Home » Egypt » Day 14. Fri 26th September Abu Simbel and the Nubian Village

We are getting to know the staff on the Doma now, and they are all very friendly and helpful. Osama the barman very kindly presented me with a scotch on the house last night, and it seems to have worked wonders - my bowels are working properly for the first time since I arrived (I never had any problem in Africa, but they don't seem to have taken so well to Egyptian food).

Day 14. Fri 26th September Abu Simbel and the Nubian Village

DaveMidgley
2005-10-22 13:54:22

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himself and one for his beloved wife Nefertari. The temple was rediscovered and excavated in the early 19th century by the Italian egyptologist G. B. Belzoni.

We are back at the Doma for lunch, and afterwards a few of us take a felucca ride up river, stopping off at the botanical gardens on Kitchener Island. On the way we pass the Old Cataract Hotel, where Agatha Christie wrote "Death on the Nile".

At five a group of us take a launch way upstream to a Nubian village for supper. We are met by a horde of kids who grab our hands and try to sell us wooden dolls for 5EGP. One teenager, Fatima, is very insistent. We walk up the sand dunes to a Nubian house, which is a strange mixture of primitive and modern, with a clay bread oven and an electric fridge. The rooms are bare and floored with sand. A double bed stands in the open courtyard, and a few of us plonk down on it, and only later realise that it is probably where the owners of the house actually sleep.

After a tour of the house we are taken to a large room where we sit on mats and eat supper - standard tourist fare, rice, chicken and chips. One of the daughters of the house offers henna tattoos and several people have a go.

We are followed back to the boat by the children, still plying their trade. They can be quite irresistable, and several people give way and purchase dolls. Fatima goes so far as to burst into tears when I refuse to buy, but I suspect a ploy and harden my heart!

We head for the Aswan Moon pub, where have arranged to meet the rest of the group who didn't come to the village. We sit and have a beer and Andrew samples a shisha, but by 9:30 they still haven't turned up, so Sarah, Roger and I get a calesh back to the Doma and get severely ripped off, 30EGP and the horse looks ill-fed and ill treated. Rather than just cracking his whip, the driver actually strikes the horse.
It turns out the others are still drinking on the Doma, so we give them a quick run-down on the evenings events, and then toddle off to our cabins.