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Unexpected illuminations |
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F E A T U R E S Sleepless in L.A.
Giving good gnocchi
Meeting Moses
D E P A R T M E N T S Postmark: Lamu
Passages:
Table Talk
Salon Taste
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- - - - - - - - E A R L I E R Tuesday April 15 My Favorite Flick
A full list of all Wanderlust articles |
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BY DEB FELLNER | chills rattled through my body. I pressed my eyes shut and pulled the
rough camel-hair blanket over my head. I exhaled deeply, trying to warm
my face with my breath. Hard earth pressed against every bone. Who knew Mount
Sinai would be so cold in May?
It was Shavuot. According to the Old Testament, this was the time when
Moses received the Ten Commandments from God. I wanted to retrace Moses'
steps and climb to the summit of Mount Sinai. I wanted to experience the ultimate biblical high.
Five of us, all foreign exchange students, planned the ascent -- a
rocky 2,000 feet from trail head to summit. At the base of the peak is
St. Catherine's Monastery, two hours by taxi from the coastal town of
Dahab. We arrived at midnight, and the mountains were obscured in
darkness. The lonely monastery shined ominously in the night, lights
throwing shadows against its high stone walls. A few robed men milled
around the entrance; one quietly stepped toward us. He watched us
searching the black sky. "Mount Sinai is there," he said, pointing in
the opposite direction of our gaze. We could see only darkness. His name
was Abdallah, he told us, and offered to guide us to the top for 15
Egyptian pounds, about $3. Since we had flashlights but no
batteries, we jumped at the opportunity.
Abdallah stayed ahead, seldom speaking, stopping to wait when we fell
behind. He wore sandals and didn't drink water. I offered him chocolate
cookies, but he declined. He seemed to operate on some unearthly
strength. Expressionless, serene, patient. My friends and I laughed,
sang, kvetched and kidded, uncomfortable with silence and too fearful to
listen to the night. After a while, I grew impatient with the constant
banter and fell in silent step with Abdallah.
I imagined myself as a newly freed slave of the pharaoh, crossing the desert
with my Jewish ancestors. Abdallah was Moses, and I followed. What is
this land of milk and honey? How long will it take to get there? Will my
faith last? I found myself wondering what Moses would think of modern
Israel.
For the past five months I had lived in Jerusalem. Israeli
soldiers armed with M-16s lined the streets, buses were pocked with
scars from thrown stones and souls were tense. The Sinai felt more
spiritual to me, despite the fact that Old Testament Jews spent 40 years
trying to escape it.
The trail twisted and climbed through sheer granite crags. Dry earth
coated my hiking boots, turning them gray. The incline was steep but
not treacherous. Large boulders jutted from the stone walls, at times
forcing us to maneuver with our hands, arms and knees. My lungs choked on
the thin, dusty air, and the sweat on my forehead turned cold like a
fever chill. Earlier that day, we'd been in the 90-degree heat of Dahab,
swatting flies and drinking warm Cokes. Abdallah pushed on, so we kept
our breaks short. We saw no other hikers during the entire journey. We
were going to be alone at the top.
Abdallah's pace slowed, and I saw an amber glow ahead. The windows of a
small shack glistened with light. Abdallah raised his hand in a sign of
caution and pointed to the ground. Shadowy dark lumps were strewn like
rocks everywhere. Sleeping bags; bodies huddled together, head-to-head,
curled in balls, feet tucked under one another's bags. Some were covered with thick blankets. I moved carefully through the slumbering masses toward
the shack. Abdallah followed us inside. An old man sat on a cot, leafing
through a book filled with names. We signed ours below a group from
Australia. His large, round face looked tired. His eyes drooped. He
nodded at Abdallah, and our guide left without a word. The old man
handed me a coarse brown blanket. I pressed it to my face. Hard
bristles scratched my skin, smelling of camel sweat and dung. None of
us had sleeping bags. It had not occurred to us that it would be cold.
We were so late that all the sleeping tents were full, and we had to find
space among the blanket of bodies sleeping on the cold ground outside.
We huddled together like hamsters under our foul-smelling blankets,
staying as close as we could to the warm shack walls. It was three hours
until sunrise. I ached from lack of sleep. I took out a crumpled paper bag of
stale pita from my backpack and used it as a pillow. My body felt like
a sack of nails, bones cried out in pain with every slight movement. At 21 I'm too old for this, I told myself. I pressed
my cheek against the pita. It was the only soft and smooth surface I
had. I waited for sunrise.
The heavy, pungent smell of Bedouin coffee drifted through the air.
Voices murmured. Bodies stirred. I lifted my head. Stone silhouettes
began to form in the distance. My cheek was sore and smelled like raw
dough. The Eleventh Commandment: Thou shalt not use pita for a pillow.
A dusty orange light filtered through the cloudy sky. The sun was hidden
by a thick haze. My heart raced, waiting for the moment when I would
feel God, feel my soul soar. I waited. I shivered. The sky remained
somber. Nothing happened. Had I expected rays of sharp light to come crashing
down from the heavens? God handing me the forgotten commandments? My heart fluttered with confusion and excitement.
I joined the scores of seekers finding perches on the rocks. All of us
stared quietly across the Sinai desert. Rocky peaks rose all around us,
indistinguishable in the gray light. How were we to know if this peak
was the true Mount Sinai? Did it matter? Just being here had fulfilled a
dream. I recalled the humble praises to God, recited at the Passover
Seder:
If God had given us the Sabbath, but not brought us to Mount Sinai, it
would have been enough.
If God had brought us to Mount Sinai but not given us the Torah, it
would have been enough.
If God had given us the Torah but not led us to the land of Israel, it
would have been enough.
And though I could barely see the horizon, I knew this sunrise was
beautiful.
The hike down the mountain took only an hour. Abdallah -- my 20th century Moses -- returned to guide us. I practically skipped the whole way
down, kicking up dust and rocks. It didn't seem like the same trail we
hiked the night before. I needed no guide or rests. I was finally warm. Deb Fellner is an editor for the @Home Network in Redwood City, Calif. She was a founding editor at Wired U.K. magazine in London, and a researcher for Knight-Ridder Information Design Lab in Boulder, Colo. She has contributed to Maiden Voyages and Spiv.
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