April 2004
Apparently there is only place in the world where you can find the purple stone, called porphyry which comes from a remote quarry in the Eastern desert in Egypt. Quarried by the Romans, there are still gigantic columns of this stone all over Rome and the 8 columns that once stood at Baalbek, in Lebanon are now in the Hagia Sophia in Istanbul. Apparently Napoleon looked for this quarry which was abandoned by the Romans 642AD and never found it. But there we were looking at the ruins of two Roman temples, and picking up the purple stone which was strewn all over the mountainside. The amazing thing about the few remaining parts of the temple was the clearness of the carving. No pollution, or rain, or anything had softened its corners or changed its form. Normally I think of ruins as weathered, but somehow in this hot, dry, desert, the rock remained as it must have been when it was first put in place!
It was easily 90 degrees and the air was hazy. We had driven all the day before, coming from Cairo down along the red sea to Hurghada and then turning west into the desert. I had slept outside the tent, as usual, but this time even at 10pm the air was so warm I was walking around in sandals and a sleeveless dress and feeling hot. (Normally I'm the only person who stays warm at night because of my winter snow camping bag!) And in the morning, I was woken up by the buzzing of insects which I first thought were bees because of their striped yellow and black bodies. But their bodies had the shape and wings of a fly and it turned out that in fact, that they were flies and not bees. So far, this had been a very different desert experience than what I was used to where the air normally turned very cold as soon as the sun set. In that kind of cold, I would be wearing all the clothes I used to wear to cross country ski in Vermont. But, now it's April and the desert remains warm throughout the night. In fact it is its most pleasant at night. During the day, one feels as if one can hardly breathe!
The other quarry we visited, was Mons Claudianus and, located at its base, this had the most complete Roman town I have ever seen. In this town they have discovered letters (ostraka) which talk about payments to the Egyptian workers and food supplies sent to them from their families in the Nile town of Quena. These workers were paid twice the amount of workers in the Nile valley, but since these quarries are so isolated, there is no habitation for miles, one can see why the payments had to be higher.
The rock in Mons Claudianus is a beautiful, white granite with large dark specks. Apparently King Fouad, reopened the quarry so he could get some of this granite for one of his palaces. Still the feat of getting this granite out from these remote places is quite mind boggling. After climbing around the mountain, we found one column, the diameter of which was about six feet, broken in two and simply left in its place which was a good climb away from the village. And all over the mountain side there were rocks which bore the marks of quarrying tools.
The group driving our cars and leading the trip were not Bedouins. Every other time I have gone to the desert, it has been with the Bedouin. But this trip leader was from Cairo and one noticed the difference in his crew. One of the most striking differences was that they were not involved in music – none of them brought instruments! The Bedouin we usually travel with, are always playing the drums and singing. They do this just to amuse themselves regardless of the tourists. Fortunately for us though, one of our campers had brought his guitar and he began to play American folk music. Later one of the Egyptians on the trip remarked how similar the type of songs were between the lyrics of the Bedouin music and that of the American folk. While the music is totally different, the ideas expressed are apparently almost the same.
One mystery on the trip was a long stone wall surrounding only a rock. It was put together like a mini fortress and located not far from one of the few wells in the desert, but no one seems to know what its purpose was, or what it signifies. The Egyptologist on the trip said she had read that it existed, but that there was no information known to us about its purpose and she didn't even know exactly where it was located. I guess the desert will keep that secret to itself!
On the way home we stopped at the Red Sea for a swim. Back on the coast, the tremendous heat of the desert had been driven away by a strong wind that left white caps all over the surface of the aqua green water. It was so windy that only five out of twenty of us went in. But after three days of desert sweat and sand, being tossed in warm, salty water was an incredible relief. It made the nine hour drive back to Cairo durable. We had only been in the desert two nights but the remoteness of this place made it seem like we had been away for centuries.
I can't describe the shock of coming out of three days of incredible quiet, space, and subtle colors of rock and sand into the bustling crowded whirl of the streets of Cairo. This must be what every ancient traveler from the desert has experienced – after days and days of desert this sudden mass of Cairo emerging and enveloping and erasing any sense of quiet and calm. And yet in the madness and rush with its color and people, I felt that sense of recognition, that yes, I was back home. As I tumbled into a taxi which appeared as soon as I put my hand out into the street, the driver looked at me and said,"You're tired." "Yes," I replied, "I just came from the desert." And the whole ten minute ride back to my Zamalek apartment he joked and chatted with that same Egyptian hospitality that I know so well and which in the end makes you feel less tired and happy to be back in Cairo.