Source: Middle East Institute Author(s): Maria Golia Original Link: https://www.mei.edu/publications/safeguarding-and-celebrating-egypts-traditional-crafts A recent contemporary art show mounted in the 13th century Qalawun Mosque in Old Cairo made an unintended point — that whatever the merits of the exhibited work, it was bound to be upstaged by the majestic setting with its...
Learn MoreMaria Golia, an American writer, has lived in downtown Cairo for over two decades. She is the author of Cairo, City of Sand and Photography and Egypt (Reaktion Books, UK, 2004, 2010), non-fiction works involving extensive historical research alongside an intimate understanding of the country’s present moment. Long-time columnist for the Lebanon Daily Star and
Learn MoreSource: Middle East Institute Author(s): Maria Golia Original Link: http://www.mei.edu/content/at/taking-egypt%E2%80%99s-big-bureaucracy Since the 1990s, the need for streamlined procedures to facilitate business, trade and investment has grown to crisis proportions in Egypt. But the political will to deliver administrative reform was always lacking, not least because it would involve lay-offs...
Learn MoreSource: Middle East Institute Author(s): Maria Golia Original Link: http://www.mei.edu/content/article/changing-cairo%E2%80%99s-spaces-bottom In mid-June, just before Ramadan, the pre-dawn calm of downtown Cairo was shattered by the sound of heavy machinery. The municipality had decided to repair the battered sidewalks, a fairly regular occurrence since shoddy concrete tiles are typically used...
Learn MoreSource: Middle East Institute Author(s): Maria Golia Original Link: http://www.mei.edu/content/at/cairo-metro-everythings-connected Inaugurated in 1987, Cairo’s Metro was Africa’s first inner-city underground and the embodiment of Hosni Mubarak’s promise to modernize Egypt’s infrastructure. It is hard to think of a Mubarak-era project that was better planned, more efficiently executed, or has...
Learn MoreSource: Middle East Institute Author(s): Maria Golia Original Link: http://www.mei.edu/content/at/cairo%E2%80%99s-townhouse-gallery-social-transformation-through-art As the urban historian Lewis Mumford pointed out, “When a city has reached the megapolitan stage, it is plainly on the downward path: it needs a terrific exertion of social force to overcome the inertia, to alter the direction of...
Learn MoreSource: Middle East Institute Author(s): Maria Golia Original Link: http://www.mei.edu/content/article/egypt%E2%80%99s-need-low-income-housing In March 2014, before resigning as Egypt’s minister of defense and pursuing his campaign for the presidency, General Abdul-Fattah el-Sisi announced an agreement with the UAE construction firm Arabtec to build a million affordable homes for “Egyptian...
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