Stop touching everything!

I've noticed the people who are viewing the exhibits in Egypt, but mostly the Egyptian people touch the walls of crumbling and unstable heiroglyphics constantly.

They don't have nice little neat border fences up like we do in Western areas. Once you pay the admission and go inside, in most areas there's nothing keeping you from tracing all the intricate drawings and calligraphy with your hands, and the guards don't even stop you!

If the Egyptian government wants to do it that way, that's ok, but I couldn't help cringing everytime my tour guide was rubbing a drawing on the wall with his fingers as he was explaining something to us. Most of the western foreigners that I saw also (since we've been trained all our lives) were able to control their urges and not touch the walls. I did see the occasional tired person sitting on a column base that looked like a seat bench though. It's cause they don't have seating areas set up like we would in outdoor museums in the western world. It's also hard to find an overweight Egyptian if you know what I mean.

I seriously wanted to tell my guide to stop touching! The walls are in half bad condition already. I don't think it needs any help with finger forces and oil off the skin. Nothing in Egypt is in good conditon anyway, and they're not doing very much to keep it that way. The guards at these sites seem more interested in chatting me up for baksheesh (tips) and hanging loose than keeping people off their national treasures.

I got the same feeling on preservation as I did in China at the great wall. Ideally they want to preserve everything, but making money is the most important thing to them. Maybe once it's really trashed they'll fix it or enforce some rules.

My advice to you: go see this stuff before there's very little left!