Valley of the Kings, Tutankhamun, Ramses I and II. All these great pharaohs and places all come to mind whenever we think of Egypt. But as a hemiplegic, it is often a matter of perspective whenever I visit these Northern African communities.
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| Map of Ancient Egypt. |
Egypt as a whole is intriguing. With its surviving history going back as far as 2800 BC when the pyramids were built and its long list of ruling pharaohs, the entire country is seeped in so much history it makes Rome and Greece look like fools. But much like Rome and Greece it has its own version of mythology, these are just a few examples:
Osiris - the God of Death
Isis - his wife and the Goddess of Life
Anubis - jackal-headed god who was also a god of Death
Horus - falcon-headed God of the Sky.
Ra - falcon-headed God of the Sun.
Sobek - crocodile-headed god of Strength.
As with any Kingdom, Country or Republic, there has also been an extensive list of Kings or Egyptian Pharaohs as they were once known. Three of Egypt's chosen pharaohs stand out more than everyone else: Tutankhamun, Ramses II and Cleopatra. each of these monarchs ruled the same kingdom but in different ways. King Tut was the boy king - ascending to the throne as a boy of eight and ruled after his father until the age of 18. King Tut is, nowadays, the predominately most popular pharaoh for tourists to view. He is also fascinating to researchers and specialists in their field as it said that King Tut had a form of epilepsy. Epilepsy is a disability/disadvantage in its own right as you are conflicted with uncontrollable shaking and an unawareness of what it is going on.
However, Ramses II and Cleopatra's rules weren't all sunshine and daisies either.
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Museum of Cairo where Ramses II and
King Tut alongside their possessions
are housed. |
Ramses II's rule was one of wartime campaigns and reestablishing the same religions as King Tut's father Akhenaten for his grandfather Ramses I and his father Seti I. Having not been borne into royalty like Tut, Ramses came up with a new form of ruling, choosing the role as War General and blending it with the role of Pharaoh. If a Pharaoh cannot lead his men to battle, he has no need to be Pharaoh is the generally held view of the man who became to be known as Ramses the Great and Ozymandias. Recent depictions of Ramses, mainly through DC's Legends of Tomorrow, which has recently been aired on screen, also show him to be a wise ruler and unafraid of constructive criticism.
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Myself - as a child seeing
how disability was treated in the
streets of Cairo. |
Cleopatra's rule was much later than either of her predecessors and comes at a time when the Roman Empire was in danger of collapsing under the strain of a Civil War, which broke out after the assassination of Julius Caesar by Marcus Brutus and Caius Cassius, who were the main masterminds of the entire events. In Shakespeare's two plays - Julius Caesar followed by Antony and Cleopatra, it takes us through two key time periods: the fall of the Roman Republic and the rise of Egypt's Queen, who was also with Julius Caesar before having relations with Antony, which produced issue and secured the line of Cleopatra's succession. Cleopatra's rule lasted 21 years, but has become known to history as one of the greatest rules in Egypt's history as it gave way to a brand new era.
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| Map of Egypt Today! |
Egypt is located in Africa's northern-most right bordering the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and is home to the life-giving River Nile, which in Ancient Egyptian times was used as the people's main trading route from Luxor to Cairo to Aswan and Karnak.
With the Nile running through it, Cairo has become symbolic with the modern era Egypt is slowly embracing, much like Giza and the Valley of the Kings has become synonymous with the the long history Egypt possesses. Cairo is a sprawling metropolitan city of over 20 million . Yet the sights of the dispossessed and disadvantaged is enough to to make you see their everyday struggles. As a hemiplegic and 11-years-old at the time of my visit, I felt extremely uncomfortable at the amount of sufferers there were in the streets and seeing their own disadvantages.. i could see they were struggling to get and yet, at the same time I was thankful, for the UK to have one of the top national health services in the world, who would do anything to ensure that what those people were going through would never happen to me.
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| Egypt's Capital City Cairo. |
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| Pyramids of Giza and the Great Spinx |
Likewise, Giza has stood against the tests of time and even after five minutes after arrival, it is easy to see why Giza easily became one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World and how its kept its status against the huge tests of time. As the burial place of Prince Khufu, it is the largest of the trio of pyramids that were built to represent and parallel the three stars in Orion's belt. The huge Sphinx only adds to the mystery of these two likenesses and important members of Egypt's society for them to hold such prominence in Egypt's landscapes. Both monuments make everyone seem small and tiny in comparison and hold a magnificently raw regalness most other monuments cannot boast.
This is why you should visit Egypt and Cairo on a city break holiday, because you will never regret seeing and visiting Egypt's Crown Jewels.
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| Flag of Egypt! |
