Egypt -- Edfu and Kom Ombo

Edfu is the place where the goddess Isis gave birth to her son Horus. At that time, she was on the run from her brother-in-law, so had to keep the birth a secret (which is why she's breastfeeding in the papyrus stand in this depiction). Eventually, Horus (falcon-headed god) grew up and defeated his uncle and ruled Egypt. Pharoahs likened themselves to Horus quite a bit because he also happened to be the god of the midday sun -- sun at its strongest.

To build and fully decorate a temple takes many, many years, but while Edfu was under construction was a very tumultuous time where it seemed no pharoah was in power long enough to see a project through to completion. The artisans constructing the temple were clever enough to keep their options open as they carved the stone decorations. If you want to get paid, you certainly don't want to cover the walls with the cartouche of the guy who was in charge two pharoahs ago. So they carved all the titles "Ruler of upper and lower Egypt" and "Son of Ra" (see the duck-sun disk sign?) but they left the cartouches with the names blank until the project was complete. Here you can see a couple of cartouches that are still empty.

Kom Ombo is the only temple in Egypt dedicated to two god -- you can kind of make out the two main doors here and the whole temple is symmetrical with equal importance given to each of the gods.

In a couple of the areas sheltered by the sun you could still make out the paint colors that would have originally adorned the whole temple. It's amazing to think that these little paint remnants on a doorway lintel are in the neighborhood of 3,000 years old.


One of the cool carvings on the temple was a medicine cabinet showing the various tools an Egyptian physician would use. You might be able to make out some giant scissors on the bottom row, a scale and maybe some forceps in the third row, etc. A lot of these remind me of tools I've seen at the dentist.


One of the gods to which the temple is dedicated is the god of the Nile, and therefore someone who was called on for fertility help. Apparently, people used to line up outside the temple to get blessings for fertility (of people or crops). They even had a few carvings of footprints still there reminding people where they should queue.

After these two temples, we headed upriver again overnight to reach the city of Aswan. There is something really exciting about going to sleep and waking up in a surprise location. On my occasional late-night wakings, I sometimes checked out the window to see what kind of place we were in or if we were still chugging along the river. It was always fun seeing the neon green lights and minerets of the mosques, shadowy outlines of date palms and desert hills. As we neared Aswan, the power lines seemed to spring up like a new riverside plant.

Egypt -- Valley of Kings & Queens and Journey up Nile

On the West bank of the Nile near Luxor is where the Valley of the Kings and the Valley of the Queens are located. The gravesites are on the West side of the river where the sun sets because the sun passes into the underworld at sunset, just as the kings and queens were hoping to do. On the left you can see a river cruise boat about the same size as ours. You can also see how the really fertile area of the Nile is a very thin strip with desert-like hills just beyond it. The picture on the right is from the Valley of the Kings and shows you just how dry and almost moonscape-like the landscape is in the area.

So...the best pictures of the insides of these tombs are textbooks because they don't allow people to photograph inside. This protects the intricate colorful paintings throughout the tombs. Apologies, but I do agree with the technique because I'd rather have the paintings for thousands more years than have a few photos for my personal collection. The Valley of the Kings is where the tomb of Tutankamun was discovered. It's supposedly the richest cache of Egyptian artifacts ever. The current theory for the richness is a) his tomb wasn't robbed because it was hidden right beneath someone else's tomb and b) his dad was wildly unpopular, so the priests didn't put many riches in the dad's tomb and kept them for King Tut's instead.

One of the cool displays at the site was a three-dimensional model of the various tombs. If you look to the right, you can see under the model, where the various burial chambers sprout downward like roots. King Tut's tomb was just a little three chamber thing with only a few stairs leading down. It was hastily finished, so not particularly decorated on the inside. In this picture you can see several long tunnels with several rooms on each. It's safe to assume that if any of these had come through time without being raided, there would probably be an even more spectacular treasure revealed.

