egypt

I got a call froma cynical young American journalist...You know the sort. He's lived in the Middle East for a little over five minutes so assumes he knows us natives well. I sip at a skinny mocha frappe while he fires off big important questions about 'the political landscape' and 'Islamic thought'. I stare at him blankly.

The building is rather like a medieval Castle and was established in the Sixth Century and soon afterwards, as the Moslem armies advanced Westwards from the Arabian Peninsula, somebody had the prescience to build a small Mosque in its courtyard to guard against it being burned or demolished. At the time of the Crusades it was the turn of the Monastery to protect the Mosque, and so it has been down the ages, each House of God extending its shelter to the other as opposing armies came and went.

Denial is not just a river in Egypt.

And Egypt ? What is Egypt strenght?her resilience ?her ability to absorb poeple and events into the pores of her being? is that true or is it just a consolation ? a shifting of responsibility? and if it is true , how much can she absorb and still remain Egypt ?

I haven't come to you only to take , I haven't come to you empty handed : I bring you poetry as great as yours but in anther tongue , I bring you black eyes and golden skin and curly hair , I bring you Islam and Luxor and Alexandria and Lutes and tambourines and date-palms and silk rugs and sunshine and incense and voluptuous ways

In February 1912, ancient China came to an end when the last of three millennia of Chinese emperors abdicated.Imagine twentieth-century Italy coming to terms with the fall of the Roman empire or Egypt with the last pharaoh abdicating in 1912. For China, the last century has been a period of transition - dramatic change and perpetual revolution.

Morning"SUNThat awakens ParisThe highest poplar on the bank On The Eiffel TowerA tricolored cockSings to the flapping of his wingsand several feathers fallAs it resumes its course The Seine looks between the bridgesFor her old routeAnd the Obelisk That has forgotten the Egyptian words Has not blossomed this yearSUN

I am all that hath been, and is, and shall be; and my veil no mortal has hitherto raised.

I see murky visions of other gods and rival magic."That REALLY didn't sound good."What do you mean?" I asked. "what OTHER GODS?""I don't know, Sadie. But Egypt has always faced challenges from outside __ magicians from elsewhere, even gods from elsewhere. Just be vigilant."~Ruby & Sadie Kane about...? Possibly Greeks?

Now because 18 months ago the first dawn, 3 months ago broad daylight but a very few days ago the full sun of the most highly remarkable spectacle has risen _ nothing holds me back. I can give myself up to the sacred frenzy, I can have the insolence to make a full confession to mortal men that I have stolen the golden vessel of the Egyptians to make from them a tabernacle for my God far from the confines of the land of Egypt. If you forgive me I shall rejoice; if you are angry, I shall bear it; I am indeed casting the die and writing the book, either for my contemporaries or for posterity to read, it matters not which: let the book await its reader for a hundred years; God himself has waited six thousand years for his work to be seen.

I could have killed you,_ I snarl.__ou think you can become a god. You always meddle and change and create. No, that is not the way. What is shall always be. What is known shall always stand.___hen you__e never been in a laboratory!

Experiment: Live and love as much as I can, before my particles fall away to wander in stardust.

Do you really think that Tutankhamen would have taken a chance on some pale girl with pretty eyes had you not been the priestess of Anubis?___ou did._ The words fall out of me.__hat?__ look up at him. __ou took a chance on me._ I sit up, breath heavy in my throat. __hen I was nothing but a dead, lost thing.

His lips are soft and crushing at the same time. I__ not sure what to do__s there an algorithm for kissing?

Ahhh." Anubis narrows his eyes at me. ____e given you inspiration. Now you__e thinking about bringing the lightbulb to ancient Egypt. It would be a hit___ll those dark tombs.__ou. I was thinking about you. His eyebrows rise. __uh? Me?__luorine uranium carbon potassium. I said that out loud. "I mean," I stutter, "I was thinking about_unimolecular reactions.

I want to go home.___mpossible. You__e here now.___ut why?___ane Ezrael,_ Anubis says, __ou__e dead.

From beneath the folds of his robes, he reveals a small steel dagger. __ou have tempted fate so many times already and still yield to it. Time for history to rewrite itself. Time for Tutankhamen to have a new ending._ Aten holds the hilt out to me.I stare at the dagger. The hilt is bronze, carved with sun discs that glow when they catch the sun. __hat do you want me to do with that?__ten smiles a white, gaping grin. __ill Tutankhamen and carve out his heart.

And whose heart do you want me to steal?_ The words escape me in a whisper.A small smile pricks Aten__ lips. __ing Tutankhamen.