Prague: Looking for Vaclav Havel

“I really do inhabit a universe in which words are capable of shaking the entire structure of government, where words can prove mightier than ten military divisions."
Vaclav Havel, former president of Czechoslovakia and then president of the independent Czech Republic until 2003.


I was in Prague and so I decided to look for one of my heroes, Vaclac Havel, the brilliant, talented poet and former president of the Czech Republic. He stepped down in 2003 and has since returned to theatre, teaching, international relations, and writing. He is one of the people in this world, along with the likes of Jefferson, Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton, with whom I’d love to have dinner. I’d ask Havel about his life’s work, his passions, his role as a leader of the “velvet revolution’ that peacefully freed the country of Communist occupation. I’d ask him how a poet became a president, how a poet, playwright, and artist became a political activist and an icon of independence. I’d listen to him read his poetry and newest plays over coffee and dessert, savoring every moment with this great man.

Prague, the Czech capital, is an incredibly beautiful city, I think one of the most beautiful I have ever seen. How wonderful it must have been, how enriching and inspiring, to grow up here. My search for Havel began with a night cruise down the historic Vltava river. It was our group’s introduction to the city, led by experienced guide Bella, who lives in Prague and speaks fluent Russian. She knows the city like the back of her hand. She pointed out the sights along the river as we passed under lovely bridges, including the Charles, the oldest in Europe. As night fell and over a hearty dinner with some great Czech beer, she gave us some history, talked a little about Havel and the revolution he helped lead. Havel wasn’t on the boat, but his presence was felt.

After the cruise, Bella led us on a walking tour of the city. As tired as we were, after a 27-hour bus trip from Lviv that included a 7-hour wait at the Ukraine-Poland border, it was a wonderful walk, like a luscious dessert topping off a grand five-course dinner. Our group of 30 diverse people, many from Kyiv where the tour started, turned out to be such enthusiastic tourists it was contagious! We walked through squares, between buildings, under elaborate archways, around grand churches, cultural centers and towers, and stopped for closer looks at many, including the Maisel Synagogue, a fanciful pure white building that shines like a beacon in the night. Kind of unusual architecture for a Synagogue I thought, but, then, we are in Prague, and everything imaginable is possible.

There’s something about seeing a city for the first time at night that is wondrous: all the sites are lit up like a gigantic Christmas tree of many colored lights, decorated with the most elegant arts and crafts, Bohemian crystal in every shape and color, elaborately carved, painted and enchanting decorations. It reminded me of the antique Christmas bulbs that belonged to my grandmother and to her mother and my mother, which we get out every year to adorn our trees, but multiplied a thousand-fold over a magic fairytale land of one’s dreams. It’s dazzling.

But it was getting late, and I think Havel was either relaxing in his beautiful home in Wenseslas square, or listening to jazz at one of his favorite jazz cafes. When Havel invited Bill Clinton to Prague, they attended one such café, and Bill took a turn on a sax! What a team! Our group, however, as enthusiastic as it remained, was ready to call it a day. I would look for Havel tomorrow.

During the day, Prague is even more stunning, because you can see all the details of the magnificent architecture that defines the city. I think Havel must know them intimately; they inspired his poetry and his patriotism.

The city is packed with palaces and churches, ornate gates and towers, theaters and cultural centers, sacred and secular monuments and statuary in a range of gorgeous architectural styles from the Medieval to the Renaissance, Baroque and Gothic and up through 18th and 19th-century classics. Havel no doubt inhabited or visited them all at one time or another: the humanist and artist who used words not weapons to bring a revolution. I was in his footsteps.

I realized it didn't matter where we were, Havel's spirit was there. Surely he worshipped at times at the glorious St. Vitus Cathedral, part of the Prague Palace and Monestary complex, on a hilltop overlooking the whole city. His family once lived nearby, an intellectual and upper class family. The Cathedral was built over several centuries, not years but centuries, so it contains all of the different styles and elements that are part of prague’s architectural heritage. It features lovely slender Gothic towers, distinctive on the Prague skyline, along with incredible Neo-Gothic and Art Nouveau stained glass windows. The nave rises into the heavens, it’s that high. The spirit of Havel hovers. I could see how such beauty and artistry would inspire a revolution.

Just as important as the magnificent and monumental palaces and cathedrals are the lovely and lively town squares: Wensaslas Square (Vaclavske namesti), Old Town Square and Lesser Town Square, centers of commercial and cultural activities, where people gather and where Czech partisans in 1968, and later in the late 1980s, held organizing meetings and public protests. Havel’s motto then, during those revolutionary days, was “Truth and love must replace lies and hate.” I could imagine him stirring up a crowd, surrounded by the stunning beauty of a Prague square, with these words.

The walk down from the hilltop to the squares, on winding cobble-stoned streets lined with the former homes of merchants and craftsmen, is a feast in itself. You get both beautiful panoramic vistas of the city, and close-up views of the beautiful details of every building. You get a sense of the prosperous and proud city of the past, and the free city of the present. Havel’s family, I learned, was very much a part of this culture in this place. Havel absorbed it all, from an early age, a proud Czech with an artistic vision and a world view.

The details of Prague architecture fuse into an elaborate mosaic of red and brown roofs with white and pink chimneys, interwoven with green, yellow, rose, lavender, ochre and colorfully painted facades, decorated with pastel paintings, bas relief, decorated doors and windows above which are lovely house signs. Bella explained that these signs are not only artful decorative items, but also tell of the original owners' occupations. Thus there are signs featuring musical instruments (we saw one with three violines, very lovely), knights on horses, swans and birds, fabric and metal objects, fruits and vegetables, each designating a profession or trade, or perhaps a special interest.

Among these beautiful houses is the Storch House in Old Town Square, built in the late 19th century on the site of a Gothic building. The walls are covered with frescoes and colorful decorations, called I learned afterwards, “sgraffito” decorations, the origin of what we today call “grafitti” on our urban buildings. A knight on a white horse painted boldly on the Storch House turned out to be St. Wenceslas, the patron saint of the Czech state.

