I have signed up as a fan on Zahi Hawass’ website. For anyone who doesn’t know, Zahi Hawass is currently the Secretary General of the Supreme Council of Antiquities over in Egypt and is still active at dig sites in so many places around Egypt. I have been watching his show on the History Channel, Chasing Mummies. It is great show and I watch it every week.

To get back to where I started. I signed up as a fan on his site. He keeps blogs, what he has found, events, what he’s writing (books) and press releases. Well, since signing up for all of that, I have received many emails about all this new stuff that he is doing. Well, yesterday, I received an email and it said that on September 25, Zahi Hawass was going to be in Los Angeles and one of the Chasing Mummies episodes was going to be shown on the big screen. Not only that, but afterwards, there is going to be a question and answer session with Zahi Hawass! Ugh, and I can’t go!

I normally don’t do things like this, but since I have a blog, I might as well. I have decided what I want my first book to be and I have already started on the research.

I am going to write about Egypt! A young woman, early twenties, I think, is going to be touring Egypt and finds herself in Ancient Egypt. There she sees all the monuments in their glory and learns about Ramesses II and Nefertari. That’s all I’m giving up. So, any thoughts? Would anyone be interested in reading it? Of course, it could take years because of all the research to do.

I am going to take a break from Egypt right now and write about my anniversary weekend! So, for the next three days, I will not answer any questions about my other blogs, but keep the questions coming and I’ll get back to them!

Today was the first day of our anniversary weekend! We will be married for a year on Sunday! Today we went to the zoo and had time to make it to the mall. We actually didn’t but a lot at the zoo besides lunch (including the souvenir cup, with a picture of the baby giraffe on it. Expensive, but it’s our weekend!) and gave money to help animals out! Though we did get plenty of pictures and some video (especially of the baby polar bear). We are planning on putting those on youtube and then getting them onto our facebook page! Or, at least I am. I couldn’t tell you if Tony is going to or not. But while at the zoo, we found three dead animals! Ugh!!! 🙁 Though shortly after the first one, everyone was kicked out of the reptile house, so I think they were taking care of that one. The other two were in the amphibians exhibit and the aquarium. And then, we went into the Rain Forest exhibit to hunt for the sloth only to find out that the sloth died in January! She was 27 years old and that is long lived for a sloth, but still, I always loved searching for her!

At the mall, we looked through plenty of stores without buying anything! And then we stopped by the bookstore and Godiva! I bought a huge over 500 page Egypt book! It talks about the treasure of the Great Pharaohs, Tutankhamen and Rameses II. I got it for a great price too! Tony bought a film making book, which I hope helps him out.
Oh, I forgot we also went to Goodwill this morning and bought a book about the Lost Tomb. It’s about KV5, the tomb of many of Rameses II’s sons.
With the pictures from the zoo, I plan on making a scrapbook to remind us of our first anniversary together, since we still haven’t figured out what to get as a reminder of our very first year as a married couple. I thought a scrapbook would be nice at least. Well, I think it’s time to head to bed. We’re busy tomorrow also!

After my last post, I had some questions that were asked of me and I intend to answer them to the best of my ability.

Rameses II and Nefertari were one of the many Pharaohs and queens of ancient Egypt. Rameses’ line was originally one of the military. His grandfather was Pharaoh Horemhab’s general and was given the throne upon his death, as was Horemhab’s wish. Rameses II became known as one of the greatest Pharaohs in history.

Nefertari and Nefertiti are two different people and were queens next to two different pharaohs. I’m not sure if they were descendants of each other, since there is no evidence remains of Nefertari’s family and Nefertiti has all been erased from history. Though I find it interesting that I can find more sites for Nefertiti than I can for Nefertari, who Rameses II painted on so many walls.
I don’t think that Nefertiti and Nefertari were common names in the time period, but I could be wrong. There might have been plenty of people named Nefertari and Nefertiti among the common people, but at least in the Royalty, they were not common names.
I am not sure if Nefertari was named after Nefertiti, though the similarities makes one think so. There was only 57 years between the end of Akenaten and Nefertiti’s reign and Rameses and Nefertari’s reign. That gives the time for someone close to Nefertiti to have a child and name her Nefertari, in remembrance of Nefertiti, but we can’t be sure at all.

More answers to come…

I have read The Heretic Queen, which as I said in my last blog was about Rameses II’s wife, Nefertari. Since then, I have been trying to find out as much as possible about Nerfertari and Ramesses II. At the moment, I am watching “The Last Great Pharaoh Ramesses II on Youtube.com. Let’s just say he was a little arrogant! 🙂 But besides that, he really did love his Chief Wife, Nefertari. He would write poetry for her and even built her a temple right next to his own.

But I not only want to know about just Nefertari and Rameses II. I love to read about Queen Elizabeth I and her family, Nefertiti, Cleopatra, Anastasia and her family, Helen Keller, Pocahontas, and Sacajawea. Those are the people I usually read about. I am sure there are other people that I read about occasionally, but at the moment, it is a lot of Egypt! I have seen the Mummy, the Mummy Returns, Prince of Egypt, Joseph: King of Dreams, and something on Cleopatra on Youtube. I have also read Nefertiti and The Heretic Queen. So, you would think that I would be sick of Egypt, right? Nope.Even though I have had all this Egypt poured into my head and I had a dream about Egypt, I still want to know more! I want to understand these people, to actually get to meet them and know what they were thinking! Sometimes it’s not fair!