In the immortal words of Willie Nelson (and me – I’ve stolen this one before) the child bride and I are on the road again, can’t wait to sniff some assholes with my friends… no wait, that was Rodney Rude’s dog impersonating Willie. As the title suggests, we are on our way to Japan for a very short cruise – Tokyo to Tokyo. We’re on a Qantas flight to Sydney then on to Haneda in Tokyo also with Qantas. After the events of a year ago I swore I wouldn’t fly with them again but I guess we’re here because of a forlorn hope for an upgrade after being stroked in London last March. Hasn’t happened. Oh, and I hate connecting through Sydney Airport (about as much as I hate connecting through Heathrow). It’s been put together like a Bombay slum and it feels and smells like one when 5 international flights all arrive within 5 minutes of each other. Not to worry – we have to suffer these privations if we want escape occasionally.

We had a bit of an unexpected rather traumatic day yesterday. We had two cats for many years but now we only have one. For all of those years they boarded together at the pet motel whenever we travelled. Having each other for company meant they could forget about us for a few weeks rather than just during the 23 hours a day they spend sleeping. Edgar, the survivor, had something of a personality transplant when Kaos ran out of lives last year. All of a sudden he realised that treating us with typical cat disdain was not to be recommended without back-up. He is now our best friend and on his first solo stay at the feline spa, he fretted and lost weight which was probably a good thing for his ponderous bulk. Many months of the cat version of sucking up, which is pretty much confined to demands for a pat, have meant that taking him to his holiday destination yesterday felt like taking him to the cat abattoir. We dropped him off and bolted – best not to linger and get all mushy.

Most of our cruises have been in summer or in warmer climes than Japan where the maximum temperature will be around 14C and the minimum will be around 3C while we’re there. So cold-packing was a new experience. This isn’t a thongs (for the feet), jocks, shorts and t-shirts cruise. It’s a “how many long sleeved shirts will I need” and “is 8 pairs of jeans too many” and “where the f… did I put that beanie” type of cruise. We have never come close to the airline weight limit for our bags. This time we did.

Sitting on the flight down to Sydney I’m reminded of one of those imponderables, like why do women stroke their chins when driving or why does “change-up” mean “slow down” in an assortment of ball throwing games. No, the one I’m thinking of is why does the airline industry attract so many gay men but straight women. Opportunity I guess and you can interpret that word however you like. The corollary to this of course is why do so many sports attract gay women but straight men. I’ve got another ten hours or so to ponder these imponderables until they get shoved back into the dark recesses of my mind from whence they came.

It’s said that the Stone Age didn’t end because we ran out of stones. If that’s the case, Jordan is still well and truly in the Stone Age. They are everywhere. Even the desert sands around the Wadi Rum monoliths were strewn with random rocks. We just passed a truck taking a bunch of large rocks somewhere and you have to ask, what is the point? It would be like filling up a tanker with sea water, taking it to another place on the coast and putting it back in the ocean.

But if stones are pretty much all you have, you have to make the most of it. So you build forts out of them to dominate trade routes like the Romans and Crusaders did or you carve monuments and tombs out of them like the Nabataeans did about 2200 years ago at Petra. It’s just a pity they didn’t foresee the influx of tourists a couple of millennia hence or they would have made them a lot closer to the carpark.

Apart from a couple of stops on the way back to Amman, Petra was our last day devoted to another wonder of the ancient world of which we have seen plenty on this trip. By this stage there’s a lot of lead in the saddle-bags so the 4km stroll in the shade, early in the morning down to (almost) the end of the main Petra drag becomes what feels like a 40 km slog, uphill all the way back to the start, mostly in the midday sun. At least there’s a bar at the turnaround point so a liquid refreshment can be had prior to confronting the walk back.

Of course there are alternatives to walking in the form of horses, donkeys, mules, camels and some other combination of two of the preceding or you can choose the rich man’s camel – a golf buggy to take you back. But that would be cheating says he now sitting in the shade in a 5 star hotel sipping an ice cold ale. Then it was stubborn pride, hubris, stupidity or something that kept the head down and the bum up and the legs relying on muscle memory i.e. remembering how to walk, to get me back.