The Old Town Square (Staromestaske namest) also features a fantastical (if there is such an adventive) Astronomical Clock. Every hour, moving figures, the apostles, appear in the upper windows, marching around the tower, along with the toll of bells and the sound of a live trumpet filling the square with majestic sound. The crowd applauds, and the trumpeter, in regal red dress, bows. We are enchanted!

We wonder off toward a grand church with a distinctive large green cupola that draws us to it like a magnet. What is this magnificent Baroque structure that dominates the Square? It's St. Nicholas Church, and it’s interior is as elegant as its exterior, full of amazing paintings and statues, lovely stained glass windows, and a beautiful ceiling fresco above an elaborate Nave. Popes spoke here, to throngs of worshipers, Havel among them. I'm not sure what Havel's religious beliefs are, but under his spiritual side lies a free spirit who loves Frank Zappa and Smashing Pumpkins and other alternative forms of music and art. At the same time, I can picture him worshipping at one of these grand churches, or enjoying a Mozart concert in the Smetana auditorium of the beautiful Art Nouveau Cultural hall or at Philharmonic Hall, a massive Renaissance building.

There is one building in Prague which is among Olga's favorites and which she said she must see again. Would we go with her? Yes, of course. We walked along the river, along a grand boulevard, to a funny-looking building that looked as if it was swaying in the breeze. "This is it," Olga exclaimed, jumping 3 feet into the air! "It's the Dancing Building!"

So this gray "leaning-tower-of-Pisa" building wasn't swaying in the breeze, it was dancing! It was happy; it was free. I later read in a guide book that it stood on the site of a building that was bombed in 1945, and that it was designed and built between 1992 and 1996 by an American architect and a Czech architect, working together, combining old and new world styles. The architects: Frank O. Gehry and Vlado Milunic. The same Frank Gehry who designed the Toledo Museum of Art addition and the modern glass building and other buildings of distinction in America.

The Dancing Building seemed such a joyful metaphor for change and hope. It embodied the eclectic spirt of Vaclav Havel, the old and the new, dancing together into a brilliant future.

I didn’t see Havel, but his spirit is everywhere: creativity and political reality fused into a magnificent mosaic composed of the past and present. Havel inhabits Prague's essence. That’s where I found Vaclev Havel, poet-president of the Czech republic.

A Sense of Place

The responses to the 2011“Starobelsk Memories” calendar have been positive and enthusiastic, evoking the pride and pleasure people derive from seeing their city highlighted and beautiful. The calendar promotes a sense of place, a sense of a shared community with its own distinctive architecture, character, environment, landmarks and memorials, and folklife traditions. When we see our town in bold relief, we feel pride.

It reminds me of my working days with the state humanities councils in DC and Florida. One of the NEH chairmen, William Ferris, a southern Folklorist and director of the Center for Southern Culture in Mississippi, was a premier advocate of a “Sense of Place.” The idea resonated in both DC and Florida, places that couldn’t be more different from each other yet so similar in their need for recovering and celebrating their distincitve identities.

In DC, the compact 63-square-miles nation’s capital on the Potomac River, the humanities council focused its grantmaking and programming on exploring and extolling the heritage and distinctiveness of the residential city beyond the Capitol, the White House and the National Mall. This is the city that thousands of residents have called "home" for generations. The DC council funded and created hundreds of programs—award-winning documentary films, seminars, publications, public forums, exhibits, oral histories--on the city’s vibrant neighborhoods, its migrant and immigrant experiences, the stories of people who came to the city in search of a better life, its art, culture and folk traditions.

The same in Florida, one of the largest states in the US with over 16 million people and immense diversity from the North to the South. The Florida council awarded grants throughout the large state to explore local history and the built and natural environments, which are unique and splendid; offered heritage tourism weekends; invoked the state's indigenous Indian roots, its Spanish heritage, and its ethnic diversity; involved teachers in Florida history; and published a magazine devoted to Florida culture and traditions. In a state where so many people migrated from other places, “making Florida home” was the Florida council’s mantra.

The Starobelsk calendar fulfills a similar purpose. It is unusual here in this small village of 18,000 in far-eastern Ukraine near the Russian border to glory in local history, to be a “booster” for the town. Most residents, who have lived here for a long time, take their environment for granted, have other priorities besides the town’s identity or a shared heritage rooted in place.

The calendar highlights and extols the virtues of the village, in all seasons, in all its variety: The town center, the park, the Aydar river, holidays, folk art and architecture, its houses and churches, the university, and the Cultural Center, library, administration building, post office, and other downtown places where people shop, chat, and gather. All places people know and with which they are intimately familiar. Yes, “gathering places,” so special in a village where everyone walks from here to there and everywhere. I did more work by bumping into people on the street than anywhere else. Gathering places, public spaces, on the streets, are central to daily life here in Starobelsk. The calendar focuses on these special places, and in so doing evokes wonderful "aha" experiences and draws people together in a collective embrace of place.

"An embrace of place." It anchors us in a distinctive environment, a physical spot on planet earth, a geographic location that fosters attachment and belonging. It grounds us in a community of memory. It speaks both to our individual stories and to our shared stories, our collective history. “Starobelsk Memories” pays homage to a town that embraced a stranger from America. It is truly a special place.

A Day in Dontesk

Wikipedia photos of Donetsk and the Euro2012 logo. We passed this stately church on the way to the bank.


On Tuesday I took a six-hour bus ride to the big Donbass city of Donetsk, and then 3 hours later I took the 6-hour bus trip back to Starobelsk. All those hours riding a bus just to get to a Peace Corps-approved bank to get a new ATM card so I can access my PC account and the $250 I get in my monthly allowance! That’s because my old card was eaten by a local ATM machine and reported a “hot” item when my wallet was stolen at the end of December on the train from Lugansk to Kyiv. Luckily my wallet was found and returned with my passport (but no money), so I got to go to Egypt. What a miracle that was, and in so many more ways than anyone could have predicted.

There was no heat on the bus, but the driver was a real expert at driving on snow and ice. The roads were as bad as those photos I've seen of the roads in Chicago after the recent blizzard blew through the Midwest.

