last leg in Luxor - معبد الأقص ومعبد الكرنك

I'm gonna jump right into photos:


Our first stop today was the Temple of Karnak. It was another one of my favorite things in Egypt. It towers like a Gothic church. (Each of these pillars is thicker than a tree!)


the first peace treaty in the world, between Egypt (Ramses II) and the Hittite Empire (Hatusili III)
(hieroglyphics in the Temple of Karnak)


that forest of pillars again, with Vera, Alex, Sara and the best tour guide ever - Doaa!


goats outside of Karnak


Vera is skeptical as our evil driver hands us what is apparently a train ticket to Cairo for three people. It is indecipherable even for native Egyptians and is written with pen on torn blue paper. That's what I call "official."


Next up was the Temple of Luxor. It wasn't as cool as Karnak, but it was still pretty sweet.


Roman-era painting of (possibly) the Last Supper
Notice how the newer, Christian stuff has mainly worn away, while the thousands-of-years-older Egyptian stuff has remained. This supports my theory that people are so fascinated by the ancient Egyptians because they have come closer to permanence than anyone else.


Alexander the Great, depicted as a pharaoh and remembered by the Egyptians as a liberator, being given the key of life (Ankh) by the sun god Ra


We asked some man and his wife to take a photo of us. While we were positioning ourselves, the wife walks in front of us, ready to be photographed (by my camera?!). Then he snaps this award-worthy portrait. After that she walks right up to him so her face covers the entire shot.
(Notice I'm not even ready for the photo, because he gave us absolutely no warning.)

And we just got back into Cairo. The overnight train again took 12 hrs, partially because we were stopped next to some green, lit-up minaret for literally an hour and a half! Bleh. I hate the trains in Egypt.

Oh, and before I close, I want to address two comments/questions on my last post:
1) Shockingly, Luxor manages to defy natural law and maintain an extremely hot temperature right through midnight.
2) And as to the "Welcome to Alaska" thing: We actually got three more "Welcome to Alaska"s in Luxor, so we decided to start asking around. But no one knows for certain. A friend of Sara's says it's because of the ironic temperature difference between the two places. The wonderful Doaa suggested that they just don't know what they're saying. Our tour guide from the day before (Menan) said she thought Alaska was a well-known city, and that the Egyptians just assume most Americans come from there.

the unending train ride - أو ذهبنا إلى الأقصر

I'm typing this in Luxor! Plus (more good news) a friend of mine back in Constance just let me know that the internet is finally working in our dorms!


Last night we walked down to the Nile and decided to take a felucca ride.


This was our view for an hour and $2/person! It was awesome. (Oh, PS, a felucca is an Egyptian sailboat, in case you didn't know.) We also grabbed some shawarma and had a little picnic on the boat.

Then today we took the train to Luxor. I was told it would take about 6 hours, but it turned out to be closer to 12! We spent our entire day on the train, but at least we were in first class (it cost $2 more than second).


And it's Vera's birthday today, so we bought her this delicious, massive tray of goodies in Cairo.


The ride was very pretty, but God knows I would rather have done something else.


And our "lunch" was terrible. We grabbed pretzel sticks, which were soggy and had chunks of pepper in them. Left from the "pretzels" you can see our Chipseys, which tasted more like tomato juice than chips, and left of that our very decent pack of cheese.

Anyway, Luxor is way different than what I'd expected, but keep in mind I've seen just about nothing so far. It's also ungodly hot here. I just took a shower 20 minutes ago, and I still feel like I could use another right now. And our hostel is right next to one of the places where they blast the prayers on load-speakers - about every half an hour. But I'm very excited to be here, and tomorrow we're going to some very famous sites, so be sure to stop by again!

Жить в бизнес-классе!

I'm in Moscow!

It was a long journey to get here, but I got to ride first class with KLM, which was awesome! I even got a little tub of Ben and Jerry's ice cream with my meal! Quality living!

I'm staying in Godzillas Hostel again, and it's been completely renovated! We have a private room, sheets and blankets, and even unlimited wireless internet for 1700 rubles/night (or about €22 per person).

Kelly and I toured around Moscow today. We saw Red Square, grabbed some delicious chocolate blini (kind of the Russian crepe) in front of Christ the Savior, and walked down New Arbot. Now I'm exhausted, but before I go to sleep: МОИ ФОТОГРАФИИ!


Red Square was empty! That was a big change from last year.


outside Red Square
Authentic Russian souvenirs now include rolls of toilet paper with American currency printed on them. To quote the Russian newspaper The Exile (which is an entertaining read, by the way):

The dollar is so worthless here that fanning out stacks of Benjamins has become Russia's newest ironic photograph pose, joining the likes of the lesbian kiss and the kukla-mukla lip pucker.

Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, outside the Kremlin


On the bridge to Christ the Savior, there are hundreds of these padlocks. It turns out newly-weds traditionally sign their names on the locks, clip them to the bridge and then throw the key into the river below.


statue of Peter the Great on the Moskva river
This statue was built in 1997 and is over 300 feet tall, making it the sixth tallest statue in the world. It has become quite famous since its construction due to its being insanely gaudy, obstructive and just plain ironic - remember how Peter hated Moscow so much that he built St. Petersburg? One critic calls the monument a "big toy soldier stuck atop a bunch of broken model ships."


Here's where we had some delicious, steaming, chocolate blini.


Near the Lenin Library is this statue of Dostoevsky. He seems so sad, looking out over the omnipresent giant advertisements (which I'm pretty sure the city puts up simply in order to hide the nasty Soviet architecture).


On our way home, Kelly found this sign lying in a stack of debris. Something for the French House next year ;)

um Deutschland reisen

Hello dear blog-readers of mine!
So I've been traveling around Germany for my Spring Break. I thought I'd have more internet access than I've had, but I'm surviving anyway!
Here's my plan for the next several blogs. Each single blog I'm going to discuss one leg of the trip. Assuming (hoping) that some of you readers will visit Germany and want to do some of the things I have done, I'm also going to rank the activities (out of 5 asterisks, *****) and give the approximate price.

And we're off:
Our first stop was Stuttgart, but first we had to get to Singen, a town near Constance, in order to transfer to a different train. However, the railroad in Constance was under construction, so we had to go to a different station near by (we took a bus) and then board the train. Our connecting train in Singen was delayed an hour, so we grabbed coffee.


I'm an idiot. Whatever.
(in Singen)

Then we got to Stuttgart. Oh, and we're using the Eurrail Pass, which so far has been very easy. It cost me about $440, but it's unlimited travel for any 11 days in two months, so not a bad deal at all. We had to get it stamped before we got on our first train, and then we have to fill out the date in these little boxes each day before we travel. I give the Eurrail Pass ****, just because 5 stars is way too much for the first time I rate anything.

Anyway, Stuttgart was surprisingly gorgeous! (Quite possibly largely because the weather was spectacular.) We just wandered around and sat on the lawn near Schlossplatz (right near the two castles). People in Stuttgart were all very well dressed and very attractive. They were also predominantly Mediterraneans-looking, which surprised me.


inside the Evangelical church
very modern, very chic


street musicians, Louis Vuitton, 17th century church


Schlossplatz


Stuttgart=second love of my life, after Constance

In Stuttgart we stayed at Alex 30. It was clean, the staff spoke English (even tho we didn't need it), and decently priced (€22/bed/night, I'm pretty sure). No breakfast, tho, and it's a decent distance from the train station. You can, however, take the street car (€1/trip) directly from the train station to the block where the hostel is located. I give it ***.

So that's all for this post. Expect another tomorrow with photos from Frankfurt and Bacharach!