The Valley of the Kings and the Valley of the Queens are also bordered by a Valley of the Nobles. These are tombs of various officials and had a certain amount of treasure in them on their own. For years, people who had built their homes in this area were able to just dig in their basements or yards and find a plethora of cool treasures. After a point, though, the government got sick of losing their treasures in the black market, so they forced the people in these homes to leave. Of course, several were already millionaires and could afford to live elsewhere by that point. But this is a picture of the little ghost town they left behind.

After visiting the scorching valleys, we headed up-river to the next set of temples. It was interesting seeing all the homes along the river. Many had main supports of concrete, but then mud brick walls. There were quite a few that seemed unfinished as the rebar stretched out from the main supports into the air...but the palm leaves across them indicated that those top floor apartments were indeed occupied.

Everywhere our boat went, we were followed by people who wanted to sell things to rich British tourists. At one point I heard commotion outside our cabin window and turned just in time to see a crew member walk by. When I went to the window, I spotted these guys tying up to our moving boat. Dan took this photo from the roof -- they had rowed out to our wake, lassoed something and then managed to ride along trying to sell scarves, native garb and even jewelry. Film cannisters are apparently the ideal delivery mechanism for jewelry onto a moving boat -- they even provide safe and dry return of payment, despite tourists' sometimes lackluster throwing skills. Little kids would even row out to meet us, shout and toss from river locks or generally pull dangerous moves to get close enough to sell something. It was also amazing how many languages people could accost you in -- any romance language, English, Arabic, Russian, Hindi, etc. Not all of it made sense (why it is appropriate to greet a Brit with the phrase "lovely jubbly" we may never know).

Egypt -- Luxor

Our first stop in Egypt was the city of Luxor, site of the ancient capital city of Memphis. Memphis was the location of the Karnak Temple and Luxor Temple on the east bank, and the Valley of the Kings and Valley of the Queens/Nobles on the West Bank. As the most important temple in the Egyptian kingdom, it was key for every pharoah to do a little sprucing up at the temple during his reign. So the temple is like ogres, lots of layers. From the outermost and newest facade (made by Ramses II and shown here with the lovely sphynx-lined pathway) to the inner sanctuary is something like 4km, with gradually tightening facades all the way in. Ramses II built his facade right up to the edge of the Nile, so subsequent pharoahs had to build their contributions off to the side that leads over to Luxor Temple. The whole thing just felt absolutely massive and the symmetry was really impressive. You can see the little yellow speck of me taking a break in the collonade here.

In these collosal constructions, it is always important to identify the donor (familiar concept for museum folks). You probably know what a cartouche is -- official nameplate for pharoahs. You can see one on its side on this pillar to the left. This cartouche also has one of the pharoah's official titles as well -- "Son of Ra." Pharoahs ruled by divine right and were supposed to be the sons of the sun god Ra. Ra is the circle symbol. We were amused that "Son of" is represented by a duck. So every pharoah had to be sure to have his ducks in a row and be able to show his lineage.

Now if you really wanted to disrespect someone, you'd scratch out their picture like is shown on the left. Egyptians were big into depicting themselves in temples and gravesites becuase they believed these pictures kind of come to life in the afterlife. If you scratch out every image of a person, they aren't going to be able to enjoy the after life. You don't destroy the whole picture, though, becuase it is disrespectful to deface images of the gods.

The god on the left in the defaced picture had a fun story. Once upon a time, there was a big battle and all the guys in this one village went off to fight. Except for this one dude who was pretty sick at the time. When the guys came back from the battle several months later, they found that all their wives were pregnant. The guys put two and two together and as punishment, cut off one arm and one leg of the guy who stayed behind. They went off to battle again and found they had the same problem again. Over time, the guy became worshiped as a god of fertility. You may notice a very worn section just in front of the god's waist where people have rubbed off part of the image in an attempt to acquire some luck with the ladies.

One of my favorite statues was of a dung beetle way at the back of the temple. The dung beetle is the symbol of the rising sun. Apparently, Egyptians noticed these little beetles rolling their balls of dung first thing in the morning and figured there must be a similar creature helping the sun rise each day.

