Travels with Selkit - 4

OCTOBER 4th, 2024:

At six in the morning, I set out on the bike. 20 odd minutes of exhilatating pedalling (my first spell of cycling in years, this) takes me past the brooding Memnons and the forlorn Amenhotep temple ruins to the fork mentioned at the end of yesterday's log. From a long way off can be seen dozens of hot air balloons, some rising from some site to the north, some others hovering a few hundred feet above ground. Later I am to find out that this balloon flight thing is one of Luxor's highlights; and Luxor is the only place in Egypt that offers balloon rides. At the fork, I decide to go left - it will be valley of queens first.

The limestone hills still have a rosy hue. Their barrenness is perfect - not even cactus. I pedal into a wadi that winds thru the range and am presently at the ticket booth guarding the queen's valley site.

Several tombs have been dug into the walls and floor of the valley. The most famous of them all - Nefertari's - is locked up. I look into a couple among those that are open. Each tomb is built as a series of chambers, stairways and galleries cut into hillsides - From outside, they are merely doorways and steps leading underground. The walls and ceilings of all tombs are illustrated with murals of humans interacting with deities and sometimes going about earthly business. There is also a fair amount of hieroglyphic texts.

From the tomb of Prince Chamuas:

Here, I was most struck by the sophistication in attire. The translucent cloaks (what weaving!), the variety in ornaments and coiffure,...

I dunno what this picture represents:

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Note added later: That was a 'Djed pillar' an ancient symbolic representation of Osiris
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The glass screens put up in front of the murals are often very irritating with their reflections...

The tomb of Amenkhopshef:

Guess that is the prince greeting Hathor with a friendly embrace:

... and with stiff and staff-bearing Ptah, the Vishwakarma of Egypt:

An amazing heraldic design - the winged sundisk (it also incorporates two hooded cobras) and two winged serpents - same as those forming armrests to king Tut's gilded chair:

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I leave the Queens' valley without having seen the tomb of any queen (I noticed this slip much later!) and cycle to Deir el Madinah in an adjacent valley. This is the location of the so-called 'artisans' tombs'. Entry tickets are needed but cannot be bought here so I cycle down to the fork on the highway where they can be bought and back - a tiresome exercise that drains off calories and more seriously, time. It is already getting hot...

The tomb of Anherkha: A crazily rich ceiling design with bovines:

Looking down a passage in the tomb with all those irritating screens:

Anherkha (it must be him, looking almost effeminate in that flowing caftan-like garb) in communion with all sorts of strange beings.

That must be him and missus listening to a flabby harpist:

The tomb of Sennutem is right next to Anherkha; is it a little treasure trove!
The different episodes illustrated in the murals appear marked out by frames and that seems one way in which these tomb morals are more modern than say, the temple murals of Kerala - in the latter, everything is jumbled up.

I discover much later with some surprise (from Wiki) that this 'tree goddess' is Nut, the cosmic One:

I dunno what such a batch of squatting deities signifies:

This 'mummification mural' has a very modern layout with illustration and text neatly demarcated:

This must be Sennutem and wife tilling the Elysian fields:

A strange episode - a fanged rabbit cuts down a serpent!
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Note added later: It's no rabbit but a cat, indeed, its Ra killing Apep, the serpent of darkness (shades of the Indra vs Vritra battle there!)
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As I step out of the tomb and walk towards the Ptolemaic temple, a big fellow in a jelabiya tags along. In broken English he says he loves Hindi films and has seen Sholay 10 times.

The temple, though 'only' a little over 2000 years old, has plenty of interesting murals. All I can manage is a quick run thru. Several of the features - for example, the 'boner deity' Min - will repeat over the next few days at several other temples, some of them much older. Still some of visuals here will turn out unique (at least to my knowledge) - for example the jackal headed being in a long cloak holding a big ball!

The remnants of what is said to be some sort of artisans' township dating back to maybe 2000 BC. Incidentally, I dunno if any pharaonic palace from pre Christian Egypt has survived - this colony reminds me of pictures of the streets and houses of Mohenjodaro.

"even this worker's township is bigger than our Lothal, maybe even comparable to Mohenjodaro..." - my thoughts are interrupted when my (uninvited) companion says with a touch if authority: "come with me, I will show you something!" I follow him onto a hillside. He points at a plank of wood lying on the ground. "Here is something!" he declares and pulls the plank away to reveal a little pit within which are two human skulls. I am utterly stumped. Before I can say anything he says "Here take this, my friend! This is something very old!" and hands me this object:

I can't say if this thing is of any significance - there are some markings on it that are clearly manmade (a single squatting diety?). But some worrisome suspicions are building up within regarding my friend - I look around to make sure we are not too far from other humans.

