Egypt

My new bedoiun buddy



Pyramid blocks




Solar boats




The Sphinx




Entrance to the Valley of the Kings

King Tut's tomb

Queen Hatshepsut's temple

Heiroglyphics at Queen Hatshepsut's temple

Karnak temple

Luxor Temple

Sakkara


I made my final visa run of the year last week by going to Egypt. As usual, I only had a few days, not nearly enough to explore a culture as rich as the Egyptians. I flew into Cairo, the world’s 16th largest city with a population of about 20 million. A friend had set me up with a great travel agent, Harty Tours, and if you ever get the chance, I highly recommend them.

These things are really big. That was my first thought when I saw the Pyramids at Giza for the first time. When you think that they were built over 3500 years ago, it’s truly amazing. They were my first stop on my first day and by far the highlight of my three days. The pyramids were built in the 4th Dynasty of Egypt and are the only survivor of the original Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. The largest was built for Khufu, or Cheops, and is called the Great Pyramid. It is about 482 feet tall, is made up of about 2.3 million blocks of stone, and weighs about 6 million tons (12 billion pounds)! Like I said, it’s big. The stones used for construction were said to been brought up the Nile from Aswan and Tura, which is not a small feat in itself. One theory for the construction is that the pyramids were built for only a few months a year when the Nile was flooded and the peasants were unable to work their land. Before the construction of the pyramids, crime was high during this time and this kept the people out of trouble. They were also paid for their labor which helped to build the ancient economy.

The other two pyramids were built for by the sons of Cheops, Chephren and Mycerinus. The Pyramid of Chephren is the one that looks like it has a cap on it. All of the pyramids originally had a aesthetic stone covering the building blocks but it has completely eroded on the two other pyramids. Out of respect, Pharaoh Chephren built his pyramid about 10 feet shorter than his father, but since it is built on higher ground, it appears taller.

As cool as it was to see the pyramids from the outside, it was even more amazing to see them from the inside. My guide lucked out and got me one of the 300 tickets they issue when the Great Pyramid is open to the public. The entrance is about 30 feet above the ground. The first hallway you must walk up an incline hunched over for about 300 or 400 feet. This opens up to a much taller shaft that leads to the King’s Chamber, which the pyramid operators have added wood stairs to reach the entrance to the chamber. To enter the King’s Chamber, you again have to stoop over or just crawl for about 10 feet. It opens up to a room 17ft x 34ft and 19 ft high. The most amazing thing about being inside is that the stone blocks line up with each other PERFECTLY! How these 5000 pound blocks were each set with such precision is a mystery.

Right next to the pyramids was a museum for the Pharaoh’s Solar Boats. These boats were included in every tomb to help accompany the soul of the dead on its eternal journey. The boats were discovered in 1954 but unfortunately, one of the boats decomposed while the others were being excavated.

The last stop in Giza was the Sphinx. The Sphinx was built by Chephren and its face is his portrait. It faces the rising sun and was worshiped by the Egyptians as the sun-god and is surrounded by a temple that was only accessible to high priests and the pharaoh. The nose is rumored to have been shot off by Napoleon but more likely was done by a man upset with the local people making offerings to the Sphinx in the 14th century. Or it could have eroded over the last couple thousands of years.

Next was the Egyptian Museum in Cairo. I had one hour for a museum that houses over 120,000 Egyptian artifacts. It was like going to the Baseball Hall of Fame, seeing the jerseys of Babe Ruth, Lou Gerhig, and Ty Cobb, and then leaving. But that was all the time I had. I did get to see all of the burial jewelry of King Tut, which was worth the price of admission.

The last stop of the day was the Pyramids Sound and Light show. Seats are set up in front of the Sphinx so the pyramids are in the background. A narrator then tells the history of the pyramids and pharaohs while the Sphinx and pyramids are lit up. The stories are a bit corny but the light show is pretty neat. I tried to take a few pictures but it was the same result when you try to photograph fireworks. This link has some good photos of the show.

The next day, I got up early to catch a flight to Luxor. It was a lot warmer and less congested than Cairo. Our first stop of the Valley of the Kings. The kings of the 18th, 19th, and 20th Dynasty are buried here. They had a huge problem with grave robbers and wanted a place to protect them as their funerary objects were very important to the after life. Well, I think almost all of the tombs ended up being robber anyway except for one, King Tutanankamen. The reason is that Tut’s tomb was built down into the mountain instead of up. His was the only tomb left intact. Inside was his sarcophagus and the actual mummy. He was just a little guy but he also died when he was about 20 so maybe he was still growing.

King Tut’s tomb was neat to see because he is the most famous of the pharaohs, but it is not as large or well decorated as the other ones in the Valley of the Kings. The reason is that right after becoming pharaoh, these guys start building there burial chamber. Tut died suddenly at a young age so a burial chamber for him hadn’t been completed. Plus, he had to be buried within 80 days of his death so it was thought that he was buried in the tomb of a nobleman, not a pharaoh, which would explain the size and location.

