Abu Simbel featured in the doodle of the day

 

The Google doodle today shows the moment that the sun shines on the faces of the statues, drawing the attention of the world to this intriguing phenomena and highlighting the treasures that Egypt has to offer to its visitors.

 

Twice a year, on 22 February and 22 October, the face of the statue of King Rameses II inside the temple in Abu Simbel is lit up by the sun and dates coincide with his date of birth and his coronation respectively.

 

The temple, located deep in Upper Egypt, was carved into rocks on the banks of the river Nile. After the completion of the Aswan dam the temple and its unique feature of solar alignment would have flooded as the waters were rising so an archeological rescue mission in the form of moving the complete temple to higher ground was performed.

 

Seeing the magical moment when the sun lights up the statues of Rameses II, Amun-Ra and Ra-Horakhty draws large groups of tourists to the temple twice per year. The fourth statue in the inner chamber depicts the god of the underworld, Ptah, and his face remains in darkness as the others light up.

 

The Google doodle today shows the moment that the sun shines on the faces of the statues, drawing the attention of the world to this intriguing phenomena and highlighting the treasures that Egypt has to offer to its visitors.

http://dailynewsegypt.com/2012/10/23/abu-simbel-featured-in-the-doodle-of-the-day/

Egypt: Thumbs Up Africa Blog Four - Supershops and Mini Temples

For many years, Luxor has been a must-see for every tourist in Egypt. If not for the temples of Luxor, Karnak or Deir el-Bahri, then you would definitely touch ground here for the breathtaking Valley of Kings. Twenty-four-year old Mido Noubi runs six souvenir shops in the old city market, also known as the Luxor souk. He points to the empty street outside.

"As you can see, business is not going well. I hope, inshallah, this will change."

Egypt's tourism sector has not benefited from the Arab Spring. "Before the revolution, I had 150 customers on a bad day, but now I have three customers on a good day," says Mido calmly. "People are afraid, because the media depict the wrong image of Egypt. There is no problem here and the Egyptian people are very friendly."

Mido sells shishas, scarves of different fabrics and miniature pyramids and pharaohs. The shop, where Mido invites me in for tea, opened in June 2010. That's an unfortunate date if you recall that the Egyptian revolution started only five months earlier

Tea talk

However, the souk shop owners find comfort in solidarity.

"Muslims and Copts sit together and drink tea to work something out," Mido explains. "But then again, what can you do when the big tourist agencies from Sharm el-Sheikh build their own souvenir supershops? In contrary to these agencies, we keep the prices low. The supershops work on commission."

As I'm being served another cup of tea, a young European couple walks in. They take a short look around and leave without saying a word. Most shop owners in the souk try to lure foreigners with small talk in every world language. Experience has taught Mido that it is better to leave the customers for who they are.

"People do not like to be hassled. I learned this not long after my cousins and I opened our first shop back in 2001," he says.

A part of Mido's income once came from domestic tourism. "Egyptians are afraid, as they read in the media that there is many problems on the railway because of the revolution," he says. "This, too, is not the case."

Fewer tourists, lots of girlfriends

According to Mido, the government should come up with a solution for the tourism sector. He is not happy with the instalment of Morsi as prime minister.

"Hosni Mubarak was a bad man, but at least he made sure that the people were safe," he says. "The police did their job, but now nobody respects them anymore. Freedom is good, but too much freedom cannot be good. Now I see that people sell a lot of drugs and even guns."

Despite these acts of crime, Mido feels sure that tourists are safe in Egypt. He turns to me: "Tell your friends that Egypt is safe. The media sell one big lie. Tell them they should not believe what is written and let your friends please come back here."

A man of around 40 enters the shop. It is Mido's uncle. Yesterday a relative got married and they tell me how good the party was. Mido himself does not think about marriage yet. "No business, no marriage. But I do have a lot of girlfriends," he laughs.