I've become an expert in layering up for winter weather, so I snuggled down and relaxed for the ride. A few times I thought our time had come as we skidded this way and that. But not yet. The bus driver was in God’s hands and God, or the goddess as Loren would say, correcting me, got us home.

Unfortunately I didn’t get to see much of Donetsk. It is a big city of over a million and it will be one of the sites of the 2012 European Championship football (soccer, of course) games. It looks like a prosperous city. It was once called Stalin and then Stalino, a big steel producing and coal mining city on the Kalmius River surrounded by the farmland of the Ukrainian steppes. It's had a tortured history of Nazi occupation, destruction, and rebuilding. Today it is the home of president Yanukovich and his good friend Rinat Akhmetov, Ukraine’s richest man.

The city looks to be in pretty good shape for Euro2012. There are even signs in Russian, Ukrainian and English at the ugly old bus station! Streets are being graded and paved. The huge Donbass Stadium, built by Akhmetov, is ready, according to my taxi driver, who spoke about as much English as I spoke Russian. It's a big football city, home to two winning teams.

So you'll be hearing a lot more about and from Donetsk in 2012, especially if you're a soccer fan. Maybe its teams will bring a victory to Ukraine. That would be a huge morale booster for the entire country. Go Donbass! Hope springs eternal.

Survival Mode: Egypt Impoverished

Surviving in impoverished Egypt:
Vendor at a fruit stand; taking tourists closer to the pyramids; collecting trash; a guard at the Luxor Temple.

The guard at the Luxor Temple caught me hiding behind a beautiful hieroglyphic-inscribed papyrus column, crying. I was thinking of my brother Loren, wishing he could be here, sharing his vast knowledge of the history of Egypt, wanting to hear his voice again. The guard asked if I was okay, in halting English; I smiled and said yes, and thanked him. I was embarrassed. 

He took me by the hand to another corner of the temple and said this is where he and other Egyptians pray for good health and loved ones. "Put your forehead on this spot," he said, pointing to a well-worn shiny round spot on a marble panel, and pray. It looked a bit like the round lumps on the foreheads of devout men who have prayed five times a day for years and years, only indented. I did what the guard suggested, and I felt better. He held out his hand, and I gave him 5 pounds. He had helped me, and now he asked that I help him. I realized, as much as I disliked the hustling, haggling, and begging, that poverty and survival dictated the behavior as much as anything. If someone found it annoying and reprehensible, well, okay, so be it; the vendor, trader or hustler would just go on to the next tourist, give it a try, and keep going. All day, every day.

One of the things you can't help but notice when walking the streets of Cairo and other towns and cities is how difficult daily life is for the majority of people. They collect trash, plastic and cans for a few pounds. They work as vendors and at day jobs, in hotels, in restaurants, in hospitals, for businesses if they are lucky. They try to get as much money as they can from tourists. It's survival.

Half of Egypt's 80 million people live in poverty. Unemployment is rampant and seemingly intractible. Certainly the Mubarsk government, with its $1.5 BILLION in annual aide from the U.S., never used a penny of it to help the people. Our Egyptian guides sniggered at the huge statues of Mubarak we passed along our way to the temples, and said that's where the money goes, and into Mubarak's pockets. There was an underlying animosity at US foreign policy, but I didn't sense any anti-American sentiment. Egyptians liked Americans, and enjoyed the bartering and the bantering. What they could not abide, and it was beginning to show then, was the persistent daily endless struggle for survival.

That's what American foreign policy has done to the people of Egypt. It has caused untold anquish and suffering, and the people have had it.

Now they have taken their destiny into their own hands, and the status quo governments in Egypt and abroad be damned. Time for a change. The Tunisia effect. "Tunisia is the solution," one news report quoted a protestor as saying.

Journalist Roger Cohen, in a thoughtful NYT opinion piece, interprets the protests as Arabs finding their voice at last, moving "from a culture of victimization to one of self-empowerment." What a difference this could make in the world. That's why Mubarak should just leave, now, so an interim coalition can take over. Why prolong the struggle and the agony? Make way for hope!

Where will all this lead? Who knows. I've heard lots of concerns, lots of fears. But honestly, for the people of Eqypt, it can't be any worse than 30 years of Mubarek's US-supported dictatorship.

Musuems and Tanks

Now and Then

The Egyptian Museum is a national treasure, a journey through 5000 years of history, a vast warehouse of artifacts from ancient times. It's Egypt evocative. The Egypt we dream about.

This is why in the midst of the chaos of protest on Cairo's city streets, citizens formed a human chain around the Museum to prevent looting and damage to the building and its fantastic collections from the tombs of the pharoahs.

Where we stood on the main side of the rose-colored Museum, coming out of our Hostel; where we contemplated the best way to get to the other side of the busy street; where we stood to take photos, now there are tanks. It is such an unreal juxtaposition.

Jud and I consider ourselves lucky to have been there in more tranquil times. But even then, I realized the tranquility was more mirage than reality, more a patina on deep discontent than a reflection of people's true state of mind.

Ideas were stirring. I felt it on my tour to the Pyramids and especially to the Valley of the Kings and Queens, and Hasheptut's tomb. Those soft sarcastic voices, the jokes, the feigned laughter, have now become shouts of outrage and protest. The widespread discontent underlying Mubarak's Egypt, a pseudo "stability" that underpins the US's support, at $1.5 billion a year, of a dictator, has erupted into the streets. The genie is out of the bottle. Let's hope someone like ElBaradei will carry the day.

If contemporary Egyptians honor their past, they will protect it, use it as a foundation to build a brighter future for new generations. They will coalesce around an inclusive democratic regime of many voices, find common ground to work toward common goals, whatever their differences. Then the U.S. can put its money where it's principles are, and reverse a foreign policy that has caused widespread hunger, poverty and devastation. Then the need for tanks in the streets of Cairo will also be a thing of the past.

Egypt Unplugged

Egyptians protest in Cairo; a protest in Boston/Cambridge area supports the pro-democracy protests in Egypt and questions American policy (fickr photos, gaelic nielson and others).

