It's been a while since I last blogged and now, I am very very behind...I haven't even finished my Egypt trip entries! Yikes.
Ok, so here's the scoop right now. After being in Dublin for a few days, I left for Cork. Cork is Ireland's second largest city. The streets are cleaner here and it has a better feel to it than Dublin. I stayed in a hostel at the top of a hill for 1 week and I just moved out on Monday.
The week in the hostel was fun at first because I met new people however, it gets really tiring if you have to change rooms all the time. Bascially, you have to check out by 10:30am and put all your things into storage on the ground floor. Then, at 2pm, you are allowed back into your room and you have to lug your luggage back up the stairs to your new room. It is also hard to stay in a room with other people. When you come home at night and anyone is sleeping, you need to find your pj's, toothbush, etc. in the dark. You have no idea how much I appreciate having a place to live now. I just wanted to go to the washroom without carrying my toiletries in a plastic bag!! Oh yeah, the kitchen.....it is not the funnest thing in the world to cook with 20 other people. I really felt like I was back in residence again.
My new place is located about 5-10 minutes from the City Centre. It is a little house that I share with two others. One, is a girl from Toronto and the other is a Irish guy. Both seem to be really nice and easy going.
I also started some part time work as a waitress at a cafe called Cafe de la paix. Obviously, it's not my ideal job but it will allow me to pay the rent and meet new people while I search for a chiropractic job. It pays minimum wage plus tips. The bad thing is that Irish people don't really tip anywhere. Oh well, a job's a job.
A funny thing happen yesterday while I was at the internet cafe. I was reading an e-mail from two of my classmates (Trina and Brian) who were coming to Cork. The e-mail had stated that they arrived the night before and that they would call me that day. All of a sudden, I hear "Amanda?". I never turn around now when I hear my name because I don't know very many people here and don't expect to run into anyone I know. Turns out, I ran into Trina and Brian! They are now in Cork, interviewing with some chiros.
Some possible news on the chiro. job hunt. I spoke with a chiro. in Dublin this morning who is looking for an associate. Over the phone, she seems to be very nice. I will take a bus over to visit the clinic to see how I like it....fingers crossed......it would not be fun to move and find a place again but for a chiro. job, it's worth it. I have just startd to settle down in Cork....but I guess, if I moved once, I could do it again. I wish Max and Heather were still in Dublin. I got an e-mail from them a few days ago and they have decided to leave Ireland and move back to Canada.
Ok, that's all for now. I miss you all!
Thursday, September 27, 2007
Saturday, September 15, 2007
Bye bye Luxor, Hello Aswan
The next day, we flew to Aswan which is even further south of Cairo than Luxor. When we reached Aswan, Irene felt sick and faint so we slept for a few hous at Killany Hotel. For dinner, we had Kushari again. This is a supprisingly good Egyptian dish which consists of rice, macaroni noodles, fried onion. lentils and tomato paste. It is an unusual combination that works well.
Aswan is a pretty small town and there weren't a lot of tourists here which suited us just fine. Here, we met a really cool cab driver named Mohammed who became our personal cab driver whom we called whenever we needed a ride.
At night, we went to the sound and light show at Phili Temple. We took a boat across to the temple which we shared with an Australian and a British guy who was orginally from Malaysia!
Phili Temple's sound and light show was a bit corney but the lights were fantastic!
Aswan is a pretty small town and there weren't a lot of tourists here which suited us just fine. Here, we met a really cool cab driver named Mohammed who became our personal cab driver whom we called whenever we needed a ride.
At night, we went to the sound and light show at Phili Temple. We took a boat across to the temple which we shared with an Australian and a British guy who was orginally from Malaysia!
Phili Temple's sound and light show was a bit corney but the lights were fantastic!
Thursday, September 13, 2007
Day 2 in Luxor
Our hotel recommended a tour guide to us and so, we woke up on our second day in Luxor to meet Aladdin (I kid you not). Aladdin was pretty awesome. He spoke Arabic, English, French, German, Spanish and Japanese fluently and several other languages partially. He also teaches scuba diving in Australia and all around the world.
