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Maids and marginality in Cairo: Why legal reform isn’t enough
BY RAHMA BAVELAAR Cairo – On a summer morning in 2012 at 6am, Nadya pulls a black abaya over her colorful housedress, wistfully pins her rectangular headscarf under her chin, locks the door behind her two young daughters and steps into the oncoming heat. On a good day, it takes her two hours to get from the narrow unpaved alley in the densely populated working class neighborhood of al-Marg, to the landscaped compound in the wealthy new desert suburb of Shaykh Zayd, where she works as a maid. This summer, frequent power outages on the underground metro network, numerous strikes…
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Tamarod stokes revolution against Mursi
BY MAI SHAMS EL-DIN Cairo – Full of enthusiasm, Iman El-Mahdy, member of Tamarod (Rebel) campaign says she never expected that the dream she shared with a group of her friends would become reality. Tamarod, a grassroots movement petitioning for a withdrawal of confidence from President Mohamed Mursi, in office since June 2012, announced last week that they had already collected 2 million signatures against Egypt’s first ever elected civilian president. The campaign has set a target of 15 million signatures by the end of June, when mass protests are scheduled to coincide with the first anniversary of Islamist-backed Mursi’s…
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In Pictures: Protesters call for early elections
Cairo – Several thousand protesters converged in marches to Tahrir Square on May 17 spurred by the ‘Tamarod’ (Rebellion) campaign. The grassroots movement aims to withdraw confidence from Egypt’s elected President Mursi and bring about early elections. They have claimed to have collected 2 million signatures so far, but are targeting 15 million by the end of June to mark one year of Mursi’s term in office. Islamist leaders have criticized the campaign as “illogical”. According to several news reports, former Freedom and Justice Party MP and leading member of the party Mohamed El-Beltagy said : “I call on the…
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‘Les Miserables’ links revolutionary France, Egypt
BY DALIA BASIOUNY Cairo – Few performances can move their audience emotionally, while engaging them artistically and intellectually. But some very lucky Cairenes had the opportunity this week, watching highlights from the renowned musical “Les Miserable” at The American University in Cairo (AUC). The remarkable performance was presented in Arabic for the first time late last week at the Malak Gabr theater. The successful Broadway musical “Les Miserable” by Claude-Michel Schoenberg and Alain Boublil is based on Victor Hugo’s powerful novel about poverty, injustice and the struggle against oppression, set during the 1932 student revolt against the French monarchy. The…
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Revolutionary agriculture: permaculture design gains ground in Egypt
BY LEYLA DOSS Cairo – Almost a year ago, Abdel-Khalek Betiti (Abbouda), owner of Fekra Center in Aswan, realized that the family farm of his childhood, overlooking the beautiful Philae Island along the banks of the Nile River, had reached a standstill. His land was overused, economically unsustainable and arid. This is where Nawaya, a local agricultural non-profit organisation, comes in. Last month the NGO gave a weeklong introductory course on a concept new to Egypt, permaculture design, to provide farmers with the tools to combat the very issues that many like Abbouda face. Permaculture, short for ‘permanent agriculture’, is…
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Maids and marginality in Cairo: Why legal reform isn’t enough
May 24, 2013
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Tamarod stokes revolution against Mursi
May 22, 2013
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In Pictures: Protesters call for early elections
May 18, 2013
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‘Les Miserables’ links revolutionary France, Egypt
May 17, 2013
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Revolutionary agriculture: permaculture design gains ground in Egypt
May 17, 2013
Opinion
Op-ed: Egyptian Democracy’s Last Chance?
BY ALVARO DE VASCONCELOS Cairo Egypt’s upcoming general election could help to consolidate its nascent democracy and provide legitimacy to the government’s efforts to address the social, political, economic, and security challenges facing the country. But no election, however successfully conducted, will be enough: Unless Egypt overcomes its current political polarization and builds a broad consensus that includes ruling Islamists and the secular opposition, its problems will persist, jeopardizing the prospect of a democratic future. Egypt’s lack of strong democratic institutions and its ongoing economic crisis are fueling social unrest and crisis, division, and hostility within the political system. At…
Op-ed: Egypt’s economic siren
BY MOHAMED A. EL-ERIAN Newport Beach Facing a turbulent political situation and recurrent street protests, Egypt’s political elite would be well advised to focus on the economic implications of the current turmoil, whether they are in government or in opposition. Doing so would lead them to recognize seven compelling reasons why a more collaborative approach to solving Egypt’s problems is in the country’s collective interest, as well as in their own individual interests. First, if the social and political disorder persists, Egypt’s economy will end up with crippling inflation, severe balance-of-payments problems, and a budgetary crisis. The risk of a…
Op-ed: Rape of a nation
BY REHAM BARAKAT Last December India witnessed a horrifying gang rape crime in Delhi. A 23-year-old woman was raped by five men on a bus. I won’t get into the morbid details, but suffice it to say that the victim of this barbaric act has died of her injuries. We have been brought up naively and falsely to believe that incidents of this kind do not happen in Egypt. But I remember thinking that when news of the Delhi rape broke that surely similar crimes are committed in our nation but are hardly ever reported or covered by the media….