I’ve written about Egypt Evocative, Egypt Provcative, Egypt Seductive, and Egypt Unveiled, about the country along the Nile’s awesome antiquity and beauty, but I never thought I’d write about Egypt Unplugged.

Imagine having the power to shut down internet access to a whole country. The government asked all four internet providers to unplug Egypt, and all four complied. That action alone reveals the extent to which Hosni Mubarak’s totalitarian regime will go to stay in power, and the depth of the oppression the people have suffered for so long.

Is it any wonder that protests still rage in Egypt? Is it any wonder America has been forced, by crisis and under pressure, to reconsider its foreign policy? President Obama said that review will include the $1.5 billion we give to Egypt, too. What? We give $1.5 BILLION to Egypt? Why? To line the pockets of the dictator? Certainly the people never see a dime of that money, and we know it. Even a casual tourist can see that.

American foreign policy exposed. We have supported and kept in power an oppressive dictatorship for 30 years. We are complicit in the people’s oppression. It raises a lot of questions, and doubts, about the kinds of regimes we support in the Middle East and around the world. It has echoes of Haiti written all over it.

But look what it took. Only after the Mubarak government shut down the internet in the entire country, an “unprecedented” action the press has called it. Only after the use of excessive force against peaceful protestors, and more than 60 people dead. Only after the president for-life dug in his heels to stay in power. Good heavens. Of course the U.S. has no choice but to review it’s overall policy toward Egypt, and indeed, the entire Middle East and Northern Africa. And where is our Secretary of State in all of this? Where is Hilary?

It’s now evident to a broad public what perhaps the experts have known for a long time: that our foreign policies have been a boiling cauldron of misguided self-interest for too long.

There are broad principles at stake as well, principles we preach to others incessantly: freedom, equal opportunity, equal justice under the law, the right to protest, consent of the governed, the search for common ground in a democracy. It’s hypocritical to preach these principles then undermine them. It’s the kind of inconsistencies in our foreign policy that infuriate the rest of the world and undermine our credibility. I would go so far as to say it’s the kind of foreign policy that encourages terrorism. At least let’s practice what we preach in this ever-shrinking world. Let’s put our money where our principles are. That’s the only way to make the world safe for democracy.
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Time to make a new beginning in Egypt, across the board. That’s the message we’re hearing from Egypt now. And let’s pray it happens sooner rather than later, that more lives are spared, more hope restored.

We pray as well that Nobel laureate Mohammed ElBaradei, the articulate long-time challenger to Mubarak who just returned to Cairo, is safe and can remain a voice of reason and change. Many fear for his life. What a sorry state of affairs the protests are unveiling and revealing.

How lucky I was to visit Egypt before the inevitable turmoil erupted. The people yearn for freedom and opportunity. They want the dictator out. They want real change. I hope the young leaders and visionaries like ElBarade can find common ground for bringing Egypt into the modern world with the same granduer it bequeathed to us from its glorious ancient past.

The Tunisia Effect

Maps of Egypt, Tunisia and Ukraine to right

What do these three countries--Tunisia, Egypt and Ukraine--so different from one another, with such different histories and cultures, have in common?

In all three countries, long-simmering discontent with political intransigence, corruption, persistent unemployment and poverty is erupting into public protest. Other nations with similar long-standing problems are also lining up, on the verge of unrest. Yemen's an example

The human need for self-determination cannot be held down forever. It will break out in time, a tiny spark enough to cause a giant conflagration on top of years of mounting discontent and rage. It's like a volcano that smoulders for years and then finally erupts.

The anti-government protests now rocking Cairo, Egypt, Suez and other cities, echo the protest phenomenon in Tunisia, where the people came together to overthow an oppressive totalitarian regime. The people of Egypt, like the Tunisians, are fed up with the one-man rule that has dominated their country with an iron fist for over 30 years. They are fed up with corruption, lack of basic freedoms, police brutality, and the daily struggle for survival.

Egypt has 80 million people, almost half of whom live below the poverty level. They are finding their voice. They are speaking out. And they are making no bones about it: they are inspired and emboldened by the example of Tunisia.

I wasn’t surprised, because when I was in Egypt at year-end I regularly heard quiet complaints, more in the form of jokes or sarcasm or a feigned resignation, about their “president for life” and his self-promoting monuments throughout the capital city and in other cities along the Nile. The criticsm was muted but persistent. It seemed only a matter of time that people’s discontent would find an outlet. The 10,000 protesters in Tahnir Square, waving Egyptian and Tunisian flags, called for the president's outster and for the formation of a new government.

An AP article by Maggie Michael (1/25/2011) and journalists from Egypt quoted a 24-year-old hotel worker who lives on a salary of $50 a month as saying: “This is the first time I am protesting, but we have been a cowardly nation. We have to finally say no.” Another protestor proclaimed, “We want to see change, just like in Tunisia. ”

"Just like in Tunisia." Something similar I think is happening in Ukraine. Thousands of protesters, for example, turned out in Kyiv's Independence Square to call for changes in the tax codes, which they say favor the rich and hurt small businesses and working people. I heard supporters in Starobelsk cheering them on. They also called for new elections and a new national government.

Protests are erupting in towns and villages, too, in outraged response to local governments adopting Comprehensive City Plans without public input, as called for by law. In Lugansk, protestors urged more transparent, accessible and responsive city governments. This in far-eastern Ukraine, not in the west where it might be expected. The Tunisia Effect.

Revolts against oppression have taken place around the world throughout time. They are often slow in coming. They often reflect decades of unhappiness, simmering rage, pent-up disgust with things as they are.

Today, the communications revolution may be speeding things up. Like in Tunisia, the calls for rallies in Egypt went out on Facebook and Twitter, with 90,000 expressing support. Same thing is happening in Ukraine, where reformers are taking to the internet and social networks to keep people informed and to call for support.

Vovo and Yulia, of the NGO East Lugansk Center for Civil Initiatives, whom I've written about in my blogs about change from the bottom up, are out there leading the actions for honesty and open government. I'm no seer, but I've long sensed the yearning for change in Ukraine, and I've long noted signs of it at the grassroots level.