Had we done Petra on day 1 of this trip the CB and I may have even attempted the 900 steps up to what is known as the Monastery, right at the end of the walk in. But half way in you reach the Treasury which is what you see in most of the pictures of Petra and the Monastery is a similar shape and size so there didn’t seem much point. Besides, if the Treasury and all of the other incredible sights don’t blow your mind, you need to get back to Bali.

Unusually for us, the CB and I have really behaved ourselves vis-a-vis bar visits on this trip. Concessions have to be made for the fact that this is the Middle East with all of the connotations that implies but it’s also bloody hot and bloody dry. Notwithstanding, it’s been a couple of beers or wines after a long day touristing and then collapsing into bed. Souvenir shopping has been kept under control also so we have spent very little during the majority of this trip. Then yesterday we went to a mosaic and carpet shop and the spending restrictions of the previous two weeks went BOOM!! We’re suckers for hand-made carpets, especially if made by charity organisations. So two rugs later, the credit card was woken from its slumber and had its arse severely kicked.

We have one more day in Amman because of rearranged flights after the Israel leg cancellation. The positive from this is being able to sleep in and not worry about alarms which have been going off any and every time between 3.30am and 6.30am in the last two and a half weeks. The negative is it’s Friday, the Muslim holy day, and everything is shut. Religion still trumps mercenary mercantilism in this part of the world, it seems. Give them time. Still, it means we save our last few Jordanian dinars which are worth A$2.20 each so everything here is pretty expensive in Aussie dollars. The upside is that like most places in this part of the world, you can bargain. That doesn’t mean you can challenge the barman over the price of a Heinekan but it does mean we were able to beat the carpet man down and save a few hundred bucks

Wadi Rum is like an alien planet (are there any other sort?). Apparently that movie The Martian was made there and big chunks of Lawrence of Arabia amongst many others. We seem to have spent a lot of time recently visiting movie lots – this one plus Indiana Jones sets round Petra, Mad Max in Namibia, Game of Thrones, Gladiator and others around Spain and Morocco, Star Wars and Lawrence of Arabia (again) in Seville; the list goes on. Apart from Seville most of these places are spectacularly inhospitable and we invariably leave them hot, sweaty and exhausted (us not the locations). I hope the pampered pricks who star in those productions also get grit in their togas or experience weathering in their nether regions like we do.

Of course we’ve never actually been to any of these places when a movie is actually being made but despite the privations, like the stars, we at least have nice hotels with airconditioned bars to return to at day’s end. Returning to a tent perched on a rock in the middle of nowhere after a hard day’s extra..ing does not appeal. You wouldn’t be a Bedouin for all the camels in the Middle Eastern sand belt8

Speaking of Wadi Rum, we saw a lot of it. We did not one but two trips round the traps in the back of a hilux. And I don’t mean in the back seat of a dual cab I mean right in the back – bench seats in the tray. The first expedition – five hiluxes each with six people precariously perched in the back with a few lucky ones inside the cab, took us….somewhere, through spectacular scenery to a location where there was a table covered in glasses and a man pouring champagne into them. That was the most “and now for something completely different” Monty Python moment I have ever experienced.

Later, after checking into our desert glamp we headed out again. Incidentally there are dozens of these desert camps scattered round the hundreds of square kilometres of Wadi Rum. It’s like the Sahara desert camps in Morocco. When the sun goes down, you aren’t disoriented. Those lights aren’t stars, they’re the many other camps in the same area. Common as bums. Like resorts in Bali.

Coming back in the dark our driver obviously thought we needed to get back 30 seconds before the other four vehicles so regularly went off-piste, forging his own track through hitherto undriven rocky desert and I have the bruises to prove it. Fortunately none of the six of us in the back finished up in the dirt but I came within half an inch of nutting the bloke sitting opposite me and him me as we were flung towards each other at one point. The driver seemed very pleased with himself when we got back and oblivious to the bruised arses he had caused so I told him “fuck you very much”.

Before we leave Wadi Rum, just a short comment on the topography. It’s a moonscape – masses of pink sandstone and granite forming impossibly steep high and twisted mountains cut through by numerous metres thick, green-black glassy dykes (as we say in the geology biz). The road we were on  snaked through huge mountains of rock precariously balancing boulders as big as houses which would come crashing down with the slightest seismic encouragement. Speaking of houses, if you build one round here you’re basically in a giant’s bowling alley.

