Egypt - February 2

We left at Hurghada at 7:30am and arrived in Cairo airport around 4:30pm. The extra 2-3 hours in the middle were taken up by a minor crisis. The bus (different one from yesterday's) broke down and had to be taken to a garage, and then we had to switch to another bus - something which would have taken a lot longer if we didn't find an empty bus at the lot where we waited for the replacement. Danny filled up the waiting period by telling us about the Cairo Geniza (had to finish the story on the bus).



The whole drive is along the Red Sea, towards the Suez canal - beautiful sea and a continuous stream of new touristic developments - tens of thousands of living units - all of which seemed empty.

Only after arriving at the airport did we hear from Danny that the embassy had forbidden us to go on this road, something which seems like an exaggerated reaction to a warning by the Israeli Foreign Ministry about dangers on this road (perhaps they thought we'll go through the town of Suez, in which there apparently were riots). Their suggestion was that we fly individually to Europe on various flights out of Hurghada - Danny refused. This is just one of the many decisions Danny and Rami had to take - they were responsible for the lives and well being of 30 people - a huge responsibility!

The airport was busy but not insane. The funny thing is that flights to Israel do not depart out of the new terminal from which the flights to Europe and North America depart. So we were in a terminal full of people on their way to Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Jordan... But everybody was calm and peaceful and despite a 3-hour delay we all felt calm and rather sad that this adventure is coming to its end (ok - also greatly relieved...). We had a few last conversations with our new friends and then the normal airport routine: security checks (the El-Al checker told us that it seems her Cairo apartment was looted - she had not been back there since being evacuated a few days earlier), check-in, a bus to the plane, boarding... And then we were back in Israel, dodged a few cameras and reporters, met Moshik and went home, exhausted but happy. We definitely plan to go back and wish this new phase in Egypt's long history is successful!

Egypt - February 1

The short summary of this day is a short drive of about 4 hours from Luxor to Hurghada - a beach town on the Red Sea, just across from Sharm-al-Sheikh. The bus broke down in the middle, but was finally fixed by our driver. It was great to see the water. The town looked a lot like Sharm - tons of hotels and developments, but actually several times larger. What was disappointing were the beaches - no sand at all.

A few of us found a cafe by the water, had calamari etc. The waiter had no idea which country has Lebanon and Syria to its north, Jordan to its East and Egypt to its south. When told it was Israel, he explained that he learned in school we want to rule from the Euphrates to the Nile. Danny gave him a long lecture about the lies they were fed, complete with a bonus about the need for birth control in Egypt. The guy was so happy he requested a night class from Danny and they continued in a cafe after dinner. This was the worst hotel we got, but given that it was last minute (almost) no one complained.



After desperately searching for t-shirts and finding them all too ugly to buy, some food shopping for the next day (rumor had it that Cairo airport had no food left in its restaurants), many in the group ended up dancing in the hotel's nightclub. One of the worst singers ever, but a lot of fun nonetheless!

Egypt - January 31

This was the most suspenseful and intimidating day. The riots continued, and no one knew how bad it will get, and where. First, our leaders decided to continue as planned and go south to Aswan. On the way they checked the airport (was still closed) and the train station (train traffic still on hold), and as we turned south, the embassy decided we should stay in Luxor, and try to make our way to Cairo, together with the other Israeli group in Luxor. We passed the time waiting at the hotel, going to lunch and then the highlight of the day - sailing on the Nile, aboard a Faluka - sail boat - on which the mood finally improved with the sailors' Darbuka, singing and Riki and Yossi dancing. (We also tried going to the Luxor Museum and the Mummification Museum - all closed and guarded by many soldiers.)



As an example of the pressures Danny and Rami had to deal with - at 11pm they got a call from the embassy (or foreign ministry) that through some Egyptian travel agent there will be a flight to Cairo. They were given the following demands by the agent: $300 per person, all or nothing (this includes our 30 travelers and the other group's 30 travelers), and... decide in 15 min. They of course, had to reject. This turned out to be an attempt by the embassy to get us out - we'll never know if their leg was pulled by some opportunistic Egyptian who had no plane to offer, or we could have spent a night in Luxor airport, fly and then spend another 36 hours in Cairo airport with hordes of others. Our leaders decided to go to Cairo by bus. As the direct road to Cairo was blocked, they got army & police permission to go indirectly - first to Hurghada, and from there to Cairo.

