The Bunnies are Playing

     So all winter we have seen one bunny hanging around our back deck but this week there have been two!  They look so cute together. As I told Mia they definitely seemed twitterpated. I was expecting to be able to watch a little bunny family this spring.

 

I have sad news to report though.  When Bryan was taking Bowser outside he saw two dead newborn bunnies just laying on the lawn. They didn't have any fur and their eyes weren't open yet. We don't know what happened but I guess I won't be a bunny grandma this year. 

p.s. I love this blog my niece wrote on Segullah about the small things we do that can make a difference to others. Fifth Business 

      I know that Annie isn't really my niece but my second or third cousin or something but after watching all these kids grow up at the cabin year after year they feel more like nieces and nephews.

Alexandria

     We caught a nice early flight (had to leave the hotel at 4:30 am) back to Cairo and then from there up to Alexandria. Bryan got to see the Mediterranean Sea for the first time. Since we had the time,  I guess it was as good as place to go as any, but it there isn't really much to see there.  You always hear about the great library that was there but the remains don't look like much. You can see the niches where they kept the scrolls though. There I am with our guide and driver.  The new library, across from the University is much better.

      One of the ancient wonders of the world; the lighthouse of Alexandria, used to be here but not any more.  They do have a fort that they just reconstructed and the Pillar of Pompeii is still standing. It is quite impressive. Bryan was actually in this picture but he only come up a little past the bottom of the base. The pillar is not made of drums but is one large piece of red granite from Aswan and the monument is about 60 feet high.  We met a girl there from Brigham City who was traveling on her own.

     You get quite a view of the city from the pillar spot. Let me see if I can get the videos to work today.

We liked that you could shop for fresh fish from you car. The fish market is just by the side of the road.

   They have a nice mosque but they were having prayers so we couldn't go in.  I didn't have a scarf so I had to wear my hoodie to go on the grounds.

At the fort with many locals out enjoying the nice weather.

 We went to a nice restaurant overlooking the sea and then our guide and driver wanted us to go see the favorite summer vacation spot for the locals. It is just a little beach under this bridge but it has all these small rooms that you can rent and they said it is wall-to-wall people on a nice weekend. To get to it we had to do the Cairo Shuffle to cross the street: stop and run and stop and watch for the side mirror and run again.  That is how you get across the street when there are no crosswalks. Just take it one lane at a time and pray.

We got back late to the Mena House but were welcomed with a wonderful little chocolate cake since we were taking this trip for our 30th anniversary.  Slept in the next morning and spent an hour or so at the pool  - Olympic size and gorgeous and we got to enjoy it pretty much by ourselves. Then it was a late afternoon flight to Jordan.

Luxor

Loved Luxor.  So much history that we had to spend 3 days there.  The first night it is still part of your 3 night cruise but then we checked into the Steigenberger Nile Palace Hotel. Luxor was often the capitol of Egypt over the different dynasties so their was a lot of wealth and power.  They built the temples mostly on the East side where the sun came up and built their tombs on the West side where the sun went down.

      We started over on the west side visiting the Colossi of Memnon. These aren't much to see although they are 60 feet high. It is what you don't see that is amazing. The temple of Amenhotep that they guarded was 87 acres and they haven't really started excavating it.  It was bigger than Karnak, which is big. As they get money for excavating you wonder what they might find. Then we went to the Valley of the Kings.  You wish that grave robbers hadn't stolen everything but the painting that are left are great.  Some of the paint still looks fresh even after thousands of years. We went to the tombs of Ramses 1, 3 and 4. Sorry no pictures allowed. After we traveled to the Valley of the Queens.  The tombs of Ramses II son's the died young were quite poignant with their scenes of Ramses leading these young boys to the afterlife and introducing them to the Gods.

      Lastly to Queen Hatshepsut's Temple.  She made herself into a pharaoh and built quite the mortuary temple - stories. I like the heiroglyphs that tell of her embassy going down into Punt (Somalia maybe) and that she sent artists with them.  When they got back they painted the pictures of the African huts and rulers. They are so distinctive among the rest of the glyphs.

 

Next day was the huge temple at karnak. Rather overwhelming standing among the 134 columns in Ramses II hall. He did know how to do things larger than life-consider his family with many wives and concubines and between 100-200 children.  He started ruling young and lived into his nineties and had many military victories so was called Ramses the Great.

When you turn to the south you can see the 3 km long walkway to the temple of Luxor that had sphinxes lining it the whole way. It is rather unbelievable.

