Trip of Mount Sinai
It was 3 years ago when I was studying in Egypt with 10 Chinese classmates from Beijing Language and Culture University. One of my classmate, Liang, came to my room when I just finished my essay.
‘How about a trip, bro?’ he said.
Liang was a tall boy from Beijing. He is a Muslim, and knew more about their customs than me.
Taking a trip with such a good guide would be safe and convenience.
I looked back. ‘Where are you going? I don’t want to go to Cairo and Alexandria for we have been there so many times.’
‘Of course not there. Sharm el Sheikh, a city on shore of the Red Sea. I wanna go to Mount Sinai to achieve a ceremony for it was where Moses got the Ten Commandments.’
In fact, since our last trip- all Chinese classmates together taking a cruise on the Nile- 3 girls started dating 3 boys. That’s why I had to stay indoors in such a good holiday while those lovers went on their own sweet trips, and may also be the reason Liang came to me for he was not popular between girls. What the hell.
‘Alright. Give me 30 minutes to prepare.’ I shut down my computer and stood up.
After several hours plane trip we arrived at Sharm el Sheikh. As Liang wanted to climb the Sinai Mount in night for religion reason, we had a hurry time preparing- then I found I didn’t get warm clothes, and we had to buy some. However it was apparently impossible to find warm clothes in a place close to the equator, so I ended up buying a thin Middle-East style robe there.
This trip began in confusion. The Mount Sinai was miles away from Sharm el Sheikh, thus we have to join a tourist group to get a ride to there. We thought it would be easy- you know, we both studied Arabic, and had got used to strange Egypt-style English, so we didn’t think there would be any possibility of communication. However, when we got on the car, we were surprised to see that all tourists on the car were Russian! Later we found that Sharm el Sheikh was a popular resort among Russian, and now even the guide spoke Russian to tourists and made introduction in Russian but not Arabic nor English. Though most of the other tourists were kind aged Russians, their Russian-style blunt English were too hard to understand and make response. We two Chinese could only sit in the back seats and talk with each other.
When we arrived at Mount Sinai, it was already 1 a.m. The weather was clear and cold, and the mountain was totally dark for artificial light sources was not allowed to be built on that mountain. Liang insisted to get on the top of the mountain before 4 a.m. (sunrise), so we decided to leave the tourist group and climb by our own.
As soon as I got off from the bus I knew I made a mistake. It was freezing cold there, totally different from Sharm el Sheikh in the daytime only miles away. No lights anywhere, and as the mountain was not developed, the road was only gravels and sand. Another refresh to my cognition- Arabian robes were not as warm as it looks- in fact, my Arabian robe was very limited to keep me warm. It was made of sesame, weaved very loosely to make it light and air permeable, which could not keep heat inside well nor keep cold mountain wind outside. ‘It would be a hard time.’ I said, ‘let’s go.’
Only 1 hours later I regretted for my decision to come. Gravel was pricking my feet, wind with cold air scraping my skin, and the narrow mountain way seemed never ends. The whole mountain had no plants, only rocks and sand, which made it more boring.
‘How long we still need to go?’ I asked, trembling in cold air.
‘We just begin, bro.’ Answered Liang.
As we were climbing the mountain, Liang told me something about Moses. I was surprised to know that he appeared in Christian, Islam and Judaism; looks like his image and story didn’t differ among these old religions. And also, I learnt for the first time that these religions had close origins and background; there is Jesus in el Quran, and Muhammad in the Bible. Many stories were similar in these religions.
When it came to 3am, things got worse. I wasn’t strong nor with good stamina, and my heavy bag with two drinks and a bag of food were consuming my strength second by second. Though I was cold, I still felt my sweat drench my T-shirt and the robe. My feet was out of strength, and my heart beat hard. As the altitude increased, the sand road became more and more rugged, finally became big rocks that needed to be actually ‘climbed’. Sometimes I had to accept Liang’s help to go ahead.
Finally we got on the mountain at 3:30 am. I sat down on the top of the mountain, exhausted. Liang said he was going to do his Salat (Islam religion ceremony), and I finally found that I did a mistake. I saw he brought 4 liter of water, and I thought maybe this mountain was so dry that we need to drink more, and I bought 2 liter of sprite and 2 liter of coke. These drinks almost drained every strength of me, and now I saw Liang took out his water, and wash his hands for his Salat. I could only took out my cold drinks, drinking and looked around.
A small deserted ancient church stood there silently. No one was here. Night breeze blew through rocks and stone fences, making smooth sounds. Then I looked up into the sky.
Thousands of stars waiting there, surrounding the lone moon, giving out weak light; dark blue sky changed its color into purple, and black. Constellations, most of them I couldn’t name, all around my sight; in the middle of them was a silver river of stars and nebula, the milky way, and a cold moon in a fading halo. That was the first time I see such a beautiful starry sky- much different from the sky in the cities or the country. I just felt so calm and still, feeling myself as clear as the sky and the universe. The more I looked up, the more I felt that the stars were slowly sinking down to me, and I was also slowly floating up towards them. In the next hour before the sunrise I sat there like this, thinking about the existence and the fading, the instant and the eternal, until the sun rose and swept all the cold and dark from that journey.