Queen of Bullshit | Luxor/Aswan 2

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. 

Luxor Temple

Similar to the wall with the kings' names. This is a wall of enemy names.

This temple was taken over by Romans. They used part of it as a church. Here's the remains of a painting of the apostles.

Road of lions that meets the road of rams connecting the Luxor Temple and Karnak Temple

Altar for the church

After all this we set sail for Aswan.

I hope you all enjoyed this post. I will continue on with more pictures soon. I'm going to take a break because I've been at this for a while. 

If you liked this post, like it and Corie in Egypt on Facebook. This way, I know what kind of posts you all enjoy.

If you have questions, comments or concerns, let me know below and I'll do my best to respond.

Feel free to share this post with your friends, because you can.

You are awesome. Learn something today.

Byeeeee

Corie.

This Could've Been You Katy Perry | Luxor/Aswan 1

Back in October, Katy Perry was planning to take a trip for her 30th birthday. I heard it was to include many places such as Morocco, France, and (probably because of her Dark Horse video) Egypt. Luxor and/or Aswan, to be exact. However, her trip was cancelled. Not her whole trip, just the part in Egypt because, like the rest of America, she was worried about her safety. I don't know if I have all my facts correct, this is just what the internet has told me. The point is, when I was on my trip, I couldn't help but think: Man, did she miss out.

That's right, ladies and gentlemen, the moment you've all been waiting for. This is the first in my Luxor/Aswan series.

Traveling

I had no idea what to expect for the airport/plane experience. The first thing that happens is you walk into the airport. To do this you have to put any and all luggage (carry-on and checked) through an x-ray conveyor belt thing and walk through a metal detector. This is all the security they have. That's it. Then you go to the check in desk.

From what I understand, everyone on the flight checks in at the same time. They check in by flight not by standing in a line. I also think you can check however many bags you desire for free. I checked nothing because I can't lock the bag I took.

After that we walked through a broken metal detector to the gate. Then we took a bus from the gate to the plane. The flight I was on was free seating. I chose a random window seat (there was no first class). I was actually asleep before the plane was off the ground.

Luxor

We ate lunch on the boat before our adventures. This is what I wrote on this subject: The food isn't bad. The "beverage list" has alcohol on it. Wow. From what I've seen of the boat, it's majestic. It looks like something royalty would sail on.

Karnak Temple

The first place was called Karnak Temple. Karnak Temple was built for the god Amun-Ra. Not to be confused with Akhmenra, the guy from the Night of the Museum. (Off topic, I saw the third movie Secret of the Tomb. Great movie, almost cried. Plus Robin Williams.)

Amun-Ra was made up. Amun was the main god for the city of Luxor. Ra was the main go for the rest of Egypt. When Luxor was planned to be the capital of Egypt, the Luxor people were scared of losing the god Amun because all their sacrifices would've been a waste. In order to prevent this, they combined the two gods to make Amun-Ra (not Akhmenra, you do not understand how disappointed I am).

Model of Karnak Temple 

The very front of Karnak Temple. 

These statues line the road that connected Karnak temple with Luxor temple. Rams represent Amun-Ra.

These columns are about 15 meter's each and there are well over 100 of them.

Thought behind this picture: I want to touch the hieroglyphs.

Cute Corie and hieroglyphs.

This is a wall with the names of all the kings.

This is a lake where kings and fancy folk bathed and thanked the gods for stuff.

This is a scarab. Supposedly, if you walk around it 3 times (counterclockwise) you receive luck. 5 times for luck and marriage. 7 times for luck, marriage, and children. I decided to walk around 7 times because why the eff not. So I walk. I got around 6 times before I realized I was going the wrong way. Yay, Corie.

A thing.

Tourists ruining my picture of another part of the temple.

A picture of a statue of a king whose name I don't remember.

Please just take a moment to appreciate how awesome hieroglyphs are. 

More things.

The temple is huge. The walls and columns are covered in hieroglyphs. It's either the biggest temple or on of the biggest. The best part is, this is all by hand over hundreds or thousands of years. They had no electric tools or anything of the sort. I think that's amazing.

