Jordan - it's got to mean "Crossroad"

With another week long holiday on offer – this time because of a second Eid festival in the Muslim calendar, Eid-al-Adha which celebrates a story many faiths are very familiar with, the willingness of Abram to just about sacrifice his son – we were off to Jordan.

Most people, if you have ever even thought of Jordan the country, and not the basketball player, probably only associate it with one significant site – Petra, the stunning and spectacular city carved into the sides of mountains, and hidden from Westerners for centuries. But Jordan is more than this newest wonder of the world. It has an incredible geography that comes from being so close to two continental divides, and a history that seems only fitting when you consider it sits directly in the middle of so much historical, political, and religious turmoil. And with that, it was time for our one hour and bit flight from Cairo to Amman.

We had been told renting a car was the way to go in Jordan as it is a small country that is friendly on the foreign drivers. Needless to say, we did, but not without some serious nerves having just come from Egypt where driving is as much a contact sport as soccer is – not really allowed, but if no one is looking (and no one is, ever) all is fair! But driving truly is the way to go in this country as it frees you from the schedules of public transport that is trouble-some and confusing at the best of times.

After an evening of recovering from our tough travel day (remember that whole hour of flying?), we set out to explore.

The Promised Land!

On the first day we traveled to Mt. Nemo to visit where Moses first spied the ‘promise land’ and subsequently died at the ripe old age of 120 (we’re shooting for 125); from there we wound down to the River Jordan (more of a muddy stream smaller than 16 Mile Creek at this time of year) to see where it is believed Jesus got baptized by John the Baptist; after that it was a short drive to the Dead Sea which is so named because of its incredible levels of salt which is a result of sitting at the lowest point on Earth, some 400 m below sea level – floating in this sea is really something that has to be experienced!


Day two took us to the former Roman city, Jerash. This city is on the Eastern frontier of what was once the Roman Empire, and the ruins here are compared to Pompei. It is truly extraordinary to think of how far the Roman Empire expanded at a time when most travel was by row boat and foot! And then to see the ruins, some incredibly well preserved, elbowing up next to a modern Islamic city is quite something.

The Temple of Artemis - trivia: Who was Artemis?

Day three was a driving day to find that lost city of Petra, but on our way we crossed some stunning scenery as we moved through mountains that separated the relatively fertile soils of the Jordan valley to the barren desert that covers roughly 90% of the country. Also along the way was a stop at a Crusader castle for some more history – the beginning of the truly violent divide between Islam and Christianity. It is a sorry history on both sides, and something that has us hoping that the bad decisions of today (or the ones we think are good, but turn out not so well) do not have 1000 year repercussions!

After 7 hours of winding around 300 km of roads through the mountains we finally reached our destination, Petra! And just in time for the night walk – a highly recommended activity that takes you on a candle-lit walk to the city inside the rock. An eerie way to be introduced to such a place, but interesting as it is as close as possible these days to replicating what it must have been like to enter and leave the city in the dark. We followed this up with a trip to a cave believed to have been in use for some 6000 years, and for the last 1500 years at least, as a tavern for weary travellers. Today, it sits next to a posh guest house, but once inside you can almost taste the history.


The next day gave us a chance to really explore this magnificent creation of human ingenuity – a city protected and hidden, and very nearly preserved for hundreds, if not thousands of years. Believed to have been a place where the people of the area hid their bounty from controlling the region’s trading routes, it is more recently thought to have been a sacred place where many important people were buried in tombs. However you slice it, it is impressive to see and impressive to walk around in.

From here it was a short drive for our last adventure – out to the desert for some camping – which as it turned out is actually like staying in a pretty nice motel in the middle of nowhere that provides an outstanding restaurant, a pool, and even an ampli-theatre (that unfortunately sat empty while we were there). Now of course we have loads of desert here in Egypt, but what makes this desert interesting is the incredible rock formations and the fact this was the setting of the Arab uprising during World War I led by T.E. Lawrence, a British soldier made famous by Lawrence of Arabia. Epic and historical country for sure! Made even more epic when taken in at 60 km/h on your ATV! Not quite the romantic way of seeing the desert, like on the back of an uncomfortable camel, but pretty bad-ass none-the-less!

Bad-ass desert rovers!!

Now if your head is spinning after having read all this, simply grab a map of the world and find Jordan – it’s just east of Israel and the West Bank, a little north of Saudia Arabia, west of Iraq, and a little south of Syria and Iran. No wonder this place has seen it all. Amazingly, it stands proudly as a place of incredible beauty and history!

Iraq? No thanks.

Want to see more pictures? Tasha has pain-stakingly widdled our 400 wonderful photos to 150!! Seriously, 150. Maybe more like 75.