Seeing huge rock formations poking up out of a predominantly flat sandy floor reminded me of Halong Bay in Vietnam except the sandy floor there is sea. And the wadis down which water flows, hurtles more like, on the odd occasion when it rains were like jagged U shaped valleys which once accommodated glaciers. In this case we’d have mud glaciers travelling infinitely faster than a Greenland ice flow and you don’t want to be in the way when it arrives.

So as mentioned, the hotels have been a sanctuary from some pretty inhospitable landscapes and climate (weather actually). This part of the world is a political Housewives of New York at the best of times. Now it’s like an all-in brawl 5 minutes into a grand-final with an awful lot to play out before the dust settles, so security is ubiquitous. Every hotel we’ve stayed in has had a security machine at the entrance but appearances can be deceiving. At Aqaba the security attendant was staring at his phone and not even looking in the direction of the screen as bags either side of mine went through. We obviously didn’t look at all threatening.

The Israel part of this trip was cancelled before we left home (just) for obvious reasons.  Notwithstanding we’ve almost been there twice so far. The first time was when visiting the place where Jesus was baptised by John the Baptist, just north of the Dead Sea. Nearby where actual baptisms were taking place the Israeli flag was about 20m away just across a rather pathetic section of the Jordan River.

The Dead Sea is dropping a metre a year because too much unregulated water is being taken from the River Jordan, I guess for irrigation, and the Jordan is suffering accordingly. Give our Murray Darling Authority and the South Australian Government (or even the EU) a go at this problem and there would be waterskiing on the Dead Sea and cruises on the Jordan before you know it. And the farmers would be broke and the people would  be starving…but not thirsty.

The other time we got close to Israel was in Aqaba where two borders converge – Egypt and Israel and Israel and Jordan. So while the CB and I enjoyed not one but two buckets of ice-cold beer at the bar on our hotel’s private beach (how decadent) we could see three countries. Where else can you do that? A number of places I guess but not necessarily from such a salubrious vantage point.

Apart from those two times, we could also see Israel across the Dead Sea. The glow from the lights of Jerusalem were directly across from us with Jericho just to the north and Hebron to the south. Now without wanting to provoke an argument that could descend into violence, those places, mostly, are in the West Bank. Part of Jerusalem is in Israel but lights don’t discriminate.

Now’s as good a time as any to remark again on the quality of the beer. It is very good apart from the craft beer we had at a reception in Amman. That one tasted like many craft beers the world over – like mouthwash. Someone should tell these amateurs. It shouldn’t be surprising that the locals (generally) know how to make beer in this part of the world. I expect they have had even more practice than the Germans.

We were let out guideless last night in Aqaba because it’s friendly and safe. A teenage girl sitting drinking coffee said “hello and welcome to Aqaba” to the CB and I as we walked past so I guess that proves it. We found our way to an Indian restaurant as we are quite fond of the occasional curry. Their hot and sour soup made my teeth sweat. Unfortunately they didn’t serve beer which seems common practice (malpractice actually) in the restaurants in this country. Shame really because everyone knows that Indian food and beer go together like women and shoes.

Aqaba’s changed a bit and grown a bit since T.E. Lawrence and his sweaty band of brigands rode in, guns blazing and scimitars flashing over a hundred years ago when Ottomans were more than just something to rest your feet on. I’ve never been to Aqaba before but am basing these assumptions on the fact that unlike most other places in this part of the world the dominant architecture is Boomer modern although the ubiquitous archaeological dig was happening near our hotel.

We’re now in the initial stages of the Jordan leg of this Middle Eastern jaunt and already we’ve noticed the pace being wound back a notch although everyone is still looking forward to trashing their alarm clocks. The casualty list is becoming more extensive as we rampage through the historical sites of the land of the Ammonites which, incidentally were, when I did geology and still are I guess, coil shelled cephalopods. I’m starting to understand how Alexander the Great’s army felt after a long campaign. More like extinct shellfish than people from Amman I’m guessing.

Our tour bus is like a giant petri dish at the moment and has been for about a week but not in a good, penicilliny way. There’s nothing funny about being in a bus full of people constantly heaving their lungs up like they’ve been breathing in the Dead Sea. I think that also includes some of the people who still insist on wearing  masks. Someone should tell them. They probably still think lock-downs work and ivermectin is only for horses.