When the sun set there was a Sound and Light show. The idea is you hear "the voices" of the kings and they tell you the history of different parts of the temple. They also project images onto the walls. It was cool, but all in Arabic.


I'm sorry it took so long to get these took so long to upload. These are obviously not all the pictures I took at Karnak temple but these are my favorites. They don't do the temple justice, but it's the best I can do.

If you liked this post, like it and Corie in Egypt on Facebook.
If you have questions, comments, or concerns, leave them below and I will try my best to answer them.
If you know someone who likes Egyptian history, or needs a reminder that there's more to Egypt than what you hear in the news, please share. That's what this blog is about.


You are all awesome. Learn something today.

Byeeeee

Corie.

My Egypt Bucket List

Way back in August, I made a post of my Egypt bucket list. I just accidentally deleted that post, but I want to make an updated version because I'm about halfway through my exchange year :'(

The things in bold I have already done

-See the pyramids 

-See the Sphynx

-Eat pigeon

-post picture in Istanbul with a dorky caption (lyrics from the They Might Be Giants song)

-post a picture in New York with different lyrics from the same song 

-become comfortable with public transportation

-make friends

-buy stuff for my family in America

-ride a camel

-go sand boarding

-learn to make Egyptian food

-learn Arabic

-develop a British accent 

Here is my new list

-eat pigeon

-learn more Arabic

-learn all the words to at least one whole song in Arabic

-go sand boarding

-go to church

-go to Alexandria (mostly the library)

-go to the Egyptian museum (mummies!)

-go see old mosques/churches in old cairo (I think)

-volunteer somewhere, somehow

-learn to make more Egyptian food

-take a belly dancing class. 

That's all I have, but if there are other things you all think I should do let me know (especially if you live/have lived in Egypt).  I still haven't posted the Luxor/Aswan pictures. I will as soon as I can I promise. Also, I hung out with the Sojth African exchange student who leaves in a few days. Neither of us spoke much Arabic but we bought movie tickets, popcorn, and dinner by ourselves. Take that language barrier. (We get it Corie, you can speak Arabic, congrats.) Plus the guy wouldn't take my money because it was "mesh hilwa". What did my money ever do to you? You're mesh hilwa. Just kidding. 

If you enjoyed this post like it and Corie in Egypt on Facebook. (If you want)

If you have questions, concerns, comments, leave them below. (If you want)

If you want to share my blog with your fellow humans, that would be appreciated. 

You are awesome, I love you, have a wonderful day and learn something. 

Byeeeeee

Corie. 

Books Create Happiness

I spent this past week in denial. Wait no, in the Nile. My trip to Luxor and Aswan was great. Egyptian history is amazing. It puts all American history to shame. These temples and things were built before Jesus was even thought of. Jesus is my marker for how old something is. Before Jesus = holy crap how does this even exist. After Jesus = oh yeah, I guess that's pretty old. I don't know why I'm like that, but I am. 

Currently, the three family laptops are being fixed and all the pictures are on my camera. 

I do have some to tide you over until I can post them. 

1) sound and light ticket for Karnak's temple

2) boarding pass for the cruise ship

3) floating pump station between Luxor and Aswan

4) towel swans

5) ship tea time feat. The Hobbit

Until I can post the pictures and stories of my trip, I wanted to share something with you. Right now, I am really happy. The day I got back from Luxor and Aswan, my host mom asked if I want to go to the book fair. I mean hells yeah I want to go to the Cairo International Book Fair. 

We go to the book fair, and my host family sets me loose in this huge tent. Different stands are set up and I didn't take any pictures, I kinda wish I had. Anyway, I'm walking around and I see Eleanor and Park. People have not stopped talking about this book in forever so it's been on my list forever. I walk up to the guy and ask how much it is (in Arabic mind you) and he says it's 25 LE. That's between 3 and 4 dollars. At the bookstore in City Stars it's some 200 LE. Bought it. And this goes on for three more books. I leave with four books (Three for me one for my friend). 

