The Valley of Kings

I've only been to Egypt a couple of times as a child, but that place still managed to find its way into my heart. My parents weren't very enthusiastic about the place, since what they mostly heard about it before going was: it's dangerous, try not to stray far from your hotel, keep your child by your side at all times.

I, on the other hand, have always been mesmerized by the majestic pyramids, by the powerful sphinx, by the infinite sand dunes. All the myths and stories I'd heard and read came rushing back as I looked down from the plane as we were getting ready to land.

And I wasn't disappointed. Some things, it seems, you have to look through a child's eyes in order to truly appreciate what's around you. Otherwise you are too skeptical, too detached. You can quite easily give up the possibility of adventure for a lazy day in front of the hotel pool. And, if not for my insistence, that's exactly what would have happened.

 

But kept persuading them to go on this tour or the other, so, eventually, they agreed to leave the luxurious five-star hotel for a day go and see the Valley of the Kings, if I promised to stay close and be very-very careful.

I remember that day very clearly, even though it was so full of emotions and excitement it was threatening to become a blur. I'm not going to retell all the historic details – you can learn that from a guide or a guidebook, both of them will be much better at telling you about the whos, whens and whats of the place than I am.

What I can tell you that going there, to Biban El Moluk, is worth it. Worth the drive in the scorching heat, worth the searing wind, worth the sharp specks of sand biting into your skin. Even approaching that place, I could feel the hairs stand up on the back of my neck – so hauntingly ancient it felt. It was as if I was staring into the calm face of eternity, and felt incredibly small compared to it. The never-ending steps alone were humbling.

The breath of time continued to follow us as long as we were walking through the valley. All the treasure discovered within the tombs had long been transferred to museums, but I wasn't all that interested in the treasure, after all, it's just gold. What attracted me much more were the scenes from Egyptian mythology painted on the walls, depicting the funeral rituals and the afterlife. The illustrated spells from the Book of the dead looked so bright it seemed the magic the priests believed them to possess kept them fresh.

Even my parents couldn't help admiring the majesty of the place. The only thing that slightly spoiled the impression was being constantly followed around by people asking for money. Understanding the state of affairs in Egypt even at the time, we tried to be condescending, but it didn't make tolerating their attention much easier. And my mother constantly worried when she looked to her side, and I wasn't there. Understandable, true, but I would so much rather have had the place all to myself, to roam through it, take it all in. Then I would have seen and remembered so much more.

Revere thy parents.

This is one of the rules that everybody’s supposed to live by, but rarely does. Listening to your parents and actually doing what they tell you can be so hard sometimes…Especially when you’re old enough to see that they are not all-knowing and bulletproof.

 

This makes taking their advice that much harder as you grow up. But the older I get, the more I see that…I miss that. I miss being absolutely sure that if I tell my parents about this or that problem I may be having, it will be solved as if by magic. They might be angry with me at first, but they’ll help. Because they’re all-powerful and all-wise.

 And now…this confidence is gone. I've

seen them make mistakes; I know they don’t always make the right choices. I love them, but I know that my parents are human. This, I think, is the hardest part of becoming an adult. Realizing that there’s no magic solution to every problem in your parents’ heads.

And it’s exactly the time when it hits you: someday, you’ll be someone’s invincible problem-solver. If you’re planning on becoming a parent someday, that is. And it’s kind of terrifying. That goes to show that I, personally, am not ready to become a mother. I am in no way prepared to be a superwoman for a little girl or boy who’s going to look up to me and believe whole-heartedly that I can do anything.

This is a good way to see if you’re ready. So…do. If you’re thinking of giving birth to a child at 20, ask yourself: can I be invincible? If only for the next 18 years. 

Melancholy

So sad…I can’t function properly, can’t even write. I just want to sit here and feel sorry for myself. So much is going on, and I don’t feel like being cheerful. I feel like curling up into a ball and thinking weak, pathetic thoughts, may be crying a little. Most people I know would say that it wasn’t like me to behave like this, but, at the given moment of time, I don’t care.

I’m tired of always being O.K. Always smiling, upbeat, happy even when criticizing something or someone. I can’t do that all the time. No-one can do that all the time, unless they’re robotic or from another planet. But people aren’t used to seeing me when I’m down. And I wouldn’t want to shock anyone, or, even worse, upset anyone.

The reason for all this? I have no idea, what it is. I just want it to stop – because, unlike some writers, I don’t get inspired by depression. It sucks all the creativity out of me, and there’s nothing I can think, talk or write about but my saddness. And that’s just pathetic. So, I’m sorry, everyone. I hope to feel better by next week. But right now…there’s just…melancholy.   

Teaching or Testing?

When we enter any educational institution, what do we see as our goal? I’m not taking kindergarden or even school into account, since we’re not old enough to see further than our noses when we enter them, but, let’s say, college, or a university. While drifting in a sea of vague ideas of getting a degree and, therefore, a better job later on, we often forget the main reason: to learn.

