The Voyage of the Northern Magic: A Family Odyssey

by Diane Stuemer

  We continued south to the city of Aswan, located in a beautiful spot at the first cataract of the Nile, not far from Sudan. There, we stood at the actual quarries from which came the granite used in the many monuments of Luxor and the pyramids themselves. There was a massive unfinished obelisk still in the quarry, abandoned because of an internal flaw. Jonathan declared that finding out how the Egyptians had raised those giant monuments would become his life’s quest. We visited tombs of ancient noblemen, some of which had human bones inside them. We noticed more strewn about outside the tombs and actually picked up several pieces of human skull, including a piece of jawbone that included a tooth.

  The camel ride into the desert to explore an ancient monastery was the biggest hit of all. Christopher giggled non-stop atop the mount he and I shared, especially so on the way back, when we persuaded our camel to break into a trot. As we passed Michael, his camel swung out and gave us a little hip check to slow us down. But we laughed in the face of adversity, got our mount racing again, and began gaining ground on Jonathan, whose animal we had named Rogue because of his tendency to go his own way. Christopher was filling the air with so much laughter that the rest of us had no choice but to join in.

  As soon as Jon’s Rogue noticed we were gaining on him, he entered the race, the camel’s huge knobby legs swinging. Michael’s camel was now trotting as well, and our poor camel drivers, on foot, had to run to keep up. It was tremendous fun, and we gave our good-natured young helpers an extra tip at the end of it all. (My rear end and thighs suffered for the next two days, and Michael’s back, too, because he had been imitating the grand vizier of Egypt and was sitting cross-legged when the trotting began.)

  There is no country in the world with as many magnificent sights as Egypt. There is also no country in the world, in our experience, with such an immense ability to frustrate and anger you. Tourism, like power, tends to corrupt, and as Egypt is the greatest tourism destination in the world, it is, perhaps, no wonder that it also contains the worst class of scoundrels –mostly shopkeepers, felucca and taxi drivers, tour guides, and generally corrupt baksheesh-grabbers – we’ve ever come across. Walking through the tourist market in Aswan or Luxor was like running a gauntlet. The stall owners were so desperate for our money, they clung to us like Velcro.

  Walking along the Nile, we had to face the unscrupulous touts offering sailboat rides in a felucca, and they were the worst of all. Like the taxi drivers who, every time they saw us waiting for a local bus, ran up and explained that the buses weren’t running today – only giving up grinningly when the bus actually pulled up – the felucca drivers were shameless in their lies. Although we still loved Egypt, it seemed to us that the Egyptians who had the most to gain from tourism were doing their utmost to wreck it. To our dismay, we noticed ourselves losing our normal friendly outlook and turning surly and suspicious of virtually anyone who tried to initiate a conversation.

  One of the most important objectives for our trip to Luxor had been to pick up a package from home that contained Christmas presents: a digital camera donated by a reader, some desperately yearned-for chocolate, as well as our badly needed new transmission damper. The package had been shipped from Canada with a promise that we would receive it in four to five days. That had been two and a half weeks before. In that time, the courier company had led us on a merry chase that involved them inventing a new story each day to explain the absence of the package. It was just like 1001 Nights, but even more creative. Every time we called (and each phone call required an hour of walking to get to the public phone and as much as half an hour awaiting our turn), there was a new and different story. The waybill was lost. The declaration was lost. The entire package was lost. No, it really was the waybill that was lost. It was our Safaga Saga all over again, but worse. Eventually, we decided the only way to unsnarl this mess would be for Herbert to travel twelve hours to Cairo to try to clear the problem up in person.

  He travelled overnight to Cairo, where the package was being held at the airport. There the unhelpful courier company agent – who wouldn’t even come out of his office to see Herbert – directed him to take a two-hour bus ride to Port Suez to sort it all out. A brilliant diversionary tactic. Herbert dutifully got back on the bus and travelled to Port Suez, but there he wasn’t even permitted to enter the Customs compound or talk to a single official. After two days of intense frustration and no progress whatsoever, Herbert returned to the boat in despair.

