Saqqara Stories

Wednesday, September 26, 2012

Oberoi Mena House

Giza, Egypt

Agenda

Saqqara

Imhotep Museum

Step Pyramid

Pyramid of Wenis

Wenis Causeway

Tomb of Niankhkhnum and Khnumhotep

Pyramid of Teti

Tomb of Kagemeni

Tomb of My-Kau-Isesi

Lunch at Saqqara Palm Club

Dashur

Red Pyramid (inside)

Bent Pyramid and Satellite pyramid (outside)

Cobra Freize

Cobra Frieze. Step Pyramid complex, Saqqara, Egypt.

My new favourite thing in the Imhotep Museum is a fragmentary cobra frieze, four of them, carved from white stone. I think I could have looked at them all day, though I probably spent only ten or fifteen minutes. I think I've always liked them, but not as much as this visit. See – when Gayle was in India earlier this year, I made her a gunky lion-snake (that's something you see on a couple of Egyptian coffins – a snake's body with the head of a lion) as a welcome-back present. It's not until you try to make a thing that you really appreciate its line and form. I was working from photos, in coloured felt from a craft store. I drew a pattern on graph paper, and held it at arm's length to judge the proportions. The cobra's hood could be wider, I decided, and changed the pattern. It was still the same lion-snake, and looked almost exactly the same as it did a moment before, but now it was just a bit better. Or was it? Maybe it was better before? Did I really change anything? Moments of indecision ran together as I slowly sewed and glued, finally calling it quits around two in the morning, still wondering whether I had made something that was even worth giving.

The ancient carvers worked in stone. That's permanent. No fooling around. You really have to know what you're doing to work in stone. And to do it over and over again, because there were at least a dozen of these cobras on the frieze, probably a whole lot more. As I stood in the museum, looking at the first snake, I inventoried its features: the striated body, the flare of the hood, the cobra's face and eyes, and the hint of a smile. Maybe. Or maybe that's what I wanted to see; in truth, the enigmatic inflection of the lips is impossible to read. I imagined running my hands along the side of the carving to get a better sense of its proportions. All the snakes are similar, but none are identical. Some have longer snouts. Some vary in lateral position of the head when viewed straight-on. All have a loose, simple, sensual line that runs from the body up to the hood, then to the crown of the head. All of them are lovely.

How something so simple can holds me so completely falls just beyond my grasp.

Museum Dogs

Let me tell you about Lloyd.

Lloyd is a published American novelist, a university professor, an accomplished pianist, and one of the kindest people I have ever met. He is also Gayle's sweetheart, which is how I've come to know him.

Lloyd and I were a little bad the other night. Instead of joining the rest of the touring group for supper at a restaurant Giza, we opted for a simpler, smaller, quieter supper in the hotel restaurant. Neither of us were particularly hungry, but we knew we should eat something. We talked at length about the novels of Arthur C. Clarke, and how Lloyd had met Clarke in the late 1960s. I have been a huge fan of Clarke's work since I've been a teenager, and tried to explain to Lloyd why that was so. “His writing is so clear and poetic. And he can do the trick where he talks about something without actually talking about it.”

Lloyd nodded. “Indirection is one of the most important things in novel writing. You could have a man and a woman talking, and he could say something like, 'I really love you, and I think you should come back to my room now,' and it would be very direct, but not very satisfying. Instead, you could have them walking on a beach, and the man could pick up a sea shell and give it to the woman, and say, 'Isn't this the most beautiful thing you've ever seen?' You can tell he's interested in her from what he does, without him saying what he's feeling.”

It had the sound of truth to it, and that left me feeling deflated for selfish reasons. I have been lately reading a book of short essays by Hunter S. Thompson. I adore his work, and often pilfer the tone of his pieces without a backwards glance. It's great fun, but his writing is all very direct. And so my own writing tends to be very direct as well. It's something to work on, I suppose.