We started off the day with the Valley of Queens. There, we visited the tomb of Queen Tutti and a tomb with a fetus in it. The fetus was not mummified because it was never born.
Next, we went to the huge, valley of the kings. There are 62 tombs here and they rotate the tombs that they open every 6 months to allow the tombs to rest. Here, we visited the tomb of King Ramses IV,2. He ruled for 4 years, so it took 4 years to build the tomb. This was considered to be a short period to rule so his tomb was not very elaborate. The hieroglyphics on the wall mostly come from the book of the dead. The second tomb we saw was that of Ramses IX who ruled for 6 years. Our last stop was the tomb of Ramses I who ruled for 16 years. This tomb was a lot deeper that the other two and was very hot inside.
After the Valley of the Kings, we went to the temple of Hapsheptuh (you all know that I can't spell)....and saw the tomb of Monthemhat (sp?).
After our tour, we took a boat ride with our guide across the Nile from the west to the east bank.
We arrived back at our hotel around 2pm. This is when it is the hottest so we took a 2 hour siesta.
In the evening, we went to the temple of Karnack that was built by 50,000 people over 1500 years. We had a very busy day!
We started off the day with the Valley of Queens. There, we visited the tomb of Queen Tutti and a tomb with a fetus in it. The fetus was not mummified because it was never born.
Next, we went to the huge, valley of the kings. There are 62 tombs here and they rotate the tombs that they open every 6 months to allow the tombs to rest. Here, we visited the tomb of King Ramses IV,2. He ruled for 4 years, so it took 4 years to build the tomb. This was considered to be a short period to rule so his tomb was not very elaborate. The hieroglyphics on the wall mostly come from the book of the dead. The second tomb we saw was that of Ramses IX who ruled for 6 years. Our last stop was the tomb of Ramses I who ruled for 16 years. This tomb was a lot deeper that the other two and was very hot inside.
After the Valley of the Kings, we went to the temple of Hapsheptuh (you all know that I can't spell)....and saw the tomb of Monthemhat (sp?).
After our tour, we took a boat ride with our guide across the Nile from the west to the east bank.
We arrived back at our hotel around 2pm. This is when it is the hottest so we took a 2 hour siesta.
In the evening, we went to the temple of Karnack that was built by 50,000 people over 1500 years. We had a very busy day!
Off to Luxor, Egypt
On our third day in Egypt, we left Cairo for Luxor. Luxor is in Upper Egypt. Note: Upper Egypt is actually the South of Egypt on the map and Lower Egypt is the North. They name Upper and Lower based on the flow of the Nile.
Our hotel in Luxor was a palace compared to that of Cairo. Here, we met the cutest kitten, named King Tut. He lives at the hotel and is the manager's pet.
Funny thing happened at the hotel. I went to flush the toilet and it wouldn't work so we called the front desk to tell them to fix the toilet, when the guy came, he tried the flush and of course, there was nothing wrong with it....I just didn't know how to use an Egyptian toilet....stupid me.
In Luxor, we rented bikes for the day but we didn't get very far. It was really hot in Luxor because it's closer to the Equator than Cairo. I'm not sure what happened but I was not feeling very well at all. Instead of going to a temple outdoors, we went to the Mummification Museum so that I didn't pass out from the heat.
At the Museum, we learnt the process of mummification, learned about the weighing of the heart, saw alabaster canopic jars where they used to store the liver, instestine, stomach and lungs of the people that they mummified.
At night, we went to Luxor Temple. This was one of my favorite sites. After the sun goes down, they light up the whole temple. We wandered through courtyards and sancuaries that were dedicated to the Theban gods. There was also an avenue of Spinxes and colosal statures of Ramses II and a pink granite obelisk.
Our hotel in Luxor was a palace compared to that of Cairo. Here, we met the cutest kitten, named King Tut. He lives at the hotel and is the manager's pet.
