What Camels Really Do

Out on a ride the other day we saw a farmer leading his camel with a huge load of berseem clover. One camel can carry almost as much as a cart.

Apologies for being away. My annual case of bronchitis laid me a bit low.

Archetypes

The pyramid, the camel, the sky. What more?

Photo by Cally Stephenson while in Cairo playing tourist.

Just Trim The Mustache, Please.

Camels at Giza have intricate designs cut into their coats. I don't know if it is just artistic and or if it's also a means of identification. But these designs are created with an enormous handmade pair of shears. Frightening.

Just For Fun

I have a friend who photographs competitive bodybuilders all over the world. Ulrich comes to Cairo about once a year to check in on the Egyptians who are competing and to take videos and photos of them. He likes to make the photos interesting with good settings and so on, and I've been helping him with that for several years. So yesterday we were out in the desert watching a bunch of bodybuilders freeze to death in a chilly wind while flexing on camels. Only in Egypt...

A Shave And A Haircut

Remember those beautiful patterns cut into the camels' coats? They look so crisp that they must be done with some pretty good clippers. The clippers involved are in fact hand made iron scissors wielded by hand.

Camel Riding 101

Most tourists want to try riding a camel while they are visiting Giza, but it isn't really something within their usual bounds of experience. So once they find themselves about two metres off the ground on an amazingly enormous animal that is actually moving, a certain level of anxiety - or even abject fear - takes hold. Happily, most of them make it back in one piece.

The Parking Lot

I was on my way back to my car with friends in Nazlit Semman. As we approached the jeep in the parking lot, I realised that cars weren't the only things parking there.

Conference Call

Mobile phones are a godsend to the farmers. Where they used to be out in the fields far from their families all day, now they can check in on the home, or be in touch with help in case of emergencies. Of course, now they have to worry about the camels listening in.

The Back End

So we were driving along the road and there was this interesting shaped object on the sidewalk. Camels are so oddly shaped.

Size 12's

Camel feet don't look like they belong on a mammal. To me they almost look birdlike or reptilian. Weird, huh?

The Ride Home

A boy caught in silhouette catches a ride home from the fields atop a cutting of berseem clover. Camels are still used quite a lot for farm work in this area.

Tea Break at Dahshur

Some of the tourist police and their camels take a break in the afternoon in the shadow of the Bent Pyramid at Dahshur. This pyramid is interesting for its sort of squashed shape (the builders used too steep an angle initially and then had to lower it) and for the fact that it is one of the only pyramids that still has its facing stones.

Passing on The Right

Nazlit Semman, the area at the base of the pyramids of Giza, is a cacaphony of voices and a whirl of animals, most of whom shouldn't really be in the midst of automobiles. For first-time visitors, it's flashes of sound, colour and sometimes horror, when the eye catches some of the underfed horses being offered for rides. But when it is a neighbourhood that one occasionally visits for one reason or another, details begin to emerge and some of the whimsy surfaces. This man was taking his camel from the area near the pyramids into some of the residential areas...lunch break? home for the day? Who knows. But he had to make it across three lanes of traffic, cross a bridge and do the same on the other side of the road. Pretty calm camel, I must say.

And In The Centre Ring....

I was driving along happily minding my own business when I spotted a psychedelic camel and what appeared to be a saber-tooth tiger...or maybe just a regular tiger or lion or other large cat...standing in the front garden of an apartment building. I had to get a photo. It appears to be a company that does large statues and while I can kind of understand Venus de Milo and maybe Marcus Aurelius...or even the camel!..the guy with the black hair on the balcony is just a little too weird.

You Moving IN???

Donkeys and water buffalo look aghast as a camel lowers itself to its knees in front of their pen at the farm. The horses have met camels before in the desert, but the donkeys don't have much to do with them.

Deflated

I love photographing camels. They are extraordinary creatures who are both so foreign and so expressive. I have a great respect for camels and am careful never to insult one as I've heard that they have long memories and are famous for carrying a grudge.

Countryside Traffic Jam

Riding on the canal-side trails in Giza is wonderfully educational. On this occasion there were three of us on horseback who found ourselves behind a trio of camels being led out to a grove of palms in the fields where they would be loaded with trimmed palm branches to be carried out to the villages where the branches would be processed into palm boxes or furniture, fiber ropes, and woven mats. The camels didn't seem any too happy with the equine tailgaters.

Just Gawking

Egypt is a photographer's paradise. Not only do we have some of the most wonderful sites to see and portray, but the photographers themselves are so photogenic.

Taking Shelter

Some boys hide from the winter wind between their camels at the pyramids of Giza.

Waiting With His Buddy

One of the tourist police and his camel wait patiently at the edge of the parking lot near the Great Pyramid. The parking lot overlooks the Mena House Hotel and golf course.