  After this debacle, we debated long and hard about whether to continue in Northern Magic to Suez. But we had already motored six hundred difficult miles from Sudan with our strange Frankenstein transmission and had grave doubts about how much longer it would hold out. We decided the whole family would take the long ride to Cairo by bus instead. Our last hope was to call the Canadian embassy.

  Soon, we were sitting at a big boardroom table (“Wow! This table is as big as our boat,” Michael marvelled), being given a very warm welcome by embassy staff, including the ambassador herself. The embassy swung into action immediately. By the next day they had managed to free our transmission part, and the day after that even got Customs to release the kids’ Christmas presents, my mother’s home-baked Christmas cake, and, most important of all, my chocolate. The only thing Customs refused to release was a used digital camera, sent by one of our readers so that we could transmit digital pictures to our Web site.

  In the end, the digital camera was sent off to Cyprus, to wait for us there. The rest of the package, in all its despoiled glory, was delivered to us, after six whole weeks of trying. By now mice had eaten through some of the precious marzipan, and money included in one letter was missing. But the most important things: the Magic Cards, the books, Grandma’s Christmas cake, the bag of Fudgee-O cookies (double creme), and, of course, the Hershey’s Kisses, were all intact and just days later sitting, rewrapped, under our little Christmas tree back on the boat. All, that is, except Grandma’s Christmas cake, which was mainly devoured in our Cairo hotel room. I didn’t touch the Hershey’s, though, I swear.

  Okay, okay, just one little taste.

  Our weeks of continuing struggles in Egypt had, in truth, been getting us down. The cumulative effect of so many aggressive people trying to cheat us, plus our troubles getting the package, had been made worse by the fact that the people who had been currently renting our house back in Ottawa, who also happened to be Egyptian, had just broken their lease and done a midnight move. This deprived us of our main source of income. Finding a replacement tenant for the seven months that remained before we came home would be difficult and costly. The burden of this impending financial disaster was weighing on us heavily.

  Our time in Cairo had been further complicated by Ramadan. We had been in Muslim Malaysia during Ramadan and had hardly noticed it. But in Egypt, this holy month totally circumscribed our day. Most restaurants closed between dawn and 5:00 p.m. If we didn’t join the hungry throngs right at the stroke of 5:00 p.m., we would risk not being able to find food at all. As the month of Ramadan proceeded, especially late in the day, people became extremely crabby – understandably so, since they were hungry, thirsty, and needed their nicotine fix. If this is anything like how I am when I need a chocolate fix, I sympathize entirely. However, it made it all the less enjoyable for us, and I’m sure contributed to some of the problems we had with shopkeepers and taxi drivers.

  In Cairo, we were invited to the home of Vice-Consul Nikki Dunn, where, along with other embassy staff and their families, we celebrated their success in getting our package released. That night, Canadian warmth and hospitality surrounded us like a warm blanket, a blanket we really needed. Nikki even presented us with a real, honest-to-goodness Butterball turkey for our Christmas dinner. For the first time, it felt as if Christmas really might be coming after all.

  We spent two more days marvelling at the sights of Cairo. Christopher’s highlight was seeing the glorious golden mask of Tutankhamun at the Cairo museum, which contained enough treasures to stoc
k half a dozen institutions. Jonathan’s favourite was gazing upon the face of Pharaoh Ramses II, preserved well enough over 3,200 years that you could still see the colour of his hair. As Michael finally stood in the shadow of the Great Pyramid of Cheops, he put his hand reverently upon the giant stone blocks and said, “Mom and Dad, you can do what you want for the rest of the trip; now I’ve achieved my dream.”

  There was truth in Michael’s words for Herbert and me as well. Standing once again beneath the pyramids was, for each one of us, an awesome moment.

  We spent our last day in Cairo trying to do our Christmas shopping at the Khan el Khalili bazaar. It’s amazing how many different forms of Tutankhamun, the pyramids, and statues of the Egyptian god Anubis appeared under our little Christmas tree that year. On December 23, we caught the bus back to the boat, carrying our hard-won care package. A bus official looked suspiciously at the box, which was covered with large stickers and stamps from Customs. Frowning, he demanded to know what was in it, and whether we had paid the duty. One Hairy Eyeball from Herbert, and he didn’t dare ask another thing.

