As compared to the ground floor, the setup on the 1st floor is significantly different since the galleries are generally categorised by themes. A section of the floor that deserves special mentioning will be the Tutankhamum galleries where it houses majority of the artifacts recovered by Howard Carter (he rose to stardom by discovering the rather intact tomb for the short-lived king in 1923). 2 hours were subsequently taken to explore this floor (note that 4 hours were spent on the ground floor) but we did not check out every exhibit as detailed as we did while we were on the ground floor. I.e. we were truly "mummified" by the enormous amount of artifacts!

After engaging in some intensive negotiation with our minds, we decided to shell out an additional E£100 (or S$25 per person) for an entry to The Royal Mummy Room (rooms 46 & 56). Housing some of the remains of Egypt's most illustrious royalties (from 17th to 21st dynasties of the New Kingdom), including the all-famous Ramses II (in fact, majority of the sights we visited along the Nile were somehow connected to this great pharaoh), this is THE place for anyone really interested in mummies. However, please note that Tutankhamum's mummy is being kept in his tomb in Valley of the Kings. We were probably done in 30 minutes as there were only about 20 mummies on display. Perhaps I do not get excited just by looking at the raisin remains of these ancient pharaohs and the steep extra admission charge did not help. It was another "been there done that" for my backpacking career though I wonder if I would ever regret in the case where this sight was left out.

In short, an entire day (9am to 5.30pm) was spent in the museum and we were probably too ambitious in attempting to cover everything in detail (note: it was IMPOSSIBLE). Egypt simply had too much history to be packed into a 2-storey building. The museum requires a serious overhaul soon as the building itself is not able to cope with this quantity of artifacts (I felt like being in a storeroom where every feet of displayable space is used to house an exhibit!). The old labelling and the poor lighting conditions also did not help in exhibiting these wondering items belonging to Egypt's colourful history. A "Grand Museum of Egypt" has been planned (location will be close to the Giza Pyramids) though progress has been slow (i.e. not likely to be ready before 2012). Hopefully, it will all get better in the future.

Before we headed out for our daily dose of Kushari, we met a Korean family (who just arrived in Cairo) asking for information on getting to Luxor independently. I recalled ourselves asking the same questions when we first got here 10 days ago. Felt really good that we were able to assist; after all, one of the joys of travelling is to help fellow travellers in doing similar routes which one had done.