"Please give me some tip!" I hear him say. I hand over some dough. He is not done: "I make this. Please buy this!" and fishes out something from his pocket.

"100 pounds!" he says. I can't but shell out more money (later, I am to refer to his creation as an 'Amarna cat' for its strange, Marfan-like proportions seem reminiscent of the short-lived style of art introduced by Akhenaton at his capital Tell el Amarna).
He is now beginning to pull out more artefacts from his pocket. But I have recovered sufficiently to say "Sorry, no more. I am not a rich man!" and walk off in a hurry towards civilization.
I still don't know what those skulls are doing in that pit.

It is midday and the sun's glare is piercing thru my hat as I reach the Ramesseum, a temple built by Ramses.
Several statues of Ramses in Osiris-pose, headless, stand like pillars. If they were proper caryatids, that would be even cooler!

Inspiration for Shelley's Ozymandias - a huge colossus, fallen, mutilated, of the mighty king:

It seems Ramses could never get over the near disaster of Kadesh. Here he is again, the Maharathi scattering the Hittites.

These colossal statues remind me of the special effects giants from the 1960s' film 'Jason and the Argonauts':

I am back at the resort by 1.30. The hottest part of the day is spent indoors. By 4.30, I resume the biking exploration and head for the Luxor ferry.
Huge ferry boats run round the clock (Luxor has no bridge). They are quite cheap - just 15 pounds for man plus bike. On the river bank on the city side, stands this military monument, perhaps commemmorating the Yom Kippur war. The bayonet reaching out into space looks like an ancient obelisk.

The day is fading fast. I bike downstream along the river bank. Past the entrance into the huge Karnak temple area is a rundown park. I halt to watch my first sunset over the greatest river on earth.

Travels with Selkit - 3

OCTOBER 2nd, 2024:

Today I have to finish with Cairo and leave for Luxor

An online booking has been done on an express leaving at 10 pm from Ramses Station (it cost me a fortune) and reaching Luxor by 9. But, as per the website, I can't simply board the train - I don't know the seat number etc and for that, a phone call has to be made to a certain Mr Tariq in Cairo.

Tariq says on the phone: "Do you insist on the 10 pm train? I can get you a seat on a train leaving at 8 pm and reaching Luxor at 6 am and it's a very good train!"

I can't remember ever having heard an offer like that. I say I booked the 10 pm train because i don't want to reach Luxor so early.

"Sir!" he almost pleads "the eight pm train is very good! I can get u a nice seat!

(why is he so desperate? And as if a nice seat is a favor after i paid thru my nose for the ticket!)

But I can't argue with someone I haven't ever seen (and probably will never ever see) and that too in an alien land. I give in: "okay! what is the seat and coach number?"

"Sir, I can't tell you now. Please reach Ramses at 7.30 pm and ask at the Tourism Police office. I will arrange with them to give you your ticket - it will have seat number etc - and they will help you. It's a very good train!"

....

That is the situation in the morning. I push the train thing into the background and set out for the Grand Egyptian Museum, being built as a final and suitable resting place for all the treasures now in the dingy Egyptian Museum - Tut and all. The full shift might take years, if not decades, judging from what I am to see.

The GEM opens at 9 am and I am there on time. Entry fee - a whopping 1000 pounds. A board warns: "galleries are closed". But I have no choice but to enter.

From outside, the place looks like a swanky airport terminal - massive, futuristic with the pyramid as a recurring motif and lots of glass.

Right in front is a curiously mounted 'hanging obelisk' dating back to Ramses. In the black framework-like structure supporting it have been carved the names of Egypt in many world languages, among which I could spot only two or three Indian languages - one of which is .... മലയാളം (although the lettering is not quite correct)!!

A huge and sprawling atrium opens up - all I can say is: it simply does not look like the interior of anything, let alone a museum - just see this!

Deep within is a colossal Ramses striding powerfully towards the visitor - the very centerpiece of the whole affair. To me, this Ramses seems a little less distinguished as a work of art than the supine colossus of Memphis but is in near-perfect condition.