Afterwards, Etch A Sketch texts me and asks me if I want to go with her to the book fair. Today, we went. I bought three more books. The grand total was seven books for about $22 or 155 LE. As a book lover this makes me happy. 

The other part of my utter happiness at the moment, is my ability to function. When you're in a foreign country, not knowing the language, you tend to depend a lot on other people. When you're 16 years old, you don't really want to rely heavily on other people. Especially when you are on am adventure in which you are supposed to be independent. When I was at the book fair, both times, I could ask how much a book was, receive the answer, and pay by myself. I could say "excuse me" when someone was in my way and say "no thank you" when a shopkeeper asked if I needed/wanted anything. I even randomly ran into a friend from school. I know enough people in this country to randomly bump into a friend! Do you know how amazing that is?! 

Going into this, I didn't know how hard it would be to be an exchange student. Being away from home and you're family is hard. Not being able to understand and communicate easily is hard. Come summer, not being able to wear shorts will be hard. But so often I get these moments where I feel loved, or empowered, or smart, independent, brave, or all of the above. They really keep you going, even if it is just asking how much a book is and paying for it on your own with your parents money. 

I really can't wait for you all to see these pictures. They won't nearly do the landmarks justice, but I love them so much. Also I'll be telling the stories of the gods and pharaohs I know and love. I will split them up by day, or I'll split them into landmarks I don't know for sure yet. I'm so exited. The trip was great and I saw a belly dancer (in my opinion it was more booty than belly but whatever). 

If you liked this post, like it and Corie in Egypt on Facebook. 

If you have questions, comments, or concerns, leave them in the comments and I'll try my best to answer them. 

If you know someone who'd like this blog or post, be a good friend and share it. If you want. 

Stay tuned for Luxor/Aswan pictures. 

You are awesome and learn something today. 

Love you guys. 

Byeeeee

Corie. 

Mid-year Break Part One

My last final was on Tuesday. I walked out of the final so happy. As much as I love school, the month or so of final exams was not fun. I had a lot of time off intended for studying. Unlike my friends, I didn't spend all that time studying. The problem was that my friends were all busy and I wanted to do things, but everyone was studying. 

Tuesday

After the exam, we waited for the bus which came two hours after the exam ended. Two of my friends and I went over to my friend's house. We went to Pizza Hut and it was the most American place I've been in Egypt. 

Story time: When I was little I LOVED black olives on my pizza. I don't know when or how it started and ended but there was a time where that's all I wanted on my pizza. 

We ordered a supreme pizza. It had a little bit of everything. I'm not a veggies on pizza person, but I decided to try it and if I didn't like it, I'd pick off the veggies. First of all, it was delicious. Second, black olives on pizza is still good. 

We watched a movie and hung out. It was really fun. Cairo is so so big and we live kind of far from each other so it sucks we can't do this more often. 

Wednesday

I borrowed a book from my friend. I read it in four hours. (Little over 200 pages). Then I went over to another friend's house. I don't even remember what we did. We ate, she studied, I borrowed books from her. 

Thursday

Exams in Egypt officially finished on Thursday. My friend and I went to City Stars. We wanted to watch Interstellar, it wasn't playing. We went downstairs to see Horrible Bosses 2, it was VIP and was 4x the regular price. We went back upstairs to see Night at the Museum 3, it was sold out. We waited in line for The Pyramid for about ten minutes and I got so fed up with strangers touching me so we left. We got "Chinese" food from this place called Panda House Express. The food was better than I thought it was going to be. We watched Freedom Writers. If you ever need a movie to watch, that movie is really good. Then we watched Lucy, not as good as I was hoping but still interesting. 

Friday

Etch A Sketch and I woke up early to go to the 10 AM showing of Night of the Museum 3. No one was there. 

Advice: if you live or end up in Egypt and want to go to the cinema. Go at 10 there is no one there. 

