Egyptian Records – Page 5 – Arabian Records (1st post : Eid Al Fitr – 01st Shawwal 1439 (AH) / 15th June 2018 ) / (BETA testing – Research

Omar Sharif: Lawrence of Arabia

July 10 marks the death anniversary of the late iconic international Egyptian actor Omar Sharif.

On this occasion Egypt Today looks back at some of the milestones that led to his international debut.

Sharif’s childhood

Born in Alexandria as Michel Dimitri Chalhoub on April 10, 1932, he was of Lebanese descent, but was born and bred in Egypt. His parents were of good social standards; his father in the wood business and his mother a notable society hostess who often hosted King Farouk to play cards.

Growing up, Sharif easily became multilingual as he was brought up by his French speaking mother and attended an English boarding school and Victoria College; he also became fluent in Italian, Portuguese and Spanish.

After graduating from Cairo University with a mathematics and physics degree, he attempted to follow his father’s path of work but quickly receded and went on to London to the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art.

Sharif realized his passion for acting at the tender age of 13 when he participated in his English boarding school’s theatre program.

This horrified his father, since it would stop his son from following in his footsteps and becoming a timber merchant. Later, Sharif’s talent overcame all obstacles and he became a world-renowned actor.

The immortal cinematic and romantic couple Sharif and Hamama

In 1954, Sharif starred in “The Desert’s Devil” (Shaytan al-Saharaa), but his break was the same year when he acted in “Struggle in the Valley” (Sira’ Fi al-Waady) alongside his wife, the late great Egyptian actress Faten Hamama.

The love story of Hamama and Sharif began when they worked together in Youssef Chahine’s “Struggle in the Valley.”

Despite being born Catholic, he changed his name and converted to Islam to marry her in 1955. A marriage that lasted for 20 years, the famed couple were the symbol of love to all the Egyptian audience.

They portrayed their love in a number of successful movies that will live on for years after their death; movies that taught us the true meaning of love, such as “Ayamna el Helwa” (Our Beautiful Days), “Nahr El Hob” (River of Love), “ Saydet el Kasr” (The Palace Lady), “Sra’a fe El Mena” (Struggle in the Port), among others.

El Sherif’s international Stardom

He achieved international stardom in 1962 by acting in Lawrence of Arabia alongside Peter O’Toole.

He maintained his status as a foreign heartthrob by leading in films like Dr. Zhivago and Funny Girl, which caused outrage in Egypt due to the romance with his leading co-star, Barbara Streisand, who won an Oscar for her role.

Funny Girl was based on a play with the same title also starring Streisand. This musical comedy drama is a biographic, based on the life of Fanny Brice, a famous female Jewish comedian of the 1900s who dreams of stardom in New York City’s Broadway.

Against all odds she rises to the top and falls for Nick Arnstein, played by Sharif, a businessman and compulsive gambler.

While the 60s were the best and busiest years of Sharif’s acting career, they were the ones which took a toll on his marriage with Hamama, and the couple shocked their fans by getting a divorce in 1974.

A resonating talent

His impeccable acting skills speak for themselves, but his mastery of contract bridge also precedes him. He wrote books on bridge, his favorite card game, and even established the Omar Sharif Bridge Circus.

However, his addiction to gambling eventually caused him money troubles, which led to his acting flops and his downward spiral.

Living alone and with little money, Sharif spent his later days living in hotels in Paris and London until he made a brief comeback with his role in the 2003 French film “Monsieur Ibrahim.”

The film received positive reviews, and Sharid even won the audience award for Best Actor at the Venice Film Festival.

Sharif was always keen to support and encourage young talents such as the famed Egyptian actor Mohamed Ramadan, who had a small role in Sharif’s only Egyptian soap opera “Hanan w Hanin” ( Tenderness and Nostalgia).

Ramadan previously announced in a number of TV interviews that Sharif encouraged him a lot and praised his acting talent, predicting at that time that he will be a superstar in the future.

“When I first met Omar Sharif, he greeted me as if I was family. He was someone who really loved people; when he found out that we were [both] Egyptian, we bonded instantly.

The main piece of advice he gave me was to start in Egypt and get that experience under my belt before trying to have a career internationally,” recounted the Egyptian rising international actor Amir El-Masry in an interview with Egypt Today.