After leaving the restaurant, Lloyd played on the hotel's grand piano in the lounge, filling the bar and the lobby with jazz standards and other songs I didn't recognize. The music was forceful enough to replace much of the ambient sound, and in doing so, became the soundtrack for the hotel staff. I watched as the bell captain crossed the wide lobby, one step at a time, in no particular hurry. Three men in black jackets and immaculate pressed white shirts cross-checked receipts at the concierge desk. The reception staff processed arriving guests. These mundane activities all seemed to have a special purpose when observed with the addition of music.

And today, as we were about to leave the Imhotep Museum, I watched from the bus as Lloyd tore off bits of old piece of pita bread and tossed them to a pair of dogs in the otherwise empty parking lot. The dogs live nearby, at the edge of the desert, and looked to be in good heath -- lean, but with good coats and a solid build. He would tear off a bit of bread, and toss it to one dog, who would catch it in its mouth. Then he'd do the same with the other dog. Then back to the first, and so on until there was nothing left. The dogs never missed. I have seldom seen Lloyd look so pleased.

The Saqqara Palm Club

The Saqqara Palm Club. Saqqara, Egypt.

 There was no one at the Saqqara Palm Club when we stopped in for lunch. The last two times I have been there in 2008 and 2010, it was packed. Today, there was a couple using the pool, and our group. That's it. It's a good place with excellent service and solid food. Please give them your custom.

That's all I really wanted to say. I have no particular anecdote to relay about the restaurant; I just wanted to recommend it because they have always been good to me there. For example, when I'm in Egypt, I prefer not to eat meat. It's not a big thing, but if I have the choice, I prefer to eat a vegetarian meal. When I mentioned this to the waiter taking care of us, the manager overheard, and offered to make up a plate of mixed vegetables, and some french fries. Would that be OK, he asked? Perfect, I said, because it really was exactly what I had been hoping for. Two plates soon arrived, one of very tasty seasonal vegetables, and one of really excellent french fries. I offered some of the latter to Gayle, knowing that she had also declined the mixed grill. She took a handful. And then later on, she took a few more.

The Red Pyramid at Dashur

We were all on the bus, on the road to Dashur. Someone asked Gayle how hard the pyramid was to go into. “The entrance is up pretty high, so you start by climbing the outside of the pyramid, you go in, and then you go down a whole lot of steps. There's a short flat section, and a ladder.” Then she asked me, “Do you remember how many steps there are?”

“A hundred and thirty-nine,” I said, referring to the small black notebook I carry with me in Egypt. I had counted on a previous visit. Twice: once down, and then again going up.

The Red Pyramid at Dashur, Egypt.

I'm never really eager to leave a pyramid once I've gone through all the trouble of getting into it in the first place. So I usually hang around in the burial chamber as a slow stream of people come, gawk, and leave. Most people do not linger long. Once they've look at thecorbelled ceiling and the floor, which has been torn up badly by vandals in search of treasure, they leave. That's fine. I like the sense of place one has in a pyramid. You know that you're in Red Pyramid, and there is only one of them in the world. You can't be anywhere else, and keeping your attention focused there is slightly easier as a result.

Gayle always sings a requiem for Sneferu, and I like to hear it. It calls an end to our visit, and after that, we usually leave together. The last time we were here, I said, “Until the next time,” as we left the burial chamber. This time, I didn't say anything by way of farewell.

As a rule, pyramids are humid, very warm, and dark. You climb a long set of steps though a narrow passage before emerging high above the desert floor, and because you're half way up the pyramid, you have an expansive view of the flat sands of south Saqqara, and farther to the north, the Step Pyramid complex. On a really clear day, you can see the pyramids at Giza. Going from darkness to the airy brilliance of day is not unlike being reborn.

Gayle looks at me, a little winded, but all smiles. “We did it! Again. Why do we do this?” It's a running gag – why do we fly 7 time zone to be here, or why do we tromp through the desert to look at a rock quarry, or why do we risk life and limb crawling into pyramids? We smile because there is no answer that makes any sense, then pick our way back down to ground level using a set of worn and tricky stone steps. Part way down, we take a breather. Gayle picks a flat white sea shell from a crumbling pyramid block and hands it to me. “Eocene rock,” she says, “from when this was all covered by ocean. Forty million years ago.”

We complete our descent under an open blue sky, in the shadow of Sneferu's pyramid.