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Writer's pictureVanessa Cook

Approaching Siwa




I jerked my eyes open to find a scene like something from an action movie unfolding before my eyes. Night had fallen and we were about 15 minutes away from Siwa after an epic day’s driving across the desert from Cairo.

    We were coming up to a bend in the road, where the powers that be had decided it would be an excellent idea to build small concrete walls on either side, boxing the road in on this small section only.

    In front of us, on our side of the road was a monstrous vehicle with all its truck lights on full beam, beeping frantically at us.

Imagine waking up to that. The confusion. Oh, the confusion.

It was hard to tell what was going on in the pitch dark, whether the truck was manoeuvring, driving slowly around one of the trillions of potholes or how far away it was even.  

    Realising the truck was stationary AND parked on our side of the road, our driver slammed the breaks on and we skidded to a halt an inch – I kid you not, an inch – in front of the beast. Desert dust billowing around us in the beams of light.

    It was like waking up into a movie, a surreal moment of complete suspension. No fear, no real comprehension even, just suspension. We all watched, forgetting to breathe in that forever moment, as we slid closer in slow motion to our doom.

    The driver barely broke a sweat. He slickly swung back, swerved around the truck and carried on our way as if nothing happened. Not a middle finger. Not a cuss. Nothing.

    We all gazed at each other in surreal disbelief, all thinking the same thing - did that just happen? Titters of relief, as we checked amongst us that we were all ok.

   Once we confirmed we had in fact all just experienced the same thing (you never know in Egypt) we cheered the driver and quietly gave thanks for life.

  

Driving on into the darkness, I watched the white sand illuminated by starlight guiding our way towards the distant orange lights that announced modernity.

   Seeing we still had a bit of time until we arrived, I decided to check back in with my inner world to see if there was anything else to see from the story I had been tracking or at the very least bring it to a satisfactory conclusion before we got to Siwa. 

   At some point on the journey over I had observed the thought, “I wonder what was in Siwa in ancient times, if anything.”

    This led my awareness to consciously put out the thought, “I am open to seeing what was here before.”

    I sat back and got comfortable, my arms resting gently in me lap. I closed my eyes and began deep, rhythmic breathing. It is the trigger for my body and mind to relax and allow my awareness to see other things.

    I let the feeling of the desert guide me. We were moving through it. Over it. It reached as far as the eye could see. We were already covered in it. Miniscule particles of desert dust clung to our nose hair.

    Our fields were merging. I could see it in my mind flying past, miles and miles of sand. I let my imagination take me across the desert, until suddenly it seemed to speed up. Now we were really flying, landscape flashing past until, with a jerk we stopped and hovered over an Oasis.

    A jewel in the desert, colours vibrant against the sandy seas that lapped at its edges.

   I watched from above as if I was Peter Pan, hovering over the homes below, sheltered by large palm tree plantations, scattered amongst ancient olive groves.

    The scene began to swirl and, in its place, things began to change and take a new form. The green expanded outwards. Grasses, shrubs, trees and plantations spread out into the sands.

   The water grew and I could see the glistening of a river and another further away in the distance. The land shifted and grew as fallen and eroded land merged again with the rocky protrusions that are familiar now.

   On the rising mounds, dwellings and temples appeared, shimmering white in the sun. Clad in white calcite and polished granite, they glistened like the crusty edges of the salt pools that grow on the edges of the settlement, outside the boundary of the green, outside the realm of Osiris - as he was to be later called.

  People tended the forests and fields. Children played in a river with - elephants. Elephants?

   Just go with it, another part of me told myself. So, I did. I let the images flow, even if they didn’t make much sense.

   There were elephants playing in the river, squirting a bunch of ecstatic kids. Their riotous shrieks of delight echoed across the waters, filling the air with their joy.

   My eyes were drawn to a particular hill rising a short distance from the trees below. Around it, dwellings made of mud and stone were crafted in what looked almost like a spiral, lapping around the hill to the top where a palace perched.

    This vantage point offered a commanding view of the surrounding land. I then noticed other small, hill-like protrusions with various structures carved into them or built upon them.

    Lights twinkled in the homes, giving them a warm glow in the light of the setting sun.

   At intervals large flocks of birds filled the sky swooping in on one of the many lakes that fed into nearby rivers. Their chorus joined the burgeoning choir of birds making use of the rich mineral waters for nourishment, whether they were long term residents or passing through.