As we had already checked out from the hotel, we were moved to a much nicer hotel in Luxor. There was no curfew that night in Luxor, so people took walks along the Nile, went to the market and hired carriages. Was very relaxed and enjoyable despite everything. The worst part was the knowledge that everybody is so worried about us while we are having a wonderful time...

Egypt - January 30

Karnak (meaning "windows") is grand. Of all we saw in three hours I will only mention the, yes, amazing column gallery. 144 of them, beautiful and round, 20 meters high, each from about 10 stones weighing many tons each, all supporting a ceiling with similarly weighted blocks. I'll also mention the relevance to the history of Israel (which we saw in other places) from several carvings of conquests of it by Seti I, Ramses II and Shishaq, which is mentioned in the Bible. The names of the conquered towns (in particular those in Israel) all appear in hieroglyphics on the walls.



The group's bus dropped us off in the hotel, we said goodbye to everyone, and went to check out and go to the airport. Then we learned from Ahmed, Ayala's Egyptian representative, and various other sources, slowly over a couple of hours, that all of EgyptAir's flights were canceled, that the Luxor airport is closed and that we are stuck here.

After treating ourselves to lunch in the hotel, we set off along the Nile to the other large temple, Luxor temple, which is a 10 minute walk from the hotel. As our guide and group were visiting Tutankhamun's grave, we had to make do with Yuval's guidance. After three days of carefully listening (and remembering) Danny's lectures, he got quite good at reading hieroglyphics, recognizing gods, kings, and classical wall reliefs. So we know a lot about this temple too, and we'll see if we have to revise this knowledge when we meet Danny this evening.





We went to the mall to get some water at the small mini-market there. Adjacent to the hotel is the local government headquarters and the mall immediately after it. So the shopkeeper starts talking to us (he recognized us as Israelis) - all within earshot of the soldiers next door. It was amazing. He described how fed up people are with the corruption, both at the State level and locally. For example he complained about the sugar prices rising immensely while the government did not raise the price they give him for the sugar cane he grows. And about the fact that the price of gas rose by about a factor of 10 due to a short supply and asked why does Egypt continue selling gas to Israel if there is a shortage. Locally, he complained about Saudis and such buying up property in Luxor with the blessing of the government. People are forced to sell their properties at very low prices if they do not want to get into trouble with the officials who were bribed. And then he gave us the most amazing piece of gossip - he claimed that Gamal Mubarak is hiding in Israel! This whole experience was fascinating if bizarre and we sure hope he does not get into trouble talking like this next to the soldiers. We parted with the mutual hope that he will get to Jerusalem to pray there. A lovely man!

Egypt - January 29

Arrived at 5am, on time, to Luxor. Looked quiet. Took the bus to the hotel, beautiful on the East bank of the Nile. Left before 6am to our daily work. Danny was as energetic as any day, as if he didn't sleep only 2 hours on the train, and people followed. I apologize, but it was amazing! We crossed the Nile to the west side and started with the temple of Memnon. The only two structures already dug-out are the two enormous statutes of Memnon, son of Aurora.



From there, we went to queen Hatchepsut's (a female Pharaoh!) tomb. In general, we found that architecture here predated lots of ideas that we saw all over the world, but this was so modern, so elegant, so nature-respecting that it takes your breath away. Of course, then you find out there is much more to it. There is a grand staircase leading up to three stories, with 2 galleries each, all in perfect alignment with the base of the mountain. Each gallery describes different parts of her life in beautiful art, again in wall reliefs. Danny was extra thorough as usual, touring each and every gallery, telling us about her remarkable life, being the only woman-king, and how Thutmose III, her step brother, cousin, nephew,...(through a remarkable complex of inter-marriages) tried to completely erase her memory, physically, from history.(e.g. most of her engravings are "erased" by chisel).



Then to a well deserved lunch and rest, where a TV was showing the riots in Cairo, such a contrast to our experience here. From there to Ramose's grave. He was the prime minister of Achnaton (Thutmose IV) who is unique for formally establishing the first monotheistic religion documented - worshiping only the sun-god Aton. Thus the life-story of Ramose (grave-temples are built throughout a man's life) depicts classical scenes from the time, with all gods involved, and suddenly it switches to sole depictions of Aton and his sun disk and sun-ray beam. We could not take pictures there...

Final adventure - the bridge back to the East bank was closed by the police, so we took a small boat across the Nile. It is so beautiful and picturesque and calm on the water.





