Merry Christmas from the Old Cataract Hotel

This is the first Christmas we have had without our children. Even though Christmas is much more than a day designated on a given calender, we knew that today wasn't going to be easy! It did occur to us that the very best place to be on a day which we would rather FORGET was Christmas, is in an Islamic country. What we hadn't been aware of, is that a lot of Muslims celebrate Christ's birth too (believing him to have been a good prophet), but they celebrate on Christmas eve. We are staying in the famous Old Cataract Hotel in Aswan, where Agatha Christie wrote Death On the Nile. This Hotel was built by the famous Thomas Cook, the man who really kick started Tourism in this country. It has been closed for the past three years during which time it has been renovated & re-born! To celebrate Christmas it has tastefully bedecked its public areas in wreaths & red flower arrangements, with red glass chimes hanging from the ceiling. At the entrance, they have a tree dripping in red chimes and baubles, which looks wonderful during the day & spectacular with the lights on it at night. This Hotel drips of opulence, yet across the water, out our window on the island of Elephantine, men & women live in small mud houses, closely bound together & with the tourist industry suffering a MASSIVE drop, increasingly struggling to survive! To me Christmas is about HOPE. Please join with me, & raise your glass to hope for a new beginning in a new year! Cheers!