  On the bus, we met an Egyptian woman who was also on her way to El Gouna, the small resort town where Northern Magic had been berthed. Her name was Ekbal El Asyouti, and it turned out she had lived in Ottawa for twenty-three years. We were still smarting over weeks of problems with shopkeepers, touts, taxi drivers, officials, and courier company employees, so when Ekbal said, “Everyone loves coming to Egypt, because Egyptians are so friendly,” I simply couldn’t stay quiet.

  “Well,” I said, trying not to offend but needing to be honest, “I don’t think most tourists really feel that way,” and proceeded to tell her some of our experiences.

  She was shocked. “Real Egyptians aren’t like that,” she said. “If only you would come to Cairo again – you could stay at my house and I’d introduce you to my friends. You’d have a completely different view.” As we parted at the bus station, she pulled a lovely long sequinned robe out of her bag and gave it to me. A few days later, she and two friends visited us on the boat, carrying a load of additional presents – chocolates, wine, souvenirs for the kids. It was her way of demonstrating that not all Egyptians were as grasping as we’d been led to believe. We really appreciated her friendship.

  Preparations for our fourth, and final Christmas on board Northern Magic were hurried. We began wrapping and decorating only on Christmas Eve, after our long bus ride through the desert the day before. Yet somehow or other, despite our frustrations, Christmas arrived just the same.

  “Take a look at this,” said Herbert two days later, emerging from the engine room carrying Frankenstein, our old, jury-rigged transmission damper. “Now I’m really glad we got that package.”

  Frankenstein was falling apart. The driving disc was already cracked, and several of its mismatched springs were wearing against the flanges that had been welded in to hold them in place. It was only a matter of time before it all would have burst into pieces. If we had continued without the new part, as we had seriously considered doing, disaster would certainly have awaited.

  We dubbed Frankenstein’s replacement Frank, in honour of my father. “What an honour to have a transmission damper actually named after you!!!” Dad wrote in his next e-mail. “Few, if any, ground crew have ever been so honoured!! I am a happy NM crewman!” A few days later, thanks to both Franks, we were on our way again.

  We entered the Strait of Gubal, the narrow entrance to the Gulf of Suez, and joined the parade of massive ships moving in stately procession on their way to and from the Suez Canal. Manoeuvring in the Suez shipping lanes at night, trying to make sense out of the thousands of lights surrounding us, was quite an experience. There was the continuous procession of red, green, and white lights from passing ships, which, if we didn’t watch out, would run us down without even knowing. There’s a wonderful story – probably true – of a supertanker arriving in Suez with an entire sailboat mast and sail unknowingly snagged on its bow anchor. There were the small, garishly lit fishing boats that bobbed around, trawling for prawns. A row of flashing buoys marked the channel. Then there were the lights from the different settlements and winking headlights from passing cars, visible on both shores.

  But the most impressive of all were the rigs pumping oil out from under the Red Sea. Thousands of white lights illuminated their towering superstructures, making them look like science fiction cities of the future. Scattered within this galaxy of lights were huge orange flames of burning natural gas, spouting out directly from the sea floor like torches at the gates to Hell. As we sailed close to these infernos, surrounded by so many confusing lights, our nerves were taut. So it was with a tremendous sense of exhilaration that we arrived at Port Suez by mid-afternoon the next day.

  Virtually every yacht making the two-day transit of the Suez Canal has bad experiences to report. The problem is the canal pilots you are required to have on board. Sometimes it’s a matter of unwelcome advances to female crew, but most typically the problem is the pilots’ aggressive demands for “gifts.” There are even instances of pilots retaliating in various unpleasant ways if they don’t get what they want.

  The day before our transit, an official of the Suez Canal authority arrived. After he finished measuring our boat to assess our fees, he asked whether we had been having any problems with Egyptian officials. Herbert, smiling, just rolled his eyes. In Suez we’d already been pestered to death by requests for money from people doing nothing more than their jobs – including, just minutes before, the man who had brought this very official to our boat.