Run For The Cure 2010

Two weeks ago thousands gathered at the famous Giza Pyramids to run for the cure.
What an amazing experience to be part of!

Pink scarves, white t-shirts for the participants and pink for the survivors covering the sand in a sea of positive energy. Disorganized, random, chaos and faces filled with excitement and anticipation for the 2km run! Happy chatter mixed with the dusty desert sand filled the air. Nobody really sure where to stand or what to do - and then all of a sudden a mass of people began to yell and run across the desert, tripping on rocks, sand, and people! The mass of runners charged towards the pyramids with no clear path, dodging tour buses, donkeys, camels and each other along the way.

This is never an event that I imagined I would laugh at but as I ran on the sand, dodging eveything imaginable along the way, while listening to the yells and screams of excitement and laughter, I began to laugh too. I had to stop running to look around and take take it all in. It was amazing how much fun these people were having hurtling across the desert!

Then as I looked around, I realised that I was lost in a sea of people, separated from my friends and John. I stepped out of the group of runners and stood by the side watching for anyone that I knew... no such luck. So I stood and just took it all in... WOW! As I looked around at the people, my gaze brought me to the massive pyramid behind me. Holy cow!! I'm at the pyramids! I hopped the stone wall and walked up to the base of the pyramid and just stood in awe... in awe of such an amazing structure, in awe of the amazing energy encircling it, as thousands of people ran by, and eminating from it with the spirit of thousands of people past!

"Ring ring"... my phone! It was John... fewf!
We were reunited at the base of the great pyramid and finished the race together :)


Click on the photo below to see our photo album!

Tia & Graham's Blog

Check out some musings from our fellow partners in crime!
Graham & Tia in Cairo, Egypt!

Nuweiba Photos

A little slice of heaven on the Red Sea...

Canadian Thanksgiving in the quiet little beach town of Nuweiba, on the coast of the Red Sea - a perfect get away! We spent 3 days relaxing on the beach, reading, swimming, and eating yummy food with great friends :) It was nice to leave the busy rhythm of the city and work behind to slow down and laze around on pillows under the sun, as the even and gentle sound of the waves became the pace of life.

Click on the photo below to view the photos in our album :)



There are more Pyramids??

So off we went! Taking full advantage of our extended break to get out of the city and head a short drive away to the pyramids. It was all going according to plan - well, only if that plan included waking up late and not eating breakfast. We'd been on vacation for nearly three months now, keeping time was slowly becoming a real hassle. But we made it. And we were off. A day of traveling back in time, prepared for some heat, some sand, and some big pieces of stone!!


Everyone's going!!

Forty-five minutes later, it was all still going according to plan. Our mini-bus was headed towards Giza, the site of the Great Pyramids - man-made structures that have fascinated and captured imaginations for hundreds of (Euro-centric) years. Amazingly though, they have been around for nearly 4000 years - can we even build anything these days to last 4 years?

Glimpses of the pyramids through the highrises (which run right up to the edge of the Giza site) heightened our anticipation..........as we drove by. What?
Oh, our driver must know another, less crowded way. It is already 8:00 am and there are hundreds of buses and taxis, along with all their gawkers, so good thing we have a guide (or a teacher who's been here a couple of years) and driver that obviously know what's up.
But we keep going south. And then we turn left. And then we loop back around a bit before heading south again. We knew the pyramids were big and took up some space, but we're not idiots. Where are we going?

Oh, the other pyramids!?!

Now we kind of figured there were other pyramids, but we had no idea how close they were, or how impressive they are. Gets us excited about actually seeing The Great Pyramids!! So here instead of what we thought we'd be doing, is a little photo essay of our day seeing those "Other Pyramids".

The Step Pyramid of Saqqara.

This pyramid is the oldest known surviving stone monument - believed to have been built an incredibly 4600 years ago! It is the centre piece of a funery complex that covers some 7 square km. A French dude actually spent 75 years here poking around, and the job of excavation is still not done! Crazy sand!!


Camels! Obviously.

In awe of the Step Pyramid!

There they are!! The Great Pyramids of Giza - the closest we'd get today!

From there we headed a little further south - definitely not going to Giza today we finally guessed - to Memphis. Not where Elvis is said to be buried, although with the size of Saqqara, the burial ground for this ancient capital, who really knows! Anyways, we continued on to Memphis, which as was just mentioned, was the ancient capital of Egypt for a few hundred, possibly thousands, of years. Not much is left of that time except an open air museum built around the massive fallen statue of one of the most successful and ruthless leaders, Ramses II.

Making a case that these statues aren't as old as they say!

Bad ass Ramses II - big bad dude.

A sphinx - legend has it that these stone monuments are actually much smaller than they appear in photos because people are always trying to get a good photo - Like this one, which is actually about 3 m tall and 4 m long. Still pretty big for 3000 years ago!!

