Luxor Day Three: Valley of the Kings & Karnak

On Sunday we loaded up a little late - that second cup of Nescafe was too wonderful to leave. The first stop was the Valley of the Kings where we planned to see three tombs. The Valley is very commercialized - this is where every tour goes. Most people will never see the little treasures we saw yesterday at the workers' and nobles' tombs.

The striking difference between here and Saqqara, the 4th and 5th dynasty tombs, is the tremendous focus on the gods. Most of the paintings in these 18th and 19th Dynasty tombs is the focus on appeasing the gods. Reliefs and paintings show the pharaoh with each of many gods proving why he was good enough to deserve the afterlife. Lots of vanquishing enemies etc. seems to be what the gods liked to see. There was some artwork depicting the stuff being brought into the tomb for the pharaoh in the afterlife, but not so much daily life of the people. I'd like to know more Egyptian mythology because the names of various gods most definitely have changed over 3500 years even if the art style itself stayed pretty much the same.

My favorite tomb was Ramses IV which has the ceiling of the burial chamber painted with the goddess Nut, who gives birth to the sun each day, which travels across the heavens in a solar boat only to be swallowed by the goddess at dusk. It travels through her body at night to be reborn in the morning. No cameras allowed or I'd have taken a picture.

Afterward we headed to Deir al-Bahri, the temple of my hero, Hetsepshet. Hetsepshet was the wife of Tutmosis II who died very early leaving an infant son by another wife. As the royal wife, Hetsepshet became regent and declared herself pharaoh, going so far as to wearing a false pharaonic beard. Our group of mostly middle aged women decided we needed to become followers of Hetsepshet and embrace our beards! A tee shirt may follow...

The temple is amazing, with multiple stories and ramps leading up from the valley floor. When Tutmosis III grew up he took the reign back and actually worked pretty hard to erase Hetsepshet's existence out of the record. There are many images of H. with her face scratched out and her name replaced by Tutmosis III's. When he destroyed one of her obelisks at Karnak, there was a huge public outcry, so he walled in the other obelisk which actually preserved it. We saw the preserved obelisk in our afternoon visit to Karnak.

We were hungry, so decided to have lunch before heading to Karnak Temple. We chose a restaurant near the ferry called Africa, which had a fixed price lunch that was amazing, with delicious veges, rice, potatoes cooked in clay pots and grilled meat of our choice. We sat on a tiled, palm frond covered terrace with a trickling fountain drowning out some of the construction sounds on the street. The cost with drinks was less than $15 per person.

We rode the ferry across the Nile to catch our minibus. There is only one bridge over the Nile and it's several miles north of town, so while we ate, our driver took the bridge route and was ready for us on the Luxor side.

We headed to Karnak Temple. This is an amazing, overwhelming complex. Many pharaohs representing numerous dynasties wanted to leave their mark on this complex dedicated to the sun god, Amun. So you have courts, pylons with carved relief work, temples with lots of color still visible in the paintings, hypostyles filled with enormous columns and obelisks. We took a basic tour with our guide and then walked around on our own. This is a place with just too much to absorb in one visit. As with so many other places, pharaohs, priests, Romans and Copts co-opted the work of earlier rulers and either overwrote stuff, or just rubbed out a name and added their own, or rubbed stuff out all together. I'd like to come back for about two or three hours for several days in a row and really study individual areas. This first visit was a chance to absorb the shapes, subtle colors and the feeling of the place.



We were delivered back to our hotel for a much needed rest before hunting for another good restaurant. For the second time we were surprised by towels and bed spread sculpted into swans and tiny people. Our room cleaner really knows how to keep guests happy, and earn a big tip!

Dinner tonight was at Sofra in a 1930's building in the middle of a neighborhood. This was a place one might expect Amelia Peabody to walk into. We sat in wingbacked chairs on the rooftop terrace around a giant metal platter of a table and stuffed ourselves on mezza, then traditional soups and entrees. We followed that with desserts - rice pudding for me with decaf, Nescafe, of course.

