The phone rang at 4:15 again this morning. We had to be up and ready to catch a flight to Luxor today. We were all so worried about Airport Security in Egypt, but when we got there they hardly checked anything, and despite two metal detectors we had to go through, they didn’t care at all about the size of your liquids or even if you carried on an open water bottle. Strange! Anyways, we got to Luxor at about 9 am and went straight to the Valley of the Kings. At 9 am it was already 44 degrees Celsius in the Valley, that is about 115 or 120 degrees Fahrenheit. When we got to the Valley of the Kings we had the option of paying an extra 100 Egyptian Pounds ($20) to see King Tut’s tomb. I had to do, mostly my decision rested on the fact that I had no idea if I would ever come back and I know I would regret it later. So we went into King Tut’s tomb first and actually saw his Mummy. King Tut’s tomb is right below one of the Ramses Pharaoh’s tombs and when that tomb was being discovered debris covered the entry to King Tut’s tomb completely. Manal told us that King Tut is a very insignificant tomb. He reigned for such a short time and was so young that historically he probably would have been passed over if it wasn’t for the fact that his tomb was found almost completely intact. Another interesting fact is that King Tut’s tomb is the least ornate in the Valley of the Kings. It was originally intended for a high priest, but when Tut died unexpectedly the hieroglyphs and drawings were changed for Tut. I went in three other tombs and was shocked at the vivid colors and etched hieroglyphs on the wall. Another cool thing is that inside each temple, directly to the right of the entry way were all the pharoah’s confessions, if you will. They were supposed to say all the Kings’ wrong-doings, but because the Pharoah’s were practically Gods the inscriptions mostly said, “I did not lie, I did not commit adultery.” Noting the phrasing of these inscriptions, it is the common belief that from these “confessions,” we get the Ten Commandments.
After the Valley we went to see the Temple of Queen Hatshepsut. It was huge and it was incredible the power that a woman had back in ancient Egypt. It’s actually funny because she made up a story about her lineage, telling the Egyptian public that her mother and one of the Gods were her parents and that she was the rightful Queen of Egypt. She is always depicted wearing male clothes and she is even buried in the Valley of the Kings, not the Valley of the Queens. Let’s just say she was the exception. Actually my tour guide Manal was saying how women, especially in rural parts of Egypt, get married right when the hit puberty. And, that almost all women cover themselves even if they are not Muslim because of the modesty for which women need to have in order to be respected. After Hatshepsut’s Temple we went to see the Colossi of Memnon, two huge statues, and then continued to our hotel for lunch.
We were hot and starving and so happy to get back to the air conditioned hotel. We had some free time, so basically everyone napped, and then went back out at around 7 to see the Luxor Temple. The temple was beautiful with all of its hieroglyphs and statues. It was really interesting because parts of the walls were painted over with Christian figures and scenes, such as the Last Supper. When Egypt was proclaimed a Christian country, they painted over many of the monuments because they were said to be temples of paganism. Now there are only little pieces of the paintings left.
After the temple we went back to our hotel and a group of 7 of us went to the local bazaar. I didn’t buy anything, but it was fun to shop around and get the most out of our time in Luxor. After walking around for a bit we took a taxi back to the hotel and went to bed
No comments:
Post a Comment