In that temple King Tut had a wall done about their yearly feast for the God Ahmenka.

Can you see the acrobats doing back bends?

  It must have been something to see judging by the heiroglyphs with their priests, soldiers, acrobats, bellydancers, clapping girls and praying men. The temple has been used by various groups over the years as shown in Bryan's video.

mosque sitting above, on what used to be the street, before excavation of Luxor temple.

The next day we did the Tombs of the nobles and the valley of the workmen.  Again amazing painting and you get some insight into their personalities as they would paint their vision of paradise. One's was to have a nice farm where he could work with his wife. Another wanted to be floating on the river (I'm with that guy). We also explored Medinet Habu where there are actually remains of a palace not just the temple.  Ramses had a toilet room built right by his throne room.  Smart guy. Then we get to go back to our nice hotel room and relax.

AAh. This is the time of day I like to sit and listen to the call of prayers. Some rooms even come with a Koran and prayer rug.  This one came with little arrows on the ceiling and in the drawer that point to Mecca so you know which way to pray.
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Cruising Down the Nile

In Aswan we boarded our Cruise ship- El Farida.  It looked nice and the rooms were big (it even had a full size tub in the bathroom) and it was wonderful having the nice big window to look out at the view.  The rooms were rather dirty though so it looks more impressive in the pictures.

      On board there was one other couple from New York and then about 40 people from France. There were a lot of people from France everywhere we went. They were nice but the extent of our communication was pretty basic: bon jour, au revoir. The ship has some nighttime entertainment like a galabeeyah party where everyone dresses in the traditional clothes and a belly dancer but we were always so tired that dancing around with some old ladies in the bar didn't do much for us so I spent the evenings writing in the journal and reading.

 It's a lovely way to see Egypt though. It was very windy (apparently the wind is always blowing pretty strong up the river) so they had a swimming pool but no one was tempted.  In fact Bryan and I spent most the time up there and we were usually all alone. Along the shore you will see these old tombs just popping up and you want to explore. You make a couple of stops on the way to see temples in Edfu and Kom Ombo

In Edfu you get to take a carriage ride up to the temple, which is fun. We were supposed to take the van but the carriage riders in the "new Egypt" will promise to take better care of their horses and the vans aren't allowed down to the ships anymore.
     Edfu has a temple dedicated to Horus: the Falcon God.  Once a year they would take his statue out of his little house and put it on the boat.  They would sail it down the river to meet his wife, Hathor, in her boat and then they would spend the week together in his temple before she would sail back home.

In front of the statue of Horus

Horus' house and boat

When they tie up your cruise ship they just tie up alongside each other.  One morning we had to walk through the lobbies of 12 cruise ships to get to the shore.

 Back on the ship you get to enjoy the Egyptian countryside again. Sorry about the wind noise on the video but you will get the idea. They still seem to be doing things the same way they have done for centuries: donkeys, two-wheeled carts to get the produce to market, hand scythes, Staying in little huts made from reeds, etc. They do use electric water pumps now but we also saw a cow going around in a circle to bring up the water. As Bryan said "I never thought I could use my binoculars to go back in time thousands of years". That is what it felt like.

