Al-Ahram Weekly | Travel | "What makes the desert beautiful is that somewhere it hides a well"

		Al-Ahram Weekly Online 16 - 22 August 2001 Issue No.547
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"What makes the desert beautiful is that somewhere it hides a well"

These words by the famous 20th-century French writer Antoine Saint Exupery from the English translation of his novel Terre des hommes, (Wind, Sand and Stars), hung in the air as Amira El- Noshokaty captured this image of a lonely cart-driver at Siwa Oasis.
Heading for a water source is what desert travel is all about. As in dreams where one flies over a landscape with no borders so, too, one travels to Siwa. One moment one is crossing dessicated desert crags, dunes scorched by the noon sun and wind-blown hummocks, and the next one finds oneself in a haven of shady date palms clustered round a spring. The desert here has healing powers, and so, of course, do the springs.
One is quickly cast under nature's spell. Friendly hands offer dates and olives, or even hand-made silver rings. The crescents repeated in the pieces of jewellery symbolise fertility, and elderly women still cherish the one-sided braids their grandmothers wore in ancient times. Not only physical boundaries are bridged, but time, too.
The people of Siwa retain unique customs and speak an unwritten dialect. Women adorn their robes with pearl buttons and embroider them with distinctive orange and green thread; every stitch whispers a lifetime of simplicity. Everything they own is hand-made. Even the blue wooden cart which, for this resident, is the latest mode of transport.
Blue is the colour of the sky and of the doors of the whitewashed, mud-brick houses. The driver of the blue cart takes his time; he is in no hurry.
In Siwa, you can walk in the footsteps of Alexander, bathe in Cleopatra's spring, picnic beneath the palms. And when night falls, you can dine beside the hot water springs by the light of the moon and camp under the stars.
Practical information:
The Al-Saha festival, which takes place in October during the full moon., is when Siwans camp for three days at the foot of Gabal El-Dakrour to celebrate what was once the harvest moon, now known as mulid Sidi Soliman. The best time of the year to visit Siwa for sightseeing is from October to February, but June/July is the best season for sand cures for rheumatic diseases in Siwa's healing sands.

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