Back to Cairo = Internet...finally...here is the trip to Aswan and Luxor:

Monday:

Wake up…breakfast…back to the room to pack up my stuff and move to another room for the day. We are going on a week long trip to Aswan and Luxor so we have to check out of our rooms. But before we leave for the trip we still have more sightseeing to do near Cairo. So, what does Dr. Denis have for us today? Why not travel to Saqqara tocheck out the Step Pyramid and the head to Dahshur, to see the oldest Pyramid ever. Load up the vans, rock out to the wooh wooh wooh song, drive through the slums of Cairo, out to the farm lands of the Nile River Valley, poverty everywhere, donkey pulling carts, palm trees, unfinished houses, through a little makeshift town and we end up at the Step Pyramid….

side note: My roommate Pete is sick, and I am just waiting for it to happen to me…people are dropping like flies, and just like Sean and I had said when we started “it’s every man for himself out here”…still have a minor stomach ache, but I’m drinking MAD water to keep myself hydrated. I popped 2 pepto pills before we left after a shaky session on the john in the morning…fingers crossed, visualizing good things…….back to the Step Pyramid.

Arrive at the Step Pyramid, a massive pyramid with…you guessed it…giant steps all the way up. This structure is very ancient, can’t remember the exact dates but something like 5000 years old, constructed around 2700 b.c. History lesson from our guide, monster photo sess, group shots, solo shots, friend shots and were outa there. Load up the vans, rock out to the wooh wooh wooh song, drive through more farmland, through more slums, more donkeys pulling carts…Matt and I saw 2 dead Donkeys in the canal we were driving along, super gnarly…through another makeshift town with little kids smiling and waving and we arrive at Dahshur. Drive through the gate and there is the Pyramid. In the background you can see what they call the “Bent Pyramid”, which was an interesting topic for some engineering discussion. The ancient Egyptians while building the bent pyramid were not planning on making it bent, but they realized that with the initial angle that they started with, that the structure would not support itself, so they had to change the angle half way up (54 degrees to 44 degrees according to the guide)…back to the Dahshur Pyramid, we arrive, there are clouds right above it which made for an excellent picture with the blue sky and my circular polarizing filter…super psyched at this point. Then to make it even better, Dr. Denis says “who’s going in?”...Wait, in? ...Yes, I went inside the oldest pyramid ever…it was awesome. We climb up the stairs to the passageway inside the pyramid. The descent was not for the weak of mind or body. 3x3 foot passageway at a fairly steep angle. Luckily there were little ridges for steps and a decent hand railing. What seemed like 15 minutes of cramping my body and somehow descending into a tomb Indiana Jones style I arrive in the hottest, dustiest place I had ever been. But it was amazing. A room where the Pharoahs were kept mummified for thousands of years…so sick!!...walked a little further and up another staircase to another empty room where im sure there was other cool stuff at one point, but after a while I had to get out of there. It was incredibly hot with dust so thick it was hard to breathe. And now the fun part…remember that ridiculous descent I just did, yea I had to go back up…not fun. Another 15 minutes later and I was out of the pyramid, and into the nice cool relaxing outdoors right?...WRONG! cause If you didn’t remember i am in the friggin Sahara and it is hot as hell...down the stairs from the entrance, load up the vans, rock out to the wooh wooh wooh song, drive through all the slums, donkeys, towns, farms palm trees back to Cairo and back to the Hotel.

Back at the hotel we had to get everything ready for the week trip. So I get rid of everything I don’t need and leave it in Pete's extra bag. Pack up everything else, and head to Pizza Hut…yes I went to pizza hut, I’m sick of trying to find authentic Egyptian food, and this is because I have come to the realization that THERE IS NONE! Egyptian food sucks, so I am not trying to find any good Egyptian food anymore…“its every man for himself”, and with people getting sick left and right, I am not taking any chances. Plus I’m from America, I like American food. Just like Egyptians like Egyptian food…enough ranting…head to Cinnabon for the internet. 3 hours of blogging, websiting and photo editing later we load up the vans and head to the overnight train for the week long trip.

Get to the train station; wait around while the loud speaker screams at us in Arabic. I throw out my juice because it got way too warm and I didn’t wanna get sick. 3 minutes later I see a man walk to the trash and pick it up and walk away with it…pretty intense. A train comes and Sean Ben Matt and I look at each other and go…HELL NO! The thing looked like it was straight out of soviet Russia. Luckily it wasn’t our train. It was packed full of Egyptians and I was not about to get any where near it. Our train comes, its nice looking, Matt and I bunk together with Ben and Sean in the car next to us with a mutual door. Hang out for a bit, I start the Yacoubian Building book and get bored of it in about 4 seconds, typical Alex Orsi fashion... Dinner comes, FUC#$NG disgusting, no one touched it. I tried the lasagna looking thing and then realized that I was almost sick earlier in the day so I stopped. Sonja and Ruthie came over, we watched Superbad until the computer died. Then we played cards and hung out till about 2 AM till the girls left…I passed out…more for tomorrow.

Peace

-Al