Religion

     At the risk of painting all Muslims with the same brush I will give a few of our experiences.  Our guides seemed eager to share their religion and to point out similarities: How Jews, Christians and Muslims are all people of the book, How we all believe in one God, How they believe in all the same prophets, etc. In fact when one of our guides was talking to us he said how they believed Jesus was a prophet and that there were all these prophets through time and then Muhammad was the last prophet so that is why they follow him so closely.  Bryan and I both wanted to say "there are still prophets" but decided that it was not the time. This guide also told us how he had been awakened religiously with the revolution and we could see from his bruised forehead that he had been zealous in his praying.  He actually scared us a little. I hope that he isn't indicative of what the "new " Egypt is about.
     We could also tell from things he said that he had very little respect for women or the USA or other western influences. He was very excited about some videos he had seen, that were made in the US, about the awakening of Muslims against Zionists and the New World Order. How, along with the Freemasons, they were trying to take over the world under direct guidance from Satan. If you know your Russian and Hitler history you will know they both used a page from this manual (They called it the Protocols of Zion) to excite their populations against the Jews. I think it was when our guide got so excited about this idea that I got a little worried. He was aware of how our money has a lot of Freemason symbols. Most of the founding Fathers belonged to the group and I certainly don't believe they founded America under the guidance of Satan but some Muslims probably do. I tried to say that this argument was made in the US by mostly white Christian Supremacists and that it wasn't true but I'm pretty sure he didn't believe me. As he said  "These people making these videos like the Jews they just don't like Zionists." Right, Jews are fine as long as they don't try to come over here. Enough of that.
     In Jordan, because they have a lot of the Biblical history, they know many of the stories from the Old and New Testament. I'm not sure all the things took place where they said but it's nice to think that Moses was here and Aaron was buried there, and that Christ walked on these same roads.  All of our guides believed the bible quite literally and believed in Satan and angels, they also believed in the Djin (genies) which are something apart from the others but that you can conjure up with some dark magic to help you. The Jordan guide especially believed in how they were used to protect people's gold and that if you could figure out your way around them you could find some nice old buried gold.
     The way women are treated did gall me a little: Can't go into the main (beautiful) part of a mosque, Have to be covered to go out, your husband pretty much has the say on if you can go out, your children are the responsibility of the husband's parents so basically if you are widowed or divorced you have no right to the children, married women wearing make-up outside are loose, women smoking out in public are loose, women should be virgins before marriage but men don't have to be. It isn't that I think they should be doing all these things  It is just such a double standard that I have a hard time with it. I do think their religion is good I just think their tradition is bad and I hope that some of this will fall by the wayside.
     I like their charity. Because they believe you will be rewarded for your good works and that it's important to help others I noticed that many of them would start the day by giving a little money to a beggar or buying something from someone poor. I think it was like a belief in Karma. If you started off your day by doing something nice then the rest of your day would go well.  I think our society could benefit from that. After this last mortgage crisis maybe their belief in bankers being evil for charging interest isn't so far off the mark either.
      I also liked their way of saying things. You don't have to go to prayers but whenever you miss one, especially on Friday, then you might get a tiny black spot on your heart.  If you miss too many then when you meet God you will have a black heart.  I just like the visualization of it. The morning prayer (that comes at first light) has one line different than all the others- it is better to pray than to stay in bed and sleep. I'm not sure I agree with that. I'm glad I can pray when I wake up. At least I can remember what I'm doing then. I did find the evening calls to prayer enchanting. It just felt peaceful to hear the chanting while watching the sun go down.
     I remember a talk about Islam and the LDS church where the speaker said that we really share most of our core values and beliefs.  We know that the whole world will be taught the truth some day but Jesus being our Redeemer and not just a prophet is a little bit of a sticking point with the Jewish and Islamic faiths.  I did see how the Lord was preparing them though.  Our Jordanian guide mentioned how proud they were of a book they had in their family that gave all of their genealogy down to the time of Muhammad. Their cousins just started researching it a few years ago.  If the whole world is getting their genealogy done then it won't take to long for us to accomplish the temple work when it is time.
     

Egyptian Money

     Baksheesh is such a big thing in Egypt and you hear so much about it that it made us rather nervous.  All our tour company said was to bring lots of $1 bills-and to make sure they were new with no marks. Bryan made arrangements with the bank so we could get some crisp, clean bills. Apparently the Egyptian banks won't let the people trade in money if it is marked and they won't take American coins.
      1 LE (Egyptian Pound) is worth about 17 cents and then they have piastres which are like are cents. The problem is that no one ever wants to give up their 1 LE or 50p coins.  I think because everyone uses them to give some tips for using the WC and every other sundry thing you do.  Bryan and I spent a bit of effort going to the bank and trying to get small money and we could only ever get a few.  I've heard of people making the bathroom attendant give them back change so they could have some small change for the next time.
   Thoughts on the WC's:  Don't tip when they hand you your few squares of toilet paper - wait to see if the bathroom is clean. I got yelled at once but I'm not paying for disgusting. Also, $1 is too much to pay to go to the bathroom. Many people are using the bathrooms each day and if everyone paid a dollar the attendants would be wealthy people by Egyptian standards. A little bit makes a difference so it's nice to pay some but...  The average wage is about 600-800 LE ($100-$140) per month. Their public transport minivan only cost us about 25 cents each. It is a country with one of the lower costs of living.  You don't see the difference much when you are on a tour and in the regular tourist places but when you go out on your own you can.
     At all the tourist sites there are a lot of men hanging about dressed in their talabeayahs (traditional long dress).  They are the  "guardians".  The government pays them, but only about 400LE a month, so they like to supplement their income by baksheesh.  Every time you enter a place a guardian will try to point out the different heiroglyphs. Every once in a while it is helpful but most of the time I was trying to ignore them so much that I didn't dare look at what they were pointing out.  They can get a little aggressive. Again, if they are helpful it is okay to tip them but you wish you had small coins, or a larger group so that one could pay for all. It's good to have some guardians but you wish there was only about a quarter of the ones they have. There often seems to be a little feud between the tour guides and the guardians and the tourist police.  One policeman chased off a guardian who had been following us and bothering us and just when we were thinking how nice that was, the policeman offered to show us something (for a tip) and we had to get rid of him.