The End

Sharif moved back to Egypt to spend his final days while struggling with Alzheimer’s disease. Sharif passed away at the age of 83 due to a heart attack on July 10, 2015. Sharif is a cheerful, handsome, talented and iconic artist who will remain forever alive in the hearts of his audience around the world.

source/content: egypttoday.com

_________

_________

EGYPT

Egypt Wins First Position with 7 Trophies in the ‘2022 Arab Open Robotics Championship’

Egypt has finished in first place at the 2022 Arab Open Robotics Championship held in Sharm El Sheikh on Monday.

Since 2008, the Arab Open Robotics Championship has been the largest regional robotics tournament held in the Arab world.

The tournament was organized by the Ministries of Youth and Sports, Communications and Information Technology, Bibliotheca Alexandrina, and the Egyptian Federation of Electronic Games.

The tournament included over 650 students ranging in age from four years to the end of the university stage.

The participants represented 136 teams from 12 Arab countries: Egypt, Kuwait, the UAE, Oman, Yemen, Qatar, Jordan, Tunisia, Morocco, Algeria, Iraq, and Libya.

The Arab Robotics Association accredited 100 juries to judge the tournament’s nine robot competitions.

Egypt came first, winning seven trophies. Jordan finished second with two trophies, followed by Iraq, Libya and Qatar in third place.

In addition, the tournament hosted a lively forum for Arab youth on the sidelines.

source/content: arabnews.com

_________

EGYPT

Egypt’s Suhayr Al-Qalamawi, FIRST Woman to Obtain a Doctorate in Literature in MENA region

Suhayr al-Qalamawi is an icon of literature and politics in the Arab world in general and in Egypt in particular.

She greatly influenced cultural life in Egypt and the Arab world and it was her idea to establish the Cairo International Book Fair.

Qalamawi was born in Cairo, in a family that focused on educating their daughters. Her father was a surgeon and her mother spoke various languages. This upbringing helped her complete her education, and she graduated from the American College for Girls in 1928.

Her father also played a major role in developing her linguistic and cultural skills. She excelled reading the holy Qur’an with her father. Qalamawi’s father also owned a library where she was able to feed her infinite hunger for reading.

She was able to benefit from her father’s vast library of works at an early age, and it seems that writers such as Taha Hussein, Rifa’a al-Tahtawi and Ibn Iyas greatly contributed to her literary talent and shaped her voice as a writer.

Her father encouraged her to specialize in Arabic literature, and she became the first young girl to attend Cairo University and the first woman among 40 men to study Arabic literature. After obtaining a Master of Arts, she then received a scholarship to conduct research in Paris for her Ph.D. in 1941. After the completion of her doctoral thesis, she became the first woman to obtain a doctorate from Cairo University.

During her educational career, she was influenced by a number of personalities, most notably the dean of Arabic literature Taha Hussein, who was head of the Arabic language department and editor-in-chief of the Cairo University Magazine at the time. He made her assistant editor-in-chief of the magazine in 1932, and Qalamawi became the first woman to obtain a permit to practice journalism in Egypt.

Suhayr al-Qalamawi started her career after graduation as the first female lecturer at Cairo University in 1936. Soon she became a university professor and later the head of the Arabic language department between 1958-1967, in addition to becoming the president of the Egyptian Feminist Union.

She became the president of the Egyptian General Authority for Cinema, Theater and Music in 1967 and the head of the Child Culture Society in 1968. Qalamawi was also the head of the administration of the General Egyptian Book Organization, from 1967 to 1971, and the head of the censorship authority from 1982 to 1985.

In addition, Qalamawi was able to make outstanding contributions within the cultural field. During her tenure as head of the General Egyptian Book Organization, she worked to expand the range of readers, encourage young writers, and advance the book industry in 1967. From here, she established the first book fair in the Middle East, which is the Cairo International Book Fair in 1967.

Suhayr al-Qalamawi’s contributions were not limited to the cultural community, but she also contributed to the struggle of women, in order to preserve their rights through her literary works, in addition to her participation in many conferences on Arab women, and in 1960, she was the president of the International Conference on Women.

Furthermore, Qalamawi’s journey was also full of political work, and the beginning was when she entered politics as a member of Parliament in 1958 , and was nominated again in the period from 1979 to 1984.

Qalamawi’s career was crowned with a number of awards, as she was awarded the Arabic Language Academy Award in 1954 and the State Appreciation Award in Youth Literature. She also received the State Encouragement Award, the State Appreciation Award in Literature, The First Class Order of the Republic, the Medal of Achievement, and an Honorary Doctorate from the American University in Cairo.