This is where human agency--the people's will, the people's voice--comes powerfully into play. It is human nature, I think, to struggle against oppression. It is human nature to fight for freedom and self-determination. This doesn’t mean all governments must be alike, or like the US government or any other government. There are many models of political governance. It simply means people want a say in how they are governed. They want opportunity. They want transparency and honesty. They want the chance to shape their own destinies.

The means to the end may vary, but the human need for freedom and autonomy will win out in the long run. Simmering outrage eventually becomes outright protest. If only dictators understood this basic human need they might not dig in their heels and use violence to stay in power. They might bend like willow trees in the face of the inevitable gusts of change that blow across the paths of time.

The human need for freedom, economic opportunity, justice, and self-determination will triumph. It's just a matter of time. The Tunisia effect.

Survival Mode: Egypt Improverised

   

Surviving in impoverished Egypt:
Vendor at a fruit stand; taking tourists closer to the pyramids; collecting trash; a guard at the Luxor Temple.

The guard at the Luxor Temple caught me hiding behind a beautiful hieroglyphic-inscribed papyrus column, crying. I was thinking of my brother Loren, wishing he could be here, sharing his vast knowledge of the history of Egypt, wanting to hear his voice again. The guard asked if I was okay, in halting English; I smiled and said yes, and thanked him. I was embarrassed. 

He took me by the hand to another corner of the temple and said this is where he and other Egyptians pray for good health and loved ones. "Put your forehead on this spot," he said, pointing to a well-worn shiny round spot on a marble panel, and pray. It looked a bit like the round lumps on the foreheads of devout men who have prayed five times a day for years and years, only indented. I did what the guard suggested, and I felt better. He held out his hand, and I gave him 5 pounds. He had helped me, and now he asked that I help him. I realized, as much as I disliked the hustling, haggling, and begging, that poverty and survival dictated the behavior as much as anything. If someone found it annoying and reprehensible, well, okay, so be it; the vendor, trader or hustler would just go on to the next tourist, give it a try, and keep going. All day, every day.

One of the things you can't help but notice when walking the streets of Cairo and other towns and cities is how difficult daily life is for the majority of people. They collect trash, plastic and cans for a few pounds. They work as vendors and at day jobs, in hotels, in restaurants, in hospitals, for businesses if they are lucky. They try to get as much money as they can from tourists. It's survival.

Half of Egypt's 80 million people live in poverty. Unemployment is rampant and seemingly intractible. Certainly the Mubarsk government, with its $1.5 BILLION in annual aide from the U.S., never used a penny of it to help the people. Our Egyptian guides sniggered at the huge statues of Mubarak we passed along our way to the temples, and said that's where the money goes, and into Mubarak's pockets. There was an underlying animosity at US foreign policy, but I didn't sense any anti-American sentiment. Egyptians liked Americans, and enjoyed the bartering and the bantering. What they could not abide, and it was beginning to show then, was the persistent daily endless struggle for survival.

That's what American foreign policy has done to the people of Egypt. It has caused untold anquish and suffering, and the people have had it.

Now they have taken their destiny into their own hands, and the status quo governments in Egypt and abroad be damned. Time for a change. The Tunisia effect. "Tunisia is the solution," one news report quoted a protestor as saying.

Journalist Roger Cohen, in a thoughtful NYT opinion piece, interprets the protests as Arabs finding their voice at last, moving "from a culture of victimization to one of self-empowerment." What a difference this could make in the world. That's why Mubarak should just leave, now, so an interim coalition can take over. Why prolong the struggle and the agony? Make way for hope!

Where will all this lead? Who knows. I've heard lots of concerns, lots of fears. But honestly, for the people of Eqypt, it can't be any worse than 30 years of Mubarek's US-supported dictatorship.

Egypt Unveiled: From Cairo to Luxor

Scenes from train windows, Cairo to Luxor, along the Nile. 

We were up at 6:00 am to catch the 8:00 am train from Cairo to Luxor. We chose a day train because we wanted to see the Egyptian countryside. We wanted to see Egypt unveiled. And we did.

The train station is behind a lot of rubble, I think because it's under construction. Lots of things are hidden from Western eyes, like the veiled women in burkas. We stood bewildered, bogged down by baggage and void of our morning coffee fix. Fortunately an elderly man offered to help carry our luggage and get us to the station. There was no path but the one he made. It was good enough. We tipped him 5 pounds and agreed that it was the most worthwhile tip we'd given so far. Sometimes Egypt provocative is just what we needed!

We met a lovely couple as we boarded the train, Leo, from Austria, and Lucia, from Melbourne, Australia. They were a 50ish couple who had known each other 25 years ago, met up again in Cairo, and are on their way to Ethiopia. How wonderful is that?! We chatted off and on during the train ride. I hope I hear from them again. We also met some friendly English-speaking travelers who were curious and helpful. One woman asked where we were going and when we said Luxor she told us how beautiful it is. "You should go to Aswan, too," she said. "We're thinking of a day-trip," Jud said. "You should make it a 2-day trip!" Ah boy, we don't have enough time to do all we'd like to do.

The train was clean and comfortable; a waiter or steward came through our first class car from time to time offering tea and coffee and biscuits. The whistle, however, never stopped blowing, so if sleep came it was interrupted by the constant announcement of the train going through one Nile river town after another. I caught a name every once in a while, first in Arabic, which is such a beautiful script, and then in English. A darkening sky and gray haze followed us for several hours from a small town called Matti to another larger city called Assuit. And then the heavens opened up and the rain fell.

People on donkeys, which are still the predominant beasts of burden and main source of transport in rural Egypt it seems, rushed hither and thither. A man stood with his hands outstretched, as if welcoming the rain. At one point it hailed, large stones almost the size of golf balls, falling hard on the dry ground. How odd to see hail, or rain for that matter, in the desert! At one point it rained so hard water came pouring through my window and I had to move.

We were rewarded with a beautiful rainbow in the Eastern sky as the rain subsided and the sun set. It seemed to start in Cairo and end in Luxor, the end of the rainbow! The eastern landscape glowed in stunning golden light. Oh how I tried to capture the magic, but rain-streaked windows on the moving train made it difficult!

