Sunday, April 22, 2007

4/16/07 - Day 6 - Edfu and Komo Obo

As we woke up this morning we were mooring at Edfu amongst other boats like ours. They are stacked 3 deep at each port. We disembarked, walked up the ramp to our awaiting horse drawn carriages. These took us to the old ruins of the Temple of Horus, the Falcon God. It was and interesting site but to tell you the truth, all the wall drawings, carvings are all starting to look the same. If you don't keep a journal of where you have been and the uniqueness of each you won't remember what you saw. When we came out of the ruins there were vendors in every nook and cranny. They are persistent little buggers. Dad wanted a couple of gifts and he was trying to negotiate with the guy. I came over and argued some more, got a better price, another gift, and a freebie. I've come to the conclusion they won't argue and will back down from the western female. We are too aggressive for them. It really pisses them off when the man passes the buck to the woman to handle it.
An interesting thing happened yesterday as we were waiting to go through the Lock (much like the Panama Canal) there were many tiny boats that came up to the side of the ship and started yelling. Naturally we had to go see what the ruckus was. We were all on the top deck. As soon as you walked near the railing the vendors started heaving Galibias (long dresses) up at us. Then it was scarves, then table clothes and napkins. Some people wanted the Galibia because we were having a dressup dinner at night. I asked the price and they told me 150 Egyption pounds (for US divide by 5.7). I told them forget it and through the stuff back down at them (whoops, sometimes I missed the boat and it went in the water-oh well too bad. They were persistent. I finally got them all down to 50 (about 10 US) and everyone on the ship bought one even the German tourists. It was hillarious to see everyone at dinner that evening.
Another couple of items to note, as we work our way up the Nile River its getting hotter and hotter. Today it was blazing hot by 9 am. Also the features of the people are changing. Getting darker complected with more curly or kinky hair. You can easily see who and from where people migrated into this country.
Anyway, back to my day.... We headed back to the ship for leisure time and lunch. The ship departed Edfu and headed upstream to Kom Obo. After docking we went to visit the temple of Kom Obo which is the Falcon God and the Crocodile God. Good and evil. It was supposed to be an eye and ear clinic in the ancient times. We saw carvings showing this throughout the temple. At one point they still had mummified crocks on display. Well enough of this. E headed back to the ship and on the way I caused a ruckus again. I wanted to take a pic of a little boy and the burro. I offered 1 dollar and immediately some other guy came out of nowhere and started yelling at me. Well this ticked off the Tourist Police and he ran after and was hollering at that guy for talking to me. I gave up and left. Don't want to start another war. We went back onto the ship for our last night and to sail the last leg to Aswan. Upon arrival at Aswan we had a local show come on board to do some local music and dance. Interesting......Why do I always get picked to join the dancers!?

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