temple built around 19 BCE.

After the wall, I wondered into the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. Now in my complete lack of thinking, I didn't realize that I would be seeing the place where Jesus was buried in Jerusalem. This was somewhat of a moving experience for me, which I was not expecting at all. I'm not a very religious person, but kneeling next to the rock that covers the man that inspired Christianity, I felt moved. It was weird. On the walk away from the Church, I ended up on the path to see the Dome of the Rock, but I was not allowed to go right then. They had very specific times that non-Muslims could see the Dome, and I was already too late for that day. My first attempt at seeing the Dome had failed.

After that, I meet up with some Canadians that were really cool and went to get some beers. This turned out to be a horrible mistake for me, kinda. The Canadians I meet were really cool and we had a great night out on the town, but I ended up getting horribly sick (not entirely from the beer, I only had like two). I had been having stomach issues since I had left Jordan, and staying out late and drinking seemed to push my stomach over the edge. I'll spare you the details, but I was unable to make a tour of the Dead Sea and Masada that I had paid for the day before. For those that know me, you know I had to be really sick to miss a tour that I paid $50 for.

On day two, I woke up really late took some Cipro and did some more walking around the city. I wanted to see the Dome of the Rock, but I had woken too late. I decided I would pay to walk around the city walls so I could get to see all of the old city. It was cool to see that people were actually living in the old city and that it wasn't just a tourist location. Most of the people that I saw in the old city appeared to be Palestinian. What I personally found interesting, was seeing a bunch of kids playing soccer on a basketball court. Clearly, I was not in America.

The next significant thing that happened to me in Jerusalem was going to a Passover Seder. This was an awesome experience. It was hosted by the family of a friend from work. I think the most interesting thing was there was a reason for everything that happened during the night. I learned a lot about trip of the Jews out of Egypt. It also required that you drink four glasses of wine, which should be a requirement of all holidays. The food was also really good. After dinner, we went to a bar that was open in protest to the requirement that they be closed that night. A very good night indeed.


After this, I left Jerusalem for a couple days to go back to Tel Aviv and the Dead Sea, but on my last day in Israel I headed back to make a quick trip to the Dome of the Rock, which I had failed to make it to on multiple attempts before. This was on Easter, which made the city absurdly crowded. That traffic made me miss the morning window allowed for non-Muslim visitors, so I dropped of my big bag at the Jaffa Gate Hostel (really nice guys working there) and hung out until the afternoon window. When I finally got to the security entrance for the Dome, they scanned my day bag and saw that I had my laptop. Evidently, laptops can't go near the Dome of the Rock. I was so upset. I had come to Jerusalem with the sole purpose of seeing the Dome, and I didn't have enough time to drop off my laptop and make it back. So I hid it beside the security room and hoped that it would be there when I got back. I went into the Temple Mount area, took some quick photos, then ran back to my bag. I was disappointed that I was not able to go in the Dome of the Rock because I wasn't Muslim, but it was still cool to be close and see the beautiful tiles and dome. When I returned to the security room, my bag was still there. I thanked G-d and headed for Eilat.

A Tel Aviv Story...

Boy meets girl and friend.
Boy shows interest in girl.
Girl shows interest in boy.
Boy, girl, and friend go to a bar.
Girl says she has a boyfriend.
Boy leaves bar.
Boy in a drunken stupor goes to all night sushi place.
Boy goes to sleep happy.

The End