We get up to the cinema and we headed towards Night of the Museum 3, when I saw it. INTERSTELLAR

We wanted to see Interstellar back in November, but I had an AFS thing I had to go to. We never ended up seeing it and we thought that since it wasn't there the day before, it was out of theaters. I was so sick of people saying how great the movie was. But holy crap it was so good. I cried like four times, I was not expecting to cry. 

Then we got Cinnabon. Cinnabon is life. 

Yes, there's a Cinnabon under all that chocolate. 

Saturday

Sometimes after being social a lot, I have to recharge my batteries. On Saturday I slept, read, watched TV and movies and relaxed. 

At about 10 ish PM, my host parents ask me to make roz bel laban. I've never made this before, but you gotta try new things. I pulled up my food post and clicked on the roz bel laban link and followed that recipe. I didn't fail! It worked and it tasted good! I was so proud. 

Sunday

I finished my book today. It's called Me Before You by Jojo Moyes. It is a new favorite. I loved it. It was amazing. I cried. I am still feeling all the feels. 

Unable to really do anything due to all the feels of this book, I packed for my trip tomorrow. And now I'm blogging. 

Tomorrow I leave for Luxor and Aswan. These are two cities far south. I will be flying and then taking a boat from Luxor to Aswan. It's five days, I don't know if I'll have internet or not. I don't know exactly what all I will be seeing, but it's going to be all kinds of things very old. Older than all of you, and possibly Jesus. People keep telling me to take pictures, and OF COURSE I'll take pictures. How else am I supposed to make my history loving Grandpapapapapa jealous?

As always, if you enjoyed this post... Wait a minute. The blog is different.

Yes, if you have not noticed, the blog is a little different. The picture that originally tiled the background was taken from Google images. This picture is mine! Yay! Also I made it brighter because before the blog was kind of dark. I also added a What is Abroad Outlook? page and an About Me page so check those out if you want. I'm going to spend some time going through my posts and making tags to organize everything a little, but I'll probably procrastinate. 

If you liked this post, be sure to like it and Corie in Egypt on Facebook. 

If you have comments, questions, or concerns about anything leave them in the comments. 

If you know someone who'd like this blog be a good friend and share it. 

Let me know if you like the new blog look. I like it, it's brighter. 

You are awesome and as my sixth grade history teacher says: learn something today. 

Byeeeee

Corie. 

Exchange Student Tag

Today I got my second visa so I thought I'd celebrate with the Exchange Student Tag.

A tag is an internet challenge. The most famous one would be the ALS ice bucket challenge. Normally, though, it's a series of questions targeted at a specific group (exchange students, book lovers, beauty gurus, it's a big YouTube thing) and the people of said group answer them. It's a little hard to explain but I'm sure you'll figure it out. 

This tag was made by a blogger named Lærke. She is from Denmark and spent her year in Vegas with EF and I found it by googling "exchange student tag". 

Some of these questions have posts for them. I will link those way, way at the bottom. Some of these questions have inspired new posts so keep an eye out for those. 

Here we go:

What is your name, age, nationality and company?

My name is Corie. I am 16 years old. I am american (United States of, that is). I am with AFS. 

Ana ismee Corie. Ana setashr. Ana amrekia. Ana m3a AFS. Is that right? Don't laugh if it's not. 

Where are you living your exchange year?

Cairo, Egypt. In case you hadn't figured that out yet. 

Why did you decide to be an exchange student?

When I was six years old, my family hosted an exchange student. Ever since I had been surrounded by exchange students. Exchange students and AFS is part of who I am. The better question is why wouldn't I be an exchange student? 

Also for the past three or four years I have been in love with the Arabic language and the little culture I knew about. I am also the person who would scream at you until I'm hoarse if you say anything racist or religionist against Arabs/Muslims and I needed some experience to back up my arguments. 

If you haven't read my posts "The Beginning" or "Bridging Cultures Scholarship" then check those out for more. 

What did you think when you first stepped out of the plane?

*plane lands*

Okay, Corie, this is it. 

Jeez this bag is heavy. How has this been on my back for three days. 

Okay, bathroom bathroom bathroom. Where's the bathroom? How do you say bathroom? Whatever. I'll pee at home. 

These signs are in English! This is great!

Non-residents fill out white forms. That's me. Okay. Filling out the form. I don't have a pen... How do you all have pens? Where is my mom and her 100 pens? Oh right, on another continent. Okay. Banks have pens. "Can I borrow a pen?" *writes with a fake pen* "Qualam?" *acquires pen* "Shokran"

Okay, where's my suitcase? There it is. This is heavy too. 

I'm so tired

Customs guy 2: what's in your bag?

Me: Clothes and shoes?

Customs guy 2: Okay

Nadia: Corie!

Me: Hi!

It's so hot and loud. 

What is this driving? I'm gonna die. 

Food. Bed. It's still so fricking hot. 

Oh, so that's the sunrise call to prayer. 

What is the weirdest thing you have tasted so far? 

I don't even know. Okra? They look like little cacti. But I guess there's okra in the States. I mean, all the food is good. Meshy maybe. It's like stuffed vegetables with rice or meat or other vegetables. It's good. I have yet to eat pigeon which I really want to eat. My friend is determined to bring me a liver sandwich. I'll keep you guys updated. 

I have a whole post about food btw. 

Update 15/5/15: I have eaten mombar which is cow intestine.

Have you done anything so far that you never thought was possible?

I have literally climbed up the pyramids. I have understood Arabic that is spoken to me. I have been invited to join the college level MUN. I have gotten over homesickness. I have lived abroad. 

What has been the biggest challenge so far?

You know, there are lots of challenges. People you don't understand, people not understanding you, being thousands of miles away from anything familiar. The biggest challenge I have to say has been Christmas which was one day of terrible homesickness or the flu which was four days of hell. 

How do you like the school in your host country?

I have been taking finals for the last month, so I'm kind of just done with school. Otherwise though, the teachers are nice, the people are cool, the uniforms suck and I miss wearing what I want to school, I love my friends, the classes aren't terrible, the library has Harry Potter, and the principal gave me a birthday card. I'd say I like it. 

How do people dress in your host country (in your opinion)?

Differently. And by that I mean everyone dresses differently. Every one wears pants or long skirts/dresses all year long.

But if you've ever seen pictures or movies with Arabs basically wearing a really long shirt/dress some people wear those. I think it's pretty normal. Teens don't dress that different from teens in America. 

I would actually love to do a post like this so let me know if that would be interesting for you to read. I'll probably post it anyway. 

Also, my friend is a fashion designer. Check out Rana Madkour Designs on Facebook and Instagram because her jewelry is beautiful. 

If your exchange year was a song, what would it be?

Rather Be - Clean Bandit

Walk Like An Egyptian - The Bangles (for obvious reasons)

How do you imagine the day you are going home?

All of the feels. I don't even want to think about it. Go away. 

Who would you like to do this tag?

If you are or were an exchange student, answer one or more of these questions in the comments. I would love to know what you guys have to say. Even if you didn't study abroad you can answer at least one of these questions. 

As always, if you guys enjoyed this post like it and Corie in Egypt on Facebook. 

Leave any questions, comments, or concerns you have in the comments and I will answer them. 

If you know someone who would like this post or my blog be a good friend and share it. 

If you know an exchange student you think should do this tag, tag them. 

You are awesome, and as my sixth grade history teacher always said: learn something today. 

Byeeeeee

Corie. 

Links:

The Beginning: http://abroad-outlook.blogspot.com/2014/06/the-beginning.html?m=1

Bridging Cultures Scholarship (with video): http://abroad-outlook.blogspot.com/2014/06/bridging-cultures-scholarship.html?m=1

Food post: http://abroad-outlook.blogspot.com/2014/11/donut-have-pun-for-title-but-olive-you.html?m=1k

Rather Be - Clean Bandit: http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=cUC_rzsiua8

Walk Like An Egyptian - The Bangles: http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Cv6tuzHUuuk

Rana Madkour Designs: https://m.facebook.com/Ranamadkourdesigns?_rdr