Back to the hotel for another switch in this schizophrenic trip. From the balcony of our hotel room, besides the Nile, we observe the local police preparing for the evening riots, complete with shields, tear-gas guns and water hoses. Our hotel borders the mayor's office so they cordoned off the street from both sides, and declared curfew at 6pm. We didn't see much action, but other group mates claimed to have seen one dead and one wounded on the street. We definitely heard gun shots late at night.



All this, the news from home, and our travel agent's fast action got us a reservation on tomorrow's flights Luxor-Cairo-Tel Aviv. With a heavy heart, we decided to separate from the group and return home. As all flights were for the evening, we decided to still join the group in the morning to Karnak temple.

Egypt - January 28

Breakfast news was that we are staying in the hotel. Riots continued in Cairo and elsewhere, people died, and the tourist police is worried. Given that our plan today was central Cairo, that made perfect sense. However at 11am Danny convinced them to let us go to Memphis, and see more pyramids.

While not as impressive as the Giza pyramids, the two we visited were really interesting. Both belong to the same Pharaoh - Seneferu - father of Hufu. He first built the "crooked pyramid", in which the angle up changed midway, didn't like it and built the "Red pyramid", which is called so for no obvious reason. We climbed inside to the burial chamber, which is hidden behind two false burial chambers - these kings were well aware of tomb-looting and devised childish ideas to prevent them, like false doors etc. Nothing worked, and all of them were robbed (well, except for King Tut's, where the robbers were caught red-handed). The soldiers guarding these pyramids were very bored and glad to kid around with us, being photographed and very happy for any baksheesh we gave them.



Then we went to Memphis itself, to a museum which collected tons of sculptures. The most impressive is an absolutely huge one of Ramses II (later we found out there is a much bigger one, which weighs 1100 tons!). Others include another sphinx, the goddess Chatchor (looks like a cow, and has several portfolios including protecting Egypt's borders, music, orgasms and more) and others. Then another hour in traffic to go to lunch at 5PM - this is a good place to say how amazing our group is. Most people are older, quite a few in their 70s and even 80s, and they accept hours on end of heat, no toilets, standing, and listening to the elaborate lectures of Danny without a complaint - quite a feat!

As we were finishing the meal, around 6pm, we got the news of the curfew at 7pm, rushed to the bus and headed to the train station, bypassing various blocked roads and seeing people obviously converging to a demonstration. But we made it, waited like refugees in the station, boarded the train, which left and arrived on time. It was a nice experience overall - clean, organized, 2-person cabins with bunk beds and clean sheets. Not that we slept much - talked late about the "situation", then the rattle kept us awake, and then they woke us up for breakfast at 4am.

Egypt - January 27

On Thursday morning we woke up to the hotel phone ring which woke everyone up at 5:30, so we can be early enough (7:30am) in line for the Hufu Pyramid, 1Km from the hotel.
There is no individual responsibility on this trip, perhaps logical in a group of 32,
though people in our group seem well traveled and organized. Anyway, we did make it on time to that particular ticket line - they only sell 150 tickets each morning.

We had a funny incident in the ticket line: Einat & Yuval's student cards were "of the wrong kind" and ineligible for the 50 pound discount (a regular ticket costs 100 pounds). But the cashier gave them student tickets nonetheless, and 50 pounds change accompanied with a huge wink and smirk when Avi handed him 400 pounds - we cheated the government together and split the difference. So this is our first step down the slippery slope of the criminal's life in Egypt...

It is very hard to describe the effect of the pyramids. When you stand next to them, they don't look as big as they are supposed to. When you compare them to anything nearby (eg a person) you get a better sense, but it is still misleading. The two things which seem to give a better perspective are looking at them from a distance - they don't seem to get smaller, and dominate the view. The other thing was climbing into one, as we did in Hufu's, the largest pyramid, built some 4600 years ago. In some pyramids the burial place is underground, in some at ground level, and in some, Like Hufu's up in the middle of it. So you climb a long (about 100 meters), narrow, dark and rather airless path inside this huge structure, realize that it is not hollow, but full of "bricks", each about 2.5 tons, with over 2.3 millions of them. You further see much better than from the outside the extreme precision of how they are laid next and above each other. I'd say it was awesome, but as the day progressed I realized that I should use this word cautiously - I'll need it again and again.



