The Great Pyramids of Giza | Egypt Travel Blog: Day 2 (Part 18) 01D19

The Sakkara Complex: The Pyramid of King Titi

Egypt Travel Blog: 10 DAYS Egypt Explorer - Felucca Cruise & Red Sea

The Pyramid of Titi (or Teti) is a smooth-sided pyramid located in central Saqqara. It was one of the earliest pyramids containing pyramid texts. Dated 2300 BC, King Titi was the ruler of the 6th dynasty.

The Titi Pyramid doesn’t look extraordinary on the outside. This is the only pyramid in which I went inside.

The entrance tunnel was not pleasant, and the tour guide asked people with heart or other conditions not to enter. You have to kind of crawl in a half-sitting position for a few minutes through the long descent of 1800 meters of narrow tunnel to enter the chambers.

Once inside, it shockingly transports you to another world. The ceiling is covered with lots of stars and the walls are covered with spells in hieroglyphs. 

There are several passages and chambers inside such as a funeral serdab, an antechamber, and King Titi’s burial chamber. Moving from one to another, you need to bend over as the doorlike entrances and short tunnels are made of stone and can’t support most people standing at full height.

Like many other pyramids or tombs, the Titi Pyramid had been broken into and robbed by tomb robbers.  The lid in the burial chamber was broken, but the basalt sarcophagus is well preserved still today and a first to have had a single band of the Pyramid Texts inscription.

The experience of seeing inside a pyramid was mind blowing. This is something I have been dreaming of all my life and it felt different upon achieving it.

We will be heading to have an Egyptian-style outdoor lunch from here.

Can Grocery Gateway Save You Money?

What Is Grocery Gateway?

First Published Date: July 2, 2014

Grocery Gateway is a an online grocery grocery store servicing the Toronto area. It is a part of premium grocery chain Longo’s. The idea of Grocery Gateway is fairly straight forward. Instead of going to the grocery store, the grocery store comes to you at a time of your choice. And yes, depending on some factors you may be able to save money with Grocery Gateway.

What’s The Minimum Purchase Required?

The minimum amount of purchase required is $45 at Grocery Gateway. During the checkout, you can pick several delivery windows from 6:00 AM to 10:00 PM for the next few days. The delivery fee is $9.95, regardless of order size, as long as the $45 minimum is met.

When Grocery Gateway Can Save You Money

If you do not own a car, like many other people who live in big cities, Grocery Gateway is a convenient option to save money and time. For example, if you are getting weekly or monthly groceries, it may not be possible to use public transit and you will end up taking a cab. A taxi ride from my nearest grocery store to my place comes close to about $15 + tips. For some of us, a taxi ride from the nearest grocery would cost a lot more. In situations like these, $9.95 delivery fee is definitely a bargain. Plus you are avoiding the hassle of carrying bulky items by yourself.

When Grocery Gateway Will Not Save You Money

For those of you who have cars, Grocery Gateway may not make sense, as it is easier to just drive and pick up your groceries.

What I Do

I take a mixed approach depending on what I need and when I need it. I have to pass by 3 grocery stores on my way from work to home. For most of my daily necessities, I pick up an item or two as I need them. However, when it comes to bulky or heavy items for which I would have had to take a taxi, I use Grocery Gateway instead and save money. This usually happens once every 2 months or so.

Last Word

Not all big cities have services like Grocery Gateway. If your city has similar online grocery stores like Grocery Gateway, you can save money and time depending on how you utilize it.

How To Have A Green Summer

How To Have An Eco-Friendly  Green Summer

Published Date: April 23, 2009

It may seem premature in the second half of April, but making early plans for how you are going to enjoy the summer can really get you in the mood for the evenings getting longer, the days getting warmer and the decrease in rainy days. Taking green issues into account is something that can happen naturally – after all, if you are going to be spending a lot of time outside, then you are less likely to need to use a lot of energy indoors. Heating will be less of an issue, you won’t need to put lights on as early, and in the kitchen the chances are that salads will take the place of soups, so the hob won’t have to be on so much for a start.

But beyond the saving you will make on energy and the dent you can make in your environmental impact, there are other ways that you can prepare for a green summer. These take many forms. Things that you can do to keep the household green, to make your daily lifestyle more environmentally friendly, and ways that you can change the annual summer routine – some of them very subtle – to make things more green-friendly. You’d be surprised where you can make a difference!

There are few people, for example, who do not enjoy a good barbecue in the summer months. It allows you to enjoy simple, grilled food while not having to be cooped up in the kitchen. So often, people serve up dinner and run into the lounge to watch television while they eat. But eating outdoors allows you to make the best of the natural resources that for so much of the year are either absent or ignored. A barbecue can bring with it environmental difficulties, though – the air can get polluted pretty quickly, so you need to look for a green barbecue. One that uses less gas or coal would be ideal.

At that barbecue, you will of course have some guests who would love a cold beverage – as often as not it will be a beer. You can help the environment while enjoying a beer, which is news that will encourage some of the more skeptical enviroskeptics to give some thought to helping out. You can do this by buying organic beer. It does the same job as your typical beer, and goes just as well with grilled food, but producing it impacts the environment a great deal less.

While outside in the sunshine there is of course the danger of succumbing to the lobster factor. Some of us tan beautifully at just the right speed. Others are not so lucky, and can burn up after less than an hour outdoors. For this reason, it is ideal to have a brand of sunscreen which is non-toxic. Additionally the chances are that with all that food and drink around, you will be visited by bugs. Just as with your sunscreen, a more natural brand can be the winner here. It is better for the environment and better for you.