Different tombs are open on different days so I was also able to see Ramses III, Ramses VI, and Ramses IV. These tombs were decorated from floor to ceiling with carvings and hieroglyphics. It was really amazing to see and imagine the amount of work that went into making the tomb. Pictures weren’t allowed inside the tombs otherwise I would have spend 3 times as long there.

Close to the Valley of the Kings is the AlDeir Al-Bahri Temple built for Queen Hatshepsut, one of the few women to become pharaoh in ancient Egypt. She was born of royal parents, Tutmosis I and Aahmes. Her two brothers died prematurely but Tutmosis I had a son, Tutmosis II, by a commoner. Rather than have a woman become pharaoh, a man of partial royal lines became king but married his half-sister Hatshepsut. However, he too died early in his life giving Hatshepsut the opportunity to become pharaoh, partially because Tutmosis III, another partially royal son of Tutmosis I. This did not make Tutmosis III very happy and after Queen Hatshepsut died, he defaced many of the monuments erected during her reign.

I met quite a few Egyptians in the shops in Luxor. Each one of them asked where I was from and when I told them I was from Chicago, everyone of them either asked me where I hid my gun or told me they heard Chicago was a dangerous place. I guess Chicago has a bad rap in Egpyt.

I also hit two other temples that day, the Temple of Karnak and Temple of Luxor. The Temple of Karnak was great because it was so big. I spent a lot of time just wandering around both of them taking pictures.

I flew back to Cairo that night and got up early ready to see more sights. We started off with a few different churches, temples, and mosques the next day. All were very beautiful and ornate but did not compare to what I had seen the previous 2 days. So were set off for Sakkara, the site of the oldest known pyramid in Egypt. My boss tried to tell me it was more impressive than the Pyramids at Giza but I would argue otherwise.

The oldest surviving pyramid is called the Step Pyramid of Djoser and was built in the 3rd Dynasty for Pharaoh Djoser by the architect Imhotep. It is not built with the large stones that constructed the Pyramids at Giza but with smaller stones in a series of terrace and is the largest stone building in the world. Another great place to wander around because of all the other buildings and ruins around it. It also provided a great long distance view of Cairo and the pyramids.

After that, my time in Egypt was up. I did a little shopping and left for the airport. Back to Kuwait and work.

The week before I went to Egypt I spent my first Thanksgiving. I had a nice meal of butter chicken with all of the office guys. I sure missed turkey, mashed potatoes, and pumpkin pie. My worst Thanksgiving ever but only because it wasn’t anywhere close to Thanksgiving at my grandparent’s house.

I will be back on US soil in 6 days. I can’t wait. It’s hard to believe I’ve been gone 8 months. Plus I don’t have a winter coat, much less any coat, so it’s going to be a little cold. Hope I get to see all of you that are in the Chicago area. If not, have a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

Well, you could say I’ve been a lazy blogger or really boring for the last two months. I guess both are true. Since I went to Dubai at the end of August, I have been working everyday and my trips out of Kuwait have been to Abu Dhabi for a day to our other job site and then back to Kuwait. The only good thing about those trips was the bacon at breakfast and the beer at dinner. But I have to leave the country in another week and I have a 3 day trip to Egypt all but finalized. I hope to have some good pyramid pictures up in December.

Since I have no pictures to post (outside of work photos which aren’t that exciting) I put up some pictures from my trip to Kenya two years ago. Follow the link.

The most interesting thing that happened in the last two months was the holy month of Ramadan. It is the most important month for Muslims where they “renew their commitment to the Creator.” Ramadan started in Kuwait on September 13 and it officially starts when you can see the first glimpse of the new moon. So in the southern hemisphere in places like Indonesia and Malaysia, Ramadan started a day earlier because they could see a new moon earlier. And in Kuwait, they don’t use astronomy, they have a moon sighting committee to determine the beginning of Ramadan.

It seems the main aspect of Ramadan, outside of praying five times a day, is fasting. Fasting is called sawn in the Qur’an and the literal meaning is “to abstain.” For Muslims, it means no eating, drinking, smoking, sex, or anything else that is “self-polluting” from the break of dawn until sunset. The no drinking or eating made it difficult for the laborers at the shop. They were allowed to stop working at 2pm but almost none of them did. Most of the laborers make less than $2/hr so every bit helps. But at sunset everyday, there is a prayer and everyone breaks the fast. I read that a lot of Kuwaitis become nocturnal to make the fasting less difficult.

The big change for me was that there were absolutely no restaurants open during the day so I’d have to buy my food the night before. And no one could eat or drink in public. The government imposed a find of 100KD (~$350) or 2 months in prison. To eat lunch, have a cup of coffee, or just rehydrate at work, I would have to keep my office door closed. But along with a few minor inconveniences came the one benefit for me. The Ramadan sweets and baked goods were fantastic. I had to set a daily limit or I wouldn’t have fit through the door.