After viewing the 3 great Giza pyramids (and the many small ones, there are about 100 in this area) from various directions we went to see the solar boat. No, it is not solar-powered, but rather the boat which is supposed to carry the dead Pharaoh when he resurrects in the underground river, similar to the way mythology explains how the sun, after setting in the West, moves at night in that underground river back to the East. This huge and really beautiful boat was reconstructed recently from a kit left there 4.5 millenia ago which contained the complete materials and complete instructions - IKEA style.



The sphinx... Another amazing view. There seems to be a plan to restore its nose (which was used as target practice by Ottoman artillery) - we debated the pros and cons of this plan - no resolution, but as nobody asked us that's ok.



We stopped for lunch at a very touristy place, so some of us opted out and lunched on fresh pitas we bought from the pita bakers - delicious!



Then to the Sakkara - burial Mastabas (the precursors of pyramids) of priests and noblemen.
You go into one and immediately feel amazement at the quality of art created so long ago, at the remarkable level of preservation, as well as sorrow knowing that it will all deteriorate
very soon as there are no efforts made at all to protect and preserve it. The art is wall reliefs with remarkable detail and beauty, depicting mainly the wealth of the dead person, decorated with all kinds of fish, birds and land animals, and scenes from daily life, like milking and sacrificing cows, force-feeding geese, etc. It was all in color too, with some paint remaining. And they cram hordes of tourists into these tiny rooms which, even if they control their natural tendency to touch these reliefs are forced to lean or brush them when pushed by other tourists. What a shame.

Finally, we went to see the tomb of Josser, from around 2800 BC. He had an architect who
invented so many things we are used to call by other names. The pyramids started with him (accidentally, building one mastaba on top of another, nicknamed the "steps pyramid"),
Greek columns (Ionic and Doric) have started here, where his columns represented a bunch of reeds tied together. And probably more things I forgot. Very impressive!



Back to the hotel buffet - nothing to write home about. (There was a tourist trap stop on the way in a gift store - we are afraid the cut the local guide and driver got from this stop was nil - everybody was tired and not interested in shopping at all.) Then a lecture by Danny on the history of Egypt, fascinating in detail and very long - some people (like us) started losing him and fading away.

Egypt Trip - Introduction

We decided a few months ago that we really have to go to Egypt during this Sabbatical in Tel-Aviv. We were hoping to find an arrangement similar to those we had in India and China - hook up with a local company and hire a car, driver and guide. We asked around and found no good recommendations, but our friend Rami recommended Ayala Tours. In particular he thought that the tour guided by Dan Bahat (Jan.26 to Feb.2, 2011) is sure to be excellent, and we (Avi, Edna, Einat & Yuval) signed up. Rami surprised us a few days later by announcing he also signed up as an assistant guide.

A few words about Dan: he was the former City Archaeologist of Jerusalem and currently teaches in Toronto. He is extremely knowledgeable, reads hieroglyphics as if they were his mother's tongue and is fluent in Arabic. His huge repertoire of (dirty) jokes in Arabic is a sure way of diffusing any unpleasant situation. And his mustache is unforgettable! See it at http://he.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D7%93%D7%9F_%D7%91%D7%94%D7%98

And then the demonstrations started in Tunisia... and spread quickly to other Middle-Eastern countries and in particular to Egypt. Tuesday, Jan.25 was the Day of Wrath in Cairo with huge, mostly peaceful demonstrations, and we started wondering...

On the 26th we were notified by Ayala Tours that despite the riots in Cairo we are proceeding according to plan ("things are expected to calm down"). So we took a cab to the airport, met the group, flew to Cairo, were picked up at the airport and transferred to the hotel.

We (obviously) have many many more photos of the trip. They are all on Picasa

December 30-31

We skipped the morning homework session on Wednesday and went to Irith's directly after breakfast. She lives in a very nice neighborhood - the people are clearly well-off but it's not as ritzy as the area by the hotel. Most of the buildings are smallish apartment houses, and we saw quite a few women in western clothes. We went to a nice Italian place for lunch and then did some shopping. We continued to the conference center and heard a very interesting talk about the role of tempreature and pressure gradients in the formation of the continents and in the formation of life.

After saying goodbye to Irith, we went with Jaikumar to a Chinese-Thai restaurant (his family had left already in the morning). The food was surprisingly good but the experience was quite bizarre - the restaurant was completely empty, decorated in a very garish fashion and there were about a dozen south-east Asian waiters with very poor English hovering over us.

