Nile River Cruise: Nubian Museum, Philae and Abu Simbel Temples, Parts 2 and 3

The early morning wakeup call came while the sun was just beginning to creep over the horizon, but the temperature was already soaring. The first leg of our morning journey took us to the Nubian Museum, which chronicles the slowly disappearing culture of the Nubians, but with a very Egypt centric point of view. The monuments, statues and displays from the ancient kingdoms could have been taken from anywhere and the following Christian and Muslim exhibitions were not terribly interesting, I am sad to say. After that, a quick trip to the High Aswan Dam, built throughout the 1960s and thought responsible for the death-blow of Nubian culture in Egypt. After that brief stop, we were ferried - literally - to the Island of Philae, or rather its relocated twin.

When the old Dam was built in the early 20th century, and subsequently heightened twice, it drowned this temple which marked the border between Nubia and Egypt during the Greco-Roman times. In the 1970s, world effort and money was mobilized to move the temple - lock, stock and barrel - to a neighboring island 300 meters away which was high enough to house the temple. It was a Herculean effort, to say the least, like a giant 3-D puzzle. The temple was meticulously re-created as it was on the sunken Island that was its home for over 2000 years. The temple is a monument to both the efforts of Twentieth-Century archaeologists to preserve history, and earlier visitors interested more in vandalizing and leaving their mark.

First, the temple is riddled with Coptic crosses from when Christianity was adopted as the official Roman religion. The faces of Gods and Pharaohs alike were chiseled out and in the place of the key of life, there were deeply etched Coptic crosses. Then the French came, and Napoleon Bonaparte's archaeologists were no match for the pride of the diminutive madman's troops who etched their decrees and names into the sandstone. Additionally, the temple of Philae was the last stand for the King of Egypt and his Mamluk army in the early 19th century and their slaughter is commemorated on the walls opposite of a scene of Isis offering the Ptolemaic Pharaoh eternal life and the ability to crush all of Egypt's enemies. Added to there were the scratched initials of the later British troops, who took great pains to etch their initials, regiment, and dates into the stone. I have seen the same initials, regiments and date in three different temples. Even modern names seem to have been etched into these otherwise magnificent carvings, forever reinforcing the petty human desire to "me too" onto history - I doubt anyone even remembers who C.B. from the 19th regiment of 1889 was (and I seriously doubt the bugger himself remembered it once he went home to jolly old England).

Day 4;

We awoke at 3am in order to depart at 4am with the rest of the convoy from Aswan to Abu Simble. The reason for this caravan is that there are literally cross-border bandits and other less-than-friendly elements along the desolate stretch of highway between the two points and the Tourism Police do not want a repeat of the Temple of Hatshepsut incident of 1997 where dozens of tourists were robbed and murdered by a dissident group. That aside, the temples of Abu Simble on the shores of Lake Nasser are impressive for two reasons. First, their location is actually 80 meters higher and 120 meters further north than their original locations. This is because the construction of the high Aswan Dam began to flood the valley into which the temples were originally carved, consigning them to a watery grave if something was not done. Hence the move, jig-saw-puzzle style. The second reason is the fact that the original architects of the Great and Lesser temples (One to Ramses II and the other for his favorite wife, Nefertari) were constructed so that the light shone directly on the statue of Ramses II deep inside the temple only one day per year, per temple. The first on his birthday, the second on his coronation day. Even more impressive is that Ramses' statue was one of four in the Great Temple; Amun-Re, Toth, and Ptah were the others. All but one statue receives at least some light throughout the year, except for Ptah, the God of Darkness whose statue is forever shrouded in shadow. The new sites for the temples were meticulously constructed of concrete and native stone to resemble the original locations, therefore on the backside, access doors and sand predominate, while the front looks as natural as any of the other surrounding stone hills. They do have a light and sound show - every site so far has - but we did not stay that long. The day, and the entire excursion, was capped by another three-hour bus caravan replete with police escort. The remainder of the day is ours to have and at 8pm, our flight to Cairo leaves Aswan - and all the temples we have seen so far - behind.

Some friends and I, eager to leave the thronging gaggle of tourist companions behind ventured out into the HOT Aswan day, exploring the market (Sooq) and witnessing a change in progress. Part of the Sooq is still dedicated to the locals where vendors of fresh produce squat next to the butcher's shop and across from the housewares stand. Intermixed with these folk was a young, HARD working seller of Nibian and Arabic music. One of our threesome decided he wanted some Nubian music but wanted to be sure that the CD which touted its status as a "Compact Disk Recrordible" (sic) was actually going to work (a very real worry). The young man pulled out the ultimate in Egyptian "make-it-work" demonstration equipment; he had two old, wooden drawers into which an old computer CD-ROM drive, car stereo tape deck, and radio reciever had been mounted. The other drawer held two old speakers, one from a car, the other from an old boom box. working quickly, they wired the two boxes together, jerry-rigged wires in all directions, and strung another wire to some hidden powersource in an abandoned shop. Amazingly, the contraption worked wonderfully! He sold the CD AND a tape to my friend for LE56, out of which he paid his boss LE50.

Meanwhile, my other companion and I were a ways off, enjoying a popsicle and staying out of the sun when a very old Nubian mand walked up to us. "Ingelezie?" (English?) he asked in Arabic. No, we responded, American. He then guessed what STATE we were from! He complimented us on our Arabic and asked if we knew the Nubian language. We answered "no" and he proceeded to tell us a few words in Nubian; "Water" and "Go". He then smiled, shook our hands, and walked off. My companion turned to me and said "Did that just happen?" Evidently, it did.

Once we wandered into the more "touristy" portion of the market, things got a bit more familiar, with the ubiquitous statuary, t-shirts with rude captions, and tacky-tacky nick-nacks all around. We purchased some authentic things situated in the backs of the stores (old woven baskets, jewelry and incense for instance) - much to the delight of the vendors who expected us to buy the other things - and wandered further into the market. Immediately, the natural feel of the market was gone as stained-wood shops, standing cheek-to-jowl sprang up to our left while others were being constructed to our right; tourism's dollars and the insatiable desire for "A camel can go for 14 days without a drink, but I can't" T-Shirts were slowly transforming Aswan's sooq.

after that we spent a liesurely hour at the Nubian House coffee shop. It is situated on a bluff overlooking the cataract and is breath-taking in its beauty. The coffee shop also serves as a living museum, with recreations of the colors and designs of real Nubian houses inside. If you are ever in Aswan, blow off the Old Cataract Hotel and eat, drink, and soak in the atmosphere of the Nubian House (not the Nubian Restaurant).