After an enriching career, Suhayr al-Qalamawi passed away in 1997.

source/content: egypttoday.com (edited)

________________

_________

EGYPT

The FIRST Marvel Project to have an Arab Director. Filmmaker Mohamed Diab Discusses ‘Moon Knight’

Representation matters. Not just representation of ethnic background, but of personal experience. As Egyptian director Mohamed Diab becomes the first Arab to direct a Marvel project with the eagerly awaited limited series “Moon Knight,” it’s a landmark moment not only because of his nationality, but also because he was born, raised, thrived and suffered in Egypt, living through his country’s revolution and painful rebuild, and ultimately becoming one of its most important chroniclers.

“I’m not someone who is obsessed with firsts, but I will say that what is unique about me getting the Marvel job is that I’m coming directly from the Arab world,” Diab — who previously helmed the award-winning films “Cairo 678” (2010), “Clash” (2016), and “Amira” (2021) — continues.

There was a major reason that Diab’s voice was so necessary to the project. While many of the Marvel comic books from the 60s and 70s drew from cultures and mythologies from across the world, they were written and drawn from a perspective foreign to the cultures they were influenced by, leading to limited — sometimes offensive — portrayals of those people, places, and histories.

Part of Diab’s mission was not just to apply his own voice to the show, but to include the creative voices of as many Egyptians and Arabs as he could. Each Egyptian character on the show is portrayed by an actual Egyptian — something rarely, if ever, done in Hollywood — including the ancient deity that plagues Moon Knight himself. Behind the scenes, Diab recruited the previous collaborator Ahmed Hafez as one of the series’ editors, and the great Egyptian composer Hesham Nazih to write the series’ score.

Diab — as the show’s key creative voice along with creator Jeremy Slater — was integral in far more than capturing the Egyptian aspects of the show; he helped shape its entire aesthetic, so the show embraces elements that no Marvel project has before in terms of tone, style, and themes. He also personally convinced two actors who had long resisted becoming part of a superhero project — Oscar Isaac and Ethan Hawke — to come aboard.

“The wonderful idea of hiring Mohamed to be our quarterback, to guide this ship, is that the movies he’s made in Egypt are incredible,” says Hawke. “He’s not looking at this with the eyes of an American, he’s looking at this — and these deities, and this world — from a vantage point of growing up in Egypt and having a lot to say about it. It’s exciting to be around him in that way.”

Diab also recruited the Egyptian-Palestinian actress May Calamawy, best known for her role in the Golden Globe-winning sitcom “Ramy,” as one of the show’s leads.

Ultimately, “Moon Knight” — which debuts internationally on Disney+ on March 30 and will premiere in the region this summer — is a show full of outsiders who, in partnership with Marvel Studios head Kevin Feige and many others, lent their creative voices to make this a Marvel project like no other.

source/content: arabnews.com (edited)

________

_________

EGYPT

Eng. Ahmed Mekky, First Egyptian Appointed the Head of Fiber Optic Connect MENA Council

The Fiber Connect Council MENA has announced the appointment of Eng. Ahmed Mekky, Chairman and CEO of Benya Group, as Chairman of the council for a two-year term, succeeding Mr. Juan Colina. His appointment for this esteemed role, marks the first time an Egyptian assumes this position.

Eng. Mekky has been involved with the council in his capacity as a member of the Board of Directors since 2011, and was nominated for his role as Chairman of the council, in light of his endless contributions to the ICT industry on a global level and particularly for his extensive experience in the field of optical fibers.

Benya Cables, a subsidiary of Benya Group, began with ambitious plans to build the region’s largest optical fiber factory, and is now months away from materializing that reality.

Fiber Connect Council MENA has a mandate to exponentially increase the deployment of high-speed fiber networks, to connect consumers, businesses, governments and organizations, with the products and services needed to enhance quality of life, make a sustainable impact on the environment, boost business competition and develop apps to ultimately transform the way people live and businesses operate.

The Council’s Board of Directors is comprised of a notable cohort of member organizations such as Corning, Prysmian MEFC, OFS, Etisalat, and Oman Broadband. The board was formed in 2011 as an initiative launched by the founding members, and since inception, now boasts a member and partner count over 50 prominent industry leaders.

Kholoud Al-Dergham, Director General of Fiber Optic Connect Council MENA, welcomed the appointment of Eng. Ahmed Mekky as the Council’s new Chairman, highlighting “his expert record and experience in this field as invaluable assets to the Council, as well as a unique opportunity to invest that kind of experience, to accomplish the council’s objectives to expand the use of fiber optics”.