The last day of Ramadan was on October 12 and the next two days are called Eid al Fitr. This is the biggest holiday in Kuwait. Families and friends get together and there is a two day work holiday. I made the mistake of trying to drive and it took me an hour to make what was usually a five minute drive.

I think the Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) must be a Big Ten fan because every Saturday night there is at least one Big Ten game on. Usually I’m able to watch either the Illini or Bucky. I’ve seen at least 4 Illinois games but I’m ashamed to say I couldn’t stay awake to watch them finish off THE Ohio State University. I made it halftime which was at 1:30am and the eyes just wouldn’t stay open. But I did watch the entire game last weekend against Northwestern. Keep your fingers crossed for a BCS bowl!

I can’t find real brown sugar anywhere in Kuwait. So I had some shipped to me in a care package. Except it is incredibly difficult to import things to Kuwait. I needed to get an Arabic translation to the shipping list and the guy that did the translation told me in India, brown sugar is slang for drugs. He just made the translation say sugar but when I received the package, I was sitting with a different Indian guy. When he saw the brown sugar bag, his eyes got really big, he grabbed the bag and smelled it because he really thought I had drugs shipped to me.

Well, I hope to have a few more things to write about in the next few weeks. I will miss my favorite holiday, Thanksgiving, but plan on spending it here with 3 Indians, 2 Koreans, and an Iranian. And a partridge in a pear tree. Have a great turkey day!

Dubai

Desert 4x4's


Becoming a local


Arabian Desert sunset

Belly dancer

Burj al-Arab ceiling and balconies

Burj al-Arab fountains


Life is still hot, dry, and dusty in Kuwait. But I think (hope) the 50°C temps are gone for the year. It’s still in the mid 40’s everyday (110’s Fahrenheit) but at least I don’t burn myself on the steering wheel driving home from work at night.

So two weekends ago, a friend of mine from Chicago, met up with me in Dubai, United Arab Emirates. Some of you know Dave Ripley. He had been killing the last 6 weeks bumming around Europe and I guess he figured his trip wasn’t complete without a visit to the Middle East.

Dubai is an amazing city literally rising out of the desert. Somewhere around 20% of the world’s tower cranes are in Dubai because almost EVERY building is under construction. There was construction on either side of our hotel. You drive down the main road and you everywhere you look another high rise building is being put up. The world’s tallest building, the Burj Dubai, is being built there. It became the world’s tallest building in July and it isn’t finished yet (scheduled for completion by the end of 2008). The architect won’t disclose the height to prevent next guy from designing one taller until they’re finished. In addition, Dubai currently has 4 island projects being built in the Gulf. The Palm Jumeirah, The Palm Jebel Ali, The Palm Deira, and The World. Dubai originally had about 72km of coastline. After all of the planned development is complete, Dubai will have over 1500km of coastline.

A lot of the trip was spent exploring the local beaches and night life but we did get out to see some of the local sights. I went to Ski Dubai for the second time, which may be as many times as I’ve gone skiing at any other individual place in the US. We also went on a Desert Safari. We piled into an 8 person Land Rover and headed for the Arabian Desert. After about an hour of driving, we pulled off the main highway into sand. Just like that. All of a sudden we were on a Land Rover roller coaster ride (this video is tame compared to our ride but gives you an idea). On the way to the desert, our driver told us he had rolled the Land Roller 3 or 4 times. I didn’t believe him at first but after that ride I can’t believe it was only 3 or 4 times. He drove over sand dunes as if trying to flip the vehicle. He had the car almost straight up or straight down and virtually rolling over sideways. I swear there were magnets in the sand that kept from going over.

After a good 20 minutes of this joyride, we stopped along with the 6 other 4x4’s in our group to take pictures of the desert sunset. The desert in Kuwait is flat and not much to look at. The desert near Dubai is the type of desert you see in movies, with rolling sand dunes as far as you can see. It was difficult to walk to the top of some of the dunes and of course sand was everywhere by the time I was done walking around.

The next stop was the Arabic camp which was right next to some military compound. There they had camel rides, sand boarding (like snow boarding but on a sand slope), an Arabic BBQ, traditional Arab clothes to try on, and a belly dancer. The sand boarding didn’t go so well. The board kept getting stuck on the sand and it seemed like there should have been a steeper slope. But some kid in the tour group was really good so maybe I was just really bad at it. The belly dancer was pretty good and got a lot of crowd participation. Dave got up and did some strange belly dance putting a cane in between him and another guy. Ask him to see the video.

