Pyramids!

We left the hotel bright and early on Saturday to see the first pyramids built in Egypt. I bet many people reading this will be surprised to learn that there are more pyramids than just the three pyramids in Giza. Egypt has 138 pyramids! Of course, not all of them are in the best of shape but they are definitely pyramids. The first pyramid ever built was for King Djosner and it was known as a step pyramid due to the 6 steps that comprise its structure. This was where I rode my first camel with my friend Hannah!!! It was so exciting!!

Riding a camel!!!

One of the pyramids we saw was a mistake. After it was finished, the king noticed that it was not in the correct shape. As Ian so promptly informed me, “This is why math is important.” Honestly, if math is only important for building pyramids to bury dead pharaohs and their treasure then I think I chose the right career path. Not so sure what the demand is like for something like that. Long story short, I hate math and I think I would thoroughly happy with a “bent” pyramid if it meant avoiding math. Just saying, I think the pyramid looked beautiful! The king, however, did not. He was unhappy and demanded another pyramid to be built.   

Our opinions of the pyramid!

We even got to enter two of the pyramids! They were awesome to see but definitely hard work to get in. To enter, you have to climb through a seemingly endless passageway that is only three feet high to a sauna like small room filled with people. The ancient Egyptians built the entrances to the pyramids 1 meter high so that all people entering the tomb had to kneel to show respect to the deceased king. Once inside the pyramids, the view is incredible. The first one we entered had walls that were covered in hieroglyphics!

As soon as we were done with the pyramids, we rushed to get lunch and then back to the hotel. We had traditional Egyptian sandwiches. They were quite interesting. We received three pitas. The first one was filled with refried beans. The second one was filled with the falafel thingy. The third one, however, was filled with FRIES! So odd. I decided to eat the fries by hand rather than in the pita. I drew the line there.

Pita sandwiches

The President of the Nour Party

That evening we had two speakers but I will focus on the one that was by far the most interesting. Let me preface this by saying that my professor has connections. Somehow he got the president of the Nour Party, a new political party in Egypt, to come speak with us. The Nour party is the second largest political party in Egypt behind the Muslim Brotherhood. It is an Islamic party that formed quickly after Mubarak’s fall. He discussed the revolution, the upcoming election, and the creation of the party.

With Emad Adbel Ghafour- president of El Nour party

I just have to say, I was not fooled by this man. He is such a politician! He told us all exactly what we wanted to hear. It was like hearing “blah, blah, blah, we love America, blah, blah, poverty is bad, blah, blah, young people are great.” It was an incredible and fascinating experience but mostly a critical lesson in the essence of being able to dissect political rhetoric. It demonstrated the inherent flaw in all political parties (yes, even the democrats). Ultimately, political parties work to gain power and maintain power in order to implement their ideas. This means they do anything to do so. The Nour party, despite being the second largest in the country, decided not to run a candidate this election term. When asked why, the president said a lot of empty words and somehow transitioned the answer into the tagline phrase “poverty is bad.” In reality, they aren’t running a candidate because they are aware that the first presidency is likely to be a failure so they have decided to wait four years and then sweep in to save the country.

Another thing, the party is greatly for the implementation of Sharia Law. However, one would not be aware of this based on the talk he gave. He greatly avoided the topic until it was brought up in a question. At that time, he went on a long rant about Islam being nothing like the stereotypes many Americans think of. He never once discussed what Sharia Law would mean for the country. Even more outrageous, he did not ONCE discuss the party’s political platform. Instead, he stuck to those key phrases, “America is good”, “poverty is bad”, and of course “students like you give me hope.” Blah, blah, blah…

Interestingly, we got one straight answer!!! YAY! When asked about the problem regarding the decrease in tourism and whether an economy can truly rely on a tourism industry for income he answered no. He believes Egypt needs to find another industry to base it’s economy on. What that is, however, he did not really say. He said “natural resources” which is kind of a no brainer. What those resources are was never mentioned. After these short sentences, he catered the answer to us. Talking about how it is a travesty that the pyramids are only visited by roughly 3 million people every year when the Eifel Tower is visited by about 12 million. Of course, he had to make us happy by explaining that these artifacts do not belong to Egypt. Instead, they belong to all the people of the world. Blah, blah, blah….

It was a great opportunity and I am glad we were able to meet such an influential figure in Egyptian politics but I was definitely not impressed by what he said…

Dinner

That night we had my favorite dish of the trip so far, Egyptian barbeque which means kebabs. The dish was served on what looked like a large box. The box had hot coals on the bottom then a metal lid with delicious goodness on top of it. We had lamb, chicken, and beef, Yummy. I really enjoyed what happened when we were done eating, however. A group of 5 of us went outside, separated from the rest of the group, and smoked hookah and watched the soccer game. It was so incredible to truly be involved in a part of Egyptian culture: hookah and soccer. We were with Judge Samir who is always so much fun. We sat together and discussed the numerous speakers we had heard that evening, critiquing some parts and praising others. Hearing Judge Samir’s thoughts on the new party was very interesting. He is extremely liberal and therefore very upset with some parts of the party’s platform. He was particularly upset regarding this party’s treatment of the popular issue of women’s rights. As he put it, “I would not want to be a woman if this party gained power.” I find this to be quite terrifying. I was planning on asking a question regarding the topic but did not because I was worried of offending the speakers. I regret that choice.