We packed most of our stuff last night, and left the hotel after breakfast today. The flight to Mumbai left on time, so we arrived at the International terminal at Mumbai around 1pm, for a midnight flight to the US... We are used to sitting around by now, so we did. Now we are all checked in and sitting in the business lounge (those Continental Gold Elite cards are useful!). Seems the plane will be at least 20 minutes late - let's hope that not much more than that!

Photos

I was hoping to add photos to the blog, but the connection is very slow. So - all the photos are in http://picasaweb.google.com/ednawig (5 albums, title "India 2009 - Album 1" through "India 2009 - Album 5".

December 28-29

Both days were spent similarly: breakfast at 9, homework until around 12 and then we went shopping. On Monday we met Irith on Commercial Street and shopped there and on Tuesday we went to MG Street. We got quite a few things, enjoyed the tuk-tuk rides and managed to shoo away all the people who tried to sell us many different things on street corners.

On Monday we went to hear David Gross at the conference - he talked about the role of theory in research. Tuesday there was a concert of Indian music by a famous vocalist. This is not very easy to listen to for a long period of time so we bailed out after 1.5 hours.

Both nights there were banquets at the hotel - the food wasn't bad and it was nice to talk to different people.

Tomorrow we are going to Irith's place - will be interesting to see how they live. And then it is time for goodbyes - all good things have to come to an end...

December 27

The rest of the day was very leisurely and we enjoyed the luxury and lack of dust. Irith arrived around 1pm and it was great to catch up - we have not met in many years, although we more or less kept up on major news via email and such. They have been living here for 1.5 years already and will probably stay for at least one more year.

After lunch we had a short stroll in the hotel's neighborhood which is very affluent - lots of beautiful villas, no cows or cow dung on the streets and no beggars either (but there were about 15 tuc-tuc drivers who were trying to offer us their services and were hard to shake off).

Avi had a whole team of fans for the talk - Sumana and the children, Irith and ourselves but the talk was very well received by others as well. I have heard Avi give many talks, but I have never seen such an engaged audience - the questions (some of them rather aggressive, but in a friendly way) kept coming until Jaikumar had to forcibly announce that no more questions will be taken (and then agreed to one more as the person was so insistent he has to ask it...).

It had started to pour during that time (rather late in the season and quite surprising). So we went to the hotel and ate there again - I cannot remember ever eating 3 consecutive meals in a hotel!

Was wonderful to sleep in nice soft and clean beds. Would have been perfect if we could figure out how to turn off the light over our bed. This room has about 20 light switches, none of which controls this light. I think we'll have to call for help tonight - how embarrassing...

December 26-27

We got into our 2 cars (the children had become very close to Na'ama
by then and wanted to join her on the drive). We started off at Aihole
which is an architectural lab - a site with
temples of many different styles. We drove on to Badami (Ritvik
developed some kind of stomach flu as we were driving so we had a few
vomiting stops). It was around 3:30pm and we had not eaten lunch yet.
This turned out to be quite a task - the first hotel we tried refused to
take us for some reason, the second restaurant was very crowded so we
could not fit in and then Jaikumar found a very strange place - an empty
large hall which apparently is a banquet hall and they managed to serve
us some mediocre food in some very dirty dishes. So far we had no ill
effects.

We were very tired and felt we had seen enough temples but as we had
time before having to go to the train station we stopped at the Badami
temples (Sumana stayed with Ritvik in the car as Ritvik was feeling very
badly). We walked listlessly up, turned a corner - and were amazed -
caves dug out of an almost sheer brown-pink rock. These were very old
caves with the most exquisite carvings - amazing what they could do 1500
years ago. The place was very crowded and seeing all the colorful saris
on the background of the rock was amazing. As in any other site there
were dozens of school groups there - all the students in their school
uniforms and all very excited to see us (apparently many of them live in
villages and don't see too many foreigners).

We drove to the train station, released the drivers and boarded the
train (it was late but that is to be expected). The berths are quite
comfortable and we all slept reasonably well. Now we are almost in
Bangalore, and will be very happy to arrive at the hotel and take long
hot showers...

A few hours later... we feel much cleaner after those showers and a very nice breakfast with lots of Western food. Indian food is great, but after a week of hardly any Western food, the change is nice.

Turns out that the conference reserved 2 rooms for us in the hotel for the rest of our stay. So we decided to stay here rather than move again to Irith & Alan's. Irith will come over here soon and later we will all go to hear Avi's talk. One of the plenary speakers had to cancel due to illness and Avi is the emergency replacement. Jaikumar was tasked with getting Avi to Bangalore (dead or alive?) and it seems everybody is very relieved that he arrived safely...

