Mummy's curse, my dive team dies - Draft Outline for Post Graduate Book

 

The Great Pyramid of Giza

Curse. I Am The Last Diver In The Water

By Stephen the Cursed One

It is not a legend. I know it firsthand to be true. And so did my deceased diving companions—before they succumbed to Earth's unforgiving waters. Maybe it was the long-dead Hemiunu, the architect of the Great Pyramid, who was ordered by aliens to punish us for defiling Giza’s sacred monument, once one of the ancient Wonders of the World. 

He did. I found out he was the gift that keeps on giving. The cemetery continues to be filled by my Red Sea media dive team.

It was ten years ago when a scabby, toothless Egyptian guide who had spent his life hustling tourists at the entrance to the Great Pyramid of Giza used traditional phrases and gestures to ward off evil from infecting his potential customers — especially when hustling a dumb journalist and a sweaty TV camera crew. Yeah, like us.

"A'udhu billahi min al-shaytan al-rajim" (أعوذ بالله من الشيطان الرجيم—"I seek refuge in God from the accursed devil"), the wizened old pyramid hustler shouted at us as we squeezed through a living wall of selfie-snapping sweaty American tourists blocking our way from the narrow desert passageway in and out of the ancient stone structure.

The dude was shaking in his sandals when I told him I thought I’d just seen a shadowy ancient UPA (Unidentified Pyramid Alien) cursing the five of us while chasing us inside a hidden chamber deep in the Pharaoh’s treacherous keep.

“I think he wants us dead. Like yesterday,” I explained. “He kept hitting us with a long pole and pointing at his skull-and-crossbones tattoo. He made sounds like he was fifty feet down in the Nile, running out of air. The only English he knows seems to be ‘I Curse You!’ Said really loud of course”

Curse. It’s like saying “Hi Jack” to a buddy in the line at Airport Security. It’s just not done.

Tour bus trippers always have their phone cameras at the ready, and immediately, they pointed them at the source of the words “Mummy’s. Curse." And ran. Stampede style at us.

Our wannabe guide thought he was coming to our aid. He spit three times (symbolically) into the hot sand—a common gesture to ward off bad luck, often accompanied by the chant, “Tfuu, tfuu, tfuu.” Then, he shot me that universal "you owe me baksheesh" side glance.

Meanwhile, the government-supplied ex-military taxi driver yanked an Uzi from under his seat and ran to our real rescue. We were media, remember, and he assumed we were CNN. So did the 100 tourists filming with their iPhones, a squad of trinket salesmen, and Bedouins sporting blue-eye amulets (the traditional "evil eye" charm). All of them were madly waving Non-Disclosure Agreements (NDAs) while squishing their ever-diminishing circle tighter around us in the blistering hot sand.

Hemiunu was an alien engineer who helped design the Great Pyramid using extraterrestrial technology 

While his name isn't as well known as Pharaoh Khufu's, his engineering feat—the Tura limestone Great Pyramid—remains one of the most impressive structures in history.

One claim that has floated around is that Hemiunu was an alien engineer who helped design the Great Pyramid using extraterrestrial technology. Some conspiracy theorists argue that the precision of the pyramid's construction is too advanced for ancient humans, so they credit Hemiunu with having "otherworldly help."

 

My Mummy Doesn’t Love Me: A True Prose Poem About A Diver's Curse. Three Down, Two To Go

  

I have to ask you something. It is not like you are doing anything anyway is it? Besides, who doesn’t want to talk about hearses and modern day Egyptian death curses?

Look at my back; do you see the tiny monkey? It may seem small but it weighs heavier than the Sphinx. It has been there for a decade and killed four dive buddies in a blink.

Oh, this is the truth, but you’re not feeling brave? Call it a waking nightmare that comes from the wrong side of the grave. All of the deaths were underwater. All caused by a ghostly Egyptian mummy stalker.

We were a crew of five standing in Cairo’s White Desert saddled with cameras, lights, and a pyramid of dive gear. Oh and guess what else? Ten cases of Molson Beer. We were to be the first TV crew to film a death ship deep down in the nearby Red Sea. Our dive boat was late; we had time to explore a pyramid with the tourist bourgeoisie.

This isn’t THE big question but I need your answer, ever been to the base of a pyramid in the high season? No steps. Just a steep ramp where you will drown in an ocean of very large Yankees pushing frenetically both up and down.

Michel our safety diver was so hot and tired he broke a sacred pyramid rule. He climbed into an empty sarcophagus for a nap; Sound like a fool? The tourist police crowded the chamber and one swung a walking stick at my head. He yelled that we were cursed and said we five were already dead.

Running, avoiding the swinging stick now aimed at my heel I escaped the Chamber of the King. I got out with nary a scratch so I figured the Pharaoh’s curse had an inauthentic ring. Fun tales from inside the huge Pyramid of Giza. Back in Cairo, we laughed it off with a beer and a “ Mummy’s Special Pizza”.

We took to our boat and went out into the Red Sea to explore the Salem Express shipwreck. She sank in 1991 filled with Mecca pilgrims trapped below her main deck. 35 metres down, we were about to make scuba TV history inside the ship. The powers that be forgot to mention to us that the 500 victims of Her sinking were still inside the submerged crypt.

Three days of underwater filming later we finally return to the  dock and left the sea. Sick with  unwanted dead children memories, our crew ran to the waiting bus. Except Radar, our local hire who stayed got in the water to fix the ship’s ailing prop. Accidents happen, the engine kicked in – I heard the sickening sound when his severed hands dropped. DEATH NUMBER ONE.

Two years later we lost Michel when his rebreather failed during a Tobermory trip. He was dead before he could be pulled onto the waiting tender ship. At the funeral we three remaining Egyptian  divers toasted the two lost men. Dissing the heathen curse we gave a loud loud Christian Amen. DEATH NUMBER TWO

Three years later, our underwater videographer was 100 meters down in Lake Superior filming the Gunilda wreck. His rebreather failed, he didn’t make it back alive onto the dive boat deck.

THREE down, two to go, just me and Jim the producer of the Red Sea Show. We’d drifted apart over the years until I got the call that he had just flat lined down below. He had been filming schooling hammerheads at Cocos Island when his gear went to shit. He was brought to the surface; his heart and lungs had quit.

I was about to make the now required toast when the phone rang again and I was told to hold that drink. Jim was barely alive; a doctor had brought him back minutes after his Pacific Ocean sink.

A year later I almost took my own final underwater spree. 35 metres down, five hours out to sea, aggressive Tiger sharks, my missing boat and me. Both Jim and I have escaped the mummy’s beckoning hands. Has that curse of old finally disappeared in the Sahara Sands?

There is where you ALL come in; tell me truthfully do I have to stay out of the sea? Am I going to buy the farm soon or is the rocking chair for me? Jimmy says he died and though he did make it back, he has fulfilled the hex. “ I am DEATH # FOUR  Buckle up and be a man, Stevie Boyo, you are next.” 

What do you think? Please hurry. This is an ongoing true story.