Funny thing happened at the hotel. I went to flush the toilet and it wouldn't work so we called the front desk to tell them to fix the toilet, when the guy came, he tried the flush and of course, there was nothing wrong with it....I just didn't know how to use an Egyptian toilet....stupid me.
In Luxor, we rented bikes for the day but we didn't get very far. It was really hot in Luxor because it's closer to the Equator than Cairo. I'm not sure what happened but I was not feeling very well at all. Instead of going to a temple outdoors, we went to the Mummification Museum so that I didn't pass out from the heat.
At the Museum, we learnt the process of mummification, learned about the weighing of the heart, saw alabaster canopic jars where they used to store the liver, instestine, stomach and lungs of the people that they mummified.
At night, we went to Luxor Temple. This was one of my favorite sites. After the sun goes down, they light up the whole temple. We wandered through courtyards and sancuaries that were dedicated to the Theban gods. There was also an avenue of Spinxes and colosal statures of Ramses II and a pink granite obelisk.
The Great Pyramids
I'm sorry that i'm really behind on my blog. I arrived in Dublin last night and now I am staying with my classmate Max and his wife Heather. I have my orientation session for the work in Ireland program tomorrow.
Back to three weeks ago......our second day in Cairo faired much better than the first. We woke up early and met our tour guide and driver. The guide was a young female around our age who spoke english pretty well. She was cheerful and happy and was a native of Cairo. We had a private mini van for the 3 of us plus the guide and driver.
Our first stop was in Dahshur. Here was saw our first pyramid! It was the Red Pyramid and it was 7000 years old. We crawled inside the pyramid and explored 2 chambers. It's really really hot inside the pyramid. The other pyramid here was the Bent pyramid. We couldn't go inside so we walked around. The special thing about this pyramid was that it still had some of it's orginal coating on it. Most of the coating has fallen off the rest of the pyramids. Apparently, there are 99 pyrmaids in Egypt (finished and non).
Next stop, Memphis Museum. Here we saw a lying down statue of King Ramses II and the second largest spinx in Egypt, which, compared to the largest is quite small.
Next was Saqqara and the museum where Irene fell asleep during the documentary. Here is also where the step pyramid is found. It is the oldest pyramid and a precursor to all the others.
Final destination- Giaza and the great pyramids. It interesting here because the pyramids are actually situated pretty close to town. When taking pictures, you can see the town in the backdrop. We decided to climb into the biggest of the pyramids. This was quite the feat.....lots and lots of stairs. It's pretty cramped inside and you have to climb hunched over. I hit my head on the ceiling so many times. We climbed into Kufu/Chehop's tomb. We also saw the great spinx. At sunset, Irene and I rode a camel, which Dave rode a donkey in the dessert, around the pyramids. It was amazing!
Back to three weeks ago......our second day in Cairo faired much better than the first. We woke up early and met our tour guide and driver. The guide was a young female around our age who spoke english pretty well. She was cheerful and happy and was a native of Cairo. We had a private mini van for the 3 of us plus the guide and driver.
Our first stop was in Dahshur. Here was saw our first pyramid! It was the Red Pyramid and it was 7000 years old. We crawled inside the pyramid and explored 2 chambers. It's really really hot inside the pyramid. The other pyramid here was the Bent pyramid. We couldn't go inside so we walked around. The special thing about this pyramid was that it still had some of it's orginal coating on it. Most of the coating has fallen off the rest of the pyramids. Apparently, there are 99 pyrmaids in Egypt (finished and non).
Next stop, Memphis Museum. Here we saw a lying down statue of King Ramses II and the second largest spinx in Egypt, which, compared to the largest is quite small.
Next was Saqqara and the museum where Irene fell asleep during the documentary. Here is also where the step pyramid is found. It is the oldest pyramid and a precursor to all the others.
Final destination- Giaza and the great pyramids. It interesting here because the pyramids are actually situated pretty close to town. When taking pictures, you can see the town in the backdrop. We decided to climb into the biggest of the pyramids. This was quite the feat.....lots and lots of stairs. It's pretty cramped inside and you have to climb hunched over. I hit my head on the ceiling so many times. We climbed into Kufu/Chehop's tomb. We also saw the great spinx. At sunset, Irene and I rode a camel, which Dave rode a donkey in the dessert, around the pyramids. It was amazing!