December 25

All 8 of us piled into our 6-passenger van and drove the 4 km from the
hotel to Hampi (this is nothing - we had seen close to 30 people pile
into a pickup or 10 people in a tuk-tuk). The first temple we saw was
nice but we had seen so many we were not too impressed (and the guide
was very mediocre). Then we went to admire the elephant who was washing
himself in the river and was very picturesque - big rocks in the water,
people bathing and washing their clothes and beautiful views. Next we
walked over to some ruined temples and started becoming amazed and it
only got better from then on. The valley opened up to reveal amazing
views and some wonderful boulders (we saw no climbers although Eyal says
this is a well known climbing site). We went down to a site which is
very reminiscent of King Loui's temple in the Jungle Book. There used to
be a bazaar there in olden times and it was easy to imagine the whole
area bustling and full of life. We walked back to the gat by the river
and hired a "boat" - a round basket made out of reeds with a tarred
bottom - basically a large saucer. We were rowed slowly down the river -
more ruined temples and beautiful boulders. Then some more archeology
and a walk back along the river to our starting point.

Jaikumar knew of a nice restaurant called the Mango Tree. It was a bit
of a walk and we were wondering if it's worth it as it was hot and there were so many
other restaurants closer by, but we were wrong. It's a most beautiful
setting - terraces on the side of a hill with built-in stone tables, all
facing the river, and shaded by large trees - mango and others. The food
was delicious (a special Christmas tali!). We called Einat from there
and she said she had also eaten there and has a photo of herself on a
huge swing. The swing must have shrunk since then - it is small
and very high up with a few dolls sitting on it - clearly not intended
for humans any more.

We got back to the hotel around 5 and decided to skip the other ruins
and have another leisurely evening.

December 24

We found a very miserable Na'ama in the morning - she had thrown up at
night and was feeling very sick and weak. So we had to partake of the
lovely breakfast without her.

The first part of the drive was very slow - terrible traffic jams, and a
couple of stops for Na'ama to throw up. Once we left Bangalore the
highway became much better and we made good speed for 200 km. Then the
highway got bad again and Yuval got car sick so we had a couple more
throwing-up stops.

We met Jaikumar, Sumana, Samhita and Rikvik at Kamalpur and it was
great to see them again. The last time we saw the twins they did not
talk English but now their English is fluent and they are the nicest 9
year olds. They were a bit shy at first, but Rikvik overcame that
immediately and Samhita did too after a while. This was the first
evening we had to relax and we spent it talking, playing games, riding
bikes and shopping at Hampi Bazaar. The hotel was very simple and the
beds rather hard - felt a bit like the Beduin hut in the Sinai. We
decided we'd rather not spend 3 nights there, so Jaikumar spent hours on
a very slow Internet connection and managed to get us all train tickets
to Bangalore on the 26th.

December 23

Dec 23: Madurai

We started at 8am. Our guide Mahesh was waiting for us - very different from previous guides, quiet and non-imposing. Besides guiding he runs the Aathma Foundation, a voluntary organization working to educate people in villages.

Our first stop was the Meenakshi Temple (excellent websites exists including some virtual tours) . As usual, it is a Siva temple, but while in all other Siva temple there would be a smaller temple for his wife Parvati, here Parvati is the main object of worship. If you are confused, Meenakshi is one of the many names of Parvati. We have seen by now many temples, many of them extremely impressive in size, beauty and detail, but this one tops them all. Beyond all the aspects mentioned, the activity in this temple is amazing - hordes of pilgrims queue up to go to the sanctum sanatorium to give offerings to the gods and get ashes to put on their foreheads. The halls are huge, with thousands of delicately sculptured columns supporting them. On the floors groups of visitors sit, eat, talk. A trained elephant (which we saw in other temples too) would perform the usual trick of picking a 10 Rupee note from anyone with his trunk, and then "bless" the giver by putting the trunk on their head (naturally the kids did it). Hundreds of elephants could easily fit between the columns and would not be noticed - it is that big. The pagodas at the gates are huge with numerous god and other sculptures, beautifully painted.

Next was the Nayak palace. It is really a recreation by the British of an older, destroyed palace. It has a huge dancing hall, and was a good starter for our next attraction, the Ghandi museum, dedicated mainly to the history of the occupation of India by the British, the resistance movement before and during Ghandi's time, and the eventual retreat and independence. We learned a lot there, and need to read more about it.