From the windows of a train, the Cairo countryside along the river and canals looks very green and pretty, miles of fertile fields, of what I'm not sure. Fields of wild grasses, some corn, alfalfa, other vegetables, herbs maybe, some sugarcane. The means of farming looks pretty traditional, sythe and sickle, but the irrigation systems, canals and ditches carrying water from the river to fields seem to be effective. We learned only later that some of the canals are polluted and we were warned not to put even a finger in the water. Except for the donkeys and minarets, the Egyptian countryside looks a lot like Florida, with many varieties of palm trees.

After being in the bustling and chaotic city of Cairo, the rural scenes seem calm and serene. The palms compete with the minarets in reaching for the sky, lovely pastoral scenes in pastel.

Stacks of hay are bundled into humps with stalks reaching out from them, making them look like camels sitting in the desert.

And yet poverty is evident too. People live in stick huts, dank hovels and crumbling buildings along the canals and the railroad tracks. Donkeys, cows, goats, and chickens run around muddy yards. There's little to no protection against the elements, or the harsh sun. Nothing in the way of material possessions, which seems ridiculous even to note. Material possessions? For people living in huts, tents and stick structures with only a few palm fronds for a roof? It's survival.

Still, women did laundry and hung it out to dry on posts and falling fences. Boys kicked a soccer ball around a muddy field. Young children in ramshackle buildings next to the train tracks smiled broadly and waved as the train passed, so close to windows without glass that I could almost touch them.

Sometlmes Jud's side of the train had the prettier views, while mine filled with the gray-brown of poverty and slum dwellings. Sometimes I had brilliant green fields on my side, with swaying palms, while Jud had row upon row of brown brick dwellings surrounded by brown dirt paths and fields.

You have to look out of both sides of the train to get the whole picture, to process all the images, the conflicting views and visions, the beautiful and the ugly, the rich cultural overlays and the gray-brown underbelly.

On the train from Cairo to Luxor I could see both sides of Egypt.

The train was almost three hours late and we arrived in Luxor in the dark, the lights of the city shining brightly after the unusual rainstorm. We found that out later: how rare the rain and how welcome, no matter the damage it may have caused or the activities it slowed down. Rain in the desert is a gift, like the huge clear rainbow we saw over the landscape of Egypt, a sign of good luck I thought.

The train ride from Cairo to Luxor shows daily life over the patina of antiquity. It’s Egypt in the now, an unfolding panorama of rural and urban landscapes, grace and poverty, green and brown, palms and minarets reaching for the sky, people going about their business, farming, buying and selling, seeking tips and advantages wherever they can, heeding the Call to Prayer, heeding the call to survival and daily life. It's Egypt unveiled.

Egypt Seductive: Our Whimsical Hostels

For me, staying at funky hostels or B&Bs is always a fun part of any travel adventure. Jud and I tried one night at a more upscale place in Luxor, which had a beautiful view of the hills, all lit up, and the river. We decided it wasn't for us! For one-quarter of the price we could stay at a unique, modish, idiosyncratic hostel that was more our type, and usually more interesting. So the next morning we got situated at The New Everest Hostel.

There were some glitches, but they soon got straightened out. People who stay at hostels are friendly, from all over the world, the staff is helpful, the places are clean and tidy. We usually run into Peace Corps Volunteers, as we did in Cairo. And Jud is good at checking the hostels out online at Trip Advisor and www.hostelworld.com. This is a wise thing to do, and these internet sites are reliable. The hostels usually give recommendations and make arrangements for tours, restaurants, and things to do. It's a good thing to make sure your tour guide speaks English, which we learned from experience on our way to the Pyramids at Gize. Check Jud's blog for more advice!

The top photos are of the rooftop cafe at the New Everest Hostel in Luxor, where we had a hearty breakfast of eggs, rolls and coffee every morning. Mohammed, our young cook, made me feel special and I have a soft spot in my heart for him. He is from a poor rural family, trying to make it in the big city. May God go with him. It was also nice to listen to the music of Bob Marley, a favorite of our hosts at New Everest. The collage shows the location and the lobby, decked out in New Year's holiday finery. It is on an alley off of an alley, the real city. Once inside it is clean and cozy, and its smack in the middle between the Train Station and the Luxor Temple. Can't beat the location.

Our Cairo Hostel, Egyptian Nights, was also off an alley. We could see the Egyptian Museum across the street out of our window, a beautiful sight, day and night. It is also near the heart of downtown. The building seems in bad shape at first sight, but on second and third look you can see the beauty, in the entrance way, the high ceilings, the large doors and windows. It's not for everyone, but it was fine for Jud and me. Very clean, with a staff that wanted to please. And wi-fi, which was great.

Egyptian Nights. The name alone evokes dreamy images of the golden, magical and sometimes mysterious Egyptian past. Sergey Prokofiev's "Egyptian Nights" suite came to mind, and the hundreds of films set in Egypt, from Cleopatra movies to Mummy movies, Agatha Christie and James Bond movies, Death on the Nile and The Valley of the Kings. A swirl of images and sounds, like the poster in the photo collage (right). Now I want to listen to all the music and see all the movies inspired by and set in the Egyptian landscape.

Egypt seductive!

Egypt Provactive

These 3 little girls wrangled 20 pounds out of me for soda and chips (but they were so cute!). Women traditional and modern. The Alabaster factory and shop: hard to resist, right? A Brazilian woman from our Valley of the Kings and
Queens tour group with young Egyptian women at Queen Hatshepsut's temple.

The architecture of ancient Egypt evokes powerful images of a gilded past. We see

fantastic, almost surreal, monuments to Kings and nobles. We see craftsmanship and

exquisite beauty. We learn how ancient Egyptians viewed themselves and the world,

all in beautifully graphic ways. As one scholar said of the ancients, “They thought graphically,” in images and pictures, not intellectually, not in words. I'm no expert, but the art of tombs, temples and pyramids support this view.

Contemporary Egypt is something else. It is more provocative than evocative; mostly in the hustle and bustle of daily life. From art for the dead, to the art of the deal, Egypt has come a long way!

