Egypt - An Epic Destination Where Ancient And Modern Combine

Egypt has long reeled in travellers—today it is an epic destination where ancient and modern combine. Rebecca Misner gets the inside track.

- Rebecca Misner

Egyptologist Hala Sayed, who is my private guide for the day, explains that ancient Egyptians imagined the afterlife as not very different from life on Earth. “No cherubs, pearly gates or having dinner with Elvis and Jesus,” she says. It’s an early morning in September, and we’re standing on the nearly empty main floor of the neoclassical and sensationally salmon-hued Museum of Egyptian Antiquities on Cairo’s Tahrir Square before the tour buses have arrived to disgorge their passengers. Tombs, Hala explains, were often painted with everyday scenes—people grinding grain, having sex, brewing beer—and depicted the family members and beloved pets the deceased hoped to see again. This prosaic version of paradise was not due to any lack of imagination (these are the same people who dreamed up the wasp-headed, hippo-bodied goddess Ahti) but because “life was pretty good”, Hala says. “Egypt was heaven.”