As long as I can remember two countries have filled my mind
with wonder.
They seem magical and
otherworldly with their ancient architecture and exotic looking people.
Forever,
Egypt
and
Greece have
been countries I have longed to visit.
Greece,
which seems so easy to get to, is a country I have somehow kept on my list,
telling myself I shall go there on my honeymoon one day.
Egypt
I never was sure how I would get there.
When I saw the itinerary of the Semester at Sea voyage I
would soon be taking, I cried.
Cairo,
Egypt was on the
list.
I would visit the country I had
dreamed of my whole life.
We would have
only 48 hours there, the shortest time in any country, while the ship transited
the
Suez Canal.
To make the most of our time there, the tour had us visiting the
pyramids at sunrise and sunset.
At sunset I was mostly on my own, taking it all in; thinking
of my mother having been there years before; thinking of how few people have
seen what I was seeing; marveling at the grandness of each pyramid. I was giddy over the fact that we actually got
to go inside the middle pyramid of the three pyramids of Giza.
At sunset I was with friends. Even though we were told
repeatedly to,“stay off the pyramids,” we formed a human pyramid on top of the
largest pyramid. Thinking ourselves so
clever, how many other tourist thought to do that, I wondered? Probably
hundreds.
Other tourists stopped to watch and took photos of us as we
fell about one another. I remember being
surprised at having to use both hands and feet to climb just one level of the
pyramid. I remember out tour guide,
Honi, telling us that to this day there is no human explanation for how the
pyramids came to be. I remembered why
this place seemed so magical in my dreams.
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