Power outages sweep Egypt during Eid al-Adha
This interrupted their celebration of the holiday and even impacted high school students preparing for their final exams. It also damaged some electrical appliances.
An official source at the Ministry of Electricity confirmed that there was no load shedding done in any area of the governorates, and that the cause of the outages was increased consumption and pressure on the networks.
In Minya Governorate, Upper Egypt, residents of Samalut Center, north of the governorate, complained of repeated power outages in several areas, with outages lasting for more than three consecutive hours.
In Beni Suef, various centers and neighborhoods in the governorate experienced repeated power outages.
At Qalyubia, Nile Delta, the Mit Halfa area of Qalyub experienced a power outage on the second day of Eid al-Adha for more than four hours.
The village's electricity official stated that the outage was due to a technical fault in one of the connections. The outage was eventually repaired and service was restored.
Sharqiya saw a large number of Belbeis residents complain of power outages during the holiday, in addition to a weak power supply when it returned, which impacted the operation of electrical appliances.
In Suez, residents of the 'Salam 1' area complained of a two-hour power outage during the day of Eid, amidst baking temperatures.
Within the Bagour district, the Electricity Company announced a three-hour power outage from 6:00 am to 9:00 am as part of a plan to develop and improve the electrical grid.
In Monufiya, residents expressed their discontent over the frequent power outages during Eid al-Adha.
And in North Sinai, power was cut off in the villages of Sheikh Zuweid area due to a fault in the transformer supplying the area. The fault was repaired and electricity was restored immediately, according to an official source in the governorate's electricity company.
Edited translation from Al-Masry Al-Youm
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'It might not be something that many people know, but the Nubians embraced Christianity first and then Islam,' he said. He noted that geography was not neutral in the way that different religions gained ground in Egypt. The spread of each new religion avoided parts of the country that were surrounded by mountains. Moreover, the way religion ended up being perceived and practised in different parts of the country was influenced by local cultures. The impact of geography was also important in the choices made by invaders who have conquered Egypt over the centuries. 'Both the Arabs and the Europeans, whether the Greeks in 300 BCE or the French and the British in the 18th century CE, came to Egypt via the north coast, where the city of Alexandria came to be founded,' he said. But in the case of Arabs, who came in the seventh century, it was impossible for them to settle in Alexandria or to take it as their capital 'because Alexandria is about the sea, and the Arabs who came from the heart of the Arabian Peninsula in the seventh century had no association with the sea. They knew the desert better and preferred it.' Diversity continued to influence space in Egypt over the centuries, especially with the improvements in connectivity that allowed people from the north to get a taste of the life of people of the south and vice versa. 'Today, we see that the ethnic roots of clothes and jewellery are being celebrated – from Nubia, Siwa, and Sinai – but they are all celebrated as authentic Egyptian arts,' he said. 'Egypt is one land, but it is not one thing; this is something we should be happy about because it is ultimately a source of richness,' Moatamed added. In ancient Egypt, all Egyptians worshipped one God, but each of its over 40 provinces had its own deity. Today, each province exhibits a cultural duality – one side owing to its association to the whole of Egypt and the other owing to its particular geographical and topographical identity, with adjacent provinces sharing much of this. However, modernity has been affecting this ancient pattern. 'Weddings across Egypt are becoming less unique and more standardised and more in line with norms generated from the centre, for example,' he said. There is less space for local songs than there used to be, for example in the Oases of the Western Desert, and all brides now go to beauty salons to have their hair and makeup done before the wedding, even waiting at the salon for the groom to pick them up from the doorstep. 'This would not have been the case in the past,' Moatamed stated. What goes for social occasions also goes for religious ones, he argued. More and more of the specific practices associated with the holy Muslim month of Ramadan or the Eid Al-Adha are disappearing in favour of more standardised behaviour. This is a function of modernity whose advances are curtailing the uniqueness of different places and bringing more connectivity. 'When I think of peasants in the villages of Sohag [in Upper Egypt], for example, I can see the change,' Moatamed said. 