1022. Home at last, from my "World Tour"! Egypt, Jordan, (Petra) and Israel -- # 1.
These blogs about my tour will be mostly pictures, and explaining them, telling some of the interesting facts that I heard, from the tour director, Dr. Clark Christian, a retired LDS Institute teacher, and the native guides that we had in each country. He called himself "Bishop Clark" during the trip, and had sent the very informative book shown above, several weeks ahead to read before we got there. His wife Laurel also sent articles telling about customs of each country, etc. They also sent lists of scriptures connected with the sites we would see.
The traffic there was very interesting! Cars didn't stay in their lanes, and people would walk across the street between cars.
Soon after we arrived, we were on a bus, with a very educated and articulate Egyptian lady, and first went to the King Tut Museum.
There we saw things such as these:
This one appears to be a mother and a baby!
Our guide in Egypt spoke excellent English! She told us that 5% of Egypt is green, around the Nile River. The rest is desert, and outside of the city, most are farmers. They have free schooling, with 16 universities, but 50% of the population is illiterate, and stay on the family farms and help support the family.
There were police all over, around the museum, and other places.
Our guide explaining meanings of the carved stone behind her. We were not allowed to take pictures in the room with King Tut's treasures, a lot of gold there!
The next morning we got on the bus and headed to the pyramids! Our hotel was close enough that some could see the pyramids out of their hotel window! There actually are 118 pyramids in all in Egypt, but the large ones are best known. They have found over 4200 tombs in Egypt. The largest is the pyramid of King Cheops. It is the only one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World still in existence. It is located on the Giza plateau near the modern city of Cairo and was built over a twenty-year period during the reign of the king Khufu (2589-2566 BC, also known as Cheops) of the 4th Dynasty. There are 2 others close by.
It has 2,000,000 stones of 5 tons each, and covers 13 acres. It was crafted so carefully without mortar, that you can't even put a piece of paper between blocks. It is possible to go inside (for $15), but I didn't do that! Some did, and it was through very narrow passageways, in which you had to stoop and almost crawl to get through. Instead I walked around on the outside, and met some very fascinating people!
There were many camels available to ride on. Our guide told us to be careful, as some would offer a free camel ride, and then you may have to pay $50 for them to let you down! She also advised us on how much to pay for souvenirs, to not be charged too much by the many vendors all over!
Looking up from the bottom of the huge pyramid!
The wind was blowing quite a bit that day. I was wearing my passport around my neck, We were told in each country to have our passport on us at all times.
A lovely Arabic mother, who had 2 children with her. I got a picture of them, but it didn't turn out good -- was too dark! They couldn't speak English, but were very friendly, and liked their pictures taken. It was interesting to see the rather primitive lifestyle they had, and yet most had cell phones, and used them a lot!
Actually I realized that the one woman on the right who appears very dark was because only her eyes showed with the head covering she was wearing. Mothers love their children all over the world. It was fun to see the little families together, and the love they showed each other.
This gives an idea of how large the main pyramid is!
This is the next largest in the group of 3 which were close to each other.
My roommate LaWana Shakespeare and I. We roomed together in each hotel. Below is a general view of the people who were there that day.
There were many vendors close to the pyramid site, and everywhere else. Their economy depends a lot on tourism, and it really suffered a few years ago when due to civil unrest tourists didn't come much.
It is rather hard to see the sphinx in front of the pyramid on the right. It is 110 feet long and 56 feet wide. We were told that the sphinx was built long before the pyramids, perhaps before Noah's flood.
Our delightful guide was always saying "ha be be" at the beginning or end of a sentence. I asked another man who helped us what that meant. He said it was a term such as "darling" or sweetheart!
This was another view close to the city. She told us that in the past people had built condos quite close to the pyramids, and then they made a law that you couldn't do that, and they had to be torn down. It would take away from the view if some were close!
Two young sisters, Whitney and Ashlynn Christian, granddaughters of our tour director! They were the youngest on this tour, and had to be content with most people much older! They were delightful!
We also went to the ruins of Memphis, a city which used to be the capital of Egypt. Over many years it became covered with sand, etc., and is no longer inhabited. It was the capitol of that area before Cairo, and was quite close to Cairo. The sphinx shown below was in ruins from Memphis, and left it the spot it was originally. You couldn't move it!
This is only the beginning! I will have several more blogs about this inspiring and fascinating trip! I'll miss tomorrow as my grandson Sam Lieske is graduating from the University of Utah, in architecture! He will continue on to a Master's. Also his brother Ben's wife will graduate from SUU just an hour later, as the valedictorian of her music major! We're sorry we can't be both in Salt Lake City, and Cedar City at the same time!
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