"Act Documentary"....
After getting our fill of the pyramids (if that's even possible!), we traveled by bus to the beautiful city of Aswan. However, before I get into that, I have to tell you about the Egyptian men. Literally unlike anything we've experienced so far. The Chinese men just stare at you with blank or confused looks on their face. The Indian men stare at you with mostly innocent and curious smiles. The Egyptian men shout at you, follow you, and make you feel seriously uncomfortable. I swear, the word leer was invented only to describe the men here. There is no other word for their stares, except that they are leering at you. The vast majority of them have the impression that foreign women are all easy and slutty, because we don't cover our heads/arms/etc, and because their only frame of reference for us is usually Hollywood movies. It's quite crazy. I guess since they are not inclined to treat their own women too well, the men here feel it is their right to stalk you on the street, follow you for blocks, whistle, or make disgusting kissing sounds. One creepy dude followed us around downtown Cairo for a good hour, and every time we though he was gone, he'd turn up again and whisper "do you want to feel beautiful?" EEW!! When we were at the airport in Munich, we met an Egyptian guy about our age who was giving us recos on places to see, and he warned us about the men here. He told us "Basically, Egyptian men are like Italian men, without the charm." That totally sums it up! Even now, as I type this, the dude beside me is blatantly staring at me and watching everything I do on the computer like it's perfectly normal to openly read private internet sessions... I hope he knows enough English to read this as I type! Experiencing local culture is what traveling is all about, so we are taking it all in stride. We have the luxury of experiencing this for a few weeks then leaving, but I feel so sorry for the women here. There is no worse paradox of globalization and oppression as when we saw a woman dressed in a full burqua (the horrible black robes that cover everything but the eyes) trying to eat McDonalds with her kids, having to try to put the burger to her mouth under the veil while not exposing any skin in the process... (fyi - the McD's in Egypt - by far the most disappointing we've had in our travels. The Big Mac has weird spices on it.)
Anyway, back to Aswan. This is a small city located on the banks of the Nile. The pace is relaxed, and the shouting is still present, but reduced. It is a beautiful place, and we loved strolling along the Nile catching glimpses of ancient tombs and sites located on the West side of the river (the West bank of the Nile is always the place for the dead, as that is where the sun god Amun dies everyday. The East bank is for all living people and temples not dedicated to the dead). In our wanderings (looking for an ATM), we encountered the funniest group of old Egyptian men just hanging out on a bench. They gave us directions to the bank and let us take their photo... my fav is the dude on his cell phone! For our first night in Aswan, we took a private boat along the Nile and saw some Hieroglyphs on the rocks, temples, and a beautiful sunset. Then we had dinner with a Nubian family... in theory a great experience, but in reality we shared the experience with two other Intrepid groups, the ladies tried to sell us stuff, and they made all of the poor children dance for the rich tourists at the end of the night when they probably should have been in bed. So much for a genuine cultural experience, but it was interesting to see how they lived, and also that even the mud huts had satellite tv :)
Us on the banks of the Nile; Us on the roof of the Nubian house overlooking the village and the satellite dishes; Local men just hangin out.
Very early the next morning (3am!) a few of us piled into a bus and joined the convoy to Abu Simbel. Only one convoy per day leaves for the site, and you have to travel this way so that the police can monitor the people on the roads to ensure the tourists are safe and no vehicles are hijacked. We arrived in Abu Simbel early in the morning, which was perfect because the temperature was already in the high 30's. We had a great time wandering through the temples built by Ramses II. He built the temples supposedly in honour of the sun god Amun, but, like all men with a god complex, he adorned the largest temple with 4 massive statues of himself, and the other one with 4 more statues of himself and 2 statues of his wife Nefertiti. The temples were nevertheless impressive, especially since they were moved back 500m in the 1980s to avoid being flooded by the river! Our guide at the site was also hilarious, and very animated. The hieroglyphs and paintings inside were stunning. A big THANK YOU goes out to Aunt Gale for funding our trip out there... it was definitely a can't-miss site!
