My Father In Egypt

[poliphilo]

In 1986 I suggested to my parents that they might like to accompany me on a trip to Egypt. My father said he'd been there before, hated the insects and being pestered by child beggars and didn't want to go again- so I went with my mother.

We have a big wodge of photographs taken on that earlier trip. He was clearly there on business and presumably sometime before the Suez crisis of  October-November,1956- after which British engineers would have been persona non grata.

Here he is peeking out from under his mosquito netting



And this would seem to be the project he's working on. It looks like they're doing something to a dam. I'm not sure but I think it could be the Assiut Barrage- and if it is then the year is 1956- when some large scale improvements and repairs were carried out- and the balloon is about to go up. He's the one in the Indiana Jones hat...



Another view of the site. Like something directed by D.W. Griffith or Cecil B de Mille.



Time for some sightseeing. Here we are at the Colossi of Memnon- on our way to The Valley of the Kings...

Comments

[pondhopper.livejournal.com]

The second photo really does look like a movie setting (without the relatively modern crane).

Do you have photos from the trip with your mother?

[lblanchard.livejournal.com]

Lovely images.

[sovay]

He's the one in the Indiana Jones hat...

That's my favorite, even if the shots of the dam itself are wonderful from an engineering perspective.

Thank you again for sharing these. I am really enjoying seeing these mosaic pieces of the past.

[michael john grist (from livejournal.com)]

It's inspiring to imagine grandpa in an Indiana Jones hat, out there changing the shape of the world. Great to see!