Egypt in December

[bakubo]

Just thought I would drop in and let you know I am still alive.

I am in Dahab now and before that I was in Cairo, Aswan, and Luxor. Hard to believe, but I have already been in Egypt for 2 weeks and have 2 more weeks.

I got up very early yesterday morning and with my backpack I walked in the dark to the Luxor train station about 8 minutes away to find a taxi. It was so early that I thought it was the one place I would probably find one. No problem! Got to the Luxor airport and the flight to Sharm El-Sheikh with departure and arrival exactly on time!

Outside the Sharm El-Sheikh airport I found a man with a van who lives in Dahab and he offered me a ride there for about the same as a taxi to the bus station + bus ticket to Dahab. It was 1000% better because I didn't have to wait a couple of hours at the bus station and he took me right to the door of the hotel in Dahab instead of ending up at the Dahab bus station and needing another taxi. It was illegal so when we arrived he asked me to slip him the money very discreetly so no policemen would see it.

No room available but they asked me to wait a couple of hours because someone would probably check out by noon -- and someone did. Got a large room with an enormous patio/balcony about 30 meters from the ocean. The ocean and brown desert mountains of Saudi Arabia in plain view across the Gulf of Aqaba (part of Red Sea). It is not expensive. My room next to the ocean is about $23, but it is the most expensive room so far in Egypt. Of course, there are cheaper rooms here too, but $23 is cheap and I have a big covered patio next to the ocean.

Tomorrow I will go to Jerusalem, but it is a quick 24 hour trip. Leave Dahab at 10:00 PM and get back to Dahab about 10:00 PM the next night. I am also thinking of going on a 2 day trip from here to Petra, Jordan. It is a good chance to go to Jerusalem and Petra since Dahab is fairly close. Don't know if I will ever get back to this corner of the world.

I have been trying to write updates on my blog, if anyone is interested:

http://bakubo.blogspot.com

By the way, photos are no longer allowed inside the tombs. That's okay, because it isn't really the kind of thing I really want to photograph. No cameras allowed too.

[Birma]

Great to hear from you Henry. I was wondering only last night what had become of you (I hadn't thought of checking your blog) so it is good the know the trip is going well. Reading through your blog you have certainly packed in a lot and it will be brilliant to see your photographs of all these iconic places, as well as the usual people shots. How many Gb are you up to so far? How are you finding photographing the locals?

[Dr. Harout]

Nice to hear again from you.
Try to find some time to share your photos.

[aster]

Greetings, Bakubo!

Take good care and enjoy your time out there....and come back with brilliant memories.

Yildiz

[Dr. Harout]

....and come back with brilliant memories.

Yildiz

And excellent photos (we are selfish ).

[bakubo]

How many Gb are you up to so far? How are you finding photographing the locals?

I have taken about 9gb of photos so far. Photographing people is generally challenging. I have got quite a few, but I have passed up many more good photos than I generally do in most places. Similar to Morocco, but maybe a bit more difficult here. The funny thing is that although most people make it clear with body language or words that they don't want their photo taken and sometimes even get angry at the sight of a camera there are others who come to me when they see me and motion to my camera asking me to take their photo. These are not the ones who do this because they then want to hit you up for money. These are regular people, children *and* adults, and don't want anything. Of course, since the A700 is digital I always show them the photo on the LCD afterwards. In Islamic Cairo one afternoon as I was walking along a man was sitting on a step with his wife and child. He motioned for me to take their photo. I did and then showed it to them and they all had a big smile on their face. They wanted nothing else.

[bakubo]

Nice to hear again from you.
Try to find some time to share your photos.

I'll be back in Japan on 12/27 and then I will start to work on the photos. Probably by the first or second week of January I will have the selected ones on my website and, of course, I will post here too. This netbook is okay for the internet and for just taking a quick look at downloaded photos but not for doing raw conversion, etc. I can do it, but the screen is too small to make the work comfortable or even worth the trouble. My bigger computer is sitting patiently in Japan awaiting its chance to get to work on the new photos and I would hate to disappoint it.

[bakubo]

Take good care and enjoy your time out there....and come back with brilliant memories.

Thanks, I am enjoying it. I hope I have a few good photos by the time I leave. It is really hard to pass up some of the great photos ops that I passed up. That is true everywhere, just more here.

