T A B L E_T A L K Beautiful Ireland, but the weather sucks. Discuss in Table Talk R E C E N T L Y Neglected Classics By Pete Hamill Erico Verissimo's extraordinary "Mexico" deserves to be republished (01/26/98) Mondo Weirdo By Tim Wall Bad trip: The pilots locked themselves out of the cockpit! (01/23/98) Passages By Christopher Hunt Waiting for Fidel (01/22/98) How to buy a Turkish rug By Laura Billings A priceless encounter (01/21/98) First descent By Steve Van Beek Rafting where no human has been before (01/20/98) - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Your virtual travel agency - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Browse the Passages archives		Paradise found+| page 2 of 2 Despite the exoticness of the setting, I had a feeling of déjà vu. The few tourists in town were young backpackers looking as they did when I was among them in the l960s: impossibly gorgeous and unkempt. There were some small, funky hotels and a couple of outdoor restaurants with menus (beefburger, french fries, etc.) written on fading signs. For backpackers, I learned, Siwa is an exotic place to relax and stay warm in the winter, live cheaply in an ancient and fascinating culture and -- because Siwa's spring water is absolutely pure -- recover from various illnesses. In my 20s I would have preferred to stay in those $7-a-night hotels, but now I was thrilled to find the Siwa Safari Paradise Resort just off the main town square, down a dirt road lined with date palms. The resort was brand new and deliciously empty, and featured a free-form, spring-fed swimming pool. A charming cottage for two with a truly wonderful breakfast cost only $60 a night. That night we gobbled down the fresh cucumbers, tomatoes, olives and cheese we had been afraid to eat in the rest of Egypt, and then went into the garden to play cards. There we found a group of Egyptian bureaucrats and businessmen in suits and ties talking intently around a table. It didn't take long to hear the news: Within a year, the Egyptian government was going to open up a nearby military airport to civilians. We were dismayed by the news, but at the same time thankful that we had arrived in Siwa at the perfect moment in time. For the next few days we rented bicycles from one of the cheap hotels in town and headed off on journeys even further back in time. I am not a history buff, but history in Siwa, as in all of Egypt, has a way of staring you in the face. Greek, Egyptian, Bedouin and Berber artifacts and tales swirled around us in an exciting stew. At the Oracle of Amoun, which was on a hill, we saw just how vast the place was -- over 23,000 people and 400,000 date and olive trees. The lake we'd seen coming in turned out to be no mirage: It was a huge salt lake. Too huge. The Egyptian government has a project in the works to get rid of Siwa's rising ground water by pumping it hundreds of miles away into something called the Quattar Depression. We stayed at the Oracle for a while, entranced by the mysteries that seem to live in the very air of Egypt: Who is God? What is our fate? And how perfect can the experience of eating a ripe tomato be? We also found Siwa's Mountain of the Dead, which had some tombs dating from the Ptolemaic period (525-332 B.C.) and earlier. A guardian at the site showed us the head (complete with hair) of a mummy. Back at the hotel we learned that one of Mustapha and Zakia's grown sons had come home from a hospital in Alexandria, where he had gone after he had broken his arm in a dune-buggy accident. Although we had figured out that non-Siwan Egyptians were outsiders in Siwa much like ourselves, dozens of local people came by to offer Mustapha and Zakia sympathy and help -- some bringing not only food but money. We missed some Siwa stories because of all the uproar, but Mustapha did find time to tell us a few. My favorite was about the Greek woman archaeologist named Liana Souvaltsis, who spent many years excavating in Siwa, looking for Alexander's burial site. It seems to be an accepted fact that Alexander the Great wanted to be buried in Siwa, but he was in Jerusalem when he died, and on the way back to Egypt his body was kidnapped from its 2,000-member funeral procession. Some years ago, the woman held a press conference in Siwa to announce that she had finally found Alexander's tomb. It was a huge discovery and there was much excitement in the archaeological world, but then came the time for the second press conference in Cairo, where she was going to reveal her proof. Souvaltsis never showed up. We learned, too, that for the past several years another unsuccessful archaeologist has been showing up, donating his camels to the local people for a tasty barbecue. He is a German man who makes the long trek from Luxor to Siwa each summer, crossing hundreds of miles of desert in search of the remains of an army of 50,000 men. The men were sent to destroy Siwa's oracle by the king of Persia but were never heard from or seen again. And we found out about one very intriguing local custom: Each October there is a three-day festival during which Siwans must settle all of their past year's disputes. Mustapha also found time to talk to me about the problem of what was going to happen to Siwa after the onslaught of tourism. "You tell me," he said, "what better way is there for the local people here to become economically independent? Selfishly speaking, I'd like to see Siwans keep their culture intact -- it's good for business. But how can you say that you hope people will remain poor and uneducated? I think we just have to try to manage development. Keep it small scale and in good taste." "But look at what's happened to the north coast," I said. "I hate what's happened to the whole north coast," he agreed. "I just hate it. I used to come to Marsa Matrouh (the closest town to Siwa, 190 miles away) when it was the most beautiful place on earth -- just some Bedouin tents and a few fishermen on the white sand and that beautiful turquoise water. Now I don't even like to see what's happened -- I try to avoid looking at it whenever I drive through." "So how can you want development?" "Maybe one of the good international hotels will come. Maybe they can do it right." "A Sheraton?" "If Sheraton would build the right kind of hotel, why not? For years Siwa has been dependent on aid. People cheered when Nassar came here in the l950s and promised the people he'd build a road. Now we have electricity and even television -- the modern world has come in. We're working with the local elders here who want development; the young people want it too. There are only a very few people in the middle who are resisting." On our last night in Siwa we heard some singing and drumming and I found out that it was a "show" being put on at one of the backpacker hotels. I tried to imagine a group of young Siwan men drumming and singing happily with the laid-back young backpackers, but all I could think about was a refueling stopover I once made on the island of Biak off the coast of Irian Jaya. It was 4 in the morning and three men came into the airport waiting room dressed in grass skirts and necklaces of bone. They walked over to a corner and started stomping their feet and playing ukuleles. Out of embarrassment everyone eventually went over to a duty-free shop and stared at the perfumes desultorily. I'm rooting for Siwa, but still -- go there as soon as you can. SALON | Jan. 27, 1998 Tracy Johnston is the author of "Shooting the Boh." - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - For more information on Egypt travel options, visit Wanderlust Marketplace. PHOTOGRAPH BY TRACY JOHNSTON