Egypt 2009 - Day 3 (Morning)
Saturday, Nov. 14, 2009 – Tour Giza area
Our wakeup calls came at 6:20 AM and 6:30 AM and then Kathy called us about 15 minutes later to make sure that we were up. Breakfast was in the same place as dinner last night. It was OK. The eggs were cold and the omelet line long. The coffee was scarce and weak, but the pastries were great. Our hotel is the Pyramids Park Resort and it is lovely. We will be here for 3 days.
At 8:00 AM, we loaded onto our bus for our tour of the area. The first stop was Memphis – not the one in Tennessee, but the one that the one in Tennessee was named after. Memphis was the first capital of Egypt. Ramses II AKA Ramses the Great was here. There is a large carved likeness of him lying in the museum on the site. Other points of interest included a Sphinx – smaller than the better known one by the pyramids but with face intact including nose – and a standing carving of a king. The sign said that it was Ramses II, but the face on the carving wasn’t his. Our guide Atef who is an Egyptologist, told us that it was someone else. Something that I learned later in the tour was that masks were made of the kings and these were used for the statues. As a result, the statue look was very correct and precise to that king.
When I enter a site on a tour like this, I like to take a picture of a sign that indicates where we are. This helps me organize my photographs better. There were very few identifying signs in Egypt so I took pictures of my admission tickets. This worked well and by the end of the tour, I noticed quite a few of the others in our tour group taking pictures of their tickets too.
Now for a few words about restrooms in Egypt. This was the first public restroom that I used in Egypt. On the plus side, they are western style (sit down) toilets not the “Turkish” type (squat over a trough). There was a woman at the door collecting tips before she would let you in. There is no toilet paper in the public toilets so one has to tip the attendant to get about 3 pieces of TP. NOTE: Bring your own toilet paper when you come here! I was the last in line and the water appeared to be on a timer. By the time that I was ready to wash my hands, there was no running water at the sink. NOTE: Bring hand sanitizer when you come here! The restrooms could be in just about any degree of condition, but were generally fairly clean and I personally didn’t find any missing seats. Toilet paper is closely rationed and soap may or may not be present. There were never any paper towels and hand dryers often didn’t work. The “attendant” might or might not provide some extra TP to wipe your hands on. The bathroom in our hotel in Giza had a bidet in it, but our other rooms had only toilets. Often there was a coiled shower hose with a sprayer on it next to the toilet. I’m guessing that this is what the locals use to clean themselves instead of TP. However, I had no idea how to use it and I suspect that this hose thing was the source of water that was frequently present on the floors. The bathrooms in our hotel and on the cruise boat were well stocked and fully functional. The recommended tip amount to the restroom attendants was one Egyptian pound. The coin version looked very much like a Euro coin but it was only worth about 18 US cents. There was also a paper version. These coins and the paper one pound notes were hard to find. Even banks claimed not to have them. Probably the bathroom attendants hoard them all. Several of us speculated that the main reason for the bathroom attendants was job creation. In this poor country, even this job was prized.
Egypt 2009 Day 3 Morning
Our next stop was Saqqara. This is the home of the Step Pyramid. Our guide Atef, claimed that this is the oldest known human built structure in the world. It looked like a dusty pile of rocks which it was. It has 6 steps or layers. In its heyday, it was covered on the exterior with smooth finished higher quality limestone rocks that would have made it look much more finished and pretty. These rocks were pillaged a few thousand years ago to build other buildings. The pyramid was built for one King Djoser who was eventually buried underneath the structure. A fellow by the name of Imhotep is credited as being the architect of this structure in the 27th Century BC. We also walked up some steps where we had a nice view of several of the other pyramids.
The vendors by this time were starting to really annoy me with their “20 postcards – one dollar” and beads and other trinkets for sale. A place like this would be much more impressive if one didn’t have to dodge vendors continually. This seemed to be the only location that we visited that allowed the vendors inside the fee area. Other sites allowed booths and bazaars outside and most required that we walk through them, but we didn't have to dodge vendors after we passed the pay turnstiles and security scanners.
Now for a commercial break. Our next stop was one of the things that I really object to about these tours – the "shopping" stop at some place not on the agenda that smells heavily of kick backs and overpriced goods sold to unsuspecting tourists that don’t have the option of going somewhere else to look for better bargains. There are always several of these kinds of stops on every trip. This time, it was a carpet “school”. We got to see how the carpets were made and who made them. They were made by children as young as 10 years old. We could watch the children quickly tying the knots in the carpet. I made the mistake of asking how many hours a day the children worked there and the answer was 6 hours a day. Then I asked when did they go to school and learn other subjects. The guide hedged on this question and said that they worked either morning or afternoon and could attend school the other time of the day. Well 6 hours is more than a morning or an afternoon. I didn’t buy his story. In my opinion, this so called “school” is nothing but child labor abuse and would be illegal in the USA. Admittedly the rugs were beautiful. They were also expensive. We spent an hour and a half here. These “shopping” opportunities should be optional for those who want to shop. The rest of us should not be forced to waste our time. Several of us were really angry later on when we got to the Sphinx so late that the gate was closed to best viewing platform.
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