15/10/22 : Nubian Village - Kom Ombo - Luxor

 

15/10/22 :  NUBIAN VILLAGE - KOM OMBO

Our cruise boat was docked and then we took small boat to small village town where we got to see the Nubian Village and its people.   The Nubian villages are known for their colorful streets, the rainbow-painted walls, and the kind people there! Nubians have a unique skin tone and also a unique language that no one in Egypt talks like. They live on the West bank of the Nile, deep down south in Egypt. The famous colorful Nubian village is about 3 miles south of Aswan, Egypt on the west bank of the Nile River.  The Nile crocodile was worshiped in the time of the pharaohs as evil, envy and war god named Sobek, and that's why Nubians mummified the crocodile to prevent evil things and adopted it as a tradition.  They rear crocodiles in their house.  We got to handle them in our hands, but ofcourse their mouth was tied.  We returned back to our cruise boat, where we had our lunch

We continued our sailing to Kom Ombo, an agricultural town in Egypt.  We visited Ptolemaic Temple,  one of the Nile Valley most beautiful sited temples. It is dedicated to two gods, the local crocodile God Sobek and Haroeris.  Kom Ombo temple is one of the most unique temples in Aswan and probably in Egypt. Kom Ombo means “The Hill Of Gold” as the word "Kom" means "Hill" in Arabic while the word "Ombo" means gold in hieroglyphics.

It was dark by the time we reached, 21 cruise ships are running parallel with us in this high season time upto Luxor.  Can you imagine the foreign tourist crowds, poor light, uneven paths but interesting.

  

The Luxor Temple is a large Ancient Egyptian temple complex located on the east bank of the Nile River.  One of the main functions of the temple focused on the annual Opet festival, an event in which statues of Mut, Khonsu, and Amun would travel from Karnak to the temple. There are huge statutes of  King Ramesses II in the courtyard.  The Front Pylon of the Luxor Temple six statues of standing Ramesses and in the centre there is tall Obelix.  There is a seperate museum in the complex for mummified crocodiles.  

Ancient Egyptians were able to mummify animals, including cats, monkeys, and crocodiles. Experts believe that this is part of the ancient Egyptians' rituals to appease the deity Sobek associated with the Nile crocodiles. He was depicted as either a full crocodile or a human with a crocodile head. There were crocodile priests who spent their days mummifying crocodiles and offering them to the gods. They meticulously wrapped the crocodiles with the same material and care that was used for human mummies, which shows how important these offerings were

Unlike many other ancient constructions in Thebes, Luxor Temple still stands and is visited to this day. It is also still used as a place of worship.  A part of the Luxor Temple was converted to a church by the Romans in 395 AD, and then to a mosque in 640, which is more than 3,400 years of continuous religious worship.  Just behind Luxor Temple, is big complex of  Karnik Temple, which we will visit next day.  Patron of fertility and accompanied with Hathor and Khonsu, while in the northern part of the temple was consecrated to the falcon deity Horus the Elder (Haroeris) the protector of the Pharaohs and Egypt. It was also built to confirm the ptolemies sovereignty and supremacy over the entire country.

After dinner, we went up on deck  to see lit up Nile by night.