Dear Safarists,
Here I will try to convey the beauty I have found in the
wilderness of Sinai and its inhabitants. The experience is
foreign even to most Arabs who haven't been to the Area of
Sinai before and walked its footpaths up the highmountains.
'galt' is the Arabic word for a certain form of water pool
in the desert. It's large enough to swim at and probably
bigger and deeper than your home swimming pool, but it's
only in meters and most are only seasonal and stay only for
few weeks.
The mountains are red, black and white igenous rock
depending on the percentage of amounts of minerals of it.
Bedouins of Sinai are most aware and observant of surface
geology since deserts are naked Earth down to the bones of
it. No vegetation except few Acacia and White Broom trees
here and there and aromatic herbs and shrubs too. But the
landscape remains RED! :)
Talking to Bedouins, is another amazing experience even to
'Arabs'. Bedouins are the thin population of desert people
who've refused over the millenia and their forefathers to
believe they need to live in a city! :) They enjoy the
silence and understands how to enjoy it. They understand
the warmth of a local widely spread society but don't like
central governments with their diluted son-of-no-body
one-size-fits-all sort of practices. They rever heritage
because it teaches them how to survive the harsh wilderness
of the desert mountains. Those natives of Sinai have
developed over millenia the code of the desert. free,
extremely conservative in usage of resources, be discplined
or won't survive the environment.
They're very kind.. no they're "survivingly" kind. They
tell you that those who won't help the desert, the desert
won't help them. They tell you the reason they'd invite
foreigners to their food however impoverished is tribute to
the land and tribute to themselves too.
A Tree cutting is a CRIME! They treat it less than killing
a human, but similarly with their ancient code. To a
nile-valley person like myself, it seemed like an
exageration. But to them, they talk with passion about each
tree giving you idea about how did it do last year and how
it compares now. Their ancient trees are famous creatures.
They take pride in being the ones that take care of it.
Don't mistake them with 'us'! :) Cosmopolitan 'Arabs' who
live in towns are not deservants of the word "Bedouins". :)
However the ethnic differences that might appear between
city-dwellers of Arab countries, Bedouins remain a
different breed: not ethnically but culturally! They are
among other indigenous people to be the ones that store the
ancient code of medicine and honor practices that worked
well for long time.
I am leaving to England to finalise my Masters degree in
Geography (done on the Sinai highlands) soon so the coming
3weeks might be horribly busy for me. But I'll try to
continue notes from my hikes in Sinai for you here, guys.
Hope that'll initiate wonderful memories of others talking
about their nature and indigienous people and making it a
convincing case that there's a chance to celebrate
diversity and oneness. :)
Salaam,
Mohamed Mabrouk
SWY8-Egypt
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I might sound like a crazy dreamer but.. only crazy dreamers can come up with ideas like the Egyptian pyramids!
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http://groups.yahoo.com/group/SaharaSafaris/
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