February 2012
15 posts
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Paris was never along the Nile (Arabic)
باريس لم تكن أبدا على ضفاف النيل
يشيع استخدام عبارة “باريس على النيل” بين المستشرقين وكثير ممن يحسون بالحنين إلى الماضى. وقد ذاعت تلك العبارة فى أوساط البرجوازية المستاءة من القاهرة المعاصرة والتى تحاول أن تجد فى الماضى ملاذا تهرب إليه، وهو فى هذه الحالة العلاقة المتصورة بين القاهرة وباريس التى يعدونها عاصمة الحداثة فى العالم بأسهر. أما المستشرقون المعاصرون فيستخدمون تلك العبارة...
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A new beginning for Egyptian tourism (Arabic)
بداية جديدة للسياحة المصرية
فى معرض الحديث عن التحديات الاقتصادية التى تواجه مصر، تتكرر الإشارة إلى مشاكل السياحة فى أعقاب ثورة 25 يناير، حيث انخفض عدد السياح الذين زاروا مصر فى 2011 بنسبة 30% عن السنة السابقة. ورغم هذا الانخفاض فإن شوارع وسط البلد فى القاهرة ما زال بها عدد ملحوظ من الأجانب. لو جلست فى مقهى الحرية أو المقاهى المحيطة بجاليرى التاونهاوس، سوف تحس بأن أزمة السياحة غير...
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Metro Line 3 partially opens
This week and after more than five years since construction began, Cairo residents welcome a new metro line. When finished Line 3 will run from Cairo Airport in the east to Imbaba and Cairo University in the west. The first stage, which has been opened, is only five (Attaba-Abassiya) of the total 32 stations on that line. Officials have announced that phase two is %60 complete. Although it is a...
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Ahram Gardens
Construction on Cairo’s forth metro line is due to begin. The line will begin from its western-most station at the beginning of 6th of October desert city at DreamLand (a gated compound) and head east. The second station will be at Ahram Gardens, a vast area that is larger than the entire city of Cairo around the year 1900. The area of Ahram Gardens when super-imposed on the center of...
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A financial citadel
A massive construction site along Salah Salem Road, just below the Citadel, has been sitting idle for a couple of years now. The construction competes with the Citadel in a battle over size and visibility. The stalled constrcution is the Cairo Financial Center, a project that aimed to create a financial and touristic hub where the stock market would be relocated from its downtown location. Major...
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Jadaliyya: Struggles that fueled a revolution
Bulaq: Among the Ruins of an Unfinished Revolution. Directed by Davide Morandini and Fabio Lucchini. UK/Italy/Egypt, 2011.
“Bread, freedom, and social justice” has been one of the most memorable chants from Egypt’s year of mass protests. Although world and Egyptian media have been fixated on the symbolic Tahrir Square, little attention has been directed towards places where many Egyptians...
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Specific weights of architecture, the Cairo probe
By Ying Zhou
A little more than a year ago, twenty-six architecture students from the ETH Studio Basel landed at the Cairo International Airport. They were to begin their urban research sojourn. For most it was their first time in Egypt. For most it was also their first time doing urban research. They were armed with maps, readings, toolkits for understanding the architecture vocabulary of a...
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Heliopolis Palace (Hotel)
There is a lot of mystery surrounding the commission currently surveying presidential palaces. Every few weeks news emerges of priceless finds including historical objects dating to Egypt’s last dynasty or earlier in addition to precious stones, and “rare paintings.” It is unclear why the ruling military council took such swift steps to survey the palaces and their contents...
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Al-Hakim: a place to idle
One of Cairo’s most hospitable places is the al-Hakim mosque located at the northern end of al-Muizz Street. Here is a short description of the building from Archnet:
This mosque, also known as al-Anwar, ‘the illuminated’, was begun in 990 under the Caliph al-‘Aziz but was not completed until 12 years later under the Caliph al-Hakim. At the time of its construction...
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Transport: Operating Territories
By Tiffany Wey
Cairo’s infamous traffic is popularly expressed as a mirror of Egyptian society—reflected by the seemingly deviant lifestyles of microbus drivers, corruption of traffic police, and the frustrated immobility of passengers who rely on public transportation. If traffic is a physical manifestation of urban systems in conflict, what does Cairo’s traffic indicate about the state of its...
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The Contested Road to Khufu
Why the proposed new road wouldn’t solve any of the problems it claims to
By Meredith Hutchison and Nicholas Hamilton
One element of the Cairo 2050 document is the creation of a wide boulevard from the Sphinx square to the area of the Giza Pyramids. The project proposes the extension of the Arab League Road by 6 km and a 540 m wide roadway and redevelopment zone which would...