We walked back through typical neighborhoods and the excitement of the Eid the Muslim holiday celebrating Abraham's sacrificing a sheep instead of his only son, Ishmael to fulfill Allah's command. Tomorrow, December 8th, we've been warned that the street will run with blood as each family reenacts this ceremony by slaughtering a sheep, goat or cow. A portion of the meat is given to the poor and everyone feasts.

As usual, the streets were full of milling men of all ages. A few young women were out and about, and most older women were shopping for the food they are going to spend the day tomorrow cooking.

The streets are filthy and often smelly, crowds are everywhere listening to loud music, drinking tea, smoking shesha and dodging cars and motorcycles. Stores are generally clean inside and interesting to explore. We saw baskets of herbs and spices, fresh fruit and veges, shoes, clothing, etc. Each store is very tiny and specialized. If you want hand tools, go to a hand tool store, if you want fresh veges go to that store and next door for other types of groceries. Everything seems to come alive at about 10pm. In a country where it's blasting hot most of the time, cool evenings is when everyone shops and visits.

Every street is multiuse with apartments above the stores. I'd expect them to be fairly modern working class places. The exteriors are messy and unappealing. Plumbing and wiring is on the outside of the buildings which are made primarily of concrete and brick. It's difficult to understand a culture that seems to be proud of keeping their possessions tidy, but ignores the curb appeal for the most part. Cairo is not a beautiful city! It is confusing seeing street sweepers tidying up in front of some businesses and apartments and ignoring vacant lots full of garbage. With all the confusion about where garbage goes, you have to wonder if that street sweeper isn't emptying his trash bin on wheels into the vacant lots!

Again I am struck by how safe I feel milling around with these crowds of people in the middle of the night in a strange city.

Luxor, Day Two - Tombs and Temples

I'm full of history! The first day of our organized tours we were picked up by tall, handsome Mahmoud, our guide for the next two days. We loaded into a spacious, air conditioned minivan and headed for Medinat-Habu, Ramses II's memorial temple. So much is ruins, but areas have beautifully preserved colors and reliefs. Our guide talked about the villages we saw as we drove to the temple. In ancient times, only workers lived on the West Bank, isolated from the regular population to help protect the location of tombs.

The details of what I saw can be read in any guidebook, so I won't waste space. My impressions are of the timelessness of everything. Somehow, the ancient Egyptians managed to retain a continuity of artistic style and look for nearly 35oo years. Subtle differences are seen in statuary with more grace in the figures, more detail, space between the arms and body, columns that stand alone where hundreds of years before they had connecting walls to lend support. Columns are interesting to follow. Previously they were made of sheaves of palm trunks, so the first stone columns were carved to look like palm trunks bound together. Ancient Egyptians were uncomfortable with change, so things needed to progress slowly.

Then, to add to the confusion about pharaonic periods, a pharaoh will take a shine to a past ruler's monuments, statues and temples, and appropriate it, scratching out the previous guy's name and adding his own. This has been confusing for even the Egyptologists trying to date all these things.

Then, you have the Romans and the Christian Copts scratching out stuff they didn't agree with and in the case of the Romans, overlaying walls of relief work with their own paintings. For archaeologists, the question is then, what do you preserve, the stuff underneath, or the overlayed things which are also ancient and historic. Added to all this is the 19th century graffiti to contend with. It leaves a huge puzzle to assemble and work to understand.

I stood apart from our guide often during our tours, listening to other English speaking Egyptian guides presenting any number of theories as facts. Kathy pointed out this morning that this is very much in keeping with an educational system that functions primarily on rote memorization rather than conjecture and and critical thinking skills. I wonder if we're doing much better in the U.S., but at least critical thinking is viewed as a vital part of our system.