I was reminded of Athens and Rome when we were in Amman. You’d hardly be able to scratch the surface without digging up some ancient artefact so forget about digging an underground rail system. There’s a lot of housing development going on at the moment because they have a lot of spare land so instead of going up (5 stories max) they go out. A lot of land is being released so property developers obviously don’t run the local councils and state governments like they do in Australia. So regarding cultural heritage, I was about to ask our local guide how a landowner goes about building a house that needs minor excavations to level the land, say. Before he could answer, the squad turned up and in an instant we were talking about putting cardamom in our coffee so I left.

The squad is a group of six very nice people who have not left each other’s sides for the whole trip. It’s like the Human Centipede without the disgusting bits. It’s like the people who religiously sit in the same seats in the restaurant or on the bus day in and day out and mostly only talk to each other. As I may have mentioned previously, that’s not me.

We’ve now moved forward a few of thousand years. Whilst in Egypt we did occasionally encounter the 300 year Greek period commencing with the first Greek monarch, Alexander the Great and ending with the last (funnily enough), Cleopatra. But mostly we were firmly in the varios dynasties commencing over 5000 years ago and featuring many kings called Ramses with Ramses 2 figuring prominently. In Jordan, it’s very much now the Roman era with Roman ruins and Christian history as well as more recent developments with their next door neighbour (not Saudi Arabia, the other one).

Speaking or recent history, we are now retracing the camel steps of Lawrence of Arabia. Like the Japanese did with Singapore in WWII, Lawrence and his Arabs took Aqaba from the rear. Maybe the rumors about him were true. Like Singapore, the guns were pointing out to sea and everyone knows that despite their monika “ships of the desert”, camels can’t swim. I guess if you live in the driest places on earth, it’s a skill that they would rarely have cause to exercise especially if you have a barrel of water or two strapped to your back. Okay, I’m not entirely telling the truth here because some, not all camels can swim. But a camel swimming would be about as natural and elegant as me on ice skates or the child bride on a balance beam.

I’m pretty sure it’s Thursday today. That means we leave Egypt tomorrow for Jordan. I can say we’ll be leaving relatively unscathed in a global political sense but drilling down, there has been a couple of tweaks health wise. Overall we’ve managed a resounding pass considering this place’s reputation but no perfect score unfortunately. Last Saturday I was what an old boss used to call half f…d and let go. 14 hours sleep fixed that. Today the child bride got a fit of the vapours which is what I understand ladies get in these hot climates if their corsets are too tight or something. The CB had ditched the corset for today but was still wearing her wobbly boots.

The temple of Philae on an island in Lake Nasser is dedicated to Isis the goddess of healing (amongst other things) ironically enough considering the CB’s fainting spell. Incidentally, this is the largest man-made lake in the world and sits behind the High Aswan Dam. The temple has accommodated religious activities from the Pharaonic era, the Greek era, the Roman era and the era of Christianity so there’s quite a celestial turf warfare going on there. So when the CB went all glassy eyed, started shaking and sliding down the wall we were leaning against I didn’t know if she needed a chocolatier or an exorcist. After a sugar hit, a wet hanky round the neck and 15 minutes of vigorous hat waiving to keep the temple air moving around her and the spirits at bay, she began to function again. So an easy afternoon today and we’ll skip the boat ride which’ll show us stuff we’ve already seen from the land.

Tomorrow’s another 4.00am start. For God’s sake, we’re supposed to be on vacation and these things are meant to be relaxing. This one’s been in the vein of “if it’s Thursday, this must be Belgium” as we charge from one temple to the next like a rampaging Alexander the Great. His generals poisoned him because he wanted to carry on conquering, whereas they wanted to smell the roses or whatever was growing in the Hanging Gardens of Babylon, after a decade long rape and pillage tour of the middle east. So our tour guide had better tap the brakes occasionally.

It’s now tomorrow and we have seen our last Egyptian temple or temples actually. The two at Abu Simbel down near the Sudanese border are basically a “get a load of this” to travellers from the south who may not be conversant with the Egyptians’ ability to build humongous edifices, the message being, “If we can do that to a mountain, it doesn’t bear thinking about what we can do to you if you step out of line. And by the way, do you want to buy this worthless trinket for only $1.”

