Starting My Treasure Hunting In England

"I didn't expect that the other party would not tell us our destination this time." After Bernard completed the basic registration and left, Fan Meng whispered to Liang En.

As a former soldier of the Foreign Legion, Fan Meng's French proficiency can be said to be very good among non-native French speakers, so he naturally knows what Bernard just said.

"To be honest, this feels as bad as if we didn't give out mission goals before we carried out the mission. I hate this feeling of facing the unknown."

"There's nothing we can do about it." Liang En spread his hands and shook his head helplessly. "After all, illegal excavation is so rampant on the eastern and southern coasts of the Mediterranean, so we must prevent some bad situations from happening."

In fact, the act of robbing antiquities also has a very ancient history. In ancient Egypt, some pharaohs and nobles even had their tombs stolen shortly after they were buried.

For people in some regions and cultures, digging for antiquities is a way of life, usually something the poor have to do in order to survive.

To take the simplest example, in some war-torn areas, shops are closed and fields are burned, and there is no possibility of going out to make a living. In this case, if a person digs up some antiquities to sell them in order to support his family, it is difficult for people to blame him.

But the problem is that in many areas, illegal excavation activities have become large-scale activities. In those chaotic areas, some guys will loot some relics and even destroy them in the end.

For example, during the turmoil in Egypt in the past few years, various illegal excavation operations suddenly increased. At least the number of various robbery holes on the ground has increased significantly.

What’s even worse is the fact that most of these stolen cultural relics end up in auction houses in New York or London, or even put up for sale publicly on eBay.

This situation illustrates from the side that behind many illegal excavation operations is not just a simple purpose of local people to make money, but a link in the international black market of cultural relics.

Also for this reason. Therefore, formal archaeological teams like them have to choose to hide their investigation destination. Avoid well-informed thieves who dig in and destroy the site.

After staying in Paris for a day, they took a plane directly to Cairo.

Because the plane was an Egyptian airline, the attendants all spoke English with an Egyptian accent. So Liang En and the others could only guess what the service staff on the plane were talking about.

Since it is winter now, the climate in Cairo, which is located on the Mediterranean coast, is pretty good. It is not as hot as expected after leaving the airport.

When everyone arrived at the suburban hotel they had contacted with their luggage, Professor Jacques, the team leader, announced that everyone could disperse and go out for a walk. Of course, the other party specifically reminded everyone to try to go to crowded places and not to wander into shantytowns.

So after exchanging a large number of Egyptian pounds on the first floor of the hotel, Liang En and Fan Meng went out to go to the city center. Unlike in London, taxi drivers here don't use meters at all.

Fortunately, it only costs 3 euros to get from here to the city center, so Liang En didn't bother to negotiate the price, but just agreed, got on the bus and went straight to the city.

Soon, the car drove onto the avenue leading to the city center. Although there were no guardrails around this avenue and were all concrete blocks, the two-way eight-lane road was really well built.

In particular, this road had neither a speed limit nor a traffic light, so with the driver's furious driving, it took them less than half the time expected to arrive near Cairo's Tahrir Square in the city center, where Liang En and their target was the Cairo National Museum. There.

To be honest, Liang En would rather not save this little time. Because the Cairo drivers on the road were driving too wildly. If they disagreed, they would snake on the straights and accelerate through corners.

In addition, Liang En was a little uncomfortable with the heavily armed checkpoints before entering the city. Fortunately, Liang En and the others had Asian faces and looked like tourists. So I was just checked up and down with a metal detector, and I didn't enjoy the full-body pat down by the armed police.

"Since we are here to inspect ancient Egyptian cultural relics and ruins this time, we must come here to take a look." Looking at the double-story luxury stone building opposite the square, Liang En introduced to Fan Meng. "This is one of the top museums in the world."

"You can see it." Fan Meng looked at the armed guards around the museum and said, "If this place wasn't important, there wouldn't be so many armed guards."

The walls of the National Museum in Cairo are surrounded by a post every three steps and a sentry every five steps, all of which are armed guards with guns. After entering, I discovered that I needed to pass three checks to get in, and I also had to be searched when I went out.

However, the fare here is not expensive, a ticket only costs 100 Egyptian pounds, which is equivalent to 4.6 pounds. And this ticket also includes the main exhibition hall and Tutankhamen Hall.

Interestingly, above the price list next to the ticket office, it says in English and Arabic that photography is prohibited in the museum, and next to this line it says, unless you purchase a photo ticket.

After buying two tickets and a photo ticket, Liang En and Fan Meng walked into the exhibition hall, and were shocked as soon as they entered the exhibition hall.

The exhibition hall on the first floor is filled with huge statues from various temples. Some of them are obviously damaged and should be placed here for repair, while the other part is very precious and not suitable to be displayed outside.

The density of artefacts in this museum makes it look more like a warehouse than the empty museums in London. And most of the sculptures don’t even have glass covers, or even fences.

"Hey, we're in contact with history." After looking around, I couldn't find any placards prohibiting touching, and the staff at the venue didn't stop them either. So Fan Meng simply stepped forward and touched the huge statues placed outside.

At this time, Liang En carefully observed all the representative statues and took a bunch of photos focusing on the words on them. Because these words were very valuable to him.

After spending nearly two hours carefully looking at the pile of things on the first floor, the two people went up to the second floor. Different from the large items on the first floor, the second floor is full of small items, giving people the feeling of entering an antique store from a warehouse.

The most eye-catching one is the Tutankhamen Hall. Once you enter, you can see the world-famous golden mask in the center. In addition, the golden cultural relics placed in the museum make people feel like they are in a state of ecstasy.

However, Liang En and Fan Meng spent less time visiting than most tourists because they did not visit the paid royal mummy hall. After all, for Chinese people like them, visiting the golden coffin is the limit, forget about the mummy.

"I really don't understand why so many people are willing to pay to visit the morgue." Fan Meng complained after watching a group of chattering American tourists buying tickets to enter the Royal Mummy Hall, "Don't they think it's unlucky?"

"Europeans don't seem to be so taboo about this." Liang En shrugged. "At least as far as I know, there are several guys in London who not only collect mummies but also keep them in their homes."