I think some of this is also part of a culture that is steeped in religious law. Islam is a religion of law. Interestingly, three major religions share a heritage in the deserts of the Middle East, Islam, Christianity and the Jewish faith. Islam holds the tenants of their version of the Old Testament and the laws set out in it as the living, breathing reality of their daily lives, and they're reminded of this 5 times a day with the call to prayer. I have found that generally this is manifest in the people I have spent time with as acceptance. We do what we're supposed to do according to Islamic Law, and leave the rest to Allah. Cross the street against horrendous traffic, "inshallah" or leave it to God. I'll see you tomorrow, "inshallah", if God wills it. My wife is sick and in the hospital, "inshallah", she'll recover if God wills it. There is a certain peace in this system because the law has a certain black and white quality - I do my part and follow the law as best as I can, and God will take care of the rest. I'm very clear after 3 weeks that in order for us to make any headway diplomatically our diplomats need to understand the gravity of "inshallah" as the organizing principle of the lives of average people in Islamic countries. I know at this point that I don't in the least bit understand exactly how these people think and live.

We rested at the little town next to Medinat Habu and were entertained by an old man playing a two stringed instrument. Such a charming sound. I thought of Rachel's little ones and couldn't resist paying the man 20LE to take one home. He showed me how to resin the bow, tune it and play. We put on a little concert for all the locals hanging around, who clapped and laughed at my lack of skill.

Next stop, Valley of the Queens. The tomb I would have liked to see, Nefertari, Ramses II's wife is restored but closed to preserve it. It is estimated that each visitor leaves behind 2.6 grams of sweat, increasing the destructive humidity in the tombs.

Interestingly, royal male children under 12 years old are buried in the Valley of the Queens, so two tombs we visited, Amunherkhepshef and Khaemwaset were young sons of Ramses III, and the beautiful paintings were of the pharaoh introducing his sons to the gods. We also visited Queen Titi's tomb. We're not sure who her husband was, but heiroglyphs referred to her as "royal wife, royal daughter and royal mother," and the tomb was much like the two prince's tombs we visited. This has led archaeologists to the conclusion that she was probably a wife of Ramses III.

Interestingly, in the royal succession, being a son of a pharaoh was not as important as being married to a royal princess. So Ramses III was a commoner who married a royal princess, probably Titi, and thus was able to claim the throne. In the same light, when Ramses II's much beloved wife Nefartari died, instead of taking another royal princess to wife, he married his oldest daughter ritually - he had sixty-some commoner wives as well. He reigned so long, he actually went through four royal daughters before he died! Only two women in 35oo years fought the system and claimed the throne for themselves, Hetsepshut and Tawosret. As I've said before, ancient Egyptians stuck to their traditions, and didn't often rock the boat!

Next we visited the Tombs of the Nobles. So Nice! Not many people so we could linger over paintings depicting more scenes of daily life rather than scenes of meeting and reckoning with the gods.

It was still early, so we asked to go to the tombs of the workers. This was an interesting side trip. Working on tombs was familial. Digger's children became diggers, painter's children became painters. The week was divided into 10 days rather than 7. Workers worked on the royal tombs 8 days a week, then they worked on worker tombs for one day and had a day of rest. When a worker died, he was buried in the tomb currently being prepared, and then a new tomb was started. Each tomb, as with royal tombs was dug and plastered while the person was living. Painting was planned and most was accomplished after the person's death during the 90 days needed for mummification. Tombs in the valleys we visited were rarely finished. There just wasn't enough time even with several hundred painters working.

In the worker's tombs, paintings were primarily showing scenes of daily life. Each was about the same size and shape, and it was clear that to some extent they did their best work in their own tombs.

The village ruins of mud brick workers homes is nestled in the valley, and interestingly, the modern archaeologist's residences are situated high overlooking this valley. I paid a little baksheesh to be able to walk up and take a look at their view. Inspiring and beautiful!

We dragged back to the hotel and walked down the street to an English owned and run Indian restaurant. Excellent food and great atmosphere.

We went back to the hotel for a rest and was on the docks by 4:30 for a felucca ride organized by our taxi driver of the first day. There was very little wind, so the modern day solution is to catch a ride with a tug boat, or at least an Egyptian version of a tug boat. At one point there were four feluccas strung along behind the run down poor excuse for a motorboat. One we were upstream a ways, we pulled in our rope and drifted back. We watched the sunset, then the lights of the city while passing a relaxing two hours.

We were still too full for a full dinner, so returned to Dean's for dessert - chocolate mousse and sherry triffle.