    You got the feeling that life thrives in this place. It reminded me of Pride Rock in the Lion King. A sort of primordial energy in perfect, cosmic balance.

    I know cities like this are not meant to exist more than14,000 years ago, or whatever the date is. That is, according to the accepted version of history and archaeology. They’re not meant to exist and yet this story feels familiar to me, as familiar as memories of my own life here.

   Snippets of life back then have been coming to me at random for years and half the time I can’t make sense of it. It’s like trying to look at a painting through little holes in a piece of plywood and the painting is of a subject you have no frame of reference for.

   I glide over towards a large terrace made of stone that extends from a pillared veranda, part of a palace at the top of rocky hill. It looked out over the waters and trees below, holding various key sites in its line of sight.

   A tall woman and an old man stood together with the sun setting behind them, watching the stars appear in the darkening sky to the east. From here they could still just about make out the route to the temples carved into the sacred mountain.

   Unlike the smaller, almost conical shapes of most of the hills within the settlement, this one stood like a solid presence. It called to you immediately.

    The mountain has a series of shelf-like surfaces, creating large areas where structures were built.

   Sites were chosen due to the particular frequency the location has or aligns with, which encompasses the scope of information it has to transmit to someone communing with the space.

    Structures were built not as places of worship, in the way we are familiar with, but as tools for learning, healing, expanding consciousness and overall energizing and expansion of life force.

   It was normal for gratitude to be expressed after an experience in one of these sites but it was not in worship. The people understood they were part of everything and working together to learn more, all with the intention of life thriving.

   The earth, like the human body, has various systems that function physically, electro-magnetically and energetically or spiritually. Around the energetic field of the earth are particular points that act as amplifiers or generators for the Earth grid. Different points have slightly different functions but they are all powerful repositories of information from the grid and as such, also powerful transmitters of information back into the grid.

    I must acknowledge that “grid” is not a satisfactory word to use because it conjures up a very linear, two-dimensional image that couldn’t be further from the truth. The patterns the energetic fields create are extraordinary, intricate geometric shapes. Not flat at all but moving and multi-dimensional.


Siwa is one of these places. And on top of that it is a place of Source energy on earth.

    The keepers of the portal had been born into this task and guided to take up the role of teacher and leader as decreed when the time was right.

   The old man had been in this role for more decades than he could remember. He had served his people, the stars and the planet with integrity and love.

    He was like a grandfather to her, although whether he was actually her grandfather or just felt like one is unclear.

  

The evening breeze whipped her auburn hair across her face, loosened from an elaborate braid that fell thickly down her back. She was tall with an air of self-assurance that comes from an athletic body confident in its abilities.

   She wore a pair of loose trousers that gathered just below the knee, falling in neat folds from an embroidered, buttoned waist. On top of that she had a small top with no sleeves, buttons down the front and long ends tied around the waist just above the waistband of her trousers. A long, wide-sleeved robe protected her from the chill of the evening breeze.

   He was in his usual long, thick-spun robe with slightly wide sleeves that ended just before his wrists. He had been wearing the same type of clothing for as long as she can remember.

Probably as long as he can remember too.

   And that is saying something as he was very old, by far the oldest person anyone alive knew of. Yet you wouldn’t think it to look at him. He could still make the journey up the steep mountain paths to the temples.

   He may have stepped back from such active duties in leadership as he had held before but he was still a robust, powerful and downright playful man.

 

“Something is shifting. I can feel it,” he says, breaking the silence.

“There is always change,” she spoke quickly, cutting him off as if she didn’t want to hear confirmation of her own fears.

“Not like this. I have watched the patterns of the universe, through the caves and the stars for a long time and this is different. Lilli you cannot hide from it!” he ended firmly.

“I know!” she took a deep breath in to calm down.

    She could feel anxiety bubbling inside of her, a strange feeling of foreboding. Something hadn’t felt right for some time and no matter what she did to shake it the feelings had only intensified.

“I know what you speak of,” she sighed, “Yes, I feel it. It is like a shadow that weighs heavily on the edges of my field. I have asked the cave for answers but so far I cannot comprehend what I have seen.”

“Like looking through a haze,” he added, staring off to the temple of the oracle in the distance being swallowed by dusk.

 

 

  



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