One of the world’s most luxurious hotels, the Burj al-Arab, is in Dubai. They claim to be the world’s best hotel (you get your own private bulter) and it is one of the landmarks of the city. It is shaped like a sail and was the first of the islands built off the Dubai coast. It’s pretty expensive to stay there (about $2500 a night) so one of the cheaper ways to get inside is to reservation for have coffee, breakfast, dinner, drinks, etc. We tried for coffee or drinks but all were booked so we settled for breakfast. For about $60, you get to pass by the security and entry into the hotel, excellent service, and the meal. The menu for breakfast was a small cup of musli and yogurt, a fruit tray, mini bagel sandwiches, a pastry tray, an egg dish I had never heard of but was really good, and unlimited hot and cold beverages. It was a good meal and the inside of the hotel provided great scenery.

After eating, we took a bunch of pictures along with the other tourists that weren’t staying there. It was the most elaborate hotel I had ever been in. There were big fountains at the ground level and the mezzanine level where we ate. On both sides of the ground level fountain there were escalators. As you rode up either escalator, you could watch the fish in the 15 foot tall aquarium built into the wall next to the escalator. I can only imagine what the rest of the hotel looks like.

On the way back to our hotel, we got the cabbie to drive us out onto the Palm Jumeirah. We could only go part way out onto the stem before getting to a security guard who wouldn’t let you pass without proving you lived there. But we did get a view of the houses out on the fronds. Only a few more millions to go and I’ll have one out there.

Ramadan starts tomorrow. This is the month long religious holiday for Muslims. Its beginning and end are dependent on seeing the new moon. Kuwait has its own moon sighting committee to determine the beginning of Ramadan. Apparently the new moon could be viewed in the southern hemisphere yesterday so Ramadan could start earlier in those countries. Anyway, from sunrise to sunset, Muslims fast, so no food or drink. And non-Muslims are asked to not eat or drink in public. Restaurants are closed during the day and most businesses and schools have new hours. My office usually works from 7am-5:30pm but the official Ramadan hours are 8:30am-3:30pm. And don’t get caught breaking the fast because there are penalties for doing so, whether you are Muslim or not.

In this today’s newspaper…”Fasting violators to be prosecuted – The Interior Ministry has warned that violators of the Islamic morals and public order during the holy month and public order during the holy month of Ramadan will be prosecuted. A fine of a maximum KD 100 or one-month imprisonment shall be imposed on violators who get caught eating or drinking during the day in Ramadan. In a statement, the ministry said that those who assist or instigate others to break their fast during the day in Ramadan will also be fined, including restaurants which may be closed for a maximum of two months as a punitive measure. The statement said the minister has jurisdiction to take action against those found violating the ministry’s rules during Ramadan.”

By the way, I was able to catch the Bear’s game last Sunday. It was one of three games on television here on Sunday, two noon (CDT) kickoffs and the 3:15pm kickoff. They also had the Sunday night game on Kuwait’s Monday night and the two Monday night games were on Kuwait’s Tuesday night. Only bad thing about the Bear’s game (besides the loss) was that it didn’t get over until 2am. Had a rough day at work on Monday.

Jordan

Oval Plaza


Colonnaded Street


Temple of Artemis

Testing the acoustics of the South Theater

Elephants in the Siq

The Treasury

The Silk Temple

The Monastery

View from the High Place

The Treasury at night

Aaron's Tomb

Only handrail in Petra

Floating in the Dead Sea

Mt. Nebo

Mt. Nebo mosaics

I still haven’t found much for entertainment or sight seeing in Kuwait but luckily I have to renew my visa every 30 days which means I get a chance to explore some of the local area. This month I went to Jordan, a country I knew nothing about 6 months ago. I found out I needed much more than the 3½ days I spent there.

Jordan is a relatively small country in the Middle East, bordering Israel, Palestine, Syria, Iraq, and Saudi Arabia about a 90 minute flight from Kuwait. It may not sound like the most welcoming place but I found it is a beautiful country with great people. I decided earlier this year that I wanted to visit Petra, the setting for the last scene of Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. I didn’t know the name of Petra before researching Jordan but had seen pictures and thought it looked like a place in the Middle East so I started Googling and eventually found it. After doing more research and talking to a friend who had lived there for a while, I found out there was a lot more than just Petra to visit.

This was probably one of the more adventurous vacations I had been on. I was traveling alone in a country which I don’t speak the main language. When I got lost, I eventually got pointed back in the right direction by people that spoke adequate English or played cultural charades well enough to get me back on the right path.

I rented a car from the airport and the guy that brought me the car was Palestinian and had originally grown up in Kuwait. He told me that his family had fled Kuwait when Saddam invaded in 1990. He drove with me part way to my first destination, Jerash, gave me a basic map, and wished me good luck. (This link gives a pretty good description of a tour of the city.)

