On a Government visit to the Middle East with Minister for Foreign Affairs, Brian Cowen, Deaglán de Bréadún looks for signs of progress.
I feel like screaming. I am in a small dark tunnel with no end in sight. There are people crowding in front of me and behind me and the air is getting thin. And it's not a dream or an old escape movie: we are sightseers, not POWs tunnelling to fresh air and freedom.
The only consolation is, there is no jolly hockey-sticks type there to say, "Isn't this fun?" I feel guilty for not enjoying myself - I am, after all, in the bowels of one of the fabulous Great Pyramids on the outskirts of Cairo. It's a side-trip, a brief touristy interlude in the sombre official programme for the visit of our Minister for Foreign Affairs, Brian Cowen, to Egypt and other parts of the Middle East.
Feeling claustrophobic I soldier on, because it's not every day you get to see an ancient Pharaoh laid out in glittering jewels; at least that is what I am expecting. It is all a little too much for the Minister and his party, however, because when I look around they have made a discreet withdrawal, leaving me to boldly go where politicians and mandarins fear to tread.
After a long, hard climb, and athletic feats worthy of Indiana Jones, I find myself in the great burial chamber. But it's empty and bare, with not a Pharaoh or jewelled dagger in sight. They have been removed, whether officially for transfer to a museum or unofficially by long-dead looters is not immediately clear. I am reminded of Samuel Johnson's words about the Giant's Causeway: "Worth seeing, but not worth going to see".
It occurs to me that my experience parallels that of the politicians and diplomats who, over many years, have braved obstacles and uncertainty to build a comprehensive Middle East peace, but it turned out to be an empty, hollow construct at the end of the day.
As I was having these thoughts, Cowen and his party had moved on to the Great Sphinx, that "shape with lion body and the head of a man", as W.B. Yeats called it. Our learned guide, Amal, told the Minister it was "a symbol of wisdom and power". Cowen, now sporting a Country and Western-style straw hat in the desert heat, quipped that the Sphinx "must be a Fianna Fáil man".
The famous Riddle of the Sphinx is as nothing compared with the conundrum of stabilising this troublesome region whose persistent and bloody wars threaten not only our oil supply but, since 9/11, the security of the entire world.
The reason for Cowen's visit is to prepare for Ireland's forthcoming membership of the EU's foreign policy "troika" along with Italy and Europe's foreign policy chief, Javier Solana, from July 1st and the Irish presidency of the EU from January to June next year. From January next, Cowen will be the EU representative in the Quartet - UN, US, EU and Russia - which has devised the Road Map for establishing a Palestinian State by 2005.
After Cairo, Cowen moves on to Tel Aviv, but there is no Israeli government representative to meet him at Ben-Gurion Airport. In line with agreed EU policy, Cowen is making a courtesy call to Yasser Arafat, in his capacity as elected President of the Palestinian Authority. But the Israelis have had it with Arafat at this stage and, as a result, Cowen's requests to meet Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and the Foreign Minister, Silvan Shalom, are turned down. In diplomatic terms, therefore, Cowen is not in Israel at all!
But to their credit, the Israelis provide all necessary technical assistance and security protection. The Minister's delegation is escorted to the King David hotel in Jerusalem and an armed Israeli soldier protects their rooms. Tourism in Israel has collapsed, so the hotel is quiet.
Traditionally, all the "nobs" have stayed in the King David, which was described as "a minaret of joy and happiness".
Previous guests range from Bill Clinton and John Major to King Zog of Albania and Moshe Dayan, the colourful Israeli general with the eye-patch: a video history of the hotel says, "Moshe Dayan had only one eye but it was always on women."
It was also the scene of a notorious outrage on July 22nd, 1946, when terrorists blew up the hotel's South Wing, where the British administration of the time had its headquarters, killing 91 people, including 17 Jews. People cried and wailed from the rubble for three days. Then there was silence.
This attack was ordered by Menachem Begin, who later became prime minister of Israel. Today's terrorist is tomorrow's statesman, they say, and Begin's peace deal with Egypt's President Sadat in the late 1970s earned them both the Nobel Peace Prize.
Yasser Arafat also won the Nobel Prize but the current Israeli government does not regard him as a prospective partner in peace. Last March, after a particularly horrific suicide bombing, Israeli forces attacked Arafat's compound in Ramallah, on the West Bank, claiming Palestinian terrorists were taking shelter there.
As it happens, I interviewed Arafat immediately prior to those attacks, on St Patrick's Day, 2002. I hadn't been back since and, when I followed Cowen's party to the compound, I was shocked by the devastation at the Palestinian equivalent of Áras an Uachtaráin.
Buildings were reduced to rubble, while dozens of burnt-out cars and jeeps were piled on top of one another, like old bags of rubbish back home.
The Minister himself was clearly appalled at what he saw and publicly called for an end to the attacks, having regard to the dignity of the President's office.
Arafat himself looked considerably older and whiter, his lips pursed like a man who has been through some bad times and knows there are more to come. He told his visitors he was afraid even to come out of his ruined headquarters for the press conference, claiming there could be another attack.
I was not present at his meeting with Cowen but it seems that the Palestinian leader has a formula for these occasions. Last year he gave me a photograph of a statue of Our Lady in Bethlehem, which he said was damaged by Israeli fire, and he also gave me a dossier on the alleged use of depleted uranium by Israeli forces, a claim that has not, to my knowledge, been convincingly substantiated.
Over a year later, Cowen was given the exact same items. For his part, the Minister presented Arafat with a ceramic bowl as a gift.
Perhaps the constant attacks and the strain of living in a confined space are taking their toll. But, however flawed, Arafat remains the prime symbol of Palestinian national aspirations and we are told that his stock has risen on the Palestinian "street" since the siege started.
In the compound I met a member of Arafat's staff who had helped me secure the interview last year.
What were the attacks like, I asked him. "It was very difficult," he said. So many people were killed and injured. But he added, on a defiant Shakespearean note: "For us, it is a case of To Be or Not To Be."