Tea with the elephants

Nyier Abdou struggles with the joys and banalities of modern-day wanderlust
There aren't many things worth sitting in a train car for 13 hours, but seeing a black sky ease into cobalt blue over fields of baby palm trees and rows of sunflowers perking up their heads is a hell of a way to reassure oneself that you've left the big city and plunged south. At this time of year, Egyptians begin to grow finicky about going anywhere without a stretch of sand and sea, but a little dry heat never hurt anyone, and I had my heart set on Aswan for a get-away-from-it-all weekend. The tail end of the high season, but early enough to gamble on a few days of fine weather, a sojourn down south can feel positively exotic.
The train crowd heading down to Luxor and Aswan are a different breed altogether from the early-bird plane menagerie milling around Cairo Airport, and for this I was relieved. Domestic travel in Egypt is relentlessly uniform, with limited flight destinations keeping the clientele in the airport terminal waiting area an unvarying mix of bored local elite and unfathomably upbeat tourists, decked out in the requisite cruise-wear -- frumpy sun hats, corporate-issue visors, wispy scarves, lots of linen, practical shoes.
An eternal paradox plagues the local traveller: he is forever redirecting his course to avoid tourists and their attendant ilk -- the pushy vendor, the obsequious tour operator, the impersonal, yet obtrusive hotel staff. And yet it is he, and many more like him, who make up the very legion of invaders he shuns with such distaste. The overnight train (10 hours to Luxor, 13 for Aswan) may seem daunting, but I found the varied company -- backpackers, venturesome tourists, foreign residents and locals alike -- to be more attuned to my relaxed sensitivities.
A TASTE OF GREATNESS: Once, as a child, I came to Aswan and stayed in the famous Old Cataract Hotel, now run by Sofitel. I remember nothing of the trip, except an excursion with my parents slogging up a hill on camelback to the Qubbet Al-Hawa (Dome of Wind) shrine, near the Noblemens' Tombs. Our old guide, Mr Taher, would nod off as we oohed and ahed over the landscape, only to pop up again, refreshed, at just the right moment, with a bit of historic trivia. While a gaggle of five-stars and upscale four-stars have staked out prime spots on islands along the Nile -- the Oberoi on the tip of Elephantine; Club Med, on Amun Island; and Isis Island, to name a few -- nothing will ever usurp the Old Cataract as the address for the Aswan experience. The colonial-style manor with its stately terracotta façade and manicured gardens is a fixture of Aswan lore: Death on the Nile was filmed here; Winston Churchill trounced through here, and foreigners who turn up dreamy-eyed over The English Patient are not disappointed with this throwback to imperial elegance. Mind you, such rich nostalgia doesn't come cheap, but most other pleasures in this town do, so for a few days, you can afford to splash out (Egyptians pay LE285 for a single, LE440 if you want to see the Agha Khan Mausoleum from your window; foreigners pay $196 for a single, $303 for a Nile view; Tel. 097 316 000, Fax 097 316 011). Keep in mind, the high season drops off at the end of April, and prices cool down as temperatures rise.
There is something to be said for lazing about a pool with a jaw-dropping view of the Nile. There is also something to be said for the attention to detail that one expects from a hotel with so formidable a reputation -- a quality we found sadly lacking. We were assigned two rooms; one of us lucked out with a double room, but the other room was small, dark, and equipped with a single bed smaller than the one issued to me during my freshman year at university. The porter, who saw my face and seemed to anticipate my reaction, immediately picked up the phone and rang down to reception. I complained the bed was egregiously small. "You requested a single room," the concierge replied. For this kind of money, that explanation was not satisfactory.
The other room was sunny and charming on all counts, except that it had clearly been sprayed for bugs after it had been cleaned. Dead mosquitoes littered every surface, most notably, the bed. This detail, while promptly remedied with embarrassed smiles by an affable young man from housekeeping, is naturally off-putting. Later that day I was unable to get into my room and a crew had to come and replace the knob. But when you settle yourself into breakfast at the stunning 1902 Restaurant, though, such irritants will swiftly melt into insignificance.
People rave about sunset on the Cataract terrace, and with good reason; this kind of luxury can induce you to forget your ordinary life and fancy yourself part of history. Again, one must be prepared to pay for such serenity. We coughed up almost LE40 for nothing more than a cola, two coffees and a little square of chocolate cake. But dusk, encompassing the "elephantine" jumble of rocks bathing in the Nile across from us, was priceless.