Jerash is considered on of the best preserved Roman archeological sites outside of Italy. After missing my exit and guessing my way through the residential area of Jerash, I finally found the visitor center of Jerash. I wish I had gotten there faster because I caught the very end of a Roman soldier fighting performance in the Hippodrome. So I moved on to the Oval Plaza, which seems to be the real beginning of a tour around the city. It was pretty empty that day and I was alone so I must have looked like an easy target. A kid approached me and asked if I needed a tour guide. I assured him that I didn’t but he walked around the Oval Plaza and the Temple of Zeus with me anyway. He knew some interesting facts so I told him I’d hire him for the hour and we started through the city. We walked down the Colonnaded Street, like Main St., to the Macellum. Inside were a bunch of columns and Raith rested a penny on rock and set one end of the penny under the column. He then pushed the column and you could see the penny moving up and down. He told me the columns were seated in a way to allow them to sway to prevent them from falling during earthquakes. Considering an earthquake did a lot of damage to the city in 749 AD, I have to believe him. Either way, I thought that alone was worth the price of admission.

The last place we visited was the South Theater. The design of the theater was to project the voice of whoever was performing to all of the seats. I went to the top seats and could easily hear Raith when he was on the ground. Also, he showed my how you could whisper into the base of the circular wall and hear it on the other side. Those Romans were pretty smart.

A lot of the temples and theaters were getting set up for a big festival that night. Raith told me it was a lot of cultural singing and dancing. At the time, I knew I had at least a three hour drive and wasn’t sure about the directions. I wish now I had stayed because I easily made it to Petra but I did get some well needed rest. I had three full days in front of me.

The drive to Petra was cool with the sun going down over the desert hills. I tried not to crash as I snapped a few shots of the sunset. I got in last to my hotel but it was a two minute walk to the Petra visitor’s center.

Petra was build by the Nabataean people but an exact date is not known. The best guess I’ve read is that it was sometime around the end of the second century BC. The place would have been great to defend as the narrow entrance to the city, or Siq, as the walls are over 100 feet tall and very narrow. Nonetheless, the Romans conquered Petra and made it part of their empire. And when the Roman emperor Constantine brought Christianity to the empire, the Nabataean temples were converted to churches and the idols carved into the rock were decapitated by the Roman soldiers.

Petra was recently named one of the new 7 Wonders of the World. I thought the place would be packed from the start the park opened. But at 7am, there were just a few people going into the park. I paid more than I hoped to for a guide but he pointed out a lot of interesting stuff I would not have seen without him. Some of these things were the carvings of idols in the rock and Nabataean, ceramic pipe running along the walls, and “Nabataean graffiti” carved in Latin, Greek, and Aramaic, the language spoken by Jesus. My guide told me there were pipes running throughout Petra and there was running water in the homes and a sewer system.

The most recognizable place in Petra is the Treasury. It is the first thing a visitor sees when coming out of the Siq and is pretty breath taking to see. It is a giant carving in red rock. The acoustics are really interesting too because the area right by the Treasury is surrounded by 100 foot rock walls. This is really the starting point to exploring the park. There are several booths open selling souvenirs, maps, books, snacks, and water (essential for a day in Petra). You can rent a camel, donkey, horse, or a horse drawn cart to take you anywhere in the park. All are rented by the Bedouins, a nomadic people indigenous to the area. They were somewhat aggressive trying to sell things but were also very helpful even if you didn’t buy things from them. I was told by my guide that the Bedouins didn’t live in the park anymore. The Jordanian government recently built them a city outside the park but I found out not all of them live there.

The rest of the day I spent exploring the main sites of the park. The Theater, the Silk Tomb, the Great Temple, the Monastery, and all the other ones that were easily accessible. One of the beauties of the rock was the different colors in the different layers. The Silk Tomb is a great example of that, though my picture of it isn’t as striking because the sun isn’t directly on it.

The Monastery is at one of the far ends of the park. It is a pretty good hike and a lot of the tourists rent donkeys to carry them up. Riding the donkey looked like more of an effort than hiking and later in the day I saw a lady fall off of one. On the hike, I was invited to have tea with a couple Bedouin girls that had a souvenir shop. The tea was nothing special but it was interesting to talk to them. They spoke really good English, along with bits of Italian and Spanish, whatever they need to get more business.

The Monastery was really busy. It was around lunch time and I was really tired but wanted to get a good picture with the sun fully on the rock. So I found a place about a five minute hike away from the tourists with a great view of the Jordanian landscape and took a nap. The rocks weren’t that comfortable but it was absolutely silent except for the wind and I slept like a baby for about an hour.

I got my picture and decided on my last hike of the day. It was to the High Place. Not a very original name but it comes as advertised. It was only about a 30 minute hike from the base and the view was over all of Petra. And besides the Bedouins, I was completely alone at the top.

I lucked out by visiting the days I did. Monday, Wednesday, and Thursday night they offer a night hike through the Siq to the Treasury. They put candles down the path all the way to the Treasury. They ask everyone to be silent but it’s hard to keep 300 tourists quite. Once at the Treasury, they have a guy sitting in the middle candles playing a type of guitar singing Arabic songs. Really cool because of the setting and acoustics.