Possibly one of Ramses II underlings - he gets the last laugh as he's still standing!

From Memphis we continued further south to Dashur, site of the Red Pyramid and Bent Pyramid. After the success of the Step Pyramid, ancient architects made an attempt at making the first smooth faced pyramid. This resulted in the Bent Pyramid, which by it's name alone, can lead you to believe it didn't quite work out. As it happened, the angle the architects used was too steep, so about two-thirds of the way up they had to adjust, giving this pyramid it's bent look.

What IS impressive about this monument however is the fact that much of it's original facing is intact. This is rare as most of the limestone used to make the smooth finishes to the other pyramids, including The Great Ones, was taken down and used to build ancient Cairo a number of centuries ago. A feat of recycling, but somewhat of a shame!

The massive Bent Pyramid.

Despite the setbacks of the Bent Pyramid, the ancients were undeterred, and learning from their mistakes, managed to build the Red Pyramid - which was probably not called "Red" in it's time, but has since gotten the name because the weathered lime and sand stone has a hint of red in it - a result of it's outer limestone being looted!

The Red Pyramid - nice job architects! So straight, and the oldest of the 'true' pyramids.

A classic! - "I'm a giant...HA HA HA HA!"

Overheard in the desert:
Graham: "How long do you think we'd last out here?"
John: "I bet we're trying to drink our own urine before we can get to the shade of that pyramid over there."

An un-named piece of rock that has now been dubbed "Dinner's Pyramid". The treasures it must hold!!


Next up..."The first days of school - Four weeks in the making!"

Diving Safaga Photos

Check out our Red Sea diving safari photos!
Click on the picture to see our album...

Diving the Red Sea @ Safaga

Last week, with the extra time we've been given with our late start, a group of us headed to the Red Sea for a diving safari. We took a bus East to, and then South along the Red Sea coast, to Safaga where we boarded our boat, Ramadan 3. Over the next 3 days we floated on the sea diving into the breathtaking wonders of the underwater world of the Red Sea... amazing!

On our first dive we saw lots of little colourful fishies and the ever popular "nemos" too :)

On our second dive we saw a Puffer Fish and the beautiful, but poisonous Lion Fish!


On our night dive we each had a flashlight and we went down into the dark sea to explore... yikes! We saw TONS of Lion Fish (remember, poisonous!!!) and a Blue Spotted Stingray... very cool!


On day#2 we did a wreck dive into the "Salem Express", a 1991 wreck carrying hundreds of pilgrims returning from the hajj. It was an eerie feeling floating among the suitcases, clothing, and items of this underwater graveyard.


On day three, we did three more dives, including one to a depth of 30 metres so John could obtain his Advanced Open Water certification, allowing him even greater access to the wonders of seas and oceans. Throughout it all, we saw all sorts of creatures and sights, but our favourite underwater creatures have to be the Angel Fish, who always seem to be swimming in pairs!! Of course the eels, who always seem to be lurking in the coral are pretty cool too!


It was a great way to start our Egyptian adventure, and we are looking forward to more diving, in the Red Sea or the Mediterranean, and everything else this ancient area holds for us!

Peace & Love, Cairo Maniacs

Cairo Photos

Here are some pics of our first week in Cairo... The Nile, our school, some of our fellow teachers and our new apartment.

Click on the picture to view our album!

First Days of Cairo

Welcome to the land of ancient wonders!
CAIRO, EGYPT... AFRICA... holy cow!!!

We have landed in Cairo... surrounded by the echoes of great civilisations past (also surrounded by intense heat, traffic, people, car horns, dusty desert air, and the call to prayer over the loudspeakers). We arrived during Ramadan, the fourth pillar of the Islamic faith, when everyone fasts during the day. We stayed at the Maadi Hotel and during the days searched around Maadi(the area in Cairo where most expats live) for an apartment. We finally found one and are just starting to feel settled in.

Last week we enjoyed a float down the Nile on a Felucca - Egypt's ancient sailboats. We watched the sunset as we enjoyed the company of our fellow teachers, Cairo beer and Mexican food!? This week has been spent at school doing orientation and getting our classrooms ready. The school is about a 30 min bus ride outside of Maadi, where we live. All the teachers take the bus together to school and most of us all live in the same area which is nice :) Our work week is from Sunday to Thursday with Friday and Saturday as our weekend.... so I guess we say now TGITh!! Next week we are back at school and then as of Thursday we are off until September 19th!! The Ministry of Education here decided to give a longer holiday to celebrate Eid (the celebratiopn after Ramadan).

Hooray! I think we will do some diving in the Red Sea and possibly head over to Jordan for our holiday :)