KEEP YOUR EYE ON THE NILE: The last train from Cairo that goes all the way to Aswan (a 12.30am train terminates in Luxor) leaves at 10.00pm from Ramses Station. This puts you in Aswan at 11.00am, perhaps a little disoriented. I brought along a pillow, which seemed almost ludicrous when I piled myself into a taxi the night before, but at 4.00am, was revealed as a brilliant idea. Having settled in at the hotel, we set out for a stroll around the city and the markets, turning a deaf ear to eager taxi drivers, and felucca owners offering their services. The sun was sinking into the hills when we headed back towards the Cataract. Just beyond the Cataract, a few minutes walk uphill, reveals the sprawling Nubia Museum. The museum shuts in the middle of the day, which is both convenient for those who are tied to the pool during the hottest hours, and also offers something interesting to do in the early evening (summer hours: 9.00am to 1.00pm; 6.00pm to 10.00pm).
The child of a UNESCO initiative, this exhibition space is world-class. Air-conditioned, well-organised and dripping with Aswan's famous pink granite, the Nubia Museum brings together objects saved from submersion in the Nile floodplain and chronicles the history of Nubian culture. Detailing the rise and fall of the Nubian kings, exhibits have placards in both Arabic and English and traverse Pharaonic, Coptic and Islamic eras. In the glorious sunken enclave stands the museum's pride and joy -- an eight-metre-tall statue of the vainglorious Ramses II. The elaborate life-size display of rural Upper Egyptian life, meant to enlighten the urban and foreign, is a bit hokey, but educational nonetheless.
DOING THE TOURIST THING: To say that taxi drivers are easy to find is a laughable understatement, and it's not hard to set up a trip to various sites. We agreed on a fee of LE50 for a morning that would take in Kalabsha and Philae temples (not including boat fees, as both temples are on islands). At Kalabsha, we found the dock devoid of customers and the motorboat owners a bit testy. You'll be peevish too, when you realise that if you want to get to the temple, you are open to extortion. We paid LE25 for a round trip, with an hour on the island. The main temple, dedicated to the Nubian god Mandulis, was relocated here by a German-funded mission, along with other various smaller temples. At 10.00am, we were the only visitors in the place, which was both eerie and novel, having memories of being pressed in the pre-temple crush of Karnak. For me, the highlight was the pre-historic slabs of granite set up alongside the temple. One can easily make out animal etchings -- a giraffe, a deer, an elephant. I was astonished to find these artefacts indiscriminately stacked among unattended rubble -- even if, as the guard told us, people come to the island solely to see them. And yet, standing there, with the sun skipping off the lake around us and nothing but the odd dragonfly settling on a rock, the profound silence of the moment was not only moving, but inspiring. Stashed behind a glass case in a dim display room, the effect could never be so powerful.
As it turns out, we were spoiled by Kalabsha. We were just patting ourselves on the backs for outwitting the tourists when we arrived at the busy shores alongside Philae Temple -- sadly, a far more familiar hubbub. The difference was extraordinary and laid bare the extent to which tourists are at the mercy of the system. Philae, also relocated to higher ground in the 1970s by a joint UNESCO-EAO (the now defunct Egyptian Antiquities Organisation) mission, is admittedly a grander, more elaborate structure than Kalabsha, but the experience paled in comparison for no reason other than the sheer crowdedness. School trips, cruise tours and hordes of gawping visitors conspired to recall that uneasy feeling that we were playing out our roles in an epic, but ultimately prosaic performance: extras in the play, never the stars.
KEEPING IT SIMPLE: Taking a felucca in Aswan can make you feel like you've got it all wrong living in the city; you start thinking about becoming a sea-wanderer, a farmer, a slave to nature; you think the invention of the car was a grave moment in history. The wind on your cheek, the precarious lean of the boat, the sandswept hills gliding past -- were it not for the horde of cruise boats parked along the corniche, modernity might be forgotten. We disembarked at Elephantine Island, near the old Aswan Museum (an hour's ride cost us LE20, tip included). Though so many people stare with glassy-eyed wonder at this fixture of Aswan scenery, (the smooth, bulbous rocks lend it the name Elephantine), few take it upon themselves to trample its forested causeways. At the south end of the island are the ruins of the old city, to the north, the prim Oberoi hotel and the remains of an unfinished hotel -- a real eyesore. In between are dense stretches of greenery, as well as three Nubian villages untouched by the relocation project.
