After a quick lunch, we met our guide and headed to the Egyptian Museum. There are many things to see at the Museum, but in my mind, there are two highlights.
1. The Mummy Room – seeing the real thing was spooky and cool at the same time, especially knowing that these are the bodies of several former Pharohs of Egypt including Ramses II, Amenhotep I, and Thutmes III.
2. The treasures of the Tomb of Tutankhamen. This Pharoh’s tomb was discovered in 1922 by a British archeologist named Howard Carter. This is the only reason Tutankhamen is well-known – because his tomb was discovered in tact. Otherwise, he rose to the throne at the age of 9 and died when he was 18, so he didn’t really do too much for Egypt. But the seven-kilo, solid golden mask that fit over his mummy, and then one after another of the golden coffins that were used to bury him were fascinating and beautiful to see. In all, they excavated 200 kilos of gold from his tomb.
Otherwise, we were struck by the same sentiment at the Egyptian Museum as that of the Citadel yesterday. It seems a shame that the Egyptians do not maintain their treasures better. The Museum was dusty and dingy inside. It was also poorly lit although that could be intentional. But the glass boxes that held the mummies were dusty. This is a real problem in Cairo – perhaps because the weather is so dry, it’s near a dessert, and there is a lot of pollution, dust is a permanent fixture of the landscape.
After our tour of the Museum during which Avery whined incessantly and wanted to be carried, we piled into the van for an outing to the big Cairo Mall that our guide kept referring to as Carrefoure because the grocery store is the anchor tenant. It was the driver’s idea to give us something to do before we had to turn up at the train station for our 9pm train. Avery immediately fell asleep in the van, so when we arrived at the Mall we left him in the car with the driver. The girls were in heaven and said the trip to the Mall was the highlight of the day. The Mall had all the American stores: Claire’s, Nike, Sunglass Hut, and STARBUCKS. It’s actually the first Starbucks we’ve seen since we moved abroad. It was clear, however, that we were the only “foreigners” here because Muslim women do not wear shorts! Charlotte was the only “woman” baring her legs, and it did cause quite a few stares and giggles. I’m not sure if Charlotte would have noticed, but Josh had to point it out to her. Then, she was mad at me for having selected her outfit. The girls decided to have an appetizer at Baskin Robbins and then we shopped for snacks at the Carrefoure. We anticipated that we may need to supplement (replace) the train dinner with recognizable foods.
Well, as it turns out, worrying about what we’ll have for dinner was the least of our problems. As soon as we returned to the van, Avery woke up, said his tummy hurt, and then he vomited. For the next round, I was prepared with the waste-basket – and there were several more rounds in the car. Then, when we arrived at the train station, we waited a while for our tour representative. In the meantime, Avery vomited again while standing outside the van. When our rep. arrived, he helped us with our luggage and we entered the train station. Once on the train platform (and there is only one) the track was empty and our rep. announced that we would wait here for one hour until 9:30 for our train. Standing around on a disgusting (and that is putting it mildly) train platform with a sick child for an hour – could he please be joking! If the train would not be here for another hour, I asked why we couldn’t just wait in the van so that Avery could lie down. Well, the van already left for another job. The rep. led us to the “waiting room” where I wouldn’t set foot even if there were a seat to be had. I couldn’t believe our tour company would knowingly have us arrive early to spend time in this dump, let alone when our 4-year old was sick. The driver knew he was sick and so did the rep. as soon as he arrived. And yet, they knowingly led us into the train station to stand around. Apparently, our meet and greet rep. has no common sense. How could we have known when we left the van that a) the train wasn’t already at the station (we thought it originated in Cairo --which it does but it comes from a garage into this station) b) that the trains always run late and c) that the facility we were about to enter would not nearly be suitable for humankind. Josh took Avery to the toilet – it was literally a shit hole – and Avery took a pass. The kid with diarrhea took one look and said he’d wait for the train!
I made my displeasure known. I let loose over the phone to the head of the tour company. Then, we found a place to sit in the cafeteria, and waited for the train which rolled into the station at 10:15pm! During this delightful 2 hours, I discovered that there are three sleeping trains to Aswan each night, and we were booked on the latest one. Again, why would we want to go later if given the choice? Apparently the earlier trains were booked. I was beginning to get the picture that the tour operator keeps a lot of information close to the vest and often, you get the information after it’s too late to use it.
We did meet a nice Pakistani family from Boston at the station; three out of four boys had gone to Harvard and one just graduated from Harvard Medical School. He gave us some advice about how to care for Avery.
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| Sumptuous train cabin |
Once the train arrived, it was a fire drill getting on. People were pushing and shoving and tossing luggage in a panic as if train would roll off without them (maybe it would, at this point, I guess anything is possible here). On board, I believe everyone, with the exception of Josh (either that or he didn’t let on) was shocked when we entered our cabins. Did I mention they have a cleanliness issue in Egypt? The train man who was assigned to our car couldn’t have been nicer – he recently spent a year in Columbus, Ohio where his wife still remains (didn’t explore that) and loves Americans, of which we were the only ones in our car. In fact, we were the only caucasians.
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| Avery sick in "bed' |
I don’t know exactly how many more times Avery was ill during the night. I shared a bed with him and Olivia slept in the bunk above us. Josh and Charlotte were in the adjoining cabin. Josh relieved me and took Avery at about 4am. I don’t know how many times Josh went back and forth to the toilet with Olivia or Avery throughout the night but he was getting sick from it. As you might imagine the toilets were not particularly appealing – and thank God we had wipies!! I do know that I only found one cockroach in my bed, and it was dead. So I guess it could have been worse? Actually, I can’t imagine. Oh, and did I mention it was a 14 hour train ride?
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