If you could follow the pathway out the side of Karnak Temple, you would eventually get to Luxor Temple, dedicated to the sun god's wife. The city is built over much of the sphynx avenue, though. Luxor Temple was cool because it's a little skewed (if you look down the center of the photo on the right, you'll see the colonnade seems to go off to the left instead of straight down the middle). That's because Queen Hatchupset built a little temple, but then Ramses II had to offset his outer facade when he built afterward. Queen Hatchupset upset people on multiple fronts, I think, because there were a few spots where her constructions were defaced.

You'll notice the symmetry is also off because there is an obelisk on only one side here. Apparently, the Egyptians were making nice with the French Republic and gave them the other obelisk. Today that obelisk stands in Place de la Concorde in Paris. We brought greetings from the relocated obelisk.




Dan enjoyed hanging out with Ramses II and all the other fun folks depicted at Luxor.




Lastly, wanted to show you something only depicted here in Luxor. It took us a while to figure out what the tour guide was pointing out because of his accent. For a while, we were trying to figure out whether the ancient Egyptians had Fosters or Budweiser. Eventually, we realized it was a matter of Yogi or BooBoo. You can see the bear in the lower left with the circular ear. He has a guy's ankle in his mouth and his claw is reaching up behind the leg. Bears aren't native to Egypt, so the guess is that the pharoah had gotten one as a gift and was using it in battle or something.

Another White Coat

So another school term begins here in sunny Newcastle. This term, we are joined by my cousin Emily Saluke. Emily is also in the Global Scholars program at St. George's, so in the end she and Dan should graduate together. It's fun stuff to have family to hang out with here -- who knew we'd be such trendsetters on multiple fronts (there's some lovely new Salukes on the way, I hear)!

This ceremony, as you'll recall, is where the students commit to their studies and the high ethical standards of being doctors. You can see my attempt at recording the oath below. The school gets some of their top docs and professors to officially enrobe the students in the recognizable white lab coats of their chosen profession. You can see Emily on the far left getting her coat from Dr. Shubra Barouah. Emily's class is a bit bigger than Dan's -- 160 or so students as opposed to the 90 in Dan's class. Emily seems to have already made some friends in both classes as she is living in a mixed term suite in the Parrish dorm (a couple of miles from us here in Parrish View...there's obviously lots of churches around here).



In any case, we had a fun time meeting Emily's classmates at the ceremony and on the Tyne River cruise afterward. It was our first chance to see the Millennium Bridge rotate for a boat to go under. You can see its graceful curves airborne in the picture on the left. We also got to meet one or two of the new spouses/significant others joining this term. Looks like I'm not the only pregnant chick any more -- new one even grew up in northern Virginia. With any luck, we'll be adequately supplied with borrowed baby furniture to survive until December. Then items can see further use as we pass them along to the folks in the next term (she's due in December/January). I've started filtering through Egypt pictures, so should have something together soon.

Pregnancy update

Whew! We finally made it safely home after months of exciting travel. We did take a brief break in there to see the midwife and get a sonogram. So here's the latest lovely pic of the passenger. He's so big now that he no longer fits all in one screen capture, as you can see. You might have to click on the picture to read the various labels, but we had fun seeing the heart beating and his little hand in his mouth (perhaps biting his nails like his dad or sucking thumb as mom did). Everything is generally good -- growing on pace and due date still scheduled for Halloween. We were given one last chance to find out the passenger's secret identity, but took a pass. Rather, we agreed to alternate pronouns for each remaining month. For July, the passenger was "she" and now that it is August, the passenger will be "he."

Lots of folks have asked how I have been doing, especially with all this crazy travel. I'll admit, it has been a lesson in admitting my limitations. After a day or two walking the Rive Gauche with Dan and Mike, my poor little feet couldn't take much more (For some reason, Dan finds this picture especially amusing). I sat out one morning and then joined them at Notre Dame for the afternoon. After going through the church, we got in line to go up to the tower. A nice gentleman from the cathedral was handing out little fliers to everyone in line and mentioned that I might not enjoy the 400 or so stairs. I agreed and decided to explore the crypt while the boys went up top. It was a bit cooler in there and they had cushy seats. I enjoyed a bit less the constant visits to rather poorly kept French bathrooms, especially ones where someone was stationed to gather tips. What these people did to earn them, I'm not exactly sure.

