Rooted in Adventure: Welcome to Aswan

Day 1: Bon Voyage!
We left at 6 pm for our 7 pm flight to Aswan, Egypt from Cairo on Nile Air. At the Cairo airport, we met our tour guide, Hend, who would become like family over the next week with the added bonus of being knowledgable in the area, Egyptology and Arabic. When we got to our plane, we were very surprised to find out that we were in first class. My family never elects to fly first class and my parents didn't plan to by first class tickets. We still are not exactly sure why we were put there but we think the most likely scenario was that my mom paid with credit card points and somehow that caused us to be put in first class. Anyways, it was a nice surprise and we took full advantage on our short 1 hour flight to Aswan! When we arrived, we checked into the Isis hotel and swiftly went to bed.

View from the Isis hotel

Day 2: Falooka rides, Stray Dogs and Markets

A Falooka

We woke up and ate the complimentary hotel breakfast that consisted of a mostly Egyptian style breakfast. Egyptian breakfast is similar to what an American might eat for lunch or dinner: mashed potatoes, salad, foul (traditional Egyptian food). They did also have omelets, bread, hard boiled eggs, fruit, yogurt and cereal. However, the omelets had some strong cheese and my family doesn't like Egyptian bread, it doesn't have much flavor and tastes sort like a marshmallow, so we managed on hard boiled eggs, fruit and yogurt for the next few days at the hotel. Afterwards, we hopped on a falooka that Hend set up for us and we sailed on the Nile for 4 hours with a Nubian man, JJ. We were told to enjoy our time on the falooka and not worry about learning about Nubian life as we would be heading to JJ's home to learn about Nubian life tomorrow evening! While on the falooka, we were fed a large Nubian meal, had hot tea and, later on, drank some Egyptian beer on the roof! We took a break so that the workers on the boat could eat the leftovers and we could walk around a bit. While on the shore we were able to feed this small puppy who was terrified of people and cautiously took our food. There are a lot of stray dogs and cats in Egypt but I found this one particularly cute. After our falooka ride, which ended at dusk, we went to the market to do a little shopping! We spent 2-3 hours at the market and by the end we were exhausted with all of the shop owners badgering us to come into their store, the bartering and the sensory overload: people yelling and running, music playing and incense burning. We had to get to bed because our next morning would begin early!

Sailing on the falooka

Chris and Lauren relaxing on the falooka

Drinking Egyptian beer on the Nile while enjoying the beautiful sand dune views

Cute but timid stray dog. We fed him some of our left overs.

View off of the back of the falooka. You steer by pushing large dark brown piece of wood around that is connected to the rudder.

Huge cloth bags filled to the brim with spices and dried hibiscus flower found at the market. The dried hibiscus is turned into a warm tea or cold juice that is very delicious called Karcaeday.

Day 3: Abu Simbel, Ramses II, Lake Nasser and Nubian Life
Our alarm went off at 4:30 am to meet our tour guide at 5 am to leave for the Abu Simbel temples. Our guide told us to bring our hotel pillows with us as it would be a 3.5 hour drive through the desert just to get there. Abu Simbel is about 50 km from the Sudan border so today we would be heading as far south as I will likely ever go in Egypt. The drive there wasn't too bad as I was able to get some sleep. The Abu Simbel temples are on an island in Lake Nasser. Normally, tourists wait for a boat to load and drive over the the island however, we had Hend! Hend talked to the men and was able to get us our own boat right away instead of waiting for everyone else.
The Abu Simbel temples are on an island for a reason, not by accident. When the Aswan high dam was created, the Abu Simbel temples were threatened by rising water and it was ultimately decided to move the temples to higher ground. Moving these temples, built in 1264 BC, is no easy task. For one, Ramses the Second liked to build very big temples and the temples at Abu Simbel were no exception. Secondly, inside the large temple are four statues, Ramses II and the gods of Ra, Amun and the god of the underworld, Ptah. Ramses II, Ra and Amun are light by the sun on two days a year: the day of the kings ascension to the thrown and his birthday but Ptah does not light up. Although, they wanted to keep the exact dates, it was not possible and they were ultimately off by one day. It took four years to move the temples 65 meters higher and 200 meters back and an entire town was built specifically for the workers. Tour guides are not allowed to go into the temple with you as it could cause congestion so after telling us all about the temples from the outside she told us she would wait for us in the tea shop outside. We took our time looking around and taking photos and as we were exiting we saw Hend, she was worried as we had took longer than normal and was coming to check on us! On our way home, I was able to see the Sahara desert that we had driven through. In many locations it was different than I expected it to look. The large rocks of granite looked like miniature mountains. However, in the middle of the drive, it looked exactly as I expected: flat sand as far as you can see. I was also surprised at the very few rest stops or gas stations. On the three hour drive, I believe I saw one small stop. I wondered if one had to use the restroom where would they go? The only privacy would be the side of your car! Another thing that surprised me was the large amount of random bus stops throughout the desert! You'd be driving through absolutely nothing and all of a sudden a bus stop with nothing around it! The only idea I could think of for their purpose was to provide a bit of shade if your car were to break down. Luckily, cell phone service was great through this segment of the desert so you wouldn't just be stranded. When we got home, we met up with JJ and his boat, motored across to his Nubian village and went to his home for a traditional Nubian meal which ended up being basically the same thing we had on the falooka which we didn't mind as it was all really delicious and we had been craving it! We learned about the way Nubians build their mudbrick homes. We learned that the rounded ceilings were to keep the homes cooler in the summer which can reach up to 122ºF! My favorite thing to learn about was the Nubian marriage traditions! JJ told us an unfathomable story for most Americans. He fell in love with a woman in his village, however, it was not okay for them to be seeing each other as marriages in the village are usually arranged to be for the benefit of the family. They snuck around to see each other but had to do so very secretively. He said he would just look at her and raise an eyebrow to let her know he wanted to meet that evening at their secret meeting place. Eventually, he decided he would ask for her hand in marriage. He finally convinced his family to ask her, which they didn't want to do but finally accepted, however, her father said no. Since the father said no he had to decide between leaving the village to be with her and never seeing his family again or finding another woman. He said it took him years to even regain the ability to look at other women. Eventually he found himself another wife and the other woman found herself another husband that was acceptable for each of their families. He also told us about the Nubian wedding night and honeymoon. He said that the tradition is that once the bedroom door is closed, the man isn't even allowed to touch his new wife until he can make her smile. He said men bring jewelry, clothes, perfumes, money and their best stories to try to make their new wife smile. He said he gave his new wife item after item and she didn't smile but she finally smiled when he said he was completely out of items and turned his pockets to show her. For their honeymoon, they go over to the wives family home and everyone is kicked out except one sister who will take care of the couple for 30 days. After dinner, we return to our hotel and called friends and family to wish them a Merry Christmas as it was Christmas day.

The large temple at Abu Simbel. The temples remained in pretty good shape and small details remained as they were covered by sand for many years. One of the heads is missing likely due to an earthquake in the area.