Three flights later we are in the departure area of Cairo Airport. Back when I was travelling every month it was very unusual for me to travel on an airline I hadn’t experienced before apart from one of the occasional pop-ups that did the Kaohsiung/Taipei run in Taiwan. There were numerous airlines doing that then, in anticipation of being able to expand across the strait to service big brother. So much for that and probably most of them no longer exist. I’m referring to Egypt Air here. I never had a reason to come to Egypt previously so never travelled on their airline. I’ve now done four flights with them with one more, to Amman later today. Hopefully the admin isn’t a reflection of the other important stuff vis-a-vis airlines. We flew from Abu Simbel to Aswan then on to Cairo today. Same plane and flight number with a short stop in Aswan. But we were given different boarding passes for each leg so despite staying on the plane, our seats changed. What a cluster f…k. Forty people.all trying to move one row back or across. It was like a geriatric game of Twister – not a pretty sight.

The pace up until yesterday was relentless. To achieve what has to be achieved in the time allotted means all timepieces need to be synchronised, all loins should be girded and all starters should be on the grid with engines gurgling and there is no allowance for oversleeping (day 1 in Cairo), taking 1 hour camel rides when the window is half an hour (also day 1 in Cairo), lingering and adjusting for far too long over each photo (ongoing), just generally being really slack at time management (ongoing) and getting lost (day 3). Lost time cannot be made up when itineraries are to be slavishly followed. It just extends the day so on all of our heads be it.

The day we flew to Luxor started with a 4.00am wake-up call (shudder), a painfree traverse of Cairo Airport’s multiple security checks (you have to keep reminding yourself where you are) until we got to the gate. Then a full airbus A330 had to put its collective hand luggage through one secuity screening machine. A thoroughly modern airport with thoroughly India 1980’s procedures. This was followed by a one hour, ontime flight thankfully. Then the waiting began.

After half an hour three suitcases appeared on the baggage carousel. Those who triumphantly claimed them were immediately brought crashing back to earth when they realised they had to wait for the rest of us. This continued for another half hour or so as the occasional bag appeared. I assumed the worse. Maybe one of the baggage handlers was asleep and the other one’s wheelbarrow was broken. Or maybe they were only releasing bags after rifling through our undies looking for hidden jewels as has been customary here for thousands of years. Eventually the rest of our luggage came cascading out presumably when the futility of trying to open our bags became obvious. If only the Pharaoh’s tombs had the same locks as the modern suitcase, countless  treasures would be intact.

Getting out of the airport carpark meant battling four lanes of traffic for one security lane. A big lumbering bus doesn’t lose its place in the queue easily so after another half hour crawl we were on our way. It was now over eight hours since we’d dragged ourselves out of bed in Cairo and there was still a tourist itinerary to complete. A few hours at Karnak, the biggest temple complex in the world was followed by checking in to our Nile cruise boat then a traipse round Luxor temple then back to Karnak for the light and sound show before getting back to the boat for dinner at about 10.00pm. The previous day in Cairo was the same. It’s fair to say we are not the fittest bunch of safari campers so it’s also fair to say the gathering this morning for another temple visit resembled the aftermath of Rourke’s Drift.

Most of the people we have got to know on this trip are keen travellers like the CB and I so are determined to battle the fatigue and the heat to take in the wonders of ancient Egypt – that’s why we came here after all, although for those who struggle walking up stairs, let alone in and out of underground tombs, you have to wonder. There has however been one activity which got zero takers. An early morning (bloody 5.00am again) ballon ride over the Valley of Kings and the much smaller (I have no comment) Valley of Queens was given an almighty swerve when our guide pointed out that of the five companies offering this service, the one they used was the one that has yet to lose a passenger overboard. You’d have to assume the odds are shortening.

This is one example of conformity. In many other fields of human activity we are annoyingly consistent. So despite the guides telling us to sit in different places on the bus each day there are some who don’t with one pair always snagging the seats immediately behind the central stairwell. I think she sleeps there. At the meal tables on our Nile cruise ship, the Royal Lotus, people sit at the same table in the same seats for breakfast lunch and dinner. Except me who moves around, much to the CB’s occasional chagrin. Bugger the cliques which are beginning to form like our version of Mean Girls. No, that’s unfair but it was the most apt simile I could think of. As The Cars used to sing, “Shake it up”.