The next day, we set off for an overnight cruise down the Nile on a traditional felucca boat. It was really relaxing and the crew (2 guys) made some pretty tasty meals. We also got a chance to swim in the Nile... I put my head under and hoped for the best!! The river was actually quite cold and there was a strong under current, so I justified that those elements made the water cleaner. haha. One of the guys on our trip is a quirky artist and photographer from London. Since day one, he has been taking loads of photos, and making us all pose in strange locations and take endlessly complicated shots of him (he'll ask you to retake a photo ten times if he's not happy with it!) He decided not to go for a swim, so I made the mistake of asking him to take a photo of us in the Nile. He took that to mean a full photo shoot! He had the camera out and kept saying "Act Documentary!" We kept saying "Wai, what the hell does that even mean?" But then he just kept snapping away, and saying, "yes, like that, ok one more, ok, move to the left..." What a debacle! Apparently, "Act Documentary" means that you are supposed to pretend there is no camera there... to act "normal".... the best shots we got were the ones below (one of the other tour guides jumped in the "shoot" so now we have the Egyptian hairy chest forever immortalized in our photos!). Clearly, we will not quit our day jobs to pursue a career in modeling! Upon docking at our site for the night, we had to build our own toilet site (actually a pretty impressive sit down one with a curtain!). We spent the rest of the night having some rum on the felucca (with Wai and the crazy German dude Rolf)... praying that the alcohol would kill any germs that were swallowed during the swim!
Anyway, back to Aswan. This is a small city located on the banks of the Nile. The pace is relaxed, and the shouting is still present, but reduced. It is a beautiful place, and we loved strolling along the Nile catching glimpses of ancient tombs and sites located on the West side of the river (the West bank of the Nile is always the place for the dead, as that is where the sun god Amun dies everyday. The East bank is for all living people and temples not dedicated to the dead). In our wanderings (looking for an ATM), we encountered the funniest group of old Egyptian men just hanging out on a bench. They gave us directions to the bank and let us take their photo... my fav is the dude on his cell phone! For our first night in Aswan, we took a private boat along the Nile and saw some Hieroglyphs on the rocks, temples, and a beautiful sunset. Then we had dinner with a Nubian family... in theory a great experience, but in reality we shared the experience with two other Intrepid groups, the ladies tried to sell us stuff, and they made all of the poor children dance for the rich tourists at the end of the night when they probably should have been in bed. So much for a genuine cultural experience, but it was interesting to see how they lived, and also that even the mud huts had satellite tv :)
Us on the banks of the Nile; Us on the roof of the Nubian house overlooking the village and the satellite dishes; Local men just hangin out.
Very early the next morning (3am!) a few of us piled into a bus and joined the convoy to Abu Simbel. Only one convoy per day leaves for the site, and you have to travel this way so that the police can monitor the people on the roads to ensure the tourists are safe and no vehicles are hijacked. We arrived in Abu Simbel early in the morning, which was perfect because the temperature was already in the high 30's. We had a great time wandering through the temples built by Ramses II. He built the temples supposedly in honour of the sun god Amun, but, like all men with a god complex, he adorned the largest temple with 4 massive statues of himself, and the other one with 4 more statues of himself and 2 statues of his wife Nefertiti. The temples were nevertheless impressive, especially since they were moved back 500m in the 1980s to avoid being flooded by the river! Our guide at the site was also hilarious, and very animated. The hieroglyphs and paintings inside were stunning. A big THANK YOU goes out to Aunt Gale for funding our trip out there... it was definitely a can't-miss site!
The next day, we set off for an overnight cruise down the Nile on a traditional felucca boat. It was really relaxing and the crew (2 guys) made some pretty tasty meals. We also got a chance to swim in the Nile... I put my head under and hoped for the best!! The river was actually quite cold and there was a strong under current, so I justified that those elements made the water cleaner. haha. One of the guys on our trip is a quirky artist and photographer from London. Since day one, he has been taking loads of photos, and making us all pose in strange locations and take endlessly complicated shots of him (he'll ask you to retake a photo ten times if he's not happy with it!) He decided not to go for a swim, so I made the mistake of asking him to take a photo of us in the Nile. He took that to mean a full photo shoot! He had the camera out and kept saying "Act Documentary!" We kept saying "Wai, what the hell does that even mean?" But then he just kept snapping away, and saying, "yes, like that, ok one more, ok, move to the left..." What a debacle! Apparently, "Act Documentary" means that you are supposed to pretend there is no camera there... to act "normal".... the best shots we got were the ones below (one of the other tour guides jumped in the "shoot" so now we have the Egyptian hairy chest forever immortalized in our photos!). Clearly, we will not quit our day jobs to pursue a career in modeling! Upon docking at our site for the night, we had to build our own toilet site (actually a pretty impressive sit down one with a curtain!). We spent the rest of the night having some rum on the felucca (with Wai and the crazy German dude Rolf)... praying that the alcohol would kill any germs that were swallowed during the swim!
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