The next morning, I decided I was going to see what it was like to walk through the Siq alone. I was at the gate when it opened and was the first to walk down the Siq. All I could hear was a few owls and I got some good pictures of the Treasury. Since I had gotten an early start, I decided to take one of the longer hikes in the park, to Aaron’s Tomb. It is the place that is believed to be the burial place of Moses’ brother and is one of the highest points in Petra. Again, I was alone on the hike except for the Bedouin families that I past. They had homes carved into the sides of the mountains which looked really neat. Kids ran out to greet me at almost every home. They didn’t speak English as well as their parents but were pretty funny to play with.

About two hours into the hike I thought I was getting kind of close but still not sure how far away I was. I came across an old Bedouin man at a point where I could see the main trail I was on and a less obvious trail up the side of the mountain. He asked me where I was headed and I told him. He then asked if I wanted to buy some old coins from him. He said they were old Roman coins. I told him I didn’t have much money but felt like I was in the old Zelda video game, buy some coins from this guy and he’d tell me the way. He told me the coins were $100 for two. For about five minutes, I tried to convince him I didn’t have that much money on me. He finally told me to think about it and we would talk about it again when I got back from Aaron’s tomb. He then told me to follow the trail up the mountain. He said it was an old donkey trail. I wasn’t sure whether to trust him or not, but I did and it was the right choice. I ended up losing the trail a few times but knew I was on it when I saw new piles of donkey poop.

One of the great things about Petra is there are no signs telling you not to go places. So you have to lookout for your own safety. No walls or guardrails at the edge of mountains. Just a hope you will use common sense. But hiking up to Aaron’s Tomb, I think I found the only handrail in the entire park.

Finally after 2½ hours, I made it to Aaron’s Tomb. The scenery was amazing and could not see any evidence of civilization. I’ve read that from there, you can see Egypt, Israel, and Saudi Arabia. I had my lunch of an orange and cashews, took another nap, and started the hike down. By the time I got back in the main park, it was about 5pm, a had little water left and I was exhausted. I decided to my time in Petra was finished.

One quick story about the Bedouin guide I had. He was one of ten kids and the only one to be educated. His mother, father, and siblings still live with the tribe and are still live in tents. He grew up living in Petra and when the government moved them out his mother refused to live in a house. He said they still move from place to place depending on the season. I asked him how he finds them to visit and he said that he knows the general location that they will be whether it’s spring, summer, fall, or winter. And his father has a cell phone.

The next morning, and my last day in Petra, I got up well before the sunrise because I wanted to make it to the Dead Sea before my flight. The hotel told me to go back to the main highway and drive north until I saw signs for the Dead Sea and then head west. This was the long way and not very scenic but I figured it was the best because I didn’t want to get lost and miss my flight. Well, I somehow missed the turn out of town to get to the main highway but I could tell from the cities I was being directed to, I was on the right path. About an hour into the trip, I hadn’t seen a sign in a while but knew if I kept heading north I’d find my way. I stopped at what looked like a bus stop on the outskirts of a town to ask a guy if I was heading the right way to the Dead Sea (I’d had pretty good luck with getting directions to that point). When I rolled my window down to talk to him, he reached inside the car, unlocked the door, opened it, and hopped in. I guess that meant I had my first Jordanian hitchhiker. He started talking in Arabic and I started talking in English and we both realized neither of us spoke the other’s language. I said Dead Sea a couple time and pointed down the road. He shook his head yes and smiled which I assume meant that was the right was. So I drove down the mountain, which turned out to be a beautiful drive. We didn’t talk much and when we got to the bottom of the mountain the road came to a tee in the middle of nowhere. He pointed to the right, shook my hand, and got out of the car. I have no idea where he was going but he did point me towards the Dead Sea.

The Dead Sea was a trip. Everybody floats because of the salt content, which is around 4 times greater than the ocean. If you wanted to, you could lie back in the water and take a nap. I wanted to see how far I could walk into the water before I floated. I got to about chest high water and then all of a sudden I popped up. And then I lost my balance and fell onto my back. I could have played all day there but didn’t have time. After an hour, I showered up and was on my way. They only bad thing about the water is that because it is so salty, it tastes horrible and burns your eyes much worse than the ocean. If you ever go, I don’t recommend drinking any of it.

My last stop before the airport was Mt. Nebo. It is said that Moses reached Mt. Nebo and shown the promised land by God but told that he would never make it there. This is the final resting place of Moses. There is a small church on the top of Mt. Nebo and a small visitor’s center but not much else. I didn’t have much time there but probably would have only needed to spend another hour to see everything. The views and the mosaic floors of the church were amazing.

I made it back to the airport with time to spare. I was dirty, tired, and broke (after paying the airport tax I didn’t know about, I had 1 Jordanian Dinar left), I was ready to go back to Kuwait and get some rest.

