Thanksgiving on the Red Sea - Mt. Sinai

We left for the Sinai Peninsula on Wednesday evening, Nov. 26th right after Kathy got home from school. We had a minibus that would hold 16 and there were four of us, plus three escorts - two drivers and an expeditor so we were able to spread out. The expeditor was worth his weight in gold. We went through about a dozen checkpoints before arriving at the Suez Canal, and numerous points in the middle of nowhere along the route to the St. Catherine Protectorate, home to the 2 thousand year old monastary at the foot of Mt. Sinai, and of course, Mt. Sinai where Moses purportedly got the ten commandments.

We arrived at our hotel at about 10pm. It is new looking but run down - when you see the web of cracks in concrete buildings all over the place, you wonder what will happen here with a major earthquake. The room was clean but smelled so strongly of pesticide, I wondered what they were working so hard to get rid of! The bottom bed sheet only covered the top half of the bed, I discovered in the middle of the night. Hotels here come with either full or half board meaning you get either just breakfast or both breakfast and dinner. This place came with both, so at 10 pm we were served a nice dinner of chicken, beef, veges, rice and a tray of Egyptian sweets with tea. All quite tasty.

I woke up determined to be more independent. I arranged my money according to denomination, and stored all my small change in an easiily accessible pocket for baksheesh (tips) and headed into the hotel main lobby to seek out a cup of coffee.

What a hauntingly beautiful place. The sky is purple blue and the jumbled, rough rockpile mountains and hills are rosy brown. I settled into the restaurant and pantomimed that I wanted coffee and of course got "nescafe" - instant coffee with reconstituted powdered milk, but it was hot, and I did it all myself! First step to independence in a foreign land.

A cat skittered through the restaurant. The same kitten that sat next to my chair during dinner the night before. Cats do quite well here - better than dogs and perhaps even better than children. More on cats later.

later that day...
We finally arrived at St. Catherine's and after the walk from the parking lot to the monastery I knew I wasn't going to be climbing Mt. Sinai. If I wanted to beat myself up climbing a mountain, I have a perfectly good one in my own backyard at home! The call of history and art was too strong, so I broke off from the climbers and entered the monastery complex.

Droves of tourists were everywhere, but being alone allowed me to drift about, joining an English speaking group when I needed an explanation for something and hang behind when I wanted to study a painting or icon a little longer. The monastery has been here unmolested for a zillion years. The prophet Mohammed provided the initial protection for it, and it has been gifted throughout the centuries by stellar monasteries and Christian leaders without disruptions and conflict that lead to destruction of books, icons, manuscripts and the stuff of monastic life in other places.

After photographing the ancestor of the original burning bush (fire really is good for trees!) I joined a crowd waiting to get into the monastery collections which is in a temperature controlled, carefully lit and well displayed series of museum-like rooms. A monk burst through the waiting crowd, into the closed and guarded door which he slammed behind him. Shouts and roars could be heard and people were summarily tossed out. The guard at the door told the fellow next to me that he was shouting "Everyone out! Nobody gets in, even the governor himself!!" I moved closer to the door and asked the guard, "Please.. I have come a long way." The guard told me, one moment," and slipped through the door. He came back and said, "Come in." I slipped through the door only to face the fierce monk. He shouted, "25 pounds!!" which I gladly paid, then waited to see if I was going to be fed to some waiting lions. He gave me my receipt and pointed to the adjoining room. I spent a marvelous hour in one of the most stunning collections of iconography and illuminated manuscripts this side of the Getty Museum in California. Things were beautifully displayed; lighting was perfect and the only sound I heard was Gregorian chanting somewhere distant in the monastery. It was an incredible hour. Just as I was ready to leave, others were being admitted in very small groups.

By the time I slipped into the courtyard near the little cathedral, most tourists had departed in their tour buses and the place was silent. I strolled around the grounds, watching the workmen who had appeared as visitors had disappeared. I still had hours before my climbers were due back, so I hung around watching a couple of craftsmen building a granite cobbled courtyard around the fortified church. What a delight. The older man was the head craftsman on the job, laying block with such care and precision, it was a delight to watch. When he noticed my interest, he took care to show me how he worked, how he chose, prepared and leveled each stone. His young hod carrier was anxious to practice his three words of English, so we spent a stellar hour laughing, nodding and pantomiming. Later, I spoke to a young visitor who explained to me that the Bedouins care for the monastery and do all the work and building seen on the site. When I asked if they practiced the Christian religion, the young man said, "No, but all is the same." Would that we all practiced that truth.

Shortly after settling in with a cup of coffee, which I figured out how to order all by myself, my guys marched into the area, happy to be off the mountain, but equally happy that they made the climb. After hearing how much harder it was than the guidebooks indicated, and reflecting on the wonderful day I'd had, I'm thrilled with my decision NOT to climb Mt. Sinai!