To streamline and minimize blog maintenance, I will be discontinuing maintaining the Thegreenlivingblog.com website (however, I will still hold the domain). I will gradually move all articles from this site to A Dawn Journal. This article originally published on the above website on Apr 29, 2009.

How To Save Water At Home

Conserving Water in the Home

First Published Date: Feb 7, 2010

Water is one of the most precious resources on our planet. While our planet is 70 percent water, only three percent of that water is fresh water. Of that three percent, only one percent of the fresh water is available to us, the rest is locked in ice. Around the world, water supplies are beginning to dry up and that means water conservation is extremely important. In our homes, we can work to make our homes water-smart by following some very simple green tips:

1.    When your shower is warming up, you are wasting a lot of water. You can fix this by putting a shower water container under the tap while your shower warms up. Once your shower is warmed up, take the container out. Then you can use that container to water plants and for your pets because it is plain water from the tap, with no soap in it.

2.    Only water your lawn once per week. Your lawn only needs one inch of water per week and many people over-water. Keep an eye on the weather because if you are expecting rain that week, you will not need to water. Also, only water in the evening and mornings, otherwise the sun will just evaporate the water away.

3.    Collect water with rain barrels outside. You can collect a lot of water when it rains and you can use that water inside on your plants, for your pets and even to water your garden later.

4.    The more adventurous of water conservers will try a navy shower. A navy shower, which comes from people on submarines, consists of:

1.    Get into shower and turn it on.

2.    Once you have been soaked, turn the shower off.

3.    Soap yourself up.

4.    Turn shower on and rinse off.

5.    Turn shower off and get out.

5.    You can practice the rule in your home of “If it is brown, flush it down. If it is yellow, let it mellow”. You waste a lot of water with each flush, roughly 1.6 gallons per flush with lo-flow toilets. That is more water than people in Africa get all day. Saving water this way is easy and it saves you money as well.

6.    When you are brushing your teeth, turn off the water. If you brush your teeth twice a day and leave the water running while you do so, you waste seven gallons of water per day. Turn the water off while you brush, and only turn it on when you rinse. This way, you save a lot of water every single day.

It is very easy to save water in your home. Each day, people waste gallons of water through their activities. In North America, a typical person uses twice the amount of water that people do in Europe. Even better, you can save money by conserving water because you will not be letting money essentially go down the drain anymore. There is a finite amount of fresh water available to us, a lot of that is wasted and polluted, so we need to conserve as much as we can.

To streamline and minimize blog maintenance, I will be discontinuing maintaining the Thegreenlivingblog.com website (however, I will still hold the domain). I will gradually move all articles from this site to A Dawn Journal. This article originally published on the above website on Feb 7, 2010.

What Is A Green Car?

The Green Car

First Published Date: Feb 13, 2010

What is a green car and why it is gaining so much popularity is a question that a lot of users are asking and reading about in different blogs or articles. People have become more conscious of the hazards that are presently polluting our environment and there is a lot of awareness that has been given to us by the media and the technology to become environment friendly. The green car is exactly serving the same purpose by introducing alternate fuel and battery technology. The car manufacturers are now experimenting and investigating hydrogen-powered vehicles and also that are powered by ethanol. Another technology that is being introduced by the green car manufactures is the new battery technology. The battery technology has more efficiency and there is no pollution as well.

A promising and popular technology that has come into the limelight of the future of the car industry is hybrid technology. This is unique when fuel efficiency is boosted by an internal combustion engine and an electric motor. There are a variety of greener alternatives that have made their room in the markets of the United States and Europe as well. In the year 2020, more than a billion green cars will be a part of the traffic as estimated by the experts. It is more like a dream coming true to save our environment and our planet from pollution and this dream had been watched over by millions of people over the years. The car manufacturers are also being pressurized by the governments to increase the manufacture of green cars because they are friendlier to the Ozone layer as well. Another reason for its popularity is that the green car fuel technology will also finish the global agony of rising fuel prices and now brought forward is this latest concept of more efficient and clean cars so petrol-powered vehicles will no longer be marketed or manufactured. Many big names in the field of car manufacturers have introduced their green series like Toyota “Prius,” Honda “Insight,” Nissan “Altima Hybrid” and also Hyundai’s “i10” which was launched by a famous Indian celebrity.

At present, there are a limited number of green cars available on the market for purchase. But this new technology is ever-expanding and it can be easily speculated that green technology will hit the markets of the world like a storm. There are also trial runs conducted to examine the roadworthiness for the concept cars. These concepts cars have exciting sleek designs and features that may never be introduced to most of the other ordinary car models. One of the hydrogen-powered vehicle that is a talk of the town is going to have features beyond the space age. There’s another revelation about one of the future concept car which at first glance would look like it can fly. This will also run on ethanol and its material will be very light which will contribute to its fuel efficiency. The production dates are not yet revealed but there is a possibility that the green car will be introduced and manufactured for the mass market as well. The preview of the concept car is only a way to imagine what the expectations will be for the future and these green cars will be a real help to our environment and it will go green again.

To streamline and minimize blog maintenance, I will be discontinuing maintaining the Thegreenlivingblog.com website (however, I will still hold the domain). I will gradually move all articles from this site to A Dawn Journal. This article originally published on the above website on Feb 13, 2010.