The Pyramids at Giza

In September 1991 I was taught history in school for the first time. The class of fresh new middle school children was to learn about Ancient Egypt. The teacher, a tall South African called Ms. Fraser, who had frizzy blonde hair and always wore a polo shirt with the collar turned up, introduced a class of excited kids to a fantastical world of pharaohs, hieroglyphics, hidden tombs, buried treasure, spirits and mystery. We learnt how to write our names using pictures. We were told of the mystical and enormous triangular structures built by this ancient civilisation, so big and strong they still stood today.

So began an unhealthy obsession with travelling, history and visiting relics of ancient civilisations. During my recent Egyptian sojourn, I had the privelege of seeing the pyramids, arguably the most famous archaeological wonder in the world, with my own eyes. We took a taxi to Giza, now part of Cairo's urban spread. The city ends as suddenly as the desert begins, giant monoliths springing out of nowhere beyond the modern buildings.

The taxi driver dropped us off about half a mile from the entrance. An unavoidable aspect of any visit to the pyramids is Egypt's take on the tourist industry. This means dealing with constant attention from camel and horse drivers, souvenir sellers and plain scam artists. The latter approached us as we walked towards the ticket booth, claiming that way was for 'cars only' and that we should instead follow him down a side street. I didn't know whether to laugh or be irritated by the sheer audacity of his patter. After buying our tickets for the pitiful price of 30 Egyptian Guinea (around £3.50), we passed through the low-key entrance and security check. Walking up the ramp behind the building onto the plateau, we were confronted by a man wearing the all-white tourist police uniform who yelled at us for not having a 'horse ticket', ordering us to go back. A group of Egyptians in normal clothes milled around nearby. One came over and told us to ignore the 'crazy man', which we did and walked past. The 'helper' then proceeded to try to sell us a horse ride, the apparent end game of a bizarre sales technique. 

This aside, we were not seriously hassled, only having to continually politely decline offers of camel rides and postcards. The former are offered for a ridiculously low price which inevitably goes up without explanation once you are sitting on the camel and cannot get down. Souvenirs are sold in the same way - offered for next to nothing to get your attention before the initial price is conveniently forgotten about.

None of this should, and indeed it does not, take away from the utterly mindblowing and magnificent spectacle that the pyramids, as well as the Sphinx, are. Thought to be between 3,000-5,000 years old, they were originally covered in limestone, evidence of which can be seen on the tip of the second-largest Pyramid of Khafre. They were therefore once completely white. The pyramids contain up to 2.3 million blocks weighing 2 and a half tonnes each. Despite theories that aliens did it or that the Ancient Egyptians had 'massive, massive whips', the commonly held concensus seems to be that a highly organised workforce was responsible for this incomprensible feat of engineering and construction, a theory backed up by a worker's village currently being excavated at the site.

All the fascinating facts and theories in the world cannot substitute for the astonishing sight of the pyramids themselves. They are mindboggling to look at, their combination of size and aesthetic geometric quality unlike anything else. I wandered gobsmacked through the exposed desert sunshine for two hours, unable to take my eyes off them. I imagine my 9-year-old self would have reacted in much the same way.