Abroad Outlook: Queen of Bullshit

I'm sorry for the profanity in the title, but it was necessary. I hope you enjoyed part on of my series and welcome to the Luxor/Aswan 2.

Colossi of Memnon

Fun fact: I did not know the name of this landmark until I googled it.

I fell asleep on the bus between the boat and our first stop of the day, so when I was at the Colossi of Memnon, I was basically asleep. Here's what I remember: the statues might have been built by people remembering Agamemnon. Supposedly, these are the mothers of the fallen soldiers and you can hear them cry or something. Also, I think this was the sight of a destroyed temple.

This is from wikipedia: "The Colossi of Memnon are two massive stone statues of Pharaoh Amenhotep III." They were built in 1350 BC. "The name Memnon means 'Ruler of the Dawn' and was probably applied to the colossi because of the reported cry at dawn of one of the statues." I told you!

I will link the rest of the article at the end if you want to know more.

Cute Corie and the Colossi of Memnon

The Mortuary Temple of Hatshepsut

Temple for Hatshepsut

This temple was built for Hatshepsut. It's the mortuary temple where her body was mummified. Queen Hatshepsut was the Queen of Bullshit. She was married to the pharaoh and they had a son. The pharaoh died when their son was very young, so Hatshepsut was put in charge until the son was old enough. Eventually, her son did get old enough so she did what any rational power hungry woman would do, she hid him. She hid her son, and told the people of Egypt she was the daughter of Amun-Ra and that's why she should be the Pharaoh of Egypt. This was the only way they'd accept her as a female ruler. Eventually, she revealed her son and they ruled together for a while until she died.

I would just like to point out that the economy flourished under her rule (apparently because she was a woman but I don't know if that's the whole reason).

This is a picture of a boat. Hatshepsut took a famous journey to what is now known as Ethiopia this is a picture of the boat they took.

The beautiful Hatshepsut herself.

I thought this was cool. Poland and Egypt working together for history. Yay world peace.

When Hatshepsut died, a priest or someone told everyone she lied and they were all pissed. Especially her son, who destroyed the temple and all statues of her. I still love you Hatshepsut!

Valley of the Kings

The Valley of the Kings is the place where they buried the Pharaohs. They believed that in the after life you must complete 12 challenges, pass 12 gates, before you reach the judgement. They saw that the sun was "born" during the sunrise and "died" during the sunset. Then the next morning it was "born again" for the second life. The 12 challenges represent the 12 hours the sun is down. Woah, symbolism.

The tombs are crowded, and hot. They didn't think about putting any sort of ventilation system in the tombs so it's really hot. Not to mention you are in the ground, very deep. I felt my pants sticking to my legs, I've never felt that before. Also, one of the tombs was basically 70 ish meters almost straight down. My legs were shaking after climbing back up.

Unfortunately, I couldn't take any pictures because they weren't allowed. Also I was dying so there's that.

Cameras aren't allowed in the Valley of Kings, but don't you worry. You can buy a photo set and a DVD with over a thousand pictures of Egypt for a total of 50 LE.

What a rip off! I bought it. There are really cool pictures. I haven't looked at the DVD but I will eventually. I will show the pictures and some more mythology in a different post when I can take good pictures of the pictures.

Luxor Temple

The last stop on Tuesday was The Luxor Temple.