Day 3: Aswan, the city where it all began...

Oct 18

Reached Aswan early in the morning. It was dawn when we boarded the mini bus.

The buildings around Aswan were pretty interesting.. they looked a lot like the small towns in Malaysia. There was one scene that reminded me of the buildings on the hill as depicted in Call of Duty: United Offensive - that level where you were riding a boat to a pier to bomb the lighthouse and finally taking out 3 huge AAs on the hills.

Anyway, we reached the pier. There was already a lot of cruises there. Saw Club Med (Aswan?). I was extremely pleased and impressed with the size of our cruise (M/S Salacia). It's bigger than I imagined it to be (my imaginations were based on someone's comment that Nile is very shallow - which is totally untrue).


M/S Salacia, where we spent 4 days, 3 nights from Aswan to Luxor.

We had to wait for 3-4 hours for the train group and we were not allowed to check into our rooms. Again, this has caused much grievances - we should at least be allowed to check in and freshen ourselves up. However, and the reception is right, check in time was 2pm just like any other hotels. Oh well, we spent some time taking photos and relaxing on the top deck.

Later, one of the waiters opened the lounge for us to rest and get some sleep. I tried to sleep on the couch but there were some kind of "bed bugs" or something and after a while I gave up trying to sleep. I ordered a cup of French coffee, which sucks, btw. Then I sat at the couch and somebody said that the train group have arrived.

Mido told us that we would start our tour now and come back in the afternoon just in time for lunch and our room. So off to the bus we go.

1. Aswan High Dam
First stop is the Aswan High Dam. In the bus Mido told us about how the older Aswan dam was not enough to control River Nile. We also learned about how important River Nile was to Egypt. People claimed that it was River Nile that saved Egypt, which he does not agree. He said River Nile pass through a few countries in Africa, not just Egypt. But it was the Egyptians that work hard to make use of Nile. So, Egypt's prosperity was due to the Egyptians, not just the Nile. That was why they built the old dam. However, that is not enough to control it. There's still flood every where. Because of that, President Nasser decided to build the High Dam at Aswan. By building the High Dam, he created Lake Nasser on the southern part of Nile.

Mido talked abt how River Nile started all these ancient history - how the ancient Egyptions planted their crops and then while waiting for the crops to grow, they have the time to ponder about life, their purpose in life and thus created the believe of Gods and the Second Life.

In his opinion, it wasn't the Pharoahs who built all these temples and monuments we are going to see. It is the Egyptian people. So he likes to call it Ancient Egyptian instead of Fer-RO-nik Egypt.

The importance of High Dam at Aswan:
- allow a 2 million hectar land to be cultivatable - for Egyption cotton, Egyption oranges, potatoes - create employment so that people won't concentrate only in Cairo. This land may be ready in 1-2 years time.
- he then told us about how the whole Egypt has 70 million people and ..?
- we learned that some of the ancient temples have to be relocated because of the High Dam
- generate electricity to whole of Egypt - have enough to export to neighbouring countries eg Israel
- when Africa faced famine a few years back (in Somalia and Ethopia), Egypt was the only country in Africa unaffected. This is all because of the High Dam and President Nasser.
- Mido said that the High Dam is like a double edge sword.. on one hand, it is the life of Egypt. On the other, it is the target of Egypt's enemy. All it takes (according to some General's quote) is 6 minutes to destroy the High Damn and thus, destroying the whole of Egypt.

2. Russia Monument
From High Dam we went to this monument that was dedicated to Russia for their aid in building of the High Dam. Mido said that this a friendship monument. He ended the story by saying that if you watched Lord of The Rings, the tower looked exactly like the bad guy's tower :D

On the way back from High Dam, a broken bus blocked the way and we had to detour.. we went to Philae Temple.

3. Philae Temple (pronounced as Fillet (as in the fish))
To get to Philae Temple, we had to ride a boat. This is where we learned about the Nubians (this is possibly where he mentioned that all the gold of Egypt come from the Nubians).

Mido talked about how the original site of Temple was in Agilika Island which was now submerged and they moved the whole temple to this island that is shaped just like Agilika. The island is called Philae?


Philae Temple, the first temple we visited and the first time I was fascinated by Mido's story...

In the shade of one of the pylons, he started to tell us the basis of Ancient Egyption history: the Gods.

He assigned roles to the group:
Albert = the Creator God
Kim = Nut, God of Sky
me = Jeb, Goddess of Earth

At first, there's only Jeb and Nut. They loved each other very much, so much that they were never separated. But the Creator God had to separate them (because of?) and so he created:

HZ = God of Air
CY = Goddess of Water.

God of Air and Goddess Water came between Jeb and Nut and they formed what we know as our world. See, even in the ancient time, ze people already believe the world is round.