Culture
‘Les Miserables’ links revolutionary France, Egypt
BY DALIA BASIOUNY Cairo – Few performances can move their audience emotionally, while engaging them artistically and intellectually. But some very lucky Cairenes had the opportunity this week, watching highlights from the renowned musical “Les Miserable” at The American University in Cairo (AUC). The remarkable performance was presented in Arabic for the first time late last week at the Malak Gabr theater. The successful Broadway musical “Les Miserable” by Claude-Michel Schoenberg and Alain Boublil is based on Victor Hugo’s powerful novel about poverty, injustice and the struggle against oppression, set during the 1932 student revolt against the French monarchy. The…
‘Alice’ but no wonderland
BY DALIA BASIOUNY Cairo – In its second edition, the Downtown Contemporary Arts Festival (D-CAF) which closed on April 28, presented a mixed fare of theater performances with a focus on works never seen in Egypt before. The world premiere of Lebanese performance “Alice”, created by Sawsan Bou Khaled in collaboration with Hussein Baydoun, is a case in point. This one-woman show was directed, authored and performed by Bou Khaled, a theater veteran who made her directorial debut in 2006. The exceptionally talented Hussein Baydoun, is an architect by training, but is known in the Arab world and beyond as…
Theater techies find the ‘Alternative Solution’
BY DALIA BASIOUNY Cairo Stunned by news that Rawabet Theater, the only affordable independent performance space in downtown Cairo was shut down, two theatre technicians decided to take matters into their own hands. As technicians Saber El Sayed and Mido Sadeq knew how to turn empty, unequipped spaces into full-fledged performance venues. Rawabet’s abrupt closure in February for lack of funding triggered the ingenious idea to transform The Factory, a space run by the TownHouse Gallery, and debut an arts festival they dubbed “Alternative Solution”. Click here to open the gallery. Converting this huge empty white-walled hall into an equipped…
Khan’s ‘Ambition’ captures crisis of connection
BY WAFAA WALI Cairo Imagine the oddity of watching on screen Cairo’s visually noisy streets without the actual noise. The phrase “eerie vacuum” comes to mind, but that’s precisely what director Hassan Khan has done in his latest offering “Blind Ambition”. Khan’s work, which was commissioned for the prestigious dOCUMENTA (13) in Kassel, premiered in Cairo Sunday as part of the downtown D-Caf festival. The 46-minute film split into nine different episodes taking place around Cairo shows diverse groups of people engaged in conversation which do not all revolve around a specific issue. With no clear aim and not reaching…
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Blogs
Podcast
Play on with Rami: Bikya girls
Today we got the lovely Bikya girls, well three out of five at least, in the podcast and we talk about favorite books, what it’s like running a bookshop and who does what. A fun little talk. Check it out! To listen to this podcast on your mobile device, find us on SoundCloud at Play On With Rami. You can create a SoundCloud account and stream the podcast. Or you can download the SoundCloud app on your iPhone/iPad from the App Store and on Android from the Play Store.
Play On With Rami: Adam Awad
We’re Back! Today on the Podcast we have local musician Adam Awad. The half-British half-Egyptian all awesome guy has a unique folk style which is rare to come across in Egypt. He tells us about growing up bouncing around from the UK to Saudi and then finally Egypt. Find out why he almost never continued as an artist due to rave reviews of his first recording and listen to a premiere of his latest song “Simplicity” on the podcast. He currently is in the Rolling Stones Middle East’s competition Street To Stage, so make sure to go over to www.rollingstoneme.com/sts…
Play On With Rami: Amina Ghali
This week we have Amina Ghali of Azza Fahmy talking to Rami about what it’s like being a jewelry designer, growing up with Azza Fahmy as a mom and how she got her start. To listen to this podcast on your mobile device, find us on SoundCloud at Play On With Rami. You can create a SoundCloud account and stream the podcast. Or you can download the SoundCloud app on your iPhone/iPad from the App Store and on Android from the Play Store.
