13.

Last day in Siwa

11th March

Wednesday. Our last day in Siwa. I am starting to grasp why there are several people from other continents that have chosen to buy homes and come and live here. I am past the distaste for dust and the initial impression of untidiness. Siwa has a Soul of its own and it seeps into you gently until you eventually fall in love with it. I am all for love so it’s not hard for Siwa to get into my heart.

Another one of those local bread, jam, fruit and olive oil with tomato breakfasts and we are ready for a day of last visits at our own leisure.

So we decide to walk, getting a closer feel of everyday life in the streets of Siwa. The houses, mostly unfinished, with their dusty gardens of palm trees where dates will eventually be bountiful, women clad mostly in black, wearing their burkas, with only a slit for their eyes, children playing outside, the donkeys, some well tended-to, others not so much, waiting patiently for their masters or moving their wheel carts ahead.

One man goes by, constantly whipping his donkey, who is already bleeding from such insistent torture and I sigh. Even to be a donkey one has to be lucky! I wonder… how does a donkey choose a more agreeable reality for himself? I smile… This world is rife with contrasts that only compassion can behold, stepping back into a space of acceptance that is sometimes quite challenging for the Human treading the lands down here.

We are on our way to the Oracle Temple of Amun, built a few thousand years ago, back in the day when Oracles were consulted for the purpose of divination and their words defined the course of Human decisions and actions.

Alexander the Great (over 300 years a.c) , conqueror of Egypt and founder of Alexandria - where we are headed next, after leaving Siwa - is said to have made the relentless 8 day journey to visit the Amun Oracle in order to confirm whether he was, indeed, a son of Zeus, the Greek God of Gods… Confirmation or not, what has transpired through myth or legend could be seen as a Yes, and yet one with such a mighty grip on conquering the world surely would not have it any other way. So who knows what Amun actually said…

When we arrive, we buy our tickets and go up into the ruins. Immediately a sense of reverence takes hold and I know, as surely as my feet are standing on this ground now, that I too have been an Oracle. I can almost hear my voice, speaking across the ages, sense myself in those times, feel, see, touch and yet, aren’t we all Oracles at some point of our existence? I remember being trained as a priestess, several lifetimes in the past. Such unquestionable discipline, the rigours of serious devotion, the developing of an extra array of senses that lie dormant in most humans, a tangible knowingness of living between two worlds, where the visible and the invisible are often a blurry landscape that defines no clear difference between one and the other, and thus all becomes known to the seer and no doubt can cast its shadow over this knowingness.

I realise how this discipline has come across the doorways of time and space and served me in this lifetime I am currently experiencing, for without it, I most probably would have remained lost in the labyrinths I myself created in order to keep on coming back to Earth over and over again. But my determination was steadfast and nothing could detract me from being the One I knew myself to be, even when I was unaware of this. Nothing has been more relevant to me than coming to Peace and that’s how it has come to be.

Speaking of doorways, the skeleton of several still holds a semblance of what this Temple might have been. And the silence. Even with people passing by… The silence is profound. A perfect place to simply sit in contemplation.

After a while exploring this special place, we try and find a place for Joana to record one or two more self-massage videos. The guard follows us like an unwanted shadow and seems to not want to allow us to roam free around these ruins. So we eventually settle for doing the recording with him hanging around in the far away background, out of sight. Joana is of course, still pretty self-conscious and struggling to find her voice. Nevertheless, doing this right here, in this particular setting, is absolutely relevant. So we do. These videos will never be seen by eyes other than ours, but they served a precious purpose - to pry the inner wisdom free and release Joana from her resistance to shine it publicly.

We then go and sit on a wooden bench under the share of a cane shed, waiting for the heat to subside a bit more, for us to then move on.

As we are there, sitting quietly, a young man approaches us, I can’t remember for what reason now, but we end up engaging in conversation and Abdo, short for Abdullah, turns out to be a very interesting university student from Alexandria who has taken a few days off and decided to come and visit Siwa, where he had never been before. We talk about life in Egypt, society, religion, different points of view and beliefs and it is a free flowing conversation, where we respect and learn from each other. He is soon to be married to his fiancé whom he misses - also a young university student. She is, of course, not allowed to travel alone, much less with her boyfriend. Not according to local custom.

Since we are going to Alexandria next, Abdo insists that he would love to show us around town so we must contact him once we get there. We exchange numbers and say farewell, promising to meet in two days’ time, once we are in Alexandria.

What a lovely encounter! It is always such a rich opportunity, to meet with local people from different places and to exchange awareness with each other! This is one of the things I most absolutely enjoy about travelling anywhere. The people. And I am sure it is not only luck, that I find kind people wherever I go. People who are open and willing to interact and share their treasures also. I am thankfully blessed by this endless generosity that kisses the streets of my existence.

Once we get down from the Temple, the guard who had been following us offers to take us in his dingy bike cart to the Cleopatra pool, where we have already been but don’t mind going again. He is not charging much, so this time we take a ride and once we get there, we relax in a beautiful looking Arabian style tent, where we have a refreshing lime juice and enjoy a bit more of our staying.

When we feel it’s time to move on, we decide to walk our way back to town. On the way we admire lands with varying degrees of well-tended vegetable gardens, pigeon domes and the ever present Date Palms. Also olive trees, lots of them. We realise that the fruits and vegetables here are quite the same as the local produce in our country. The earth here seems to be very fertile, and though sandy, it is also very moist, for this oasis is particularly well-served with water from the richness underground.

A thing I enjoy is the sense of safety. No concern whatsoever with crime. This sense that we are safe wherever we choose to be. And it is such a beautiful gift to be able to live like this. No longer having that trigger warehouse hidden somewhere deep below my conscious awareness, waiting to switch on fear buttons whenever survival kicks in. Survival has become a distant memory of a kind of experience that no longer seems real to me. It was just part of another game and in this new one, there is no space for it.

Once we get to Siwa town and back to our room, we get a message from Adbo warning us about the impending storm, which means he will be taking the bus back to Alexandria tonight instead of tomorrow, in order to be able to eventually get home before it strikes. Hmmm. We have booked with Khaled to pick us up tomorrow at midday.

A short while later we get a message from Khaled, with the same concerns. Asking whether we still want to travel tomorrow. We feel. We feel yes. We reply. He defines then that we must leave much earlier. He will be coming to sleep in Siwa and we will leave at 7 am. So be it. We are ready for this.

The night is restful, though wrought with wind, thunder and much rain. Yet we are sure to have made the right decision. And so be it.

💙💚💛💜💗

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