Pyramids, Lasers, Cameras and Corruption
Camels on the Giza Plateau
The result is that local camel drivers who’s livelihoods depended on working at the plateau have been locked out leaving them with no means to feed their families.
From the EgyptToday website:
Forty-year-old Ibrahim Mahmoud says his work has suffered since the added security. “They have a list of those who can enter the site, and the list has names of people, some of whom aren’t licensed and yet still get in”
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During a recent visit to Goza, in January I was appaled to see camel and horse dung on top of ancient mastaba tombs in the Western Cenetary. Also they were using the are to rest the horses and the animals were urinating all over the mastabas. A disgrace to an ancient monument. It would not happen to such a site in the West.
Also, on a previous visit when working on the plateau I was followed around ALL DAY be a camel driverwho perstered me so much I was near to swearing. He could see that I was working, measuring and photographing, he kept calling my assistant (a young female student) ‘Your daughter wants to ride my camel’! I actually missed some features I was sent to study and had to make another trip to Egypt to finish off.
The sooner that are off the plateau for ever the better, I agree with Dr. Haswass they are a menace.
Thanks for your comment Haty, it’s good to get another perspective for balance. However, the wall is not meant to keep out all camel operators. As the article linked to above points out, licensed operators are allowed in as well as those willing and able to pay the required bribe.
The tourists themselves are also ruining the sites. Take Giza plateau as an example. The lack of bins and toilets means that visitors to the site are littering, urinating and defecating in any nook or cranny they can find.
I was shocked to find rubbish discarded in the ‘air shafts’ of the King’s chamber in the Great Pyramid, which also smelt strongly of urine. You can be sure it wasn’t the camel operators who were responsible for that.
Also, we saw on Andie’s blog today even Egyptian workers hired by excavating teams are trashing the sites. As Andie’s friend said:
“The big question around here is that if the wall is protecting the antiquities from the local robbers, who is going to protect the desert from the SCA?”
Are such monstrous walls really going to save the sites and the monuments?
It doesn’t appear so.