Home again Home again!

Well, today all we did was got on a plane to Cairo. When we got to Cairo the guy who took us from the airport to our hotel was quite the chatter. He said Akon was coming to Cairo and performing at the Opera house tonight, weird right? Anyways he said we should hop the fence and get in! When we got to our hotel we walked around Cairo one last time and had lunch at a chicken place. Tomorrow I will be sitting on the plane ALL DAY LONG! Sadly, when I see you all I will have jet lag and be a little droopey. I think this is only the beginning of my passport pages I will soon have them filled up with entry stickers, I hope I go to many other places! I miss you all very much and hope to see you soon! If you have any questions whatsoever you can talk to me or post on my blog! I thought you might have a laugh in class!

Answers to your questions!

This is a picture of the carvings at Habu temple, which was for Ramses III (I think). Thes are the ones that are about 8 inches deep! The guide said they did this to keep other pharoahs who came after from carving their own names on the walls!

Here are some answers to your great questions:

* I won the donkey race, we posted a picture so you can see what we looked like. Our race came to an abrupt end when we got squished into a parking space by a taxi van who pulled in front of us and cut us off!

* how high off the ground is a camel? I think the camel's back goes to my head, so maybe 5 feet, 5 inch. The hardest part it getting on, because you mount it when the camel is sitting, then the guide tells you to lean back because the front legs stand up first and if you don't you'll fall off. Riding a camel was more comfortable than riding a donkey.

* I have seen lots of tourists, not many Americans at all. Mostly British, French, and Japanese. For the British it is not far (5 hours) and not expensive to fly, and they all are excited about the warm climate. It is amazing to sit in a restaurant and listen to everyone speaking different languages.

* As for Hatshepsut's temple...normally you can't tell the difference between between all the pharoah's faces on the statues in their temples. But when you look at statues of Hatshepsut, you can really tell that she is a female because her face is so much softer (look at that photo below) and feminine, even though she dressed totally in men's clothes and even wore that beard. Eight of her statues in her temple are still intact (out of 26 I think). Ironically, the stepson that took over after she died (tuthmosis III) was considered a great ruler and the last great warrior pharoah.

* egyptian pancakes are basically like pizza. I haven't tried it yet, but I am going to seek it out on my last night. But I did try the local cheese, feta, and it is delicious on omelettes, very salty!

* Howard Carter's tools are not in the tomb, sorry! The house where he lived is nearby and they are thinking of making it a stop on the tour, but right now it is just decaying!

It ain't over till the fat lady sings!

OK guys my trip is sadly coming to a close! Today was my last day in Luxor, or Luoxor. Tommorow I fly back to Cairo and hang out and then the next day I fly back to San Francisco. So I will post when i get to Cairo. I will be seeing you all on Monday! Today, we went to the Luxor museum which was small but very very beautiful. There were a lot of intact statues but sadly we weren't aloud to take pictures! So I really have nothing to write about or any pictures to put up so I will tell you a litle about life in Egypt!

Egypt is a very poor country, so tons of people live of tips. Woman stand outside the bathroom handing you the toilet paper and excpect a tip. Everyone is in a loop for instance that story i told you guys about on my first day how that guy tricked us into going into someone elses shop? Everyone works for everyone, if they can't make you buy somthing of theirs, they will tell you to go to this other person. Well, I would type till my fingers broke but there is a bald guy waiting to use the computer, ugh!

This is a picture of Tutankamun's mummy with his famous solid gold mask on, we took this picture of the sign at his tomb.

Hatshepsut and donkeys

Then we went to Hatshepsut's temple, nowIi am sure you all know the story of Hatshepsut but I will tell you anyway. So she married the king and they only had baby girls, and then he died. So, she became king, then she realized her step son wanted to become king. So she threw him in jail for 20 years! Hatshepsut was the first woman ruler who was very successful, when she died the step son got out of jail. He came to her temple and scratched of every single face of her, he wanted revenge! It is very sad to go there and see all of her faces chizled of, but also very exciting to be there. Hatshepsut is my personal favourite ruler because she did everything in her power to rule because she knew she could be successful! Hatshepsut dressed exactly like a man with the false beard, crown, and everything! It was very beautiful there and everything I had hoped for! We also went to the Habu temple which had color and carvings so deep I could stick my hand through! Then, we went for a donkey ride, which was very scary and nothing like a camel ride! My donkey was hungry so he kept stopping and eating, and we were on the busiest streets almost getting run over by cars. And my mom's and my donkeys went out of control and went speeding off, all I can say is, donkeys are very competative!

All better now

So, I am feeling a little better, enough to go swimming in the pool and see the sights. Today we went to THE VALLEY OF THE KINGS, gosh it was so fun! We could only see 3 tombs out of 64, we saw Ramses the I, Ramses the IV, and Ramses the IX! Those were the ones our guide recommended. They were so beautiful, they were all colored on the inside I have never seen anything so amazing. In the movies you see only carvings that are sand colored, but now picture a rainbow splash of color on each one! We also went in Tutankamun's burial chamber and I will tell you all of it when I get home, but all I can say is they had to rush him in there because he died so young so people say "oh his tomb is probably not worth seeing since there is only one room." But, I really wanted to go in so we paid the extra 30 dollars and went in! It was way cool you could see his gold sarcophagus! And, overall his mummy! It was so cool, Tutankamun officially come up to my chin! You see, they have him in there because Howard Carter when he illegally wrenched open the lid of the sasrcophagus he jabbed the mummy in the side! Since he did that he is too fragile to move anywhere to a museum! It was so great and fantastic!

By the way Mark, we were going to go to Sety the I's tomb but it was closed! So we still went to get the picture of the entrance you wanted, sorry!

Bomb in Cairo

Hello friends and family. It's Roxy's mom here. I just wanted to put up a note on Roxy's blog letting everyone know we were not near the bomb that went off in the bazaar in Cairo yesterday, so please do not worry about us. We learned of it an hour after it happened, but we were only able to get information about it from the computer just now (the Egyptians are downplaying it so as not to frighten tourists), so here are more details if you have not read about it. We are both very sad for the family and friends of this young French student who was killed. We were in this same bazaar last week, admiring the square where it happened, which is next to a very famous mosque. We are feeling very lucky and also very sad. Tomorrow we go to the Valley of the Kings, the burial site for the pharoahs. (Mom and Dad, please give Lily an extra big kiss for us. We tried to call tonight from our hotel, but the phone line was not working!)

Hey hey hey

Hey, still having a great time. Ok so the cruise was AWESOME! We would stop at a monument and then everyone would get off see it and then get back on the boat. Oh and I lost my camera! it was in my hip pouch when either it fell out or someone hippocketed me! So for now I will just use my mom's camera. So we went to the temple of Kom Ombo, Edfu Temple, the unfinished Obolisk, the high dam, and a long camel ride! And they were all awesome. Sadly I got sick from I don't know what and my hands are shaking on the keyboard, it is just my stomach that is acting funny. You know how when you have the flu you just have to sit or lay down, and if you walk your legs go a little numb? That is how I feel! Today we got to the super super fancy hotel that I paid for, I raised money in the summer to pay for it, it is sad that I am sick during the stay. Today we did Karnak temple, which is HUGE, way bigger than any other temple in Egypt!

Oh, and we went to Abu Simbel (pictured), which was also AWESOME!