Mike Tyson, that great American philosopher once opined “everyone has a plan until they get punched in the mouth”. The CB and I had a plan to see everything possible in this fascinating place. We were fully stocked with appropriate medicinal provisions and know the ropes as far as what to eat and drink. What we and everyone else cannot plan for is the rather important need to breathe. Not sure if the air was the problem but on Saturday I was punched in the face by something that emptied my energy banks and every void in my body. As I have mentioned previously in similar circumstances, I probably dropped a couple of hat sizes when that trapdoor opened, nearly turning me inside out. So we missed out on the Coptic churches but made it to the Pyramids of Giza and the Sphinx. 14 hours of sleep later I was back on my game.

Any thought that the tourist trade was going to suffer because of the war next door was swiftly allayed once we hit the first tourist traps. We are everywhere and it seems the majority of us speak Spanish. Spanish pushing and shouting is going some way to off-setting the seven century occupation of Spain by North African muslims.

Our tourist group did not wait long to implement a tradition which is now five days old. Someone always has to be late. After wandering around the Stepped Pyramid the CB and I climbed on to what looked like a full bus (it wasn’t) and someone pointed out playfully (I think) that we were last (we weren’t), to which I replied that I thought it was our turn. Normally this wouldn’t be a problem – c’est la vie, right. But as I shall explain in #6, there are implications.

Pyramids took around 20 years to build 4000 years ago with the most primitive of tools but a large lick of ingenuity. Had they been building them in Victoria today I’m sure the Victorian Government and the CFMMEU would have managed to stretch it out to 25 with the most sophisticated technology available and the ingenuity of one of those large blocks of stone. And the taxpayer would foot the bill. The Queensland Government would have announced with great fanfare the construction of the biggest Pyramid in the world, only for the benefit of Queenslanders and then forgotten about it two years later, having built nothing.

In Australia, we have a number of naturally occurring geomorphological phenomena like Ayres Rock and Mount Warning. These have been around for millions of years withstanding everything weather and climate could throw at them. But we’re not allowed to touch them. So you will excuse  my surprise when we were invited to climb on one of the seven wonders of the ancient world – the great Pyramid of Giza. We can get up close and personal with relatively recent (but ancient in civilisation terms) history but we are prevented from climbing on or up things millions of years older than the 60000 year old culture which places them off-limits. Why? Similarly, I’m yet to be locked out of a temple, cathedral or mosque because of its religious significance.

There are some iconic attractions in the world which tend to disappoint when you actually see them, like the Mona Lisa and the Venus de Milo which are much smaller than expected and for some, the Leaning Tower of Pisa falls into the same category. And there are others which completely overwhelm you like the Acropolis (did it for me) or the Himalayas. The Pyramids of Giza fall into the latter category and I hesitate to say the Spinx is hovering between the two categories but when placed into historical context slips into the latter.

The pyramids are stunning and would be even more stunning without all of the big-mouthed vendors trying to sell us mini-pyramids and other tat. One assured us he had a doctor brother in Brisbane and apparently this meant we deserved a bag full of free stuff…but with a small donation. This was the starting gun. We didn’t have time for the fun and games which were only just beginning so gave him his bag back and merged back into the very large crowd. An entirely different experience was had in a market later, where we got the CB’s fridge magnets. For me it’s t-shirts wherever we go; for her it’s fridge magnets. Anyway the vendor wanted 80 Egyptian pounds (about 4 Aussie dollars) for one. We bought 3 off him for 100 pounds.

I’m guessing that the richest person in this part of the world is the one who has the sun glasses franchise. There’s lots of sand obviously, and lots of sandstone, again, obviously and limestone (not so obviously). Consequently the vast majority of buildings and most of the ground replicate the colour range of the late great Richie Benaud’s jackets – white, off-white, ivory, cream, beige, tan etc. That’s one for the cricket fans. The point of this being that the glare is ubiquitous. The only respite, apart from night is the occasional patch of green which, if it’s not a football pitch is a fig orchard (if that’s the correct terminology). Grass is so rare it could be a tradeable commodity. That’s couch type grass not mary jane.

On the drive west from Alexandria out to El Alamein we passed countless well appointed holiday homes on the north i.e. sea side of the road.  Either sun-glasses-man has a lot of relatives or there is a large middle class in Cairo. On the south i.e. desert side of the road were very large palatial homes (for extended families) built by the government for Bedouins. Not sure if there’s any conclusion to be drawn from this separation so we’ll let it lie. The Bedouins must have been on walkabout and it isn’t summer so we drove past mile after mile of empty houses both sides of the road. Egypt’s lucky it doesn’t have an open border like the USA or the government would be finding people to place in those empty houses although unlike in the USA, it’s unlikely many would come from North Africa. They’re all in hotels in Manhattan.

