October 14

Reflections on Jordan. Well-pleased with our time there. Three or four days is hardly adequate to do justice to a country, but we knew that going in. Petra was the highlight we expected, Jerash ruins were terrific (by the way, Jerash is said to be the place that Jacob wrestled with the angel and became Israel), seeing the king was a special treat, the crusader castle was worth the visit, our guide was excellent and our character-filled lodgings were very cool. So, give it an A- (if you're a tough grader).


Flight to Egypt of a bit over an hour. At the suggestion of Dick Kiphart's Egyptian business friend, we splurged significantly and arranged for VIP treatment at the Cairo airport. As we descended the stairs from the plane, we were greeted by a woman carrying a sign with our names on it. We were greeted warmly, our hand luggage taken by a guy and literally whisked into an air-conditioned vehicle and driven to the terminal. The woman asked for our passports and baggage claim checks and asked us to describe the bags. At the terminal, we were ushered into a large luxury lounge of which we were the sole inhabitants. Somebody came in to offer us food and drinks.


After a while, our man in Cairo from the travel agency, Muhamed, came in, introduced himself, handed each of us a Mars bar and told us about what would be happening. If we needed him, we could call him 23 hours a day (he needed one for sleep). In a short time, the VIP service delivered our bags and stamped passports. Muhamed a young, personable bundle of energy and efficiency, wheeled all of our bags to a waiting car and we drove the long distance to the Egyptian Air terminal, where Muhamed got us through all the steps in record time, pointed us towards the gate and said he'd see us in a week or so.


I've gone on at such length about this arrival process, because it really was an incredible scene. Carol is embarrassed by this sort of thing; I totally groove on it. We'll be landing pretty soon in Aswan. It's been a long day, and a rest will be very welcome.


Transfer to the hotel via car and boat, as we are at the Movenpick Elephantine Island. Our representative, Luke, is nice enough, but somewhat hard to understand. He's proposing changes in our itinerary that I've told him I want to review with him in detail tomorrow, when we are awake. Hotel is modern and rather unexceptional, though certainly first class. We wait too long to be shown up to our room, which does not have a double bed. Requested adaptor plug is more than half an hour in coming, and we're awakened, despite the do not disturb sign. Not a great start.


Breakfast at the hotel, and manage to change our room to one with a double bed. Meet our guide, Mervat, in the lobby, who is accompanied by Luke, at this point a supernumerary. We call the Batts' friend, Ossama, the director of the Nubian museum, and arrange to meet him there between 6:30 and 7 this evening. Review the rest of our plans, on which we're now in sync.


We set off in our felucca, a small sailing vessel and head down the Nile to Kitchener Island, named after Lord Kitchener, who created a beautiful botanical garden with trees and plants from around the world. Kitchener was a 19th century Brit who quelled the revolution in the Sudan. Nice stroll down and across the island, which affords views of Agha Khan's mausoleum and the green banks of the Nile, contrasted with the sand behind it. Khan was an Islamic leader and brother of Ali Khan, who married Rita Heyworth.

From there, our felucca takes us back to elephantine Island, where we tour the rather well-preserved temple to the god Khnum, creator of human beings from clay and gatekeeper of the very important annual Nile flood, and his consort, Satet. The temple was built by Thetmosis II, father of Queen Hatshbsut, in the 18th Dynasty, around 1330 BC. Some of the paintings have remarkable amounts of their original color. The fort around the temple was built much earlier. We see the Nile-o-meter, used to measure the height of the river, on which the amount of taxes were based, the assumption being that a given river height should produce a certain amount of crops.


Mervat is quite a delightful guide, knowledgeable and with very good English. The weather is rather warm, 102 degrees, so we are quite happy to retire to our air conditioned hotel for a cold beer, nap and shower. Walking back to the hotel, we ran into a couple we'd met and chatted briefly with in the elevator this morning. Edy is American, Uli is German. They met when she studied in Germany and now live in Connecticut. It took us only a few minutes of conversation this afternoon to discover that Edy was a cousin of my former law partner, Ed Rothschild, who I loved dearly. We exchanged memories of Ed and his wife, Annie. This sort of coincidence happens all the time all over the world.


Around 4:45, we take a ferry over to the other side, where we are met by Mercat and our driver and tacked to the fabulous Nubian Museum. Opened in 1999, the museum houses wonderful works from all periods, very nicely displayed and explained. Mervat shows us around, explaining much about the pieces and Nubian history. Most of the Nubian people remain in Sudan today, but the two Nubian tribes in Egypt formed the Southern half of the Egyptian country, having been merged with the North by SonisertbI in the Middle Kingdom, 2100 BC, in the 12th Dynasty. .


The scope of Egyptian history is overwhelming. For starters, there's so damn much of it. And the references to dynasties and to ancient, middle and modern periods are daunting. Add to that the names of pharaohs, gods, kings and cities (some of which have two well-known names, i.e. Thebes is the Greek name for Luxor) and all of the various countries and religions that have ruled Egypt during different periods and, well, you've bitten off quite a chunk. No wonder there are legions of Egyptologists trying to explain this all. For novices like us, unwilling to invest the time to try to sort it all out (and, perhaps, incapable of doing so), the best we can hope for is that repetition will bring some familiarity, and that we'll retain a small amount of it.


After our tour of the museum, we had the treat of meeting with the museum director, Ossama Abdell Magruid, Marilyn and Charlie Batts friend. He was most gracious and friendly, and we spent most of the time talking about the absolutely astounding international cooperation that led to the moving of many archeological treasures that would have been washed away or covered forever because to the construction of the new Aswan Dam. The work that was done over decades is well-documented in the museum and is a testament to what can be accomplished by people focused on a common objective, uninhibited by politics. In thanks for their help, five or six nations were given parts of saved temples, including the Met in New York.


After our meeting, we were driven to the marketplace in Aswan, where Carol astounded Mervat with her bargaining prowess.

 Carol and I had a very good dinner at an Egyptian seafood restaurant in the marketplace that Mercat recommended. We were then driven to the river, ferried across the river and returned to our hotel.