Thursday, September 6, 2007
Ripped Off, Left, Right and Centre
We woke up late to our first day in Cairo with breakfast of tea, eggs, jam and bread. We wanted to go to Alexandria so we headed to the train station. The hotel manager had told us that train leaves every hour but when we got to the station, the ticket office told us the next train was in a few hours. The funny thing about Egypt is that you can ask 10 people for directions or information and you will receive 10 completly different answers. Also, when someone says no, the no is flexible. This also holds true for the police there. No can easily be turned into a Yes with some Egyptian Pounds.
We then decided to go to the bus station. The tourist office told us it was a 2 minute walk...we ended up taking a 10 minute cab ride. Did I also mention that there was a heat wave in Cairo....the temperatures went over 40 degrees, and this was not including humidity.
We paid for tickets at the bus station and then realised that the sights we wanted to see would have been closed by the time we got there b/c Alexandria was 3 hours away. In Egypt, there is no such thing as a refund but we did manage to haggle our way into getting half of our money back. We then decided to go to the Egyptian Museum instead.
The Egyptian Museam is huge. If you were to visit each artifact for 4 seconds, it would take you 3 weeks to see everything. The displays are also very poorly labelled. If labels were luckly enough to be present, they were in either english, arabic or french. So, we decided to hire a tour guide. Big mistake. This guy charged us 80E.P. for a 1-hour super tour in which we ran around the whole museum like chickens with our heads cut off. He was also not very knowledgable at all. After the 1 hour, we ditched the guide and wandered around ourselves. Some highlights included animal mummies, jewelery, tombs and mummificaiton.
After the museum, we were hungry so we headed to the local market Khanal-Khalili (please forgive my spelling). There we tasted a bean dish, Foul, which was excellent. One thing I really enjoyed about Egypt was their food. It was tasty and cheap.
After dinner, we saw some beautiful mosques and walked around the market where there were swindlers everywhere. People kept thinking that Irene and I were Japanese. We were glad to have Dave with us. Women don't get much say in Egypt and Irene and I were often ignored.
When we got thirsty, we decided to sit in a coffe shop to have Sheshia and tea. What a rip off. They had a tourist menu and a local menu. The tea was 10E.P., about 2CAD which is more expensive than Canada....and guess what, they brought us LIPTON tea!!!! Urgh.
On our way back to the hotel, we saw a street vendor get his goods taken away by the Tourist Police. In Egypt, there are Tourist Police on nearly every street corner. Tourist are supposed to go to them to report anything that has happened. Anyways, the street vendor had a fit in the middle of the road and then tried to run away from the police. This was a funny site as he had a a lot of adipose tissue (i.e. he was fat).
Lessons Learn from Today
- only ask directions from women
- no one actually knows where anything is
- there are no such thing as a map of Cairo with street signs
- we are walking dollar signs
- plan, plan, plan.
Wednesday, September 5, 2007
The Sketchiest Hotel
Thursday, August 23, 2007
We arrived in Cairo, Egypt at 2am. It was 30 degrees and very humid. From the moment we got off the plane, I realised that this place was going to be very different from Canada or Europe. When we walked into the airport, we had to get a visa. You would think that this would be easy but, there were no signs anywhere. We lined up in two wrong lines before someone finally told us that we had to purchase our visa from the bank....how were we supposed to figure that out??
After getting through customs, we found our friend Dave, from Toronto, who had come to meet us at the airport. Dave's flight arrived 12 hours earlier than ours.
We got into a cab and drove to the hotel. The driving in Cairo, can at best be described as terrible. There is no regard for any lanes, nor traffice lights or signs of any kind, whatsoever. Many people actually enjoy driving in between lanes more than in them. The horn is used every minute by each and every driver. It is used instead of signalling. Since this was my first experience in a 3rd world country, I was scared for my life. Irene and Dave were laughing at me.