I took a whole day off in Geneva and when we went through big museums like the Louvre, British Museum and Egypt Museum in Cairo, I was usually tired/sore enough to break down and request a wheelchair. BTW, wheelchair in the Louvre is a nightmare because it's a bunch of buildings pasted together. British Museum is a purpose-designed building, so fewer elevators to be hassled by. Not enough elevators in Egypt Museum (though for a hefty tip, it's easy to find secruity guards willing to be litter bearers up stairs).

As challenging as I thought Europe was with the warm weather in Paris and unpredictable bathroom quality, Egypt was a bit more challenging. With the triple-digit heat, it was tough keeping up with the need for water. The picture at left is Luxor Temple, several temples stacked inside each other like Russian dolls. There is one bathroom in all that and you have to tip a nice Egyptian lady so she'll give you toilet paper at the door. You aren't supposed to put the paper in the toilet because most toilets in Egypt can't handle paper (sound familiar, Mom?). There's no soap and the water runs sometimes. A new concept of cleanliness develops in such conditions.

So our first day out we headed to Karnak at 8am to beat the heat and crowds and were back to the boat by noon or so. For my co-workers who saw me at the 95th Anniversary Sing Along, you may recall the "Sandy beet red after handing out water to everyone while not drinking enough herself" look. After a few hours at Karnak, I again wore that look. Luckily, each day was laid out so that we returned to the air conditioned boat, where I could take a nice cold shower before lunch (all prepared using bottled water). Then we'd visit something else as the sun was beginning to set around 4pm or so. Plus, after day 1, I learned to drink more water, that there was a bathroom on the bus that took us everywhere, I can carry my own TP, and to generally bring more change for these goofy bathroom people so I can make more visits.

Even though the Valley of the Kings had less shade and hotter temps, I had learned enough on day 1 to enable me to survive without turning that red that frightens people. I didn't go into the tombs that involved tons of stairs, but I got to see three with amazing colors and a fair number of rooms. When we visited Edfu Temple, one of the lovely guards with oozies took Dan and I out alone behind a smaller temple (yeah, it was really as freaky as it sounds) and showed us the heiroglyphic for childbirth. It is just left of center and a bit darker because people have touched it for good luck for a few centuries. You can see the upside-down baby torso escaping from underneath the seated woman. Edfu is supposedly where the goddess Isis gave birth to her son Horus.

By the time we got to the pyramids on our second to last day, I was coping nicely with the heat. Sadly, all the walking on uneven thousands-of-years-old surfaces had really gotten to my joints, though, so I had a bit of hip pain. I didn't climb up the interior of the middle pyramid with Dan and did get a wheelchair when we went to the museum later in the day. The two-day journey home to Newcastle didn't help much. So I've been trying to sit still for a bit to allow my hips to recover. It's hard staying still for any period of time! While I'm recovering, I'm afraid I waddle a bit, but am generally doing ok. The passenger is enjoying the downtime by regularly swimming about and occasionally giving some really solid kicks. My goal is no big walking for a few days so I can go back to work on Tuesday. It puts a bit of a cramp on Dan's hopes to go to one or two local castles before classes start, but he's been really good about taking care of me during recovery. I'm glad he convinced me to schedule in this recovery week in the first place.

So Dan, the passenger and I are all feeling quite well after our many journeys and we're glad to be home. Plus, how cool is it to have visited Egypt, enjoyed an all-you-can-eat buffet for every meal for 8 days and not have suffered food poisoning once during the whole trip! I took full advantage of it, for all those of you out there who have reminded me to feed the baby. I'll admit to even stashing the occasional roll or fruit to snack on between meals as the passenger is constantly hungry. When we've had a chance to sort through the 1,300 pictures Dan took in Egypt, I'll see about including some of the highlights.