In addition, the Creator God created:
Osiris = ?, God of ?
Isis = Joe, Goddess of Love
Mr Ong = Seth, brother of Osiris
Mrs Ong (?) = Seth's wife

Osiris was a good God, beloved by all people. This caused Seth to be jealous of him. So Seth planned to kill Osiris but you can't kill a God. What Seth did was amazing. He created this beautiful box made of gold. Unknown to the people, Seth made the box to fit only Osiris' body. He declared that whoever can fit into this box, will be rewarded with the gold box. Everybody tried and failed. When Osiris tried and fit the box, Seth, quickly closed the lid and sealed it. He threw the box and Osiris into the Nile and it floated to someplace.

Isis was busy looking for the box with her husband inside. She found it on an island? There was a tree protecting the box. Osiris body was cut into 16 pieces by Seth (?) and these pieces were thrown away? Isis looked for the body part and then use linen cloth to wrap it. Mido demonstrated the wrapping using someone's scarf. This marked the first mummy made by the Goddess of Love. He also mentioned that because the arm and hand were in different pieces, Isis had to place Osiris hands in a X shaped over his chest. This is the same posture adopted by other Pharoahs when they were being made into mummy.

Something to do with Creator God's name and whoever read it will be granted a wish. Isis transformed herself into a "vulcan" (falcon), flew into the sky and read the name. Her wish was granted. Osiris lives... but only for one night. During this night, Horus (played by Swee Fee (?) was conceived.

Horus wanted revenge. Fought with Seth. Seth was older and more experienced, so Horus was defeated. His eye was cut off. Somehow the Creator God wanted to put an end to all this and made Horus the King. He gave him an artifact called the Eye of Horus which can be used to see far and into the future.

We met at another hall with columns. This "hole" was an addition by later Pharoahs. It is used as a resting place for the Pharoah after braying. Each column of the hall have different design - something about the Greek designs (?)

3. Unfinished Obelisk
We visited a quarry. Here, I remember my first encounter with security and scanning of bags. It was hot and we have to line up to get through security.

Under the shade of a tree, habibi told us the significance of unfinished obelisk to Egyptologist. The unfinished obelisk lies in the only granite quarry in the whole Egypt - and it is in Aswan. Here we learned how ze shaped the obelisks/rocks - drill holes, put wood into holes, fill wood with hot water, wood expand, blocks are broken apart.

4. Lunch - Egyptian made spagetti
Came back to M/S Salacia. We were given a welcome drink while we waited for our rooms. It's a chilling hisbiscus syrup. Yum. Someone, I think it was HZ, didn't like it, so I drank his share too. Must have lots of liquid in this trip.

Delicious spagetti - marinated very well. Yum. Love the dates.

5. Felucca Ride

An enjoyable afternoon ride on a felucca.

Felucca is a kind of yatch. There are a few feluccas around our cruise and our tour include a one hour ride on the felucca. The felucca is manned by 3 Nubians who, of course, have homemade stuff (necklace, camel bone-paper cutter, etc) for sale.

Unfortunately, there's no wind today so we didn't go far.

Mido told us that LE in the money stands for "Liv Egyption", a French term. He also talked about how corruption are rampant in Egypt - how he has to pay to ride on the train with the group and get a coach (his train was supposed to depart an hour after the group). When Kim asked how much people earn here, he said that 80% of population earning less than US$300 - have to have 3 to 4 jobs. Then there's the middle income who probably own a small apartment in the city. And there's the very rich - usually businessmen and politicians.

He talked abt Sudan and how lazy they are (compared to Egyptian)... There was a popular joke about a group of Sudan sleeping. The first to awake get to claim the title President.

Nile is the longest river in the world. The people have to respect the River God because ze need his agreement before going to Second life. Unfortunately, people don't respect Nile these days. One can see bottled water floating around... or in some places, some "uneducated farmers" will throw a dead cow into the river.

We were then entertained by the Nubians, singing some traditional songs.

I think we were too tired to even think of watching the sun sets..

While waiting for dinner, I had my first Egyptian beer. The label was Sakara. It tasted like some Cina beer. We were served by this guy who introduced himself as Mustafa.

6. Dinner
Fight between Swiss and Indians over trivial matters. Nevertheles, an exciting evening to an already exciting day :P

7. Aswan night market
Our first attempt at buying things and practicing the art of negotiation in Egypt shop. During negotiation, we mentioned a price. Shop owner was extremely offended. Closed the display window and asked us to walk carefully. So, we walked out. He then asked his son to chase after us and ask us to return to the shop. Give good price.

HZ experienced buying oilment for his sprained ankle in his first pharmacy visit in the Aswan market (of course taken there by Mido). I wonder if he nego in the pharmacy? We bought many bottles of water. Even though Nile is the longest river in the world, poor tourist have to drink from bottled water because "ze are not used to ze kemical in ze river."

WHAT A LONG DAY! ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ...