December 6th

December 6th
The first noel, the angels did say, was to.....
Today we saw the pyramids. There really isn't that much about them that is that exciting except that they are more than 4000 years old and used to hold Egyptian pharaohs. I think I liked the museum better.
We went inside the middle sized one. The passage went down then level then up then level and then there was a big room where the sarcophagus went. On the ups and downs, the ceiling was too low to stand up in. There was no interior decoration.

December 7th
Good Kind Wenceslas looked out, on the....
Today we got to Luxor and decided to go on a felucca ride. We took a sailboat to Banana Island and got out to see the bananas. We bought some lemon leaves with a pencil and looked at trees. A guy showed us that the inside of banana stalks are sweet and refreshing but not to eat, just to bit and suck the juice out.
We watched the sunset from the felucca and the captain taught Matthew and I a game. You tie your hands to a piece of string and have to get your hands free. It teaches cooperation.
I got a book about hieroglyphics. The guy wanted to sell it for 50 LE (Egyptian pounds) but I got him down to 20! Hooray!

December 8th
Go tell it on the mountain, over the hills....
Today we went to a bunch of tombs and temples. We went to the tombs of Ramses III, Ramses IV and Tutmosis III. There were lots of hieroglyphs on the walls and ceiling. All these tombs were in the Valley of the Kings. Then we saw a temple of the one and only Pharaohess, She made everyone think that she was a daughter of a god so she could take power. I wrote down some hieroglyphic phrases (maybe just words) to decipher with my book later.
We also saw a temple built by Ramses III. It was very very big. There was a balcony that the Pharaoh could look from at the priests performing rituals. I like the Egyptian god Anubis. He has a jackal head and is the god of mummification and inventor of funeral rites.
My favourite hieroglyph is the ankh, symbol of life.

Jonas