Our journey to Sinai is all about ‘healing’. Healing of our own wounds, of each other, and of humanity as a whole. A few weeks ago, in a meditation, I envisioned the Monastery of Saint Catherine, which lies at the foot of Mount Horeb. On the altar I saw the grail cup, the cup of healing. In all my travels the mystical grail pops up, over and over again.
Even in my immediate surroundings I feel the need for healing growing stronger: many people are being tried and tested at the moment: a the son of a friend is stuck because he is missing a father figure, another friend needs surgery, our dear friend in Jerusalem suffers from bone cancer… The theme of the ‘wounded masculine and feminine’ is becoming increasingly urgent. How can we heal ourselves and each other?
Waking up at our ‘Beach resort’, the day after arrival, we decide to have a ceremony at the Red Sea. Between the beach chairs and thatched umbrellas, Monique, Maria and Anne create an improvised altar. We invoke the Sea goddess, the Great Mother. I see her as a large blue, water-like creature hidden in a temple at the bottom of the sea. On the other side of the Red Sea lies Saudi Arabia. I realize that we are invoking the goddess in the heart of the Middle East, which is dominated by masculine religions and cultures. She has been forgotten and banished for a long time, and yet it is her power that helps us heal, instead of dividing and fighting. She brings us the first element of our journey: water.
That morning I remember the message Anne and I received when we tuned into the trip a few weeks earlier:
‘Part of this work is about healing, all the places that are out of balance, that have suffered from trauma, wars or painful situations in history. Part of your work is opening up basic wisdom that is stored in places like Sinai. It has the power of the fifth gospel – the Fifth Element – that has been waiting there for eons to be rediscovered, opened and activated. It is a place of healing and regeneration, in which the healing power of the Grail is being stored and kept safe.
Mother Earth is an organic, living creature, that has a lot of wisdom about her own evolution. Human beings are part of that evolution and part of that being. You are little braincells walking on the surface of the planet, connecting several dots, thus bringing information from one place to another.
What you do is connecting the dots, bringing people together, calling out your tribe, and leading them towards this purpose, this destiny of the alpha gate of the Schiehallion in the middle of Scotland. It is here that the clear sword of determination wil come down and bring clarity and inspiration to many people. While traveling you will bring the Grail and the Sword together, to bring balance to the earth.
Your journey into the Unknown might feel like an unknown journey, but it is very well planned out. It is a ‘soul journey’ with a specific purpose, to lighten up and activate a higher consciousness in many people around the world. This is what you have been doing through the last 30 years, and this is still the work: to be a pioneer of consciousness by visiting sacred places and opening up the information or wisdom that is stored in these earth powerspots. We are aware that you might not understand all of this. It is not so much through words or concepts that you know what is going on, but this is wisdom from an energetic level that can only be understood from the heart.’
Our first day at the resort ends by the pool, with Russian karaoke in the background. Mostly a journey ends with a party, but this time it seems like it is the start of it all. We dance along the water’s edge and laugh at the strange situation we find ourselves in.
While walking to the reception desk in search of wifi later that night, I get a very disturbing message from the home front. Jos, a dear friend of mine, with whom I traveled on many occasions, has suffered a cardiac arrest. He is taken to the hospital and lies in a coma. The message comes in as a shock and abruptly changes the whole journey. I alternatively feel disbelief and grief, as well as a great uncertainty about his fate.
Walking back from the reception to the room I suddenly feel him very close to me, walking along. He reassures me, as if nothing happened. ‘Just keep doing your job’, he says. ‘You know that this is all part of the illusion of existence.’ This might be the case, still on a human level his situation is hard to grasp. It feels so strange to be here, while he is lying there unconsciously, in a hospital bed.
The next day we are picked up by Mohammed, who takes us to the Bedouin camp in the desert, at the foot of the mountain of Moses. The beach resort setting changes into a setting of stones, dust, wind and mountains. The Sinai desert is dry and inaccessible. Maria – who is used to traveling in the desert of Jordan, Oman and Egypt – immediately feels at home, but I feel uncomfortable. I feel the emptiness, the great nothingness of this place and wonder what the hell I’m searching here. Suddenly a holiday at the Red Sea seems very attractive – despite the Russian karaoke. But unfortunately that’s not what we’re here for. We have to walk our path, and that leads us from the first element of water, to the world of sand, stone and air. From the mirage and comfort of the Truman Show to the harsh and bare reality of a Bedouin village.
We take up residence in two simple but clean rooms and meet the men of the Bedouin camp: Sheich Moussa, his two sons Mohammed and Saleh, the Nubian cook Radwan from Aswan, and the young Mohammed who keeps the rooms clean.
When later that night Maria gives me a reiki treatment on the back balcony of our room, our Dutch neighbour is peeking around the corner. ‘Hey’, he says, ‘are you doing spiritual work?’
To be continued
