DOP #60 - The Riddle Of The Sphinx

The Riddle Of The Sphinx
by P. Francis Booth

Herb stood by the tour bus, wilting in the heat.

“Here.” Rae handed him a brochure. “All about the riddle of the Sphinx.”

Herb took a look. After all, he was pretty handy with crossword puzzles and whatnot.

After a half hour he’d gotten it, just as the planets reached an alignment unseen for four thousand years. Herb blurted out the answer. There was a loud grinding and a deep rumbling roar. A massive shadow fell over Herb and his party. It was the last thing they saw as it roused itself and began feeding.

P. Francis Booth is embroiled in a struggle for whiter whites and brighter brights.

Comments

[Jeremy Scherer]

Is this a metaphor for the moment when, after "careful" research (often from pamphlets), tourists display their newfound brilliance before natives only to make it so blindingly obvious that they have no sense of the context surrounding said building/relic/person? I understand that feeling pretty well. I'd say that the tourists here had no idea about the history behind the riddle of the sphinx, and that they paid for it. I had a similar experience in the Czech Republic when I brought up the Soviet Union with one of our Czech friends. It's important to know the risks involved in dabbling in other cultures' artifacts: you never know when they might pounce.