Something Different

      All right. I really don't want to clean my house so I'm spending too much time on the internet. I'll just send along some things I found. Nothing to do with our trip but just saw a couple of  vids that I liked. The first is about the Festival of Colors down in Spanish Fork.  This guys editing makes it look like a blast.  Matt was there.  Was it this fun?  Festival of Colors   The bonus is that the music is done by...you guessed it.  My cousin's boy, Aaron Hatch, going by Fresh Big Mouf.  I have no idea what that means. I also like the site Devour.com which handpicks youtube videos everyday. The cobra pit is amazing. Look at all the cobras in striking pose.
    The other video made me laugh and feel good.  I especially like the parts whenever it says they don't have much space. Well, I really better go clean my space. Later.

Upper Egypt

     We traveled down south to Aswan which is part of Upper Egypt.  I don't know why I found that confusing but I always think of up as being North. We stayed at a nice Movenpick resort on Elephantine Island. It was lovely with a view of the Nile. The only problem was that it was a 2 level  with the bedroom upstairs. If you recall, our quads were very sore from the pyramid climb. There were many little groans as we plodded up and down. We checked out the dam that made one of the largest artificial lakes and went to the market and took a nice sunset felucca (traditional sailboat) ride.

Temple at Philae. As you can see it wasn't crowded.

     Here you also get to see the huge temples that UNESCO and the whole world helped preserve.  They moved Abu Simbel up the mountainside 80 feet.  It is rather unbelievable. They also moved Philae to a whole other island to save it from the rising water of the dam.
      We took a van down to Abu Simbel .  The tourist police don't let any tourist go on their own so you have to go in a convoy at 4 am or 11 am.  We opted for the 11 (It sounded better than getting up at 2:30 for some reason). We got another armed guard in our van with us.  This time he carried an uzi.  You can tell he was on high alert. I think he had a good nap. It is a really boring 3 hour drive through the Sahara. Only sand and rock with never a plant to grab your interest.

Abu Simbel is another amazing complex. Built by Ramses II. That's him in front and in front and inside and inside and inside. His wife, Nephartari is standing by his right shin on the outside. Sorry you can't really see it but that is the traditional way of showing your wife or children.

Ramses really liked Nefertari though because she got to have this temple (the picture on the right) and be shown as almost his size. She's the women in the middle of him and him. I guess the pharaoh has to show himself with all the different crowns he wears or authority he bears.





Can you believe this stuff has all been moved to get away from the water?-Amazing German engineering.
     We are only about 20 miles away from Sudan here so we had on the sun protection.  Luckily it wasn't too hot.  There aren't any paved roads connecting the 2 countries and it is illegal to cross overland (I guess that's maybe illegal between US and Mexico too) You have to get a ferry across the lake and take the train down to Khartoum in Sudan.

Pyramids

Went out to see some of the older pyramids. This is the step pyramid at Sakkara which is believed to be the first-about 2600 b.c.

Then Snefuru built one that he tried to make larger and smooth sided. It collapsed, they think maybe while this one was being built which is why all of the sudden the slope changes on this one - the bent pyramid. It actually has a lot of it's smooth limestone around it even if it isn't shiny and white anymore.
Sorry about the haze. With all the people around Cairo it's bound to happen.

Snefuru's third try finally worked.  It isn't as large as his son's (Khufu) at Giza and it is a little squattier but it showed him how to do it. This is out at Dahshur and since we were the only ones here we decided to go into this one.  Imagine walking up around 100 steps to the entrance. Then walking down over 200 feet in a squat position ( the tunnel is only 3 feet tall).  Then you get to a flat corridor for about 25 feet and all the sudden it opens up...

to a 40 foot tall room - very tall and narrow.  There are some steps going up another story or two to the burial chambers.  You climb up and it really stinks of ammonia.  Oh, I can hardly breath.  I really wish I had a scarf with perfume that I could put over my mouth.  I look and quickly get back down to the first room which isn't quite as bad. Is it the smell of dead bodies? or just all the people's exhalations mingled together? or something worse (Bryan guessed urine)? Our guide says they all smell like this. Did they smell like this when they were being constructed?  It made me glad I wasn't a tomb archeologist. But I really was glad I went down. It's a great experience. Now we just have to get back into squat position and make the steep climb back up. When we finally got outside and started down the steps our legs felt like rubber.  We were both so-o-o-o sore the next day.  That night we fly south to Aswan.