We then arrived at the SKETCHIEST hotel ever, the Berlin Hotel. There was supposed to be an elevator, however, it was not working and we had to climb 4 flights of stairs. The building seemed over 100 years old and that was probably also the last time it was cleaned. This is what happens why you travel on a student budget and pay 7 USD each per night. At that point, all I could do was laugh and go to bed.
We arrived in Cairo, Egypt at 2am. It was 30 degrees and very humid. From the moment we got off the plane, I realised that this place was going to be very different from Canada or Europe. When we walked into the airport, we had to get a visa. You would think that this would be easy but, there were no signs anywhere. We lined up in two wrong lines before someone finally told us that we had to purchase our visa from the bank....how were we supposed to figure that out??
After getting through customs, we found our friend Dave, from Toronto, who had come to meet us at the airport. Dave's flight arrived 12 hours earlier than ours.
We got into a cab and drove to the hotel. The driving in Cairo, can at best be described as terrible. There is no regard for any lanes, nor traffice lights or signs of any kind, whatsoever. Many people actually enjoy driving in between lanes more than in them. The horn is used every minute by each and every driver. It is used instead of signalling. Since this was my first experience in a 3rd world country, I was scared for my life. Irene and Dave were laughing at me.
We then arrived at the SKETCHIEST hotel ever, the Berlin Hotel. There was supposed to be an elevator, however, it was not working and we had to climb 4 flights of stairs. The building seemed over 100 years old and that was probably also the last time it was cleaned. This is what happens why you travel on a student budget and pay 7 USD each per night. At that point, all I could do was laugh and go to bed.
From Toronto to Amsterdam
Wednesday, August 22, 2007
Irene and I were on the 10pm flight from Toronto to Amsterdam. I was pretty excited about being on an airplane but the novelty wore off after a few hours. After not sleeping on the flight due to excess energy, we landed at Schiphol Airport at 5am, Toronto time, which was 11am, Dutch time. We had 10 hours to kill so we decided to walk around Amsterdam.
We took a train to Central Station and tried to find our way around. It's a bit difficult when you have no map and have never been there...luckily, the Dutch people are very helpful. We decided to have dim sum because we walked by Chinatown before heading to the Anne Frank Huis. When we ordered water at the restaurant, we did not know that we were ordering mineral water instead of tap water. 2.50 Euro for water! That's crazy. Lesson learned.
After lunch, we walked to the Anne Frank House. This is where Anne Frank and her family hid during the Holocaust. The house itself was bigger than I imagined it to be, but since she wasn't ever allowed outside for 2 years, it must have turned small quickly. Anne Frank died 1 month before she was released in Bergen-Belson and her diaries were kept and given to her father.
After the museum, we walked around Amsterdam and then headed back to the airport.
Here is one of the many canals in Amsterdam.
Irene and I were on the 10pm flight from Toronto to Amsterdam. I was pretty excited about being on an airplane but the novelty wore off after a few hours. After not sleeping on the flight due to excess energy, we landed at Schiphol Airport at 5am, Toronto time, which was 11am, Dutch time. We had 10 hours to kill so we decided to walk around Amsterdam.
We took a train to Central Station and tried to find our way around. It's a bit difficult when you have no map and have never been there...luckily, the Dutch people are very helpful. We decided to have dim sum because we walked by Chinatown before heading to the Anne Frank Huis. When we ordered water at the restaurant, we did not know that we were ordering mineral water instead of tap water. 2.50 Euro for water! That's crazy. Lesson learned.
After lunch, we walked to the Anne Frank House. This is where Anne Frank and her family hid during the Holocaust. The house itself was bigger than I imagined it to be, but since she wasn't ever allowed outside for 2 years, it must have turned small quickly. Anne Frank died 1 month before she was released in Bergen-Belson and her diaries were kept and given to her father.
After the museum, we walked around Amsterdam and then headed back to the airport.
Here is one of the many canals in Amsterdam.
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