We've made our way down the Nile and visited quite a few temples the past few days. Unfortunately, they all start to blur together and look the same. I've had the same experience with chateaus in France and cathedrals in Britain. Except now I'm older and have even less brain capacity.We are now in Luxor, renamed several times (including Thebes by the Greeks.) The Arabs conquered, saw all of the temples in the city but thought they were old palaces, and thus named the area Al-Uqsur ("The Palaces".)
It is also the hassle capital of Egypt. Souvenir vendors are everywhere and will follow you for blocks. I've seen them throw shirts onto people in the hopes that they will buy them. Sometimes they do, sometimes they don't. This doesn't stress me out that much though--the gypsy children of Istanbul are much, much scarier. Plus, I'm from New York--I know how to pointedly ignore people and look unfriendly. However, there are a few other things that cause me great stress in Egypt: the first is hoarding enough clean drinking water (I think I'm always thirsty because I know I can't drink from the tap), the second is having enough small bills to tip. There is a huge unemployment rate here in Egypt and people depend on tips for income. You have to tip for everything, including using public restrooms (god forbid you actually want toilet paper.) I'm totally fine with the tipping, I understand people need to make a living, it's just a matter of my having the small bills for it. Nothing makes me happier here than buying a large bottle of water and getting a bunch LE5 bills (=$1) back in change. No lie.
On a side note, I'm sorry to report that the seafood buffet on the cruise ship did not sit well with Mom. She had a bad bout of food poisoning yesterday. She's better today and managed to endure both the Valley of the Kings (awesome!) and the Temple of Hatshepsut.
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