{"id":17126,"date":"2022-08-13T10:00:04","date_gmt":"2022-08-13T14:00:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/capitalcitiesusa.org\/?p=17126"},"modified":"2024-11-19T13:27:06","modified_gmt":"2024-11-19T18:27:06","slug":"sly-and-the-family-stone","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/capitalcitiesusa.org\/?p=17126","title":{"rendered":"Sly, and the Family Stone"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>Originally published August 9, 2020 by Linda Lou Burton posting about Cairo, Egypt from Little Rock, Arkansas \u2013 <\/em>Remember the 2010 TV show Idiot Abroad<\/em>, where Ricky Gervais sent the bumbling Karl Pilkington around the world to see the Seven Wonders<\/em>? The premise was that Karl knew nothing about \u201cthe Wonders<\/em>\u201d and much preferred staying home within his comfort zone. So how does such a person perceive what s\/he sees when traveling? It was meant to be funny. And it was, it hit the charts. One episode was \u201cKarl at the Pyramids<\/em>.\u201d Ricky pulled the strings; first Karl was made to ride round and round on a camel looking<\/em> for the pyramids; then he visited a couple who believed aliens built the pyramids, so evening chanting with a sneak inside <\/em>a pyramid. At the end Karl sits staring at the pyramids; they are crawling with tourists, and the wind is blowing dust and chunks of trash in swirls, right into his face. His comment: \u201cWhy is this a Wonder<\/em>? All I see is dirty nappies flying round.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ah, tourists. That story makes me think of what goes on at Uluru, with the \u201cwhite ants climbing the rock.\u201d And yes, the mad crush inside the giant cathedrals, and mosques, on my Portugal-Spain-Morocco guided tour last year. It was a mob-like push and shove, with photo ops. All timed, to fit the agenda before hopping back onto the bus.<\/p>\n

The Pyramids at Giza<\/em>, and the Great Sphinx<\/em> have endured not only \u201cthe tourist crowd\u201d for centuries, but destruction, pilfering, and theft, whether for research to explain them, or for profit, or simply because of a difference of opinion as to how things are in the world, or ought to be. Everyone has their version.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Last night I had a vivid dream, I guess it came out of my NDI RTW<\/em> \u201ctouristy\u201d visit to the Pyramids, especially that garish evening light show. The dream was my own fictional version of these desert edifices. It\u2019s pretty simple. The Pyramids are tombs, and the Sphinx is a grave stone. I have visited many cemeteries in my years of genealogy research. The size and design of grave stones varies according to the wealth of a family, and their beliefs. Angels? Tiny lambs for babies? I\u2019ve seen stones with baseball bats and fishing rods engraved; or memorable quotes, like \u201cPrecious Mother<\/em>,\u201d or that funny one \u201cI told you I was sick<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Think Charlton Heston now. Playing a powerful wealthy ruler, way back before Egypt was even Egypt. Long before he dies, he orders a mighty structure built in which to store everything he\u2019ll need in the afterlife; plus the treasures he doesn\u2019t want anyone else to have. As the worker bees in his reign cut the sandstone into blocks to build his magnificent FRP, and the quarry hole deepens, an ambitious young fellow seeking a promotion presents Charlton with an idea \u2013\u201cLet\u2019s go ahead and sculpt your marker as we remove the stones for your tomb, what design would you like?\u201d<\/em> Charlton answers, \u201cA big lion to guard my tomb, but a lion with my face on it, so everyone is fooled into thinking I still watch them<\/em>.\u201d \u201cAh, master, you are indeed a sly one<\/em>,\u201d the young fellow said, nodding. And so you have the Sphinx;<\/em> on duty, sand and wind and tourists be hanged.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Originally published August 9, 2020 by Linda Lou Burton posting about Cairo, Egypt from Little Rock, Arkansas \u2013 Remember the 2010 TV show Idiot Abroad, where Ricky Gervais sent the bumbling Karl Pilkington around the world to see the Seven Wonders? The premise was that Karl knew nothing about \u201cthe Wonders\u201d and much preferred staying […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[3464],"tags":[3869,3865,3866,3867,3868,3468],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/capitalcitiesusa.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17126"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/capitalcitiesusa.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/capitalcitiesusa.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/capitalcitiesusa.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/capitalcitiesusa.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=17126"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/capitalcitiesusa.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17126\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19205,"href":"https:\/\/capitalcitiesusa.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17126\/revisions\/19205"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/capitalcitiesusa.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=17126"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/capitalcitiesusa.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=17126"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/capitalcitiesusa.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=17126"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}