PILGRIMAGE TO SINAI

Wednesday, November 08, 2006

After a nice breakfast at the Queen of Sheba Hotel in Eilat, Israel, we got in a taxi with a representative from International Tours. We thought we would spend the next two days with her, but it turned out to be only ten minutes. She took us to the Egyptian border, and told us we would need to take our luggage and an Egyptian tour company rep would be waiting on the other side. We went through passport control, out the building, trailing our luggage behind. There was nothing to do but keep walking. It was a deserted area—there were no other travelers, the place was just devoid of people—the DMZ?? Finally we went through another gate where a man was waiting—when he saw us he stuck out his hand. Brian reached out to shake it, saying, "I’m Brian Zahnd." The man said, "I’m happy to shake your hand, but what I want is your passport!" ha—just another checkpoint, a precursor of things to come. And we kept walking.

We went on down the brick walkway, our luggage clattering behind us. We soon came to another building—I would have walked around it, but Brian went on in. Turned out we were supposed to—I’m not sure what would have happened if we had bypassed it. We were told to put our luggage on the belt to be x-rayed. Still there was no one around, and we waited for someone to come x-ray it. In a few minutes, three men showed up, and scanned our belongings. They went quickly through the x-ray, and then the hand search began. They didn’t look at our big bags, but scrutinized the hand luggage. I had a magazine in my bag, and they began to turn every page. Another man approached, and explained they were looking for "erotica". Whew, I’m glad I didn’t have a Victoria’s Secret catalog! They looked through Brian’s bible too, and finally said we needed to follow them. I didn’t know if we were in trouble or not. We went into an office where four men were sitting and talking—they didn’t seem to pay us any attention until they had finished their conversation, but finally just gave us the stamps in our passport we needed. I stood in the doorway and kept our eyes on our bags.

So we walked a while longer, and finally came to a Land Cruiser waiting for us. We piled in the back with our bags—two benches facing one a nother. The man who gave us the "erotica" information turned out to be our guide, Mina. We had a driver, Ahkmed, a Bedouin with a scarf on his head, and a security guard, Mohammed, wearing a suit and tie, with a machine gun protruding from under his jacket. They weren’t in any hurry to leave, seemed to have things to do, but finally we were ready, and Ahkmed turned the key in the ignition. We were afraid for a minute the battery might be dead, but finally it roared to life, and we took off down the highway. He had to baby that battery the rest of our trip.

We drove right along the Red Sea for quite some time, there were many beautiful resorts and beaches all along the way, but they all looked deserted, no signs of life. We were told the parking was underground, and it was too early for people to be out on the beach. 9:30? They’d be out in the US! It was kinda spooky, like all the people had evacuated, and here we were traveling with a personal security guard….what’s up?

After some time driving with the sea on the left and mountains on the right, and passing through numerous military checkpoints, we left the road and began to go cross-country through the desert, through a valley with mountains on both sides. It was the roughest ride I’ve ever taken, for miles and miles and miles. That Bedouin drove that Land Rover HARD, but I was glad he didn’t go any slower. I wanted to get there and get out. After a while Brian leaned forward and began to look intently out the front window. After a while, I asked him what was so interesting. He said he needed to focus out the front to keep from being sick. In 26 years of marriage, I’ve never known him to have motion sickness. I had also noticed Mena grimacing and holding his stomach. For some reason, that has never seemed to affect me. THANK GOD!! Finally we arrived at our destination, the Colored Canyon.

I had no clue what the Colored Canyon was, or what we would do there. There was a phrase on the itinerary I had been e-mailed, "drive through the Colored Canyon." Turns out we drove to a spot where we could HIKE the Colored Canyon. That’s right up our alley! We used the toilets–Egyptian style! (When in Egypt, do as the Egyptians!) I was standing around looking at a trail that went snaking down into the canyon below us. I thought it might be fun to walk down a few minutes, and asked if we could go. Mena said, "Of course." Turns out that was part of the plan all along. We went down into a beautiful canyon, and did a circuit. The "colored" part was mineral deposits in the rock, very pretty. The hike was probably an hour and a half, and some of it was real climbing. There was a very thin spot where you had to climb down through a hole under a rock—some tricky climbing, a real bottleneck, and the only way to get through. I said to Mena, "There are some people who couldn’t get down that." He told me about a woman who did get stuck in there. When he had gone to a local hotel to pick up his group that morning, he told that particular woman she couldn’t do it, that she was too big. She told him, "If my friends are going, I’m going." She got STUCK in the rocks, and sobbed in fear for two hours. He said he finally got her calmed down, and they worked her through, pulling on her legs from below. Poor woman!!! There was quite a line of people that had formed behind her, as this is a popular place to visit for tourists.

We climbed up a fairly steep hill with switchbacks to get back to where the Land Cruiser had moved—there was a tea house, a Bedouin place to buy cokes, and more Egyptian toilets, which were in this case outhouses. There were several guides and drivers waiting there, they were discussing that a guide had taken three people down quite early that morning and had not returned. His driver was concerned they were lost. I can imagine that would be quite disastrous! There would be no place to get water, and a seemingly endless maze of corridors.

We then took off—more bouncing and swerving—it was even difficult to have much of a conversation in the back of that Land Rover. There was no road, just ruts in the sand. After about 10-15 minutes of driving, we could see a man waving us down. We stopped, they had a conversation in Arabic, and finally turned to us.

"He is the guide that was missing—his client had a bad knee and couldn’t go any farther, and they looked for a way out that was not so difficult. They found their way to this Bedouin camp (yes, there was a "camp" in sight, if that’s what you want to call it. A tent, a truck, a fenced enclosure, maybe for sheep?) He asked the Bedouin to take them to the driver in his truck, but the truck had no fuel. They were asking for a ride back, but our driver would only agree with our permission, as he was working for us. Brian said, "Sure, I would be happy to help, but we’re not riding back there…we’ll just get out and wait!" So we did—we climbed out of the Land Rover in the middle of the Sinai Desert, Mena and Mohammed got out too, the Land Rover sped off, Brian sat down on a rock under the only tree around, and fired up his computer! When worlds collide! He showed the guys some pictures he had on his computer.

Half an hour later, they were back. We went on down through the valley, slowing down several times, Ahkmed downshifting as we got stalled in deep sand. Another hour, we arrived at Ein Hudra, a desert oasis and a Bedouin encampment. I had noticed some groceries in a bag under our seat, vegetables and some tuna. Ahkmed took them in to the Bedouin women who prepared a great meal for us—Bedouin bread (a cross between a tortilla and a pita), tuna, chopped tomatoes and cucumbers, another dish of the same except with mayo added, and orange slices for dessert. We had Bedouin tea while we waited for them to prepare it—tea boiled with sugar and water (like sweet tea in the South—boiling the sugar gives it a syrupy taste) and then some spice added. It tasted like cardamom to me, but the guys said no—they knew cardamom but this was something else. We were becoming great friends with Mena and Ahkmed and Mohammed.

Lunch was served Bedouin style—blankets were laid out like rugs in the sand in an open enclosure under a roof. We sat on the ground around a low table. It’s quite comfortable, but pretty messy—you just pile some stuff on a piece of bread and wrap it up burrito style, but since you’re just sitting on the ground it drips all over your legs—there are no napkins or plates.

We didn’t finish lunch until around 3, drove back the same way we went in, and finally reached a good road and continued on to St. Catherine’s Village. It was dark when we finally arrived. We checked in to St. Catherine’s Village guesthouse. The village has grown up as a result of the monastery. Everyone who goes there goes to visit the monastery or climb the mountain—there is no other reason to go there. The guesthouses are awesome—very quaint, comfortable, REAL—no sterile Holiday Inn Express! We got checked in—supper was provided. We had a wonderful meal–onion soup, then a stuffed potato appetizer—very different but delicious, followed by shish taouk, rice, vegetables, and finally, a coconut dessert with oranges. Since we were planning to get up at 1:30 to climb Mount Sinai, we went to bed right after supper.

DIVINE APPOINTMENT!

The day was a surprise from start to finish. We didn’t expect the unusual border crossing, we didn’t expect a crew of three to take care of us, we didn’t expect the wild ride through the desert or the hike or the visit to the oasis and Bedouin camp. Sometimes God just cooks up fun things for you! How grateful I am that I like those kind of things. Lots of people wouldn’t have liked the hike—it was the very thing we love most to do. I’m glad I was dressed for it, wore my Keen hiking shoes—led of the Spirit! I know lots of people would have HATED the drive, especially those who are inclined to have motion sickness, but we considered it a real adventure, and we LOVE adventures.

But the biggest surprise at all was finding about the spiritual journey Mena, our guide, is on. We were meant to meet him, and I know we’ll continue to keep in touch. Who knows what God will do?

As we were hiking through the canyon, he told us about falling 20 meters when his rope broke as he was doing some technical climbing there a few years ago. He had broken legs, but survived, which is a miracle. Then he showed us the place where he has a metal plate in his head, a souvenir of a bus accident of which he was the only survivor. I told him God had kept him alive for a purpose. I was assuming Mena was a Muslim, as both the others were. He was quiet for a few minutes and then said, "I will tell you something I don’t usually tell my clients." He told us about having been raised in the Egyptian Orthodox Church, but ceasing to believe in God as a teenager. He said that after experiencing several miracles in his life, he came to believe once again. I said, "So you believe Jesus is God?" "Yes, and I love Him."

We were thrilled to hear that! Brian told him about being a pastor, and began a discussion about the things of God that lasted for the next two days. Mena is part of a group "that is like a church but not a church" that meets regularly for prayer and worship, bringing together Orthodox, Catholics, and Protestants together—something that I’ve not heard the likes of in any Moslem country. God is doing bigger things than CNN knows, that’s for sure.

What an awesome thing to walk in the Spirit, to go to Sinai to climb a mountain, but to become a part of something even bigger.