Cairo

Notice the burned up building right next to the museum.

Our Guard on the left with our guide. Notice the tanks around the museum.

We met our guide, Ahmed Hamed Yousif, and started off to the museum.  He helped guard it during the revolution and protect it from fire. The tourist police also gave us a policeman to travel with us everywhere we went in Cairo. The museum was great. King Tut's stuff was great but the sculptures in the main hall were magnificent and many other thing. The army still has a presence downtown.  We saw small protests at Tahrir Square but mostly media doing interviews.

     Next we were on to the Great Pyramids. When you stand up next to them you notice how really giant they are. We also had to take a camel ride.  They are rather expensive but you just have to do it.  You also have to be very clear about where you think you are going and make sure the boys who guide your camels know. Of course once I was on my camel I was able to pick one up. I got to drive the camel by myself on the way back and get him to trot a little. Not too smooth but fun.

     The Sphinx is a little underwhelming.  Much smaller compared to the pyramids. If it was on its own it might look better.
     Visited Coptic Cairo.  You have to go down a flight of steps because the city has built up so much around it and it is just small alleyways. We went to an old church that supposedly stands on the spot where the Holy Family took shelter when they came to Egypt. It would be fun to think so so I will believe it.

      There are so many old and beautiful parts of the building in the middle of this bustling metropolis (23 million). They have a small subway system but other than that they all depend on the mini-vans.  One of our guides was saying he has to plan on 2 or 3 hours to get anywhere. They all would like to buy cars.  There are a lot of cars from the 80s which you could get for a couple of thousand dollars and (Dan will appreciate this) lots of Ladas from Russia.
     We visited one Mosque (the largest) that I could go into with their cover-up and one that I could just go to the women's side which was not decorated at all and just gave us a small separate area to look at the shrine but we did have to be covered up. Meanwhile Bryan takes off his shoes and gets to go everywhere. I guess I should be happy I am let out of the house.  Some women's husband won't let them go out.
     Bryan asked how they could tell which girls were single and which were married.  Our guide said "The shape".  It was true. All the married ladies look fat. Imagine if you couldn't do anything out of the house but walk around slowly. We would all be getting very big.  I do not envy them their lives.

Mena House

    After a long flight and a stop in CDG Paris we arrived in Cairo.  Bryan had decided to use his old mission hardcover suitcase one more time.  After waiting, waiting, waiting it finally arrived all wrapped in Delta Airline plastic. I don't know when it popped open but he definitely can feel okay about throwing it out now (but he probably will keep it anyway. We only lost one thing -our new $55 dollar memory card.  Probably made us a little careful about taking pictures. Otherwise you probably would have seen a picture of his suitcase wrapped with the pretty orange rope that he used the rest of the trip.

     You quickly feel the baksheesh (tipping) pressure.  They tell you to bring lots of dollar bills. Someone is holding a sign and helps you through the visa and customs process and helps get you out of the airport. Tip. A porter takes your bag. Tip. A tour company rep and driver pick you up. Tip and Tip. We didn't tip the man who showed us where our room was but did tip the hotel porter. The dollars are going fast.

     Then we see the view out of our window and the flowers in the room and in the tub and the fruit and cookies by the bed and the tiredness goes away (well not really) but you do feel relaxed and happy.  Aaah! I Can't believe we are here looking across the street at the Great Pyramid of Giza. The only remaining ancient 7 wonders of the world. Crazy.

     Egypt was having their first vote.  The polls were closed at 7:00 but we were taking this picture around 9:30 and on the left hand side you might see the line of people that were waiting to vote at the police station there..  They just kept coming.  The people were so proud of the turnout and of how many women voted. It's a fun time to be there. There is a lot of history at this hotel too. Egyptian rulers, Churchill, FDR and Chiang Kai-shek for the Cairo conference. Carter, Sadat and Begin in 1979 for the peace talks.  During the First World War, an Austrian officer was caught naked chasing a woman through the hotel corridors. In his defense, he quoted an Austrian army regulation which stated that an officer may wear any costume appropriate to the sport in which he is engaged.