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Published: November 29th 2006
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Felucca on the Nile
We were winning until Dad took the helm...then the swedes pulled ahead ;) I always knew that Thanksgiving was may favorite holiday...but was never quite sure whether it was the food or the people. Just kidding, I knew it was because of my family, but this weekend just justified that completely. My stomach hurt, not for its longing for cranberries and stuffing (though that didn't help), but because I was laughing the entire time. Both my parents, both my brothers, my brother's wife, and my two cousins and I all met up Thursday in Luxor. In the last three years they have never flown across the country to have Thanksgiving with me...but they did fly around the world! We had a great time, smoking sheesha, watching sunsets from feluccas (Nile sailboats), giggling incesently at stories of bodily functions that I will not repeat here...eventhough my meal consisted of a really dry turkey and cheese sandwich it was still one of the best Thanksgivings!
here is an overview of what we did:
First Day (Thursday): Mom, Dad, Matt and I took the 5 am plane, checked in early, and of course, passed out. Before doing so Dad and Matt went on an adventure to the travel agencies, ending up taking a 25 piaster
Nile Sunset
One of my first pics on my new camera...yay for early christmas presents!! (around a nickel) ride on a bus to a liquor store where even my brother cowared at the sight of the blind-in-one-eye shop owner hissing "whiiiiiiisky? voooooodka?"------"uuuuuh......just some beers?".
Before the other kids got there we took a nice, relaxing, 2 hour-Felucca ride for Sunset. Matt took 40 film pictures....at least one better be pretty darn good!
As most of you know, I have been kind of nervous for everyone to get here and play tour-guide....it's a lot of pressure to keep everyone happy! So I thought the whole trip was going to be a disaster when I stepped out in the hall so see my sister-in-law standing there (they got the early flight stand-by) scouling at her new white t-shirt that my brother had just knocked red habiscus juice all over....but al humdu lillah, that was the only real incident we had. We pulled off the weekend pretty smoothly (despite the disappointment of not getting to go to Abu Simbel), and I am just hoping that I can live up to my new nickname---'smooooooth operaaaaaaator"!----the rest of the trip.
Second Day: We took the morning wandering through the huge Karnak Temple with its enormous
Karnak Hypostyle hall
note the size of the tourist on the left hypostyle hall and bathing pool. Next we stopped by the one-roomed Mummification Museum where mom first discovered canoptic jars (the four jars where the organs of mummies were placed) which she purchased a set of at a tourist trap (sorry Dad, I tried to talk her out of it). Next we were off to the less impressive, but more amusing Luxor temple. This temple had an abundance of wall carvings of the 'fertility god' doing his thing and having an assistant catch it in a cup---I am not joking, refer to my webshots pics.
Third Day: We finally made our way to the west bank where we saw 3 tombs in the Valley of The Kings, Hatshepsut's temple, and Habu temple. I couldn't take photos of the first part, but we did get some grainy post-cars. The tombs were obviously beautiful and ornately carved, but the most amazing thing was the amount of paint that has been preserved over all these millenia. I forgot my camera in the van for Hatshepsut's temple, but it was actually one of my favorite parts...I'll hopefully get one of my bro's shots to put up on webshots. Habu's temple was actually one of
our favorites...insha'allah the best (yet corniest) christmas card picture ever will come out of it. After all the Ancient Egyptian stuff I was relieved to hike around the real city when Katie, Dad and I went on a mission to scope out the tamiyya and fuul scene, which, surprisingly was my sister-in-law's favorite meal the whole weekend.
Fourth Day: We headed back to the west bank to see the tombs of the Nobles and Artisan's village/tombs (where I bought a crappy doll from my new habibi who thought Sharon was from America....jeez...I guess I'll give him a break....he was only like 7). These were actually some of the cooler tombs. They didn't mess around with crap from the Book of the Dead leading them through the afterlife. Instead, they had very interesting scenes from everyday life. One had a scene of a banquet and all the workshops (from sandal-making to bread-baking). Then of course Nick, Katie and I took another nap while the others headed on the guarded caravan across the eastern desert to Hurghada.
The ancient Egyptian stuff was cool, and although I as pretty AEOd (Ancient-Egyptianed-Out) by the end, I don't think I could ever have
a family overload (though I want to kill them most of the time...seems like an oxymoron, but that's the beauty of family-love 😉 ).
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KRom
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Thank you
What a great couple of weeks we had. Thank you for ALL of your help Laura!