And we shall name this post "Chris trying to make cool poses in front of Egyptian Temples"

This is a statue of Horus at his temple in Edfu. Horus was the falcon god, who defeated Seth, the hippopotamus god of evil, even after Seth pulled out one of his eyes. Coincidentally, the Egyptian hyroglyph for "Horus" is the same as the one for "badass."


Wait a second, could it be another humungonormous statue dedicated the Ramses II? Note the size of the ear on the crumbled head. It's an exact copy of the neighbouring seating figure, again to give you an idea of scale. There are in fact 4 of these seated in a row here at the temple of Abu Simbel... they couldn't actually all fit into this shot. This temple was built by Ramses II and dedicated to... Ramses II. After a bit of time in power, he decided that he might as well be worshipped as a god. He figured he'd build his temple way to the south of Egypt, though (it's almost at the border with Sudan), in case the high priests of the other gods got a little upset and tried to take matters into their own hands...

Being in such a remote location, the temple at Abu Simbel requires tour bus convoys to and from Aswan. So it's a 3 hour drive one way, 2-3 hours at the site, and 3 hours back. And all the tourist show up at just about the same time. This makes for some packed temples. However, most people ram into the first temple for an hour, then ram into the second temple for an hour, then go sit in the cafe and relax from all the being rammed into temples.

What that means, is that for the last half hour of the tourist crush, the first (main) temple is essentially deserted. I managed to revisit it, this time taking my time to slowly walk up the centre to the inner sanctuary. The collosal statues that also line the interior peered down on me as I hovered along. Within the sanctuary itself, Ramses II sat amongst 3 other carved gods. The four of them and I shared the space only with a tiny sparrow who sat on Ramses' crown, cocking its head as I approached. It gave a little hop to the right, another quick one to the left, let out a loud chirp, and twittered off overhead.