Alexandria, Egypt: Day 2

Following a 4 AM wake up call, we boarded our buses for the short drive to the Great Pyramids at Gizeh (what I have been anticipating since I applied for this trip!!), where we drove to a panoramic lookout in order to watch the sun rise above the three ancient legends. It was quite spectacular to watch, and although several Semester at Sea-ers chose to completely disregard the fact that other people were there and journeyed closer (only to make it impossible for us to get a picture of the pyramids without them in it!), it was absolutely the best sunrise I have ever and likely will ever see. I am only sorry that I didn’t have a better camera to capture it with (this is a stab at you, Mom!)…

After oogling the rising sun for an hour and a half, we returned to the bus and air conditioning to await our camel rides. Steph and I climbed onto a camel together for ten dollars each, jerking and rocking as the camel swayed from side to side. They are much larger creatures than I had anticipated! We rode closer to the pyramids and then back to the bus to be transported to our second pyramid stop: the ground between the bases of Cheops and Khafre. We stood for awhile, taking pictures and warding off the preying vendors shouting “ONE DOLLAR! ONE DOLLAR!” Our last stop was the Sphinx, which was significantly smaller than I had pictured it in my mind. The final view, of the Sphinx in the foreground and the three pyramids behind it, was quite incredible and an image I will not soon forget.

After our final viewing of the pyramids, it was nearly 10 AM as we headed for the Archaeological Museum in Cairo. It was repulsively hot as we debarked our bus, and of course the museum was not air-conditioned. The museum is about the point in the day when the majority of the group began hitting walls (we had been awake for six hours and had gotten less than four hours of sleep the night before, after all). The attendants in the bathrooms required one Egyptian pound if we were to be given toilet paper, but of course most of us only had one- and two-hundred bills, and as our bladders expanded it made the heat that much more unbearable. I needed to see the museum for my Art History class, and so I jotted down several notes before Steph and I left the group early to hide out in the air-conditioned gift shop, which was claustrophobically small and crowded, selling next to nothing besides postcards.

At noon we left the museum and drove to the Nile, where a riverboat awaited our arrival for lunch. We had another buffet while we cruised the infamous river (much dirtier/urban than I’d imagined), and then viewed a mediocre dervish performance followed by a less-than-mediocre belly dancing performance (more breast dancing than belly dancing). After lunch we were driven to YET ANOTHER site, the famous Alabaster Mosque. It was gorgeous, decorated in green and gold with lanterns strung all around. I have seen an insane amount of cathedrals over the past few months and this was the first mosque I had ever entered; according to my personal taste, the beauty of this mosque far outweighed any cathedral I had ever been in (and I have been in the Vatican). I learned today that Muslims do not generally create images in their buildings—as this duty is God’s alone—and I believe that the simpler motif of color and delicate decoration, as opposed to the opulence of Christianity, far better suits my aesthetic taste. We sat on the carpet in the mosque as our guide explained to us the basics of Islam and then gave us the opportunity to ask questions. Finding out a bit about Islam is something I strongly encourage everyone to do, as in western societies it is a religion that is terribly misconstrued due to the fact that many people are content not to look past September 11th. Instead, they judge another (very large and diverse) culture without knowing anything about it—save that there are several people who have DEVIATED from the religious norm and committed great atrocities. What many people do not understand is that these people are not, in fact, following traditional Islam, but have branched out to an extreme point of view that has only the fading basics rooted in Islamic culture.

After the mosque, we finally had some free time at the hotel, where Steph fell into a temporary coma after we ate a very delicious pizza. I napped for about an hour before I left with the rest of our group to go back to the Giza pyramids for the famed Sound and Light show. The pyramids were lit by different colors and a lazer-fueled, comic-like story ensued, as an ominous voice filled the air and told stories of the ancient Egyptians. Many people enjoyed it and many others were disappointed, but my thoughts were moreso on the fact that they had downplayed ancient Egypt to the point of mythology in order to make money. After all, these pyramids took an incredible amount of time and energy and killed many people (though NOT slaves; 200,000 skilled workers actually built them) in order to appease their pharaoh and the clearly VERY STRONG belief that he would rise again. Overall, I found the lighting of the pyramids to be lovely; it was the “sound” portion that was so disappointing. A peer of mine suggested music instead to go along with the lights, which I agreed would make the show infinitely better.

After the show, at around 9:30 PM, we all went back to the Marriott for dinner (another buffet!), before several of us decided to explore the hotel. On the roof we found a restaurant setup with a movie screening, which overlooked a good portion of Cairo. We enjoyed some Egyptian shisha (hookah), and Steph joined us, before I headed back to sleep around midnight. We had another 4 AM wake up call the next day…