The Detailed Adventures of Monson in the Sahara - Day 3

This day began far too soon. I watched the stars fade out into a dark blue canvass of light. The Eastern horizon grew brighter by the minute. I finally felt tired enough to fall asleep. Just as I began nodding off, the people around me began stirring in their sleeping bags. To them it was already morning, and time to get up and appreciate the sunrise. I’ve never understood people like this. Sure, sunsets are beautiful, but I’m quite convinced that sunrises are hideous! Every time I’ve seen a sunrise I’ve had to prop my eyelids open with toothpicks while exhibiting one continuous yawn that never quite reaches its climax. The yawn continues to get more intense as the sun begins to peek over the horizon, blurring my eyes with water which the morning breeze then turns into a crusty salt film that burns my eyeballs. Meanwhile my bones ache as if they haven’t had rest in a month. It hurts to breathe. My body feels all gross and filthy. The sun rises. Whoopee. Were those few colors really worth all this pain and suffering? Couldn’t we just record a sunset and then watch it in rewind? Anyways, all this to say, that morning I pulled my sleeping bag over my head during the sunrise so I wouldn’t have to experience the menacing display of agony. After the sun was fully risen and everyone was back from their morning walks (bathroom breaks), I waddled (still inside my sleeping bag) over to the smoldering coals left over from our previous day’s fire and blew on them until a flame jumped out of one of the logs. As I sat there in my sleeping bag with my horrid bedhead, enjoying the little fire I created, everyone else giggled at how tired and pathetic I looked. I glared back at them, trying to understand how they could all be so ridiculously cheerful at such an unholy hour of the day. Mornings make me sick. Call me pregnant, if you like, but mornings are just not meant for me! I’ve never understood that age old saying that goes something like, “Good morning.” What does that mean, anyways?? To me, it’s an oxymoron, much like an interstate highway in Hawaii.

Eventually my morning sickness wore off and we packed everything back into the Jeeps. After pouring fluids into every orifice of the Jeep and turning the engine over for a good ten minutes, Ayman’s vehicle finally sputtered to life. We sat there wide eyed for those nerve-wracking ten minutes, wondering if we were going to be stranded in the middle of the white desert (without cell phone coverage, might I add). Ayman was quite excited when it finally started up. I believe his exact words were: “Fantastic weesout plastic!” Oh, I just remembered another funny quirk about Ayman. He always referred to me as “Mr. Leen” for some reason. From what I understand, Ayman once took a guy by the name of “Mr. Leen” out on one of these desert safaris and now refers to pretty much everyone was “Mr. Leen.” Most interesting!

The journey back to the Bahariya Oasis wasn’t overly exciting. We just backtracked the previous day’s journey. We did stop and visit a herd of camels along the way, though. Pictures of them are in my Desert Safari Photo Album. Ol’ Bessy had a thing for me, I think. She kept batting her big, long, eyelashes at me. I was so busy playing with the camels that I forgot to look for dinosaur bones out there. I bet that’s where the jackpot is. Shoot!

Later that day, after arriving back at the Ahmed Safari Camp, we headed out for a little tea time in the desert with a German family that lives out there. After sitting there for a long time listening to the adults talk about adult stuff, Rob, Justina and I went off into the desert to hunt for fossils. Although we didn’t find any dinosaur bones, I did see a desert fox (though nobody believes me because I couldn’t get my camera on in time), and we found a whole graveyard of small animal bones. After getting back to the desert picnic we said our farewells to the German family and drove back to the camp. I got to drive! This was my first time driving on Egyptian soil… or sand, I suppose. It was only a two minute drive, but hey, it felt nice to drive again.

Following a sketchy dinner of (yet again) chicken and rice, Rob and I played a game of ping pong. I was totally schooling him… until disaster struck. The ball rolled over to the side of the table where I ran to grab it. Because I was so excited about beating someone six years younger than me at ping pong, I spun around and flung my head back up after retrieving the ball. Normally, this is a fairly harmless act. But in this case, there was a solid cement archway between my head and where my head wanted to go. Thus, I smacked the left side of my head into it at a high speed, and knocked myself to the ground. Although I’m pretty sure I remained conscious the entire time, I was not altogether coherent as I sat there on the ground. My next decision proves that. I chose to forfeit the game so that I could go and lay down. Yeah, that’s right. I forfeited. Pathetic. The rest of the day is a bit of a blur to me. I think I just laid in bed and read/stared at a book until Rob came to bed. That was the tragic end to day three of my vacation.