Eng. Ahmed Mekky is one of the most influential and prominent leaders in the ICT sector. In 2017, he founded Benya Group, formerly known as “Fiber Misr Systems,” and its affiliates with the goal of accelerating the Middle East and Africa’s digital transformation.

Prior to that, he launched Gulf Bridge International (GBI) in 2008 to build and operate the first underwater cable network, stretching over 40,000 kilometers and connecting 25 nations.

In 2011, he was appointed to the SAMENA Council’s Telecommunications Committee, and was selected on the Board of Governors (PTC).

Eng. Mekky has received various honors in recent years, including the “Telecom Review” award for best CEO in the area of enterprises offering services in telecom infrastructure for three consecutive years (2019, 2020 and 2021)

source/content: egyptian-gazette.com

__________

_________

EGYPT

Monastery of St Paul: Unique Religious Heritage Site in Egypt’s Eastern Desert

Monastery has three churches, most important of which is underground Church of St Paul.

The Monastery of St Paul the Anchorite, also known as the Monastery of the Tigers, is a Coptic Orthodox monastery dating back to the 4^th Century CE located in Egypt’s Eastern Desert, near the Red Sea Mountains.

Located about 155 km south east of Cairo, the monastery gained the moniker the Monastery of the Tigers due to its isolated location out in the wilderness of Egypt’s desert moonscape. It covers an area of about five acres of land, and is a rectangular shape of 200 metres long by 100 metres wide.

By the 5^th Century CE, the monastery was built over the cave where St Paul the Anchorite lived for more than 80 years.

St Paul, also known as St Paul of Thebes, or Anba Bola in Arabic, was a Coptic Orthodox saint born in Alexandria in 228 CE. Following his father’s death, the teenage Paul decided to become a hermit and live a simple life.

At the age of 16, he converted to Christianity and escaped Alexandria to avoid Roman persecution. According to one story, God sent Paul an angel who guided him to Egypt’s arid Western Desert, where he could live alone as a hermit.

The same story relates how God sent Paul a crow every day carrying half a loaf of bread to feed him. One day St Anthony joined Paul, and when the crow came, it had a full loaf of bread. St Paul then realised that it was God who had sent St Anthony, after 80 years of his worshipping in solitude.

As legend tells it, when St Paul died St Anthony saw two lions standing by the door of the cave in which the former had made his home. The lions approached the corpse, and used their claws dug in the ground, for St Anthony put St Paul’s body into the hole for burial.

It is for this reason that St Paul’s icon in any Coptic museum in Egypt shows him flanked by two lions with a crown above his head.

The first travel narrative associated with the monastery belongs to an anonymous pilgrim from the Italian city of Piacenza who visited the tomb of St Paul the Anchorite between the years 560 CE and 570 CE. The pilgrim is not to be confused with Antoninus Martyr.

The first monks to occupy the monastery were some of the disciples of Anthony the Great, after they learned the story of St Paul the Anchorite. It may have been occupied by Melkites for a short period, although they were followed by Egyptian and Syrian monks.

The Syrians may have had a sustained existence at the monastery, for it appears that they also occupied the monastery during the first half of the 15th Century, after which their presence disappeared. According to an isolated Ethiopian reference, the 70th Coptic Orthodox Pope, Gabriel II (1131–45 CE), was banished to the monastery of St Paul the Anchorite for three years.

Throughout its history, the monastery has suffered from several Bedouin raids, the worst of which occurred in 1484. This particularly painful attack saw all the monks murdered and the monastery plundered, following which the Bedouins occupied the building for 80 years.

The monastery was rebuilt under the patronage of Pope Gabriel VII of Alexandria (1526-69 CE), then attacked and destroyed again towards the end of the century. The monastery was deserted for 119 years, then extensively reconstructed and repopulated by monks from St Anthony’s Monastery, under the patronage of Pope John XVI of Alexandria (1676-1718 CE).

The monastery has three churches, the most important of which is the underground Church of St Paul that contains the hermit’s cave and burial place. Its walls are painted with well-preserved frescoes, and the ceiling is hung with ostrich eggs, symbols of the resurrection. The larger Church of St Michael has a gilded icon of John the Baptist’s severed head.

There is no public transportation to St Paul’s Monastery and, as the original hermit intended, it is a long journey from civilisation to get there. Visitors can take the bus from Cairo to Hurghada and get off at the turn-off for St Paul’s Monastery, following which there is a 13 km uphill trek to the monastery itself. This may sound daunting at first, but the road is well-paved and has plenty of traffic.