Driving back to Cairo from El Alamein we must have taken a different and inland highway because there was no sign of life or the Mediterranean Sea or human existence for that matter and the topography was as featureless as a catwalk model’s smile. So much of this place is unlivable its amazing they’ve been able to fit over 100 million people in. I guess you do what all overpopulated parts of the world do and that is stack them on top of each other.

Which brings me to culture and how we interpret the same things differently which is the  definition of culture I guess. Someone on our trip made the point that all of the things Egypt is famous for relate to death. The explanation is that everything to do with life – houses for example – were made of things that didn’t survive the ravages of time whereas the oldest monuments to death are pushing a stony 5000 years and counting.

Speaking of death, today’s cemeteries don’t quite have the grandeur of the Valley of Kings but also aren’t quite what we in the west are used to. They don’t comprise a majority of individual plots. In Cairo (and probably elsewhere in Egypt) you don’t have a plot you have a high-walled burial enclosure. We don’t want anyone presumed dead escaping and spoiling the wake, do we? There are three sections in your enclosure; one for the men, one for the women and one for the bones. So when one section is full or you couldn’t be bothered going deeper, you shift someone from the male or female sections into the bone section. Any slim chance you thought you might have had of your fossilised remains being discovered by some robot archaeologist a million years hence, are toast. Ashes to ashes, dust dust. But in keeping with the ancient Egyptians’ providing for their dear departed’s afterlife, some of these burial enclosures come with satellite dishes.

This blog is usually an irreverent snap-shot of the CB’s and my travels (and anything else I can think of). For this piece I intend shelving the irreverence because the subject matter is far too serious. On Friday we visited the El Alamein War Memorial and Cemetery. If that place doesn’t bring a tear to your eye, you’re a harder man than me, mate.

In what was probably once an inhospitable desert wasteland and now is adjacent to holiday homes and resorts and a few buildings that wouldn’t be out of place in Singapore there’s this beautifully manicured but entirely unfortunate place. It’s such a shame that these places even need to exist but they do and kudos to the Governments of Egypt and Australia and the other countries with war-dead there for the respectful upkeep. It’s the least we could do.

As I wandered around reading the occasional gravestone – there are thousands – waves of emotion swept over me. If I could digress for a second, when I write reports for my employer, certain words often remind me of songs or comedy sketches or even poems and, this will be hard to believe, quotations from Shakespeare. So I reference and link them in my reports. If anything, they give the intended audience a reason to read the report if they are not interested in the coal and iron ore markets. So I always have my music with me and on this day the most appropriate feeling was Comfortably Numb. Pink Floyd aficionados will recognise this song from The Wall, appropriately enough, in the circumstances, an album with many references to war although this particular song is about being medicated to be able to perform a concert. Notwithstanding this, there are lines in the second and fourth verses that fit the mood perfectly.

So the emotion was “coming through in waves” and you hoped for their sake, at that pivotal moment as these young men (I didn’t see any female names on the stones) slipped from one life which they had hardly sampled into the next phase of existence that, “there is no pain you are receding”. Gilmour’s soaring guitar solo in the middle of the song will forever remind me of that revered place.

The ages of the occupants ranged from 19 to 42 that I saw. One of our travel companions said she saw a 17 year old. At least the 42 year old got to live part of a life. Not so the teenagers and twenty-somethings. What a bloody waste.

They were buried in individual graves mostly but occasionally multiple graves. One I saw was the resting place of five. God knows what happened and what the aftermath looked like for those poor buggers. It doesn’ really bear thinking about other than to pay respects to those who quite literally picked up the pieces after the shelling and fighting subsided to afford these young men some semblance of a respectful laying to rest.

Winston Churchill said the allies had not won a battle prior to El Alamein and didn’t lose one after. So in a world that is fast approaching a point where we don’t deserve the freedoms these men fought for, we need to be reminded of the achievements of the VC’s, the MC’s and the DSO’s, the airmen, the infantry and the engineers, the privates, the sergeant’s and 23 year old captains. And thank them.