Headline in this week’s paper… Riyadh, Saudi Arabia – MAN SCARED TO DEATH BY MUTAWWA “A Bangladeshi man died of fright after being arrested by Saudi Arabia’s controversial religious police for washing a car instead of praying, a local newspaper reported yesterday. The unnamed man died last week in the holy city of Madinah after being detained by members of the Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice, Al-Jazirah reported. The Arabic daily said the man ‘convulsed in fear after he was arrested, leading to a drop in his blood pressure and causing his death’. The man was arrested by members of the commission, commonly known as the Mutawwa, for washing a car during a time of day when he should have been at prayer, the paper said. The Mutawwa enforce a strict Islamic moral code in the ultraconservative kingdom, and are increasingly being criticized by the public for perceived abuses.” Luckily Kuwait is not this strict but I sure miss the good old USA where you can wash your car any time you want...

Life has been pretty boring since I returned from Iceland. But I had a birthday last week and this year was a pretty unique birthday. It’s not every birthday that you get sung to by 30 Indian engineers. They also gave me a small piece of gold and a lunch of Indian food. Now if I could only get them to work faster, that would be a great present! The picture above is me with about half the people I work with. I should be fluent in Hindi by now.

It truly felt like my birthday today when I received a package of mail from work. Inside was about 10 birthday cards from home. I think Gamla had something to do with it because I have no idea when the last time I got so many birthday cards. I’ll have to live overseas on my birthday more often. Thank you to everyone that took the time to send me a card. It meant a lot to me.

ICELAND!!!

Reykjavik at 2am

American and Eurpoean tectonic plates

Gullfoss Waterfall

Langjokull Glacier

Geysir

Solheimajokull Glacier

Glacier cone

Skogafoss Waterfall

View from Skogafoss Waterfall

Upriver from Skogafoss Waterfall

Behind Seljalandsfoss Waterfall

The Blue Lagoon

Leifur Eiriksson and Halldrimskirkja Church

Reykjavik

Perlan

Iceland – I never imagined that I would have such a great time there. I flew from Kuwait and met up with two friends from Chicago, Charlie and Dom. Easily the best vacation I’ve taken in a long time. And every great vacation must start with being arrested, right? Technically, Charlie and I settled out of court for smuggling but that’s just details. I guess I got a little excited that I would be able to drink for the first time since arriving in Kuwait. So both Charlie and I picked up two bottles of booze and a case of beer at duty free and walked towards the exit. Neither one of us knew but the Icelandic government only allows an individual to bring in one bottle and a 12 pack of beer. We couldn’t carry our suitcases, bottles, and beer together so the bottles went in the suitcases. I guess we were the poster children for smuggling walking by security so they stopped us and asked to scan our bags. Well, they found the bottles of booze that we were “smuggling” and said we would be fined. $80 later and a chat with an Icelandic police officer, we were a bottle short and on our way. (They just let us pay the tax on the beer and be on our way.) I didn’t feel so bad after they stopped a Norwegian couple behind us for having too many bottles of wine.

After that, the trip was fantastic. The first night, July 4th, we went out of a few beers. The bars close at 1:30am on weekdays and as we left the bar, the sun was down but it looked like sunset. I knew this was going to be fun.

Our first tour was the Golden Circle Super Jeep Tour. Our tour group couldn’t have been better. Three girls from DC, the UK, and Australia, respectively, two guys from the UK, and the three Chicagoans. We all ended hanging out the entire weekend and they really made the trip. Our first stop was Þingvellir. It is the location where the Icelandic parliament, Alþingi was founded in 930, which makes it the oldest known functioning parliament in the world. It is also the place where the American and European tectonic plates meet. These plates are moving apart at about 1 inch per year. You can see where the plates are moving apart.

The next stop was the Gullfoss waterfall. We stopped at a rest area type place with a little gift shop/restaurant for what the guide said was a 15 minute stop. There was a trail so we followed it and to our surprise found the waterfall. The guide didn’t tell us about it because we were planning on stopping at it later in the tour. The waterfall was amazing and I could have easily spent a day hiking around exploring different parts of the falls and river but we had to move on to the next stop, snowmobiling on Langjokull Glacier, the second largest glacier in Iceland.

Snowmobiling was the reason to sign up for this tour. I mean snowmobiling in July, how cool. I emailed the tour organizer to check if they provided cold weather gear for this part of the tour. Luckily for the guy from Kuwait, they did. But it wasn’t too cold except when we were snowmobiling. You could see little creeks forming on the glacier from the melting ice. It was awesome. We probably spent about 30 minutes on the glacier. The water was clear blue in some parts. Simply beautiful. The snowmobiling was fun too. I almost dumped the sled a couple times (and Dom) but luckily kept it upright. 30 minutes wasn’t enough.