'In the past, their lives were all about farming. They were attached to the land, and they would not want to leave. This is no longer the case.' 'With the increasing demand for workers for the mines across the Red Sea desert, these farmers are leaving their land,' Moatamed said. This, he explained, is a function of the changing nature of the local geography due to the greater connectivity between Sohag and the Red Sea. It also leads to another change, namely the decline in the use of agricultural land. CHANGE: Modernity is not the only bringer of change to Egypt, Moatamed said, since there is also climate change. He referred to the erosion of the North Coast in and around Alexandria, something reported on in his book in detail. Speaking to Al-Ahram Weekly before the storm that hit the city in late May, Moatamed said that he was as worried for Alexandria as he is for Port Said and the entire north of the Delta. 'I am not sure we are ready to deal with the consequences of climate change on the North Coast, and my fear is that we could lose some of these cities or at least face a dramatic change in their nature and consequently in the story they have contributed to the overall story of Egypt,' he stated. There are other factors whose impacts are coming, among them economic. Moatamed said that economic pressures are prompting more and more people to abandon their land in favour of more profitable jobs in the country's cities. The construction and operation of the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD) that is feared will influence the flow of Nile water into Sudan and Egypt is another factor to take into account with regard to the possible impact on agricultural land, he said. 'It is painful to see the decline in agricultural land, whatever the reason,' he said, adding that this will impact the villages of the Delta and Upper Egypt and consequently also their cultural practices. In his book, Moatamed pays tribute to the commitment that the people of Nubia have shown to their traditions even after their displacement from their traditional land with the building of the High Dam. He writes at length about the 'right to place,' the title of the second chapter of the book, where he laments the inegalitarian access to Mediterranean beaches that have become closely associated with the financial ease. He also laments the lack of access to Red Sea beaches, which 'again is about economic limitations,' he says. In the latter area, the issue is not just socio-economic inegalitarianism but also industrialisation and a development plan that gives hardly any consideration to the 'right to place, including the right to access the beaches that people are supposed to be entitled to,' he said. 'We have forgotten that the banks of the River Nile in Cairo are often no longer accessible for strolls for those without financial means, unless they work in the restaurants and cafes that are dedicated to those who can afford them,' he added. In the central chapter of the book, Moatamed reminds readers that the 'relationship between people and nature – be it the river, the sea, or the land – is not about leisure and pleasure,' but instead is 'the main motive for creativity and productivity.' 'Zoning off the river and the sea with gates that only the rich, and never the poor, can get through does not just lead to short-term socio-economic grievances but also actually undermines the [inspiring] concept of endlessness... in favour of the [constraining] concept of limitation,' he said. He said that his book is a testimony about things that are endangered. 'I am not sure that we can be accurate when we talk about endangered things, because at the moment it seems that so many things, or almost everything, is somehow at risk,' he added. Worrying about the loss of connections between places and people in Egypt is not an idealistic thought, he argued. It comes from an understanding that the more these connections decline, the less association people will have with places and for that matter with the culture that they have given rise to, he said. Such changes also affect the relationship between the tribes of the Eastern and Western deserts and the land, which has now become more about making money through tourism or other activities than about traditional affinity. 'Some 20 years from now, those who are currently in their 30s will not be the 'elders' of their local communities. Unlike [those who are in their 50s today], they will not have sufficient knowledge to share the incremental story of Egypt,' he stated. In the introduction to his book, Moatamed writes that his decision to share his trips across Egypt and the research associated with the impressions he has gathered is about sharing testimony but also about calling attention to the need to think carefully about what must be done to keep the Egypt story intact. It is time for other people to set out on tours of Egypt, even in the simplest and most basic ways, in order to get a close and first-hand look at a story that might impact them in different ways and to take ownership of it. Follow us on: Facebook Instagram Whatsapp Short link:
