No matter how many times you have seen images of the golden mask of boyking Tutankhamen , come face to face with it in Egypt’s Cairo museum , and you will suck in your breath . It was on Nov 4 , 1923 , that British archaeologist Howard Carter stumbled on a stone at the base of the tomb of another pharaoh( 法老 )in Luxor that eventually led to a sealed doorway . Then , on Nov 23 , Carter found a second door and when he stuck his head through it , what he saw was to stun the world . Inside lay the great stone coffin , enclosing three chests of gilded wood . A few months later, when a crane lifted its granite cover and one coffin after another was removed, Carter found a solid block of gold weighing 110kg . In it was the mummy( 木乃伊 ) of the 19-year-old Tutankhamen , covered in gold with that splendid funeral mask . And all this lay buried for more than 3,000 years . Months after my trip to Egypt, I can relive the rush of emotion I felt and sense the hush that descended on the crammed Cairo museum’s Tutankhamen gallery . Cairo , a dusty city of 20 million people , is a place where time seems to both stand still and rush into utter chaos . It is a place where the ancient and contemporary happily go along on parallel tracks . Take the Great Pyramids of Giza , sitting on the western edge of the city . Even as the setting sun silhouettes these gigantic structures against the great desert expanse , a call for prayer floats over semi-finished apartment blocks filled with the activity of city life . While careful planning for the afterlife may lie buried underground in Cairo , it is noise and confusion on the streets . Donkey carts battle for space with pedestrians and the only operative road rule is “might is right .” But it is a city that is full of life—from the small roadside restaurants to the coffee shops where men and women smoke the shisha( 水烟壶 ) . Donkey carts piled high with flat-breads magically find their way in and out the maddening traffic ; young women in long skirts and headscarves hold hands with young men in open collar shirts , while conversations dwell on Kuwait’s chances at the soccer World Cup .