After the glacier, we stopped by the Gullfoss waterfall again but didn’t spend much time. The last stop of the day was Geysir, the most of the famous geyser in Iceland. It erupts regularly every 5-10 minutes and there was a crowd of people, including me, just standing around the geyser with cameras waiting for it to erupt. The whole area had a pleasant eggy odor and the people that got sprayed by the geyser smelled even better. I didn’t touch the water of Geysir but did feel the water of one of the pools near it. It easily passed the hot test. Here is a video of the eruption (sorry but you’ll have to tilt your head or the monitor).

The next day, part of group went on other tours, but half of us went on walking tour the Solheimajokull Glacier. (On the way to the glacier, we drove past Mt. Hekla. It was once believed to be the entrance to Hell until two hikers went to the top and safely returned.) They call the Solheimajokull a glacier tongue which comes off of the mother glacier, the Myrdalsjokull ice cap, the fourth largest glacier in Iceland. (Follow the Myrdalsjokull ice cap link and you’ve just went on our tour, minus the glacier.) The tour provided crampons for your books and an ice ax and we were on our way up the glacier. The first part of the glacier was steep and we lost a couple members of the tour but the rest of us went on. I thought that this glacier would be similar to the Langjokull Glacier but it was very different. The glacier was dirty. Parts of it looked like ice and snow but parts of it looked like someone had dumped piles of dirt all over the ice. The piles were called glacier cones and we were told they get there because a glacier does not slide over the ground. Instead it is constantly cycling the ice from the bottom of the glacier to the top and vice versa and that is how it brings up the dirt. The cones looked like you could just wipe them away but they were really a dirt blanket over a solid ice peak. There were still little rivers on the glacier and you could fill up your water bottle in the standing pools of water. However, if you were stranded on a glacier, the guide said you couldn’t survive on the water from these pools because the water had no minerals. So whether you’re stranded on a glacier or the middle of the ocean, you still need an alternate water source.

We spent most of the day just hiking around the glacier, trying to avoid falling in a crevice, looking at the rivers and pools on the glacier. But my favorite part of the day was the little bit of ice climbing we did. The guide found a 30 foot hole in the glacier and let us all have a chance to climb down and back up. I’ll definitely do that again!

On the way back from the glacier, we stopped at two more waterfalls, Skogafoss and Seljalandsfoss waterfalls. The hike to the top of the Skogafoss waterfall was rough but the view from the top was worth it. And if you climbed a fence and hiked just a little more, there was another waterfall. Not as high but just as impressive. At the Seljalandsfoss waterfall, there was a trail that made a loop behind the falls. What an amazing country!

The city of Reykjavik reminding me a lot of a college town. The main street is Laugarvegur and was very similar to State St. at UW-Madison. We had read that people stayed home and partied until at least midnight because it’s very expensive to drink at the bars ($15 beers). We went out at 11pm on Saturday and it was almost a ghost town. But two hours later, the bars were packed and everyone was having a good time. By the time we walked home after 5am, the sun was well up in the sky. A lot different from a 5am night in Chicago.

Sunday, we hung out with two Icelandic friends we made, Bergþóra (aka Begga) and Thelma. Besides teaching us the right way to pronounce Reykjavik, they took us to the Blue Lagoon. The water is really an eerie shade of blue. It gets even more blue in the winter because the algae changes color with the temperature. The whole lagoon is created by the run off from the Svartsengi power plant nearby. It pumps geothermally heated water from a mile below the Earth’s surface. It is like a big hot tub, without the bubbles. If you get too close to where the water is dumped into the lagoon you could get burned. You can be sitting there content and all of a sudden a hot jolt of water hits and you have to move to cooler waters. There are other spa amenities at the Blue Lagoon like a sauna, massages, natural mud masks. A good place to spend a lazy Sunday.

Charlie and Dom had early flights on Monday which left me to explore Reykjavik alone before my flight. I checked out the Hallgrimskirkja Church and Perlan. The Halldrimskirkja Church is one of the most famous landmarks in Reykjavik. In front of the church is a statue of Leifur Eiriksson, donated by the US government. We should give out more gifts like this. Entrance to the church is free but you have to pay to go up in the tower. Well worth it as you could see over the entire city from there.

Perlan is a building constructed on top of hot water tanks for the city. Inside is an award winning restaurant and a Viking museum. Outside of Perlan is a manmade geyser that is modeled after the famous Geysir.

Just a short note about the place we stayed. It is called Room with a View which is an apartment building on the main street in Reykjavik. If you’re going to Iceland, I highly recommend staying there. Anyway, when I called to book a room, the guy who owned the place told me I should pay in $US and not a credit card. The reason? The rates on the website were posted in 2005. Since the dollar has gone down so much in the last 2 years, it would be cheaper to pay in dollars than a credit card which would give the current exchange rate. It saved me $100. Pretty much an example of the people I met there.

So you can probably tell by the amount I wrote and the pictures that I had a good time. It was depressing to come back to Kuwait but New Year’s 2008 in Reykjavik is on the table. Anyone up for it?