I ask if he wants me to share this blog with him on Facebook. He laughs again. "No, I don't like Facebook, because that started all of this."

http://allafrica.com/stories/201210220692.html?page=2

Egypt reopens Pyramid of Chefren to tourists

http://english.ahram.org.eg/NewsContent/9/40/55372/Heritage/Ancient-Egypt/After-a-yearbreak,-Khafres-pyramid-and--royal-tomb.aspx

Dozens of journalists, photographers, TV anchors as well as top government officials at the Ministry of State for Antiquities (MSA) gathered Thursday at a large tent erected at the void area in front of the Khafre pyramid in Giza to celebrate the official re-inauguration of Egypt's second largest pyramid and six Old Kingdom royal and noblemen tombs.

“I am very happy today to reopen these tombs which were closed for more than ten years due to restoration,” an ecstatic MSA chief Mohamed Ibrahim told reporters.

The restored historic site includes the tomb of King Khufu’s granddaughter, along with those of five Old Kingdom noblemen.
The tombs, which were discovered in 1927 by American Egyptologist George Reinser, have been closed for restoration on more than one occasion in the past. In one of those endeavours, a site management plan was implemented at the Giza plateau the early 1990s to preserve these historic treasures.
The newly inaugurated tombs are located at the eastern and western side of Giza necropolis. They bear impressive facades, more like temples, and large chambers with rock-hewn pillars.

“Although these tombs may be sparse in decoration, they are rich in architectural features,” Ali El-Asfar, the director general of Giza antiquities department told Ahram online.

The first tomb, located at the eastern cemetery, which includes the Old Kingdom’s royal tombs, belongs to Princess Mersankh, the granddaughter of the builder of the Great Pyramid King Khufu. This tomb was originally intended for Mersankh's mother, Queen Hetepheres II, but was assigned to the daughter upon her sudden death.

At the time Mersankh's tomb was discovered in 1927, a black granite sarcophagus was found along with a set of Canopic jars, and a limestone statue depicting Queen Hetepheres II embracing the daughter. The sarcophagus stands now at the Egyptian Museum in Cairo while the statue is on display at the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston.

The second tomb, located at the western cemetery, belongs to Seshem-Nefer, the overseer of the two seats of the House of Life and keeper of the king's secrets, and is one of the largest tombs on the Giza Plateau.

This tomb is decorated with very fine reliefs and painting depicting funerary, hunting and offering scenes, as well as a depiction of the Seshem-Nefer's daily life along with his family and before his deities.

The third tomb belongs to Senefru-Kha-Ef, the king's treasurer and priest of the god Apis. The tomb’s inner walls also reveal typical scenes of the dead official and his children.

The fourth one was constructed for Nefer, the overseer of the soul priests. Its walls are decorated with scenes showing the Nefer's daily life with his family and dog.
The fifth tomb belongs to Yassen, the overseer of the king’s farms.

The sixth tomb was constructed for Ka-Em-Ankh, overseer of the royal treasury. This tomb has very distinguished false doors marked by different titles of the deceased as well as a portrait of him.

Engineer Waad Ibrahim, the head of the engineering department at the MSA, told Ahram online that restoration work aimed at returning these tombs to their original appearance at the day of their discovery.

The MSA discovered through scientific and technical studies that the large volume of visitors over the years had raised levels of humidity inside the structures to dangerous heights up to 80 per cent. These studies showed that each visitor to the pyramids and tombs releases an average of 20 grams of water vapour through perspiration, thus slowly causing damage to the plasters that cover part of the grand gallery. The walls of the Grand Gallery of the pyramid were also found to be covered with up to 2cm of salt minerals which damage the plaster.

Ibrahim said that the walls of the tombs have been cleaned and reinforced, graffiti left by previous visitors removed and inscriptions and paintings conserved. The ground floors are now protected by wood to preserve the original rock of the tombs as well as to facilitate visiting tours. New lighting and ventilation systems have been installed. A path linking the tombs to the Great Pyramid of Khufu was carved in order to facilitate movement across the plateau.

He told Ahram online that the project cost LE24 million (around $4 million) and complained that the MSA is short on funds to carry out more restoration work on the plateau, to render it more tourist-friendly, and to devise ways to stop horses and camels, popular vehicles among tourists for sightseeing, from disfiguring the plateau’s panorama view.

The MSA aims to open a new gate to the plateau at the Fayoum desert road soon, and to run a fleet of Taftafs (electric wagons) to supplant horses and camels.

As Khafre reopens, the MSA hopes to close Khufu for restoration in order to bring back the old man in a better shape.