[Greg Beetham]

Yah, have a good one Henry, and if you can't be totally good, be careful, I've heard on the grapevine that there is the odd sensitive area in places over there where the official type persons can get a little excited by someone taking photos.
Greg

[bakubo]

A couple of days ago when I met the guy with the van outside the Sharm El-Sheikh airport who I rode with to Dahab there was one more small incident that I didn't mention. A bit of background first. As some of you probably know there were 3 suicide bombers here in Dahab in 2006 who killed 23 and injured dozens. In Sharm El-Sheikh in 2005 3 bombs exploded and killed 88 and injured over 200. In 1997 there was also the terrorist attack in Luxor which killed 62 and injured 12.

Anyway, back to the ride to Dahab. After we had left Sharm El-Sheikh and were out on the desert highway we passed a couple of men in their 20s standing beside the road. The driver stopped and asked me if it was okay to pick these guys up so they could ride with us. He said they were police. Hmm, no uniforms. Why do they need a ride to Dahab? Of course, although it seemed a bit strange he did ask me and most likely there was nothing more to it than what he said, but I decided to say no. After all, I don't want to turn into another Daniel Pearl. I also made a joke that if they were willing to each pay 1/3 the cost then I might say okay. The two guys were talking in Arabic to my driver through the open window and I guess he told them I didn't want them to share the ride. They gave me a dirty look and we drove off. Right after we started driving again my driver said that they just wanted a ride to the police checkpoint that was ahead. I could see it maybe 600-700 meters down the road. Maybe they were police, but everyone else there, I noticed, had uniforms on. I am not sure why they wanted a ride to get somewhere they could walk in 5-8 minutes. It was about 8:30 AM and not hot at all. I guess they just continued waiting there until they got a ride.

Incidentally, not far from my hotel here in Dahab there is a foot bridge on the concrete walkway right next to the ocean that goes the full length of the central part of Dahab. There are many open air restaurants, dive shops, small hotels, etc. The foot bridge is in the most central location. I noticed that on both ends of the bridge the concrete appears to have been sort of blasted in an area about a meter circumference and then many pockmarks radiating away from it. I haven't asked but I am pretty sure this is where the suicide bombers did their dirty work. It looks exactly what one would expect if a bomb loaded with bolts, ball bearings, etc. was to explode there and the place that has the most people hanging around.

Anyway, it was probably nothing more than what the driver said and I am not a scaredy-cat, but at the same time it is good to use some common sense. Of course, between the two extremes of them just being police who wanted a 30-40 second car ride and being terrorists looking to kidnap a foreigner there are other possibilities such as two friends of the driver who would try to put the hard sell on me to go to some shop, hotel, etc.

[Greg Beetham]

I'd draw at least one solid conclusion Henry, if those guys had been terrorists/bandits, they would not have asked if they could cadge a ride...what would have happened I'll leave to your imagination.
It does seem your driver friend was a little more knowledgable about who they actually were though, mabe in the company of a westerner they would have got through the police checkpoint a lot easier for some reason, hard to say, unless they actually were police..undercover, the whole thing sounds a little chancy to me, and it's not a place to take chances.
Greg

[bakubo]

I'd draw at least one solid conclusion Henry, if those guys had been terrorists/bandits, they would not have asked if they could cadge a ride...

Yeah, that is why I said that since he asked it probably meant there was nothing strange going on. But, the way things often go is they start off seeming innocent and then later turn bad. After all, with a police checkpoint less than a kilometer away it probably would have been stupid of them to pass through with a foreigner in the car yelling to the police to stop these guys. I have travelled a lot and have learned to trust my gut. Something wasn't right and the chances of it being something really bad are extremely small, but no need to go against your gut feeling. I have had a few other times over the years where something didn't smell right and it turned out something weird was going on, although not dangerous. The fact is that most of the time the moment before something bad happens most people feel perfectly safe -- until they aren't. Gotta be open to people but in certain parts of the world in particular you gotta have your antenna up too. That place can be NYC, London, or anyplace too.

By the way, I was right about the places at the foot bridge:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2006_Dahab_bombings

Here are 3 quick and dirty photos from my digicam about an hour ago taken with 1 hand since the water bottle was in the other.

[Greg Beetham]

Yeah wow, that's the goods alright,
it's tragic that there are people who are so disturbed they'll not only kill themselves, but deliberately kill people they don't even know, as well.....
Greg

[Dusty]

Good call, Henry. When your gut tells you no, that should be good enough. I know as an old Jarhead you're not just a fraidy-cat and that your Spidey-Sense only tingles when needed!

Semper Fi,
Dusty

[aster]

Hmmm...those photos are spooky, Bakubo.

It always feels strange to walk on the premise of a disturbing incident in the history of terrorism of any sort.

Take care,

Yildiz