We finished the morning with the flower market, where you tread in mud between stalls of marigolds, jasmine and other flowers, sold in bulk to sellers. Flower sellers are numerous around temples as they serve as prime offerings to gods (with coconuts and bananas), as well as decorations for women's hair.

Still with our guide we went to a south indian restaurant and again had a Tali. This time we used utensils and not our hands. It was extremely tasty, some quite hot. BTW, Yuval is trying everything and eating quite a bit of stuff he wouldn't touch before - we are impressed! The highlight (which Avi liked and others hated) was a coconut leaf stuffed with coconut and sugar - a combination of sweet, sour and bitter tastes which is supposed to be good for digestion.

We then released the guide, and Ramu took us to the airport. He drove us for a week, and we were extremely impressed with his driving. He was not quite as reckless as some other drivers we had in the past, and probably better than all. The 7 hours of wait in the airport are coming to a close, and we'll soon board the flight to Bangalore.

P.S. we arrived safely in Bangalore, were picked up as planned and are staying in the lovely Le Meridien. Have to get up in less than 6 hours and drive to Hempi - that is expected to take 7 hours... Good night!

December 22

Prahladh and the driver picked us up around 8 and we went to see the Rock Fort - had to climb a few hundred steps to visit a Shiva temple and a ganesh temple. The views from the top were beautiful, and we were very interested to hear how Prahladh's father fixed the broken bell without breaking the bell tower. He had to resort to building a furnace inside the tower.

Next we visited the Lourdes Church on the St. Joseph campus. The church looks a bit like a temple... We also stopped on the way and bought a few trinkets in a souvenir store.

The highlight of the day was lunch at Prahladh's house. His mother prepared an excellent feast and we all had a lovely time and were sorry to leave, but tourism duty calls and we went to see Trichy's most famous site - the Sri Ranganathaswamy Temple at Srirangam http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sri_Ranganathaswamy_Temple_(Srirangam). It had started to drizzle by then so we all wore our rain ponchos and walked barefoot in the mud - was quite fun. This is the first temple where we as non-hindus were barred from quite a few rooms so we did not get our share of ashes and dots.

The rain was getting worse so we left at 4:30, dropped Prahladh off at his parents and continued to Madurai. We were quite sad to say goodbye to Prahladh - he was great to be with and a most gracious host.

The way to Madurai is surprisingly modern - an almost continuous 4-lane highway. Of course you still get all the different wheeled- and foot-traffic and the occasional car which insists on going against the traffic but we made good time despite the rain and arrived at the hotel before 9pm. This hotel is much nice than the one in Trichy (and cheaper too), but the dinner was awful and expensive - you cannot win them all.

A guide will meet us tomorrow and show us the Madurai sties,. In teh evening we will fly to Banglaore, spend the night there and then drive on Thursday to meet Jaikumar and family in Hampi. So it's time to go to bed!

December 21

We started off at 9:30 and went to Prahladh's. His parents are also charming and we
sat there a bit before setting off to Thanjavur. A friend of Prahladh's father
joined us for the day. We started at the Brihadishwara temple which is almost
identical to the one we saw the previous day, but much more active and bustling with
tourists and pilgrims. We hired a guide who was extremely amusing. He told us of the
wonders of the digit 9, and tried to impress us (unsuccessfully) with some very silly
arithmetic magic - he was much impressed by the contra-trick Yuval showed him. We
did the rounds of the deities, admired the sculptures and talked to some pilgrims -
the guide almost undressed a very cute young man to show us all the pilgrim stuff he
was carrying - rosaries and bells on strings under his shirt. We broke for lunch and
decided we ate at enough hotels so Prahladh took us to a place where the lcoals eat
(and which of course costs less than a 1/0 of what we paid at the other places).
This was very nice - we ate off banana leaves using our hands and it was delicious.
No ill effects so far so we will try and repeat this. After lunch we went to see a
crafts bazarre which was pathetic and did not satisfy our consumerism and then to
the Royal Museum. It houses some amazing sculptures of Shiva, Vishna, Parvati etc.
which date back to the 11th century and later. It was a bit worrying to see all the
sculptures there completely unprotected and everybody able to touch them. We also
climbed the bell tower to enjoy the views and see the skeleton of a whale which
washed out to the shore 400 years ago. The sign said it belongs to the "particular
class of whale-bone whales!". Next we went to the Saraswati Mahal Libraries and
looked at the eclectic collection of books that the king had at the beginning of the
19th century.