We set out to do a leisurely loop of the island, but ended up zigzagging: here returning to the same bright lavender schoolhouse in one of the villages; there stumbling on a counsel of black-and-white goats huddled in the shade. Making one's way through village alleys and forested paths, it is inconceivable that you are a mere two-minute boat ride from downtown. Here, sheep and goats reign supreme, pausing to eye the odd intruder with a haughty glance. Locals may at first appear cold or unfriendly, until one realises that they are simply treating you as you have always wished: they are leaving you alone, presumably in the hopes that you will do them the same service. Seeking out a boat landing from which to cross over to the so-called Island of Plants (also known as the Botanical Island), we came across a couple of tourists staggering up a rocky slope and charging forward into the brush -- a heartening sight, and further proof that local inhabitants see just enough visitors not to be surprised, and few enough not to be bothered.
A little dinghy parked at the bottom of the slope was manned by an elderly boatman, who agreed to row us over to the next island (LE5). It was a slow, somewhat shaky journey, and somewhere in between the two shores it struck me that the boat was not equipped with anything that floats -- a lifesaver, for example. But the oars plunged rhythmically into water, which sloshed gently against the boat, and I was lulled into a false sense of security. In the distance, what looked like a fleet of feluccas shimmered in the afternoon sun. My senses seemed heightened, my skin tingled. It was a calm, almost spiritual moment.
And then it broke.
TOO MUCH OF A GOOD THING: No sooner had we landed at the Island of Plants -- also known as "Kitchener's Island," for English general Horatio Herbert Kitchener -- than the spell of bliss was rudely shattered. Packs of tours were ploughing off boats. Sellers hawking knick-knacks and postcards veered into view. Groups speaking Italian, German, French and English jostled and bumped until everyone was sorted, seperate and clustered around their guide, and moving along the esplanade. You can't fight it. We went with the flow. The island is given over to the trees and plants collected with obsessive gusto by Kitchener, known for his 1898 recapture of Sudan. It is now tidily maintained, each tree bearing a plaque that tells you its name, in both Arabic in English, and where it's from and its purpose (in Arabic). Two well-kept cobblestone pathways, equipped with benches, run the length of the island. Cats, well fed on candies and picnic leftovers, pounce on fallen leaves and nap luxuriously in the sun on patches of lush green grass. While these polished gardens are indeed lovely, they suffer the same twist of fate as other sites identified by tour operators as standard stopping points. The flavour of the experience is tainted by the overtly foreign atmosphere.
There is no ferry from the Island of Plants. You can either grab another felucca, or arrange a boat. Our dinghy was still planted at the dock when we emerged, and we hopped on and headed back to Elephantine. The further Kitchener's Island receded, the more calm was restored. By the time we hit the shore, silence again prevailed, and we re-embarked on the meandering journey across the island to the closest local ferry point (25 piastres to the corniche).
LUCK OF THE DRAW: It was with weary legs and freshly tanned faces that we piled ourselves back onto the train. By now we were a little tired and grumpy, and suddenly, the 13-hour train ride didn't seem so romantic. We settled into our seats, glanced suspiciously at one another, wondering who would be the lucky one to collapse in sleep first, and hoped for the best.
Alas, it was only to get worse. Taking the train is always a crapshoot, as you never know who your neighbours are going to be. Behind us, we had a real gem: a man watching the night-time soap operas on a portable television, loud enough for everyone to hear. When I asked him to turn it down, he looked up at me in utter surprise, shocked to find someone intruding on his world and genuinely befuddled that he was being reprimanded for so innocent an act. I guess some people haven't heard that headphones were invented.
Luckily, the soap fiend disembarked the train at Luxor. Unfortunately, a few seats up, we were gifted a man who didn't have enough money for his ticket. Long, growling sessions commenced with a team of conductors, who were clearly outraged. Among themselves, they grumbled about whether they would keep letting such things happen, and the man, along with his companion, were removed.
I reminded myself of the manifold complications involved in air travel -- delays, overbooking, getting to and returning from the airport. I repeated these woes several times to myself as a reminder that we had made the right choice, which I still believe we did, although my travelling companion, who went sleepless, wasn't so sure. But then again, he didn't have the pillow.
Recommend this page
© Copyright Al-Ahram Weekly. All rights reserved
Send a letter to the Editor