The Monastery of St Paul is an incredibly important site in Egypt’s long and varied history, and is the second ancient Coptic Christian monastery tucked away in the Eastern Desert.

Visitors may also view some of the manuscripts in the monastery’s possession, which includes a Coptic language version of the “Divine Liturgy”. A tour of the site may include a trip up the tower, and a glimpse of the “Pool of Mary” where Mary, the sister of Moses, washed her feet during the Exodus.

Along with the nearby Monastery of St Anthony, the Monastery of St Paul is quite possibly the most impressive structure in the desert. It is for this reason that it is included in several Egyptian desert tours.

source/content: dailynewsegypt.com

____________

_________

EGYPT

Dr.Sara Hegy Ahmed Awarded for Cancer Research in Germany

Sara Hegy Ahmed, Ph.D

Researcher Sara Hegy Ahmed was awarded for her study on sex hormone signalling, and how they can influence the regenerative capacity of intenstinal cells.

Egyptian scholar Sara Hegy Ahmed has been awarded the Rictzenhain Doctoral Prize in recognition for her achievements in cancer research in Germany.

The prize is given out every two years to researchers with exceptional dissertations in cancer research at the University of Heidelberg, or at a research institute in the town of Heidelberg.

Motivated by the loss of a young relative to cancer, Ahmed knuckled down to receive her bachelor’s degree in pharmacy and biological sciences at the German University in Cairo, before completing her graduate studies in cancer research at the University of Heidelberg.

During her PhD research at the German Cancer Research Center, Ahmed studied the way sex hormones signalling can influence the regenerative capacity of intenstinal cells. According to her research, stem cells of non-sex organs can be affected by sex hormones – drawing a link between high concentrations of sex hormones and the development of tumors in the digestive system.

Ahmed currently works as a Transformational Coach, helping others achieve their own life goals.

source/content: cairoscene.com

__________

________________________

GERMAN / EGYPTIAN

Abdullah Mohammed Al Maainah the Emirati Diplomat who Designed UAE’s Flag

Abdullah Mohammed Al Maainah

UAE Flag Day – November 03rd.

It is commemorated every year on the anniversary, which is, however, not a public holiday.

The day is marked by schools, government offices, businesses, and individuals hanging the national flag outside their homes and workplaces.

The veteran Emirati diplomat, Abdullah Mohammed Al Maainah, had designed the symbol of the country’s unity, pride and dignity when he was only a teenager 19 years old.

Al Maainah’s design was chosen among more than 1,030 entries submitted as part of a nationwide contest.

Later, the winning flag was raised on December 2, 1971 — the Foundation Day of the UAE.

On December 2, it will be exactly 50 years since the UAE flag was first hoisted to mark the country’s union.

Curiously, he did not know his design had been selected until he saw the flag fluttering at Mushrif Palace in Abu Dhabi with his own eyes.

“It was an overwhelming feeling. All of us were happy because we had unified as one country. However, I was overjoyed the most,” said the veteran diplomat, as he recalled how he found out about the contest and prepared for it with barely any time or resources.

“One of the arrangements related to declaring the establishment of the UAE at that time was to design a flag for it. A committee was formed to look into the matter and an advertisement was put out in the Al Ittihad newspaper inviting submissions from various artists,” he reminisced.

Al Maainah said he stumbled upon the advertisement just three days before the deadline was to expire.

“It was a race against time, as I didn’t have any drawing tools or colouring pencils. I rushed out to get them and worked all night to come up with the design. It was a happy feeling staying awake for the sake of designing the flag for my beloved country,” he added.

Only two flags were raised on December 2, 1971, to mark the formation of the nation – one in Abu Dhabi, the other at Union House in Dubai.

Al Maainah said the colours of the UAE flag were not chosen randomly.

“Every colour has an innate meaning. White symbolises peace, goodness and purity, black represents solidarity, green stands for hope, prosperity and development while red denotes bravery and courage,” he added.

Later, he was awarded 4,000 riyals as prize money, as the UAE dirham was yet to be introduced as the legal tender.

Al Maainah, who has travelled around the world as the UAE’s ambassador to several foreign missions, cherishes the honour bestowed on him by the country’s wise and visionary leadership for his design of the flag.

source/content : khaleejtimes.com

________

___________________________________

UNITED ARAB EMIRATES (U.A.E)