What is just as fascinating is some text put up there referring to Nasser's decision to shift this colossus from its original location in the Nile delta to a plaza in the heart of Cairo (from where, it has been brought to GEM as protection from pollution/vibrations) as "a modern strongman symbolically using an ancient strongman to boost his own image"!

To the left of Ramses is a rising terraced slope with nearly a dozen life-plus sized statues of the enthroned pharaoh Senwosret dating back to 20th century BC. The thrones show a recurring motif that I am to encounter many times in this journey - two deities, straining like standard bearers to hold up a pharaonic cartouche or some other emblem mounted on a pole. In the statues here, the task is performed either by the flabbily androgynous river god Hapi - a copy of him on either side of the cartouche - or a Horus-Thoth pair.

Here are some more sculptures. They are arranged on the steps of yet another tiered recess. There is an escalator going up from which one can see them collectively but it is much better to actually walk up the steps and get close.

The only pharaoh I can identify on statues: Akhenaton:

The kneeling figure on this sarcophagus is the goddess Isis (my initial guess is Selkit but some browsing corrects me):

Yet another highlight of GEM is one (or some) of Khufu's ceremonial boats, originally buried in a shrine next to the Great Pyramid and restored here. But to my disappointment, it is closed to visitors now.

And that is that. Overall, I have seen some some really solid and really ancient sculpture arranged in a space that is cool and weird in equal measure.

By midday, I am at the hotel. It is time to check out. Tariq's train is at 8 pm. There are some very hot and very vacant hours ahead. I am faced with a choice between the Museum of Civilization where I am told, are kept the mummies of many pharaohs including Ramses and the Museum of Islamic art. I pick the latter, a totally unknown entity. The reason: having seen all those statues showing Ramses as a stalwart athlete, I am not at all keen on seeing him as a shrunken and shrivelled corpse.

By 1.30 pm or so, I am at the Islamic Museum, located, as per the map, not too far from the Sultan Hassan mosque which I missed out on a couple of days back.

Mainstream Islamic art, since it mostly leaves out man and even animals/birds, is pattern-intensive, decorative and intricate. are some of the exhibits at the museum that hold my eye:

The museum has prominently put up a map of the world with the great centers of Islamic art marked. Two Indian sites find mention - Agra and .... Hampi!!

I walk a couple of kilometers to reach Sultan Hassan mosque. There is enough time for a quick decco. Inside, as is becoming quite the norm, a fellow latches on to me, shows me around, says something about the mosque in very bad english and demands a tip. The one interesting bit of his performance was to chant the Shahadah in a deep baritone from the center of a huge space within the mosque to demonstrate some impressive reverberation. Both Sultan Hassan and the adjacent al Rifai mosque have very high walls reminiscent of European cathedrals but neither has visible buttresses, flying or otherwise.

The mosques will soon close for visitors so I step out and with a further 2 plus hours to fill, take a cab to the Cairo tower, a highrise tourist attraction located on an island in the Nile. One has to pay a 300 pounds fee to go up to the top floor and look all around through thick glass walls. The views are nice without being momentous - and 300 pounds is unreasonable. Looking west at the fading day, I can make out the two main pyramids in ghostly outline through the urban pollution. This might be the last time I see them, I muse.

I get out and walk a distance of nearly 3 kilometers (in the process, I once again, walk over the Nile and negotiate a gas chamber like stretch of urban mess) to the Ramses station.

The station building isn't very imposing. The Tourism Police booth is right at the entrance. I mention Tariq and Luxor train to a cop at the desk when another a very potbellied cop, who is just finishing Namaz, rises and fishes out an envelope with my name written on it. Within is this object - is this any kind of ticket at all!

Calling over a young fellow, the fat cop says: "please pay me some tip and then you go with this man to platform 11 and wait. Your train will come by 8 pm. It may be a bit late but it will come; all okay!"

I pay him his tip, pay another tip to the youngster who walks off in a hurry forcing me to run after him. In the process I miss out on a proper look around of the train terminal. All I can shoot is this object:

I wait for over an hour on platform 11. There are no announcements, nothing. So I approach the driver of each arriving train and show him my 'ticket' and am told. "No. wait!". Finally, the driver of the third train says: "Yes, Luxor, first coach!" I jump in in great relief and it's a greater relief to see that seat 21 is a spacious and adjustable window seat; I text a "Thank you!" to Tariq.

The train - yes, it's pulled by a diesel loco that chugs like a Desi-built alco - leaves by 8.30 and crawls thru Cairo suburbs for quite a while. Then it crosses the Nile and halts at Giza. I try to spot the pyramids... and fail.

