Once we were done at the last monumental ruins, we hopped back in the car and hit the road for another, bigger set at Philae. Usually the rides between monuments are dull (if you ignore the honking and swerving) but sometimes you pass a truck full of hard-partying soldiers.
Otherwise, it was an uneventful drive to Philae Temples. As we came to expect, we had to pay extra at every little step of the tour.
Inside though, this complex is so much bigger than Kalabsha.
Giant murals depicting apparently lesser gods cover the walls, surrounded by what I can only assume are pages of timeless adoration of their exploits. These figures are in immaculate condition, stunning testaments to the artistic abilities of the ancient Egyptians.
Um, except most of them aren’t actually looking so hot anymore.
It looks like a whole host of gods lost favor at some point, and someone went to considerable and very discerning effort to erase them from the record.
Nothing forbidden was too small or meaningless. It almost felt petty.
Do you ever get to the middle of a blog post and include a photo just because you like it?
As we explored, we found more inscriptions from different periods in history. Armies, expeditions, explorers all left their mark, like the survivors of the Heavy Camel Regiment. They lost around 100 men in “the Soudan”, some in action and some of disease.
Even Napoleon made an appearance, in the 5th year of his new Republique.
And again with his Navy, in the 7th year of the Republic.
With our exploration done, the day arrived when we expected my visa authorization to come through. It was Sunday again, the day the once-a-week ferry leaves. If everything went right, we would check out in the morning, take all our bags to the consulate, get my visa in a few hours, rush to the High Dam ferry port, buy whatever tickets remained, and be on our way to Sudan.
No word from the Sudan Foreign Ministry. Licking our wounds, we treated ourselves to an English World Cup match at a tea house that then tried to rip us off. 100 Egyptian for a couple 500 mil waters when we can get a 1.5l for 5? We threw him something fair and walked out. He even tried to get us to come back in the next day, the scumbag.
Have I mentioned that Aswan during the day is a bit hot and barren?
There was nothing for it, we had to keep trying. Every day it was open, we went back to the consulate. But no more with the rip-off taxis, it was time to travel like locals.
It felt like the consulate waiting room was our second home, we spent so much time there. Dave even got trapped in the restroom.
But day after day, nothing happened. It turns out the minister in charge of “telecommunications” didn’t come back to work after Eid… for 6 days, and counting. He was supposed to come back in the “next day or two”. Meanwhile, Dave and I have been making contingency plans where he would travel south through Sudan and I would head back to Cairo, then fly ahead to Ethiopia and meet him there.
But now we had an explanation and a backup plan and some meat in our bellies. What more could you ask for?
Next time: do you feel lucky, punk?
P.S. Dave says nothing. I think he’s been giving me the silent treatment all day, or maybe he choked on something.