Naturally, the process is complicated – it’s not like you can get a knowledge injection and become clever all of a sudden. It takes time and effort. And great teachers. The problem is, these days, they are more and more difficult to come by. What we mainly see are people who are there to test you - and nothing more.

Those latter ones spend most of their time praising star students who don’t seem to have any problem digesting new information for one simple reason: it’s not new to them. They already knew that. It doesn’t matter, why – they were more interested in the subject earlier on, they have parents who work in this sphere, etc. The point is: they didn’t acquire their knowledge at this particular institution. They got it somewhere else, thanks to someone else’s teaching talent.

Others, who weren’t so lucky, get treated as if they were horribly lazy – it’s constantly pointed o

ut to them that they should work harder to achieve the same results as their higher-achieving colleagues. Would that it were true, but that hard work doesn’t give them anything, because they are working according to YOUR system, while the star students got the same knowledge, using SOMEBODY ELSE’s system, one that might be much more effective than yours.

So, what’s the point of slaving under the system that doesn’t work? And why does it seem like you have to know everything when you enter a university in order to get any praise at all? And, furthermore, what’s the point of entering the said university, if you already KNOW ALL THAT STUFF? Seriously? If we aren’t allowed to make mistakes and NOT know t

hings, then why do we need you?

We don’t. We could just self-educate ourselves at home without being humiliated every time we come to class, and pass our exams at the end of the given period of time. No teachers required. Although, honestly, I wouldn’t call them teachers, because that profession is noble, and I know a few wonderful representatives who carry the title proudly. The ones I’m mad at should be called ‘testers’, because testing other people’s progress is all they do.

And that’s infuriating, because their snobbish attitude and lack of genuine knowledge can actually ruin lives. Because of them, many students give up working on their talents, afraid that they may not be gifted enough to succeed. It’s terrible, and it’s one of the reasons why I will never teach. You HAVE to have a gift for that. You need to feel in in your gut that what you really love to do is HELP PEOPLE LEARN. Not assess the knowledge they already have, but give them something new to know.

If you’re a teacher, but you don’t feel that urge in your every bone…just stop. Don’t ruin lives.

I’m Sorry, Tiffany/Ugg/Victoria’s Secret, It Just Won’t Work Between Us

How often have I seen something inexplicably amazing in an on-line shop that costs a half of what it does in a Moscow retail outlet, selected it and clicked: “Order”, only to find that, while they deliver these fantastic woolly shoes/bracelet/polar bear claw/etc. even to Honduras (whatever for), Russia is, once again, NOT on the list.

            This is so annoying that I can’t even rant about it properly. But that doesn’t mean I won’t make the effort. I’m not going to go into detail on the workings of the Russian post and all the ridiculous rules and regulations that make it that much more difficult for foreign shop-owners to cooperate with us.

            But I am going to say that

this is outrageous. It’s like the iron curtain never fell. We have to wait up to 6 months for a simple postcard, and God forbid anyone tries to order anything on Ebay – expect your delivery in a year or two. I may be exaggerating a little, but if you ever tried to deal with our post, you get what I mean.

            And there’s the service in the post-offices to talk about. In one of the previous posts in this blog I wrote about the Scary Lady Syndrome. Remember: the women who work in the offices of Pochta Rossii (the federate mail service) are, each of them, the queen bees of all the scary ladies.

They are mean, bitter and always SO ANGRY at you, their job, the whole world and everything that’s in it. Don’t look them in the eye, speak clearly, or, rather, don’t speak at all, just fill out your paperwork correctly (no-one cares that there’s not a single example of how to do that on the web or in the office – that’s your problem) and give it to them without making any sudden movements. Then, and only then, may you come out of there with your head still resting on your shoulders. And, if you’ve been blessed by Zeus and Odin, with your letter/package in your hands.

Using other delivery services helps, if only a little – they have decent employees who smile at you and speak in soft, polite voices. But THEY have to deal with the federal post instead of you, and that explains why they charge you that s-load of money for their services. And, again, due to their working through the federal post system, things still don’t get delivered any faster.

 

I have no solution for the problem, and this isn’t a motivational post, just a straight-up rant, it’s just here to let out the AAAAARGH I feel when desperately wanting to buy something that costs 2 times less in Europe, US, Asia – basically, all over the world - but not being able to do that because of the idiotic import policy of my country. If you’re with me, share and rant on, may be, someday, it’ll somehow force this situation to change.

Exam Season, So...

Sorry. I'm up to my ears with university papers, and thinking about anything but Stylistics and Translation Theory seems impossible. So, I'll make you a deal: my next post will be 10 times more awesome than anything I could have whipped up today.

For now, here's another video of me singing. It's a cover of the Russian version of a song from Brave, "Touch the Sky" ("Птицей стать"). Sorry again ^^