  “I’ve heard,” said Herbert delicately, “that many boats have problems with the canal pilots.”

  The official went into a long and reassuring speech, saying that we were under no obligation to provide any gifts whatsoever to the pilots.

  “So,” he said, when he was finished, his eyes darting around our salon, “do you have any sunglasses you can give me? Any souvenirs?”

  Ah, Egypt.

  The next day, when our first Suez Canal pilot, Atia, jumped on board, we were all on our guard. Although we were not in the gift-giving mood, we had, in fact, purchased the traditional cartons of Marlboros to facilitate our transit through the canal. But Atia proved to be a real gentleman. He was friendly and helpful, thanking me effusively for the simple lunch I served him. By the end of our first day motoring along the featureless sandy-sided canal, punctuated only by decrepit-looking military outposts, we were feeling positively warm towards him. Best of all, he didn’t ask for a thing.

  So I happily prepared a bag containing small gifts and treats for him and his children, as well as one of our two cartons of cigarettes. He accepted these with delight. Herbert and I giggled to see him trying to hide the bulky carton under his jacket, tucked inside his pants, to avoid having to share it once he got off our boat.

  “Well, if our second pilot is as good as this one,” said Herbert, heaving a sigh of relief as we anchored at Ismailia, our halfway point, “that will be great. I’d really like to leave Egypt on a good note.”

  The next morning, ninety minutes late, our second pilot, named Mohammed, appeared. He was a small, wiry man with a thin moustache. The first thing he said when he jumped on board was that we needed to give something to the three men on the boat who had delivered him. Gritting our teeth, for we had heard that if you refuse to pay the pilot boat they may ram you, we put three Cokes in a plastic bag and reluctantly handed them over as ransom.

  Mohammed’s very next words were: “And what gifts do you have for me?”

  “Don’t talk to me about gifts,” said Herbert, shaking his head. “You haven’t even done anything yet.” We weren’t off to a very good start.

  But Mohammed didn’t take the hint. He continued his pestering. Throughout the next eight hours, between his insistent requests for gifts, he was overly friendly in an obsequious, pushy way. Twice, he made unnecessary physical contact with me, once actually lying right down in my lap as I sat, cross-le
gged, on deck. Eventually, the kids and I fled inside the cabin to avoid further contact with this odious man.

  About an hour before we arrived at Port Said, Mohammed asked for a letter of reference. Herbert wasted no time in turning that task over to me. Nice guy. For a while I puzzled over what I could possibly write. Finally, I put pen to paper and then silently showed my efforts to Herbert, who nodded and signed the document with an official flourish. Mohammed took the letter and glowed with satisfaction as he read it. Then he carefully folded it, thanked us, and tucked it into his pocket.

  At Port Said, a boat came to pick him up, but we were handing out no goodie bags at the end of this party. Herbert whispered that he had told Mohammed we didn’t carry any cigarettes on board. There was no way he was going to give this slimy fellow a thing.

  “So, do you have any gifts for me?” Mohammed asked once more in his thin, wheedling voice.

  “No,” our captain said. “We paid a lot of money for this transit, so you have already been paid for your work.”

  “You have nothing for me?” Mohammed asked in disbelief.

  “No, nothing.”

  Four more times he asked. Four more times Herbert shook his head, standing impassively, an immovable rock at the wheel.

  “Don’t you have anything for the pilot boat?” Mohammed asked despairingly, as it drew alongside. Again, Herbert shook his head – he would risk a ramming rather than reward this man’s greediness with so much as a toothpick.

  Finally, Mohammed, no longer smiling, jumped onto the pilot boat and left without looking back or even answering our goodbyes. “Is he gone?” the boys asked, poking their heads into the cockpit. “Good riddance!”

  Herbert’s eyes met mine and we shared a secret grin.

  As the pilot boat receded into the distance and a wonderful flood of relief rushed over us, I pulled out a copy of the letter I had written. It was our parting gift to Mohammed and to Egypt. It read: