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Of camels and pyramids
What would the pyramids be without camels?
Egyptians were asking themselves just that this week after officials announced that camels would be banned from the Giza pyramid complex — Egypt’s No. 1 tourist attraction — as part of a $52 million project to transform the area into an open-air museum.
The camels, also popular among tourists — a photo in front of the pyramids is always better on a camel — will be penned into an area well away from the Great Pyramid, and the other pyramids that make up the Giza necropolis.
“They are ruining the site. They make the Giza pyramids like a zoo,” Zahi Hawass, the country’s top Egyptologist, told me this week.
Indeed, the camels, and their sometimes aggressive masters, along with tour guides, many carrying fraudulent documents which declare them “official,” as well as postcard sellers, and other manner of vendors, have turned the site into a chaotic Middle Eastern bazaar of sorts.
During a brief visit yesterday, I was pursued by one tour guide, two camels and one horse.
A 12.4-mile wall was recently completed, which is meant to keep squatter houses from encroaching on the site. Eventually, barriers will also keep out the vendors and the guides — as well as the camels.
Comments
By peter
October 25, 2008 9:29 AM | Link to this
Good for Mr. Hawass! The “touts” are obnoxious. The cops get into also, they want 20 LE to let you illegally climb on the pyramids.
Also, I hope the gauntlets of screaming aggressive vendors at sites like Edfu and Karnak will be cordoned off. The blocking your path, grabbing your arms and shouting is intimidating and frightening to people—spoils the experience.
Peter