Egypt is a Moslem country with a mixture of Islamic conservatism and modern practices. Terrorist threats are also an unfortunate reality, reflected for example in the recent threats and attacks on Coptics, Egyptian Christians. A recent suicide bombing killed 21 Christians, I believe at a church service. Jud and I passed a large Coptic demonstration on our last evening in Cairo, with the police out in force. It’s a sad commentary on lack of tolerance, although educated and thoughtful Egyptians bemoan the trend. I also do not understand the role of women, but it seems patriarchy rules. Some women are totally covered in burkas, head to toe, some with only a tiny slit for their eyes, a vision that seems mysterious and eerie to me. Many cover their heads only, including young teenage girls. Others dress in jeans and tee shirts, contemporary and upbeat, some with and some without head scarfs. It is, moreover, customary to have many wives, and thus many children, and to treat wives without much regard for their person. Why do women accept this? Aladdin, our guide through the Valley of the Kings, expressed concern about this and the resultant over-population. "It's big problem," he said. Again, more modern practices are emerging, driven by water shortages and related problems, the influence of the internet and the global economy, and the press of modernity, but the mixture of old and new and evolving is provocative.

Architecture for the dead. Artifice for the living. This is a central contradiction or dichotomy of Egyptian life. No matter where one goes, but especially in large cities like Cairo, there are scam artists, hustlers, and vendors waiting to make a deal, to up the ante, to get as much tourist money as they can for everything from magnets to papyrus to perfume and trinkets. I found it difficult. I am one of those “soft” tourists, as Steve Ricks calls us, who is not good at negotiating deals on every little thing. We stick out like sore thumbs and draw vendors like magnets! Most distressing are the hustlers, those who accompany you on the streets as you are walking along admiring the scenery. Charming and articulate, they befriend you, gain your confidence, say things like “don’t worry, I’m not after your money,” and then take you to a family or friend’s business. I ended up at three perfume shops in this way. The first turned out to be rather pleasant, but the perfume is so watered down that it hardly has a scent now. The second one made me mad, and you would have thought by the third time I would have been wiser. Jud was. He saw through the scam immediately and continued on to the museum, while I was seduced and sidetracked by a hustler who told me about an art gallery right up the street. HAH! Turned out to be a friend’s perfume shop. Then the perfume vendor couldn’t understand why I wasn’t a happy camper. Smile, he said. Don’t worry, be happy. Full of cheer, he continued selling me perfume all the while, aggressive, persistent, insistent, relentless.

Same thing happened when Aladdin made one tourist stop at an Alabaster shop. He said it was to learn how alabaster is mined and shaped into beautiful vases and other objects. And there was a little demonstration of this, before being led into a huge warehouse of a store where we were to buy some of the products. The lead vender stopped me along the way several times to pry me with objects, and at one point even asked for “baksheesh,” a tip. Such encounters always left me flummoxed and feeling bad. Just ignore all vendors, advised Kundar and James, the professors at the American University in Afghanistan, and yell at them if they don’t stop. It’s okay to yell at them? Well, sure, you must say no very firmly.

So it’s in our hands, the tourist’s hands, to resist such efforts, to say no. The vendor’s job, the hustler’s job, is to trick us into buying, in whatever way they can. I’m not sure how to explain this, but it is always a “no-win” situation for the tourist! Vendors and hustlers do not take “no” for an answer. Some will even chase you down the street, yelling every trick in the book about the deal they have for you. Young kids learn it from their elders, by the way, and are also very adept at this art. This is the side of Egypt that makes it a challenge, and I must admit by the end of our stay in Cairo I felt comfortable enjoying tea in our hostel! On the other hand, if you are wise and firm, you can avoid being entrapped, misled, and otherwise taken advantage of for the sake of a few pounds. And there is so much history and astonishing art and beauty and adventure just being in this ancient land.

This is Egypt provocative.

Egypt Evocative: Art and Architecture for the Dead

Couldn't take photos at Valley of Kings, but here are some of the incredible

Queen Hatshepsut's temple and tomb, on Luxor's west bank. Just amazing.





I'm back in Starobelsk via a few days in Kyiv with lots of Peace Corps stuff, mid-term medical exams, trying to close grants (unsuccessfully because I didn’t have the right receipts and have to go back and get them), and then the long overnight train ride to Lugansk, and the two-hour bus ride through the snow and ice of eastern Ukraine. I'm unpacking and getting organized, and I welcome a rest, but Egypt is on my mind.

It’s the Nile River calling, for tourists almost like the Call to Prayer, almost like it called the Pharoahs from about the 18th to 11th centuries BC.

Today, the Nile River valley is a huge amazing archeological site, one of the largest in the world (it’s a World Heritage Site) and this is what fascinates and dazzles. It includes, among many others, the Valley of the Queens; Queen Hatshepsut’s tomb, carved dramatically into a limestone hillside; and the larger and renowned Valley of the Kings, the pharoahs’ burial sites, all on the West bank of Luxor. Digs are still going on and new tombs are still being unearthed. It's a never-ending archaeological feast.

The sun rises in the East: LIFE. The sun sets in the West: DEATH. So the pharaohs built their tombs in the setting sun, “the Necropolis of Thebes," now called Luxor. Mind-boggling art and architecture for the dead.

I toured these sites with an informative and funny guide, Aladdin (another Aladdin), along with his excellent driver Mohammed, and 14 other people.  We were from all over the world: Japan, Australia, Brazil, Germany, Belgium, England and America. Among them was a former Peace Corps Volunteer, James Hunt, who served in Kazakhstan several years ago, and his wife Kundar, a former Muskie fellow who studied at the University of Massachusetts in Amherst. Small world, especially since I just finished reading 54 Ukrainian applications for the Muskie Program, and discovered how many talented people apply and how extraordinary it is to be accepted. They both now teach at the American University in Afghanistan, something else I’d like to learn more about. Imagine, we are fighting a war there, and James and Kundar are teaching at the university as if nothing extraordinary is going on around them.

