Down the Nile
Alone in a Fisherman's Skiff
Chapter One
The River That Flows the Wrong Way
ON THE DAY that I hoped to buy a rowboat in Luxor, Egypt, I was
awakened, as I had been every morning in Luxor, by a Koranic
antiphony drifting from the Islamic boys' school next door to my
hotel. With all the zeal of a Baptist preacher's, a young boy's
amplified voice shrieked repeatedly in Arabic, "There is no God but
God, and Muhammad is his witness!" and a shrill chorus of his
schoolmates howled the words back at him. I got out of bed and went
to the window - at 7:00 a.m. the glass was already warm as an
infant's forehead - and discovered that during the night many
colorful cloth banners had been strung above the corniche, Luxor's
Nilefront boulevard. In hand-fashioned Arabic characters, the
banners read, "Welcome Mister President of the Government, Muhammad
Hosni Mubarak, the Leader of Our Victorious and Progressive
Destiny." Scores of teenage Egyptian soldiers in black uniforms,
woolen berets, and white plastic spats lined the avenue in the
ninety-eight-degree heat, more or less ... read full excerpt from: Down the Nile ebook
