Shanghai...

Ahhhh... Back to order! :) I left Cairo after a busy day at Saqqara, an area with the oldest pyramid in Egypt along with several others. Flew 3 hours to Qatar and then 9 1/2 to Shanghai. So, altho only about 15 hours of travel time I got to Shanghai 21 hours later... I breathed a sigh of relief walking into a spotless airport. I love the chaos, but it's always nice to let your guard down for a minute to enjoy the serenity! A tiny Chinese girl wrestled Arab men into neat, orderly lines, instead of the Cairo stampede, thru customs. I had to smile. :) I arranged a transfer beforehand, too, so I didn't even have to deal with the melee outside... Hotel's in a GREAT location. Walking distance to all kinds of things. I got into my room and met Lisa - the girl I'll be rooming with. She's from San Diego - knows where Keala lives basically and lives close, too. We rested for about half an hour, but it was really loud on the street outside so no use trying to sleep. Checked out the Bund - basically a river walk with a really beautiful skyline, altho the air quaility is terrible. Lots of vendors selling various things, including squid frying over a fire in a pan on the back of a bicycle. Yummy! Then back to the hotel for our group meeting. Everyone seems fun - three Australian couples, an American couple, another Australian girl, and we two American girls. We had an awesome group dinner that Olive, our guide, ordered. (She has a trainee with her named Jenny so we're well taken care of.) We had a ton of food and each paid $5. :) Yah! Local beer is good, too. Can't think what it's called... Today we went to the Shanghai Museum. Also another change from the Egyptian Museum where loaned pieces of 3000 year old artifacts were notated with a scrap of notebook paper in a dustless ring! ha! Wandered around afterward and now I'm skipping an acrobat show to hang out in a smoke filled internet cafe. Oh joy! Tomorrow we travel by train to Nanjing for a busy day...

Quick update from Cairo...

Back in Cairo... Climbed Mt. Sinai yesterday. Whew! We started at 3am to make it up there for the sunrise. Very cool, literally and figuratively... :) After 100 degree heat on the Nile, tho, it was a nice change. I'll expound later. We're waiting for Michael to get here to take us to the Museum and to the market. Leaving tomorrow for China, after a visit to Saqqara and sites nearby. Can't wait to share pics! :)

Aswan Egypt!

First time on the internet in five days of Egypt. We've been that busy and come back in 20 minutes on the ship means, yah, internet still not working... I love being away! :) Started in Cairo after 22 hours of travel. Whew! Kinda' just seemed like a really short night, tho. We got to Cairo at 11 in the morning, after leaving ABQ at 8:30am. Connections were all mostly good, except a delay in Minneapolis that worried us just a bit. Anything was okay after my visa/passport scare. I did procrastinate, but it was supposed to arrive on Monday - I got the email confirmation that it had been shipped. I called Val (family friend in ABQ where I'd had the passport sent) on Tuesday afternoon, assuming that it made it. She called back that evening and said they hadn't seen it. It was too late to do anything about it so I had a fitful night of sleep, or lack there of, and pretended it was all gonna' work out just fine. It had to, right? Wednesday I called around, explained the urgency and was assured it would be found. Got a call back that the delivery guy might have dropped it off at 4088 instead of 4080, altho the address was correctly shown as 4080. Okay, that makes sense, however, I didn't care where it was, as long as I got it! So at 1:30pm, as I'm driving across the Plains of San Augustine, I get a call from Mom that the visa/passport arrived safely at the Jacksons. Still not sure where it was... Whew! So, back to Minneapolis... We're meandering thru security when we hear last boarding call for flight whatever to Cairo. Not too worried, we'd just checked in and it was still early. Still meandering and we hear final boarding call. Hmmm? Anyway, after running to the gate, we sat on the plane for about two hours while many others boarded. Kathy, who lived in Tanzania for two years, reminded us we were officially on African time. Yea! In Cairo we were picked up and taken back to Sonny and Sher-(wait for it)-ry's flat in Maadi, a nice area in Cairo. We drove thru Coptic Cairo and Old Cairo. All very cool. Much cleaner than I expected but I might be thinking of what I'm thinking of Calcutta. Hmmmm? We were greeted by Michael, their language teacher, and Kathy and Doug, who are also visiting. Sonny and Sher...ry are in Hawaii. We knew Sonny would be there, thier son is stationed there but didn't know Sherry would be... Turns out Sonny was coming in that night and we'll not even get to see/meet Sherry, as their son's going last minute to Iraq. Ugh. We unpacked the FIVE large suitcases we'd brought full of goods. Apparently duct tape and ziplocks are hard to find in Cairo, among other things. Our first night was pretty tame, saw a few sites but mostly relaxed and tried not to pass out. Went to bed normal time for Cairo... Day one: PYRAMIDS! Yea! They're so amazing. Yep, awe inspiring! Huge, hot, dusty, smelly, and really beautiful! Okay, Kathy and Laurel are done with their emails and dinner is at 7:30pm. I'll write more later. Masalaam...