So here we were in the desert on the west bank of Luxor, new friends and strangers from around the world. We stood together in the rising sun, surrounded by the undulating brown hills of the Valley that holds so much history, so many legends from the Old and Middle Kingdoms, united in our amazement at the fantastic findings that the royal tombs reveal, some 63 of them, all built, sometimes buried, deep underground, some 30 or more meters under the sand. Archaeologists must have had a field day discovering these tombs, and still do! The tombs range from small to very large with over 100 chambers. Some have been raided beyond recognition, and some are nearly in tact, decorated with scenes from Egyptian mythology that tell stories in elaborate details that are works of art. Egypt evocative.

We weren’t in search of a magic lantern with Aladdin, but he showed us the power of ancient funeral arts in the elaborate designs, paintings, bas reliefs and carvings of the entrances, corridors, columns, walls and ceilings of the tombs of Ramses I, II, VI, and IX. We asked about King Tut's tomb (probably the most famous), but Aladdin said there wasn't much to see because all the furnishings and art were at the Egyptian Museum in Cairo, and in other museums around the world. After seeing the Egyptian Museum I could understand that, not to mention all the Egyptian artifacts, mummies, papyrus, gold and silver items, jewelry, and art in just about every museum I've ever visited, including gems like the Rosetta stone in the British Museum in London. Egyptian obelisks adorn the world too, like the twin of the Luxor temple obelisk that is in Paris, or "Cleopatra's Needle" in Central Park in New York City, now the cause of concern for Egypt's Director of Antiquities (NYT, 7 January), who threatens to bring it home to preserve and care for it.

Also, the west bank "Necropolis" is so huge that it's impossible to see all the royal tombs in a day. It's a lot of walking in the hot sun from one tomb to another. We just scratched the surface.

Aladdin took us to four of the best, all awesome in their own way. The tomb of Ramses VI was especially beautiful, because it's almost fully restored to its original splendor. The gloriously painted walls and ceilings graphically tell the story of creation and death, of sunrise and sunset, in bold blue and gold with many images and hieroglyphics, packed with exquisite paintings, carvings and artisanal flourishes. Cameras are not allowed in the tombs, not even on the grounds, but I have vivid mental images that will last a lifetime.

We could take photos of Queen Hatshepsut's grand tomb and temple, however, and for me this was among the most impressive sites of all in the Valley of the Kings and Queens. Queen Hatshepsut is considered the most powerful of the queens who ruled Egypt. More an arts patron than a warrior, Hatshepsut, who dressed like a man, had her architect built the most expansive structure imaginable, an incredible work of art, for herself and for her father, Thutmose I. It is set in a limestone hillside, built on 3 floors, a sweeping set of stairs leading up to the temple, the ochre color rocks fanning out behind it, the carvings and reliefs bountiful, clear and colorful on walls and columns, statues and obelisks, astonishing detail, a story in pictures, graphic, haunting. Hatshepsut's temple and tomb are all that's left of her legacy, which was wiped out, intentionally it seems, after her death, and replaced with other stories. For a while, Hatshepsut's temple even became a Christian church, which some scholars think protected it from destruction. It remains one of the most glorious structures of ancient Egypt, truly a wonder to behold, an architectural feast, an archaeologist's dream.

Discoveries continue in the Valley, with a recent dig in 2008 being worked on now, and more on the way. There’s an underside to these fantastic finds: in one small village an enormous new site has been discovered and the government is forcing people to move out, without any compensation whatsoever, so archaeological work can begin. Some residents are holding out, but Aladdin thinks it's a losing battle. He was sad about it. Perhaps if people were paid for the cost of their homes, the situation might be better, he suggested. We understood, and sympathized. Aladdin pointed out a dramatic yellow house against the desert sky, informing us that a photo of this very house had served as the cover of the 2008 Lonely Planet Guide to Egypt. It now stands empty, it's inhabitants forced to leave, a forlorn presence in the Valley of the Kings and Queens.

Egypt evocative. Evocative of hopes for eternity and warriors' triumphs, mythology and reality, culture and craftsmanship, awesome architecture rivaling anything that came after, and the complexities of archaeological discoveries and people's daily lives. It's all part of the complex mosaic that is ancient and modern Egypt.

Karnak temple, a few miles across from the Luxor Temple

Karnak temple, a few miles across from the Luxor Temple, connected by that sphinx-lined road that is now being reconstructed, is one of the oldest and largest temples of ancient Egypt, which is saying something. It's a sprawling elegant behemouth,first described by Diodorus of Sicily (whose name comes up a lot in Egyptian historiography). The Greeks called it Hermonthis.

It was January 1 and Jud and I wanted to do different things. He went to the Luxor Museum (not the Temple) and I went to Karnak, getting a taxi from our hostel and then picking up a guide once I got my ticket. My guide was Aladden, which seemed so fitting, because his magic lantern for me was his knowledge and reverence for the site. He had a quiet demeanor, and a generous view of the Temple built for the god Amon and his wife, the goddess Mut, often symbolically portrayed in the form of a vulture (I don't know why, but it may not have the rather negative connotations we associate with it).

Older than the Luxor temple, it astounds with beautiful columns in many styles, statues, the sphinx-lined avenue, a sacred lake, obelisks, and intricate carvings. A successive line of Pharoahs added halls and chapels to the original temple, as happened at the Luxor temple. The influence of trade with Ethiopia is reflected in what's called the "Ethiopian Courtyard," where extraordinary columns, carvings and hieroglypics tell the story of this interesting connection.

Noted for its "stylistic complexity," one guide said the Karnak Temple could serve as a base to study the evolution of architecture and art from the XVIII Dynasty to the end of the Ramses era. Part of this temple was also a Christian church at one time, much later of course.

For Aladdin, a sacred site at Karnak was the base and sculpture of a gigantic granite scarab, a symbol of eternal life, dedicated to the god Knepr by Amon-Ofis. Aladdin positioned me in front of the scarab and took a photo. "It is special to have this photo," he told me. Yes, and actually it was special to spend time with Aladdin among this sprawling Temple to the gods and goddesses of the great Egyptian past.