My Historic Vacation - Siddharth Kannan

The idea of a holiday is when you are in a place which is in contrast to where you live. I really like visiting a place which has a lot of history and culture. I'm a history freak and it was the only subject I would pass in. I remember going to Egypt sometime back. By far I would consider that as one of my best trips ever! I had only imagined a place like that and had never thought I would actually end up going there some day. I had already studied so much about the place that I didn't need a tourist guide. 

I saw the Sphinx and the Pyramids along with the Mummies which have been preserved for years. There are beautiful belly dancers there. The surprising part was that some of them also knew how to speak Hindi. I liked the fact that a lot of Indian food is served there. 

Another interesting fact that I came across was that the whole of Egypt worships Amitabh Bachchan. It was surprising to see that they have more knowledge about Hindi films than probably us. The moment they see that you're an Indian tourist, they try selling a lot of Hindi film dvd's to you and at times even pester you to buy it off. That made me wonder why would Indian tourists buy hindi film dvd's in Egypt? They would rather purchase them in India.

An incident I cannot forget is when one night I was taken to see the Mummy of King Tutankhamun, much after the museum shuts down for tourists in the evening. It's a myth that if you purchase any item pertaining to him it would bring in bad luck. He was considered the most controversial evil king with a curse on him. The museum was huge like a football stadium and we could hear our own footsteps. It was horrific and scary. I could not sleep that night. I realized I'm not as brave as I thought of myself to be.

I bought a lot of statuettes of the sphinx and the pyramids as memorabilia. I also purchased robes which have Egyptian scriptures over it. I was very intrigued by a towel that I bought which has the Egyptian history of 100 years printed on it and a crown similar to what the kings wore. I felt like a king missing his Cleopatra. 

When you see Egypt you actually feel that you are re-living history.

Reporter and Author: Yashica Tolani