Past Giza, the train gains speed. I sink into a tired swoon...

OCTOBER 3rd, 2024:
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A very early start to the day's action - around 1 am, I am woken up by a ticket checker. At 4, another checker repeats the treatment; and yes, the lights in the coach burn bright thru the night. Past 5, the sky begins to grey and thru the smoky coach windows, one sees flat and lush-looking croplands and a line of barren, chalky hills beyond. Just pass 6, we pull into Luxor station.

My check-in at a resort on the west bank of the Nile is from 12. So, there are hours to fill. I get out, luggage and all. From outside, the station building looks as neat as a royal sarcophagus, well maybe.

It's a pleasant and clear morning (as per Wiki, Luxor is one of the driest and sunniest cities in the world. And let me say upfront, I won't be seeing a single piece of white cloud in the sky over my five days here!). The river is just about a kilometer to the west of the station. On the way is the vast enclosure of the Luxor temple, which opens at 6. I walk into the first temple of my trip:
The pylon (basically, gopuram, ceremonial gateway) into the temple with colossal statues on guard:

The pylon acquaints me with one of Ramses's obsessions - his 'great victory' over the Hittites in the battle of Kadesh. That's him as an Arjuna-like /maharathi', mowing down his puny enemies...(in reality, the battle was a draw that Ramses just about escaped with)


Note: In such war scenes (I am to see several over the next few days), the Hittites are shown as a faceless crowd of very loosely indicated human figures - reminds me of Annie Valetton's illustrations for the Good News Bible.

This ooks like a botched restoration job-does the head match the rest?

A mosque that got patched onto the temple some centuries ago...(note: nowhere do I see any religiously motivated iconoclasm)

Note: All those reliefs carved onto the pillars and pylons were once painted in brilliant colors. It's about time that a VR walk thru of the entire temple is made, with colors restored!

Some parts of the temple show Roman alterations and add-ons. Even remnants of some Roman murals persist:

My personal favorite from all of the Luxor temple - a pharaonic cartouche flanked by a pair of heraldic serpents, one wearing the crown of lower Egypt, the other, of Upper Egypt; this emblem is carved repeatedly on some of those massive pillars.

The sphinx avenue connecting Luxor temple with the even grander Karnak temple:

By 10.30, I am temporarily satiated by the temple and desperately in need of a shower and some rest (Luxor is a little hotter and a little more brighter than Cairo). Getting to the river bank, I ask for directions to the ferry (Luxor has no bridge across the Nile). One fellow says, "I take you over in my boat for 200 pounds". I know it is a con job but play along.

The part of west bank I get to looks very Kerala, indeed Kuttanad. Flat and very green riverine setting, highish density of population, hot and slightly humid weather, lots of resorts, narrow and poorly surfaced roads running parallel to the river, canals running alongside the roads with palm trunks as foot-bridges, stray dogs,...

I check in, shower and crash but by 4 I am up and about and walk to the north, leaving behind the canal-laced area and then westwards along a wide road running towards those chalky hills which now loom big and forbidding.

The two Memnon colossi (actually they are statues of the pharaoh Amenhotep III) mark an entry point into the vast Thebes Necropolis that stretches parallel to the river both to the north and south for several kilometers.

A little ahead, once stood the funerary temple of Amenhotep III. Precious little remains.

One reaches a fork: the left-going road winds into the range of hills and takes you to the Valley of the Queens and the Deir el Madina. The right branch leads to the Valley of the Nobles and then the temple of Hatshepsut and above all, the Valley of Kings. And straight ahead rises that ridge of bleak hills. So the West Bank of Luxor is a barely 3 km wide strip sustained by the Nile and just about holding out against the Sahara.

I retreat for the day. The return takes longer than it should - the closely spaced parallel canals mislead me into some blind alleys from which I eventually get out and to safety. For tomorrow, I arrange a bicycle from the resort people. I need to start at first light, at least by 6 am - "by midday, this place gets too hot!"

Before the day is done, I spend some time looking up 'Selkit'. First up, the 'dolphin' I imagined to sit on her head is actually a scorpion. Wiki says: Selkit protects the dead (protects?!) and guards the canopic jars that preserve the viscera extracted from the corpses to be mummified. Basically, it is quite a stretch to present her as a goddess welcoming *live* visitors as the Egypt Tourism authorities have done - but to a devotee of sorts that I now am, this is a spot of very creative repurposing!