We took a different way back and visited the ancient Kallanai dam and bridge over the Cauvery delta. Theway was much less busy than the highway and very beatiful - lots of trees and vegetation. We walked over the bridges and then continued to Prahladh's parent wherewe dropped Prahladh off and then to the hotel for dinner. It was nice that we got in a bit earlier today so we could have a nice relaxed evening.

December 20

The day started with a visit to Gopoal, Jaikumar's cousin. He lives in a small
village and manages a large farm. We were not sure how to get to his house but that
turned out to be easy as there was a young man on a scooter who waited for us at a
crossroads and had us follow him - a live GPS (it seems that neither GPSs or Google
Maps work in India). Gopal took us for a tour of parts of his farms - rice paddies,
a nice summer house of his uncle's where we ate pomellas and drank cocnut water from
trees which grow around the property. Everything is very lush and beautiful and
Gopal was very nice and hospitable.

We stopped for lunch at a hotel which Gopal recommended (a nice buffet) and we
continued to the Airavatershwara Temple in Darasuram. We took a guide there but he
was not very good and did not amuse us much. This temple is inactive and is run by
the Indian Archeological Survey - they take amazing care of these sites which are
extremeley clean and well maintained.

Next we went to the Brihadishwara Temple in the village which has the short name of
Gangaikondacholapuram (literally - the town of the Chola king who took the Ganges).
This is an active temple, and there were quite a few Indian tourists there. The
structure is very impressive and it was fun walking around it and visiting the
different dogs. We had ashes smeared on our foreheads and a red dot applied to our
foreheads. The visit ended with a race along the nice lawn between Yuval and Na'ama
which Na'ama won and another race between Na'ama & Avi which Avi won.

The road to Trichi (or Tiruchirapalli) is most bizarre. Large parts of it are
supposed to be a 4 lane highway but the project seems to have been abandoned
mid-stream. So you drive for 5 km on a nice wide road - as usual there are many
lanes of traffic going in the same direction - bikes, tuk-tuks, cars, lorries, cows,
goats, people (the last 3 might be going in any direction or just standing in the
middle of the road), when suddenly everything ends and you jump over a very bumpy
unpaved stretch of 100m or so, after which all the traffic in the opposite direction
is suddenly added to the mix (with their share of cows etc.). So you crawl for 5
km, where the lanes separate again and so it continues. This is somehow even more
nerve wracking than the regular nervousness associated with driving in India, but
our driver Ramu is very skillful, so we skip a beat only every other minute.

The hotel is much more expensive than the previous one but hardly any better (the
water is slightly warmer but far from hot). We ate supper in the Hotel restaurant
and Prahladh went to his parents' house.

December 19

The driver finally arrived, and we went to pick Prahladh up from his uncle's and continued south to Dakshina Chitra - a reconstructed village depicting the art and architecture of Tamil Nadhu. It was quite nice, and not too much of a tourist trap. Avi bought a scroll depicting the story of Ganesh and N'ama had henna applied to her left hand and arm.

The next stop was at Mahabalipuram which is a complex of temples of different styles. We took a local guide there who was very passionate but Praladh said he also made a lot of stuff up. The guy apparently finished 10 grades (in a Tamil school) and then taught himself Engish. It was not always easy to understand what he said but it was amusing nonetheless. The first temple was by the ocean - a bit worse for wear due to the proximity to the sea. Then we went to an area containing 5 pagodas and a few other structures - called 5 Brothers. And finally to another site whose main attraction was a huge wall intricately carved, which created the most amazing bas-relief.

We continued from there to a very nice hotel for a very late lunch. The setting was beautiful, the food mediocre but we enjoyed it nonetheless.

Our hotel was in Mayapuram which was quite a drive so we decided to skip the last temple on the itinerary. We drove and drove, bought some snacks so we don't have to stop for dinner and then around 9:30pm the drive stopped and said that we did arrive at that temple - Chidambaram. So we decided to look at it quickly and were very glad we did - it was just amazing and seeing it at night made it even better, especially when the gongs started tolling and people ran in for the last prayer.

We got to the hotel after 11 extremely tired. The hotel was not very nice but we were too exhausted to notice and even the cold showers did not matter at that point.

Avi's laptop seems to have a bad fan, so I will stop before describing today's events in fear it will melt down. Hopefully we can still turn it on tomorrow!