A bit of this and that!!

I have been re-reading what I've written to date and feel that I've not gone anywhere near doing justice to the wonders and glories of this ancient world. I haven't touched on the fact that a lot of the pillars in the temples are carved in the shape of papyrus stalks - all with either closed buds or open flowers. Or that a lot of the temples were built over the time period of many Pharaoh's lives. Or that some of the cartouches in the temples were left blank because the workers got tired of carving the ruling Pharaoh's hieroglyphic name in the cartouch only to have to chip it away and put in a new Pharaoh's hieroglyphic name. Or that each Pharaoh tried to out do the preceding Pharaoh by having his paintings and carvings more lifelike and elaborate than the Pharaoh before. I haven't told you the story that our Habibi told us of the protector of a Pharaoh's concubines who did such a good job of protecting the women during the Pharaoh's absence that they were all pregnant on the return of the Pharaoh. As a punishment, the Pharaoh cut off one arm of this man. Perhaps, the Pharaoh cut off the wrong body part!!!! There are so many things that we learned as we went through the temples and the sites that I remember as I look at pictures and think back on our tours, but are so hard to put to paper. I hope that as you read my account of our adventures you will forgive me for not giving you more actual information. I truly wish I had taped all of what our Habibi said to us during our tour - I truly wish he would write a book!!!

I hope that all of you know that as the blog gets bigger, some of the posts are "hidden". To get these back to read - or to see just what we've put on, look under Sarah's post "Why we are doing this". Beneath the picture of Les and I is the title "Blog Archive" - the number beside each month indicates the number of posts from that month. Just click on the name of the month and all of the posts from that month will appear. You can go back and forth, month to month to read about our adventures.

I have failed to mention one of our Habibi's favorite sayings - "mashi mashi habibi" - which means "okey dokey my love"! When he explained, gave us directions, told us to be careful, laughing with us about something, he ended with - "mashi mashi habibi". I will always remember this phrase when I think of our Habibi. When he told us about options for activities he would say something like - and for those Habibi's who want to shop...or...those Habibi's who want a sheesha...or...watch your step Habibi...or...or...or... - can you tell that we came to love our Habibi!!!

Our Habibi also informed us that in Egypt things like - traffic lights, traffic lanes, taxi meters, cross walks - all are for decoration ONLY and mean nothing to an Egyptian!!