EGYPT

Barely one month into my training programme and I was already off on my first trip. I wondered whether this would be the first of many or merely an exception.

I’d be travelling with the same group of friends I’d been with to Turkey: Akash, Zara, Rohan and Joshin (who couldn’t make it to Turkey cause of work). This time round we’d be going to Egypt and, given that I wanted to be an Egyptologist as a kid, you can imagine the excitement that had been building for years. To see the pyramids, to explore tombs, to cross deserts…

I still remember watching documentaries with my grandpa, my eyes glued to the TV as he wondered what was so special about sand and skulls. To me, it was so much more than that. It was magic and curses, gold and treasure, wonders and mysteries.

Way before the days of Wikipedia, I’d go onto Encarta and print every picture I could find related to Ancient Egypt, adding them to my ever-growing album. I’d also beg my mother to buy me the monthly Hachette The Gods of Ancient Egypt magazine, which cost an arm and a leg (or at least that’s what she’d tell me). I guess that’s understandable, given that each issue came with an actual statuette of one of the gods. Of course, I can’t say I had much of a collection since she only bought me two of them… Anyways. I also enjoyed ClueFinders 4th Grade Adventures: Puzzle of the Pyramid more than any other game in the series, and if that didn’t make me an Egyptologist wannabe, I don’t know what did.

But yeah, somehow my path led me astray from that goal. I went from wanting to become a wizard, to an Egyptologist, to a Shakespearean thespian , to an English teacher, to a lawyer, to a surgeon, to an ED doctor in little more than fifteen years. Somehow, however, my love for Ancient Egypt was still there, buried deep within my psyche. And now I was about to tap into it once again.

It would also be my first time in Africa, leaving me with just one continent left to visit – not that visiting a single country in an entire continent really means much. And so, after much ado and a short layover in Sicily, where we spent a full day exploring the charming streets of Taormina, we were off to our first destination in Egypt.