Traveling Circus

VALLEY JOURNAL

Hi all,

Here’s the link to my Valley Journal (one of the assignments for a class I’m taking here).  I’m required to post every day, so it’s a lot of detailed material.

The title is Dear Ellen, in reference to my professor, Ellen Morris. 

Cheers! 

RECENTLY...

It’s been a few weeks, eh?

I’ve been so busy. I finished my run as the official Computer Nerd Extraordinaire (digitizing plans until I passed out each night), and left the house with the group on the 26th. It was sort of upsetting to leave, which is funny because I remember thinking that it would be difficult to get attached to the team in such a short amount of time. It’s strange being out of the Oasis, because there are Europeans and Americans everywhere. Reverse culture shock!

When we left, we took the dirty bus (I’m being nice here; technically it’s the bus from hell) to Aswan, where we spent three nights. There we saw Abu Simbel (40km from the Sudan), Philae, Kalabsha, St. Simeon Monastery, the Nubia Museum (they don’t know how to label their pieces), and others. Aswan was very pretty because it was right on the water, and there were lovely boats and old hotels (read: too expensive for us to stay in), but it was overrun by seedy shop owners and annoying horse-and-carriage drivers. Our hotel… well, let’s not talk about that.

We then went to Luxor for another three nights, which is my favorite place in Egypt thus far. Beautiful, lots of temples in the middle of the city, and this fabulous restaurant called Tutankhamun where the chef serves you a meal of his choosing. It was delicious! One of the top three meals of my life. The Luxor Museum was labeled well and very well-organized, and our hotel had a beautiful view of the Nile and a pool on the roof (with Internet)! We saw Luxor and Karnak Temples, the Valley of the Kings, Deir el-Medina, Medinet Habu and the Colossi of Memnon.

Unfortunately, we’re now in Middle Egypt, which means we require private security and aren’t getting into any sites with our expired Antiquities Passes (they were issued for the wrong dates by accident, not our fault). We have to lie and say we’re Canadian, and we aren’t allowed to leave our hotel (not too bad, because it’s the nicest we’ve stayed in so far, and it has WiFi, hence my ability to blog in comfort)! We saw Dendera and Abydos today, and we’re going to explore the monasteries of Sohag (where we’re staying just for tonight) tomorrow.

What a rush. So much traveling. I also have to keep a travel blog for a grade, which I haven’t actually organized or written for yet. Methinks I will actually attempt to do some work tonight.

End note: I got a great deal on a GORGEOUS shisha pipe. :D

NEWS

Yesterday we climbed the desert scarp (~300m).  It was a ridiculous physical test, and I pulled a muscle in my right thigh (ow).  Page and I didn’t even make it to the very top because one of the grad students told the group to leave us behind so she wouldn’t have to sit and wait for the group by herself!  Grrr…

This morning I made a bone tower while weighing the organic material from Amheida.  Currently having a Cadbury bar.  Lovely morning!