King Tut and the Marathon

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“To speak the name of the dead is to make them live again.”
-- Ancient Egyptian Belief

It’s a Friday. Colin is in town and has decided that he is going to skive off. The weather is iffy. What to do? What to do? In London, one is spoiled for choice. We decided that the best of all the good possibilities was to go see the King Tut exhibit out at the O2. This actually killed two birds with one stone - we got to see a great exhibit and Colin had never been out to the O2.

The exhibit was fascinating and, to make matters even better, Omar Sharif narrated the audio guide. Now, if that isn’t a voice to take you around ancient Egypt, I don’t know what is. The exhibit was not what I had imagined. There were actually very few artefacts from the tomb itself - those are all closely held by the Egyptians these days. (And, who can blame them after the Elgin Marbles debacle….) Instead, there were lots of artefacts from tombs of Tut’s relatives and a lot of video footage about finding the tomb itself.

My favourite bits? I learned that the hieroglyphic symbol for ‘life’ is the same as the symbol for ‘mirror’. Why that struck me as so fascinating, I couldn’t tell you, but I’ve been thinking about it ever since. I actually bought an ankh (the name of the symbol) to wear as I think it is a good reminder. The second bit I loved was the fact that scientists have done a CT scan on the mummy itself. They have discovered that Tut did not have any cavities, but he did have an impacted wisdom tooth. Makes the guy come to life, doesn’t it?

As part of our ticket into the exhibit, we got to see a film called “Mummies 3D”. We went into this with very low expectations, but it was actually very cool. We got to wear 3D glasses and we got to learn a lot about how mummies were created and where they were buried. We were suitably chagrined when we left.

It turned out that we had gotten lucky and the bad weather had passed, so we decided to take the boat back up the river. Gorgeous light and, as a result, some good photos.

I was not so lucky on Sunday. It was marathon day and two of my friends were running. Absolutely pouring rain for most of the day with the result that everything I carried with me got soaked and my feet were wet for hours. The result is a lovely head cold that has kept me close to home the past couple of days, but oh well. As my friend Phil said, “Where else would we stand in the rain to cheer on complete strangers?” I thought he was right and put the experience into my good karma category.

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Photos

A Bit Windblown
But, squinting in the sunshine. Haven't had to do much of that lately!

The O2
Or, the Millennium Dome as was.

Greenwich
From the water.

The Tower
Even more imposing from the water.

The Tower
From the water, the best way to see the entrance to Traitors' Gate.

The Marathon
Wet and cold, but at least I wasn't running!

The Marathon
Mile Marker 23

The Marathon
The wet runners and spectators.