John Tyman's Cultures in Context Series EGYPT and the SAHARA www.johntyman.com/sahara |
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7.2 The Banks of the Nile Pt. II: 576-603 |
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John Tyman's Cultures in Context Series EGYPT and the SAHARA www.johntyman.com/sahara |
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7.2 The Banks of the Nile Pt. II: 576-603 |
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| .576. The farmers here grow cotton as a cash crop, and grains (mostly millet and maize), bananas, vegetables, and dates for subsistence. (Near Kom Ombo) |
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| .577. They also grow food for their animals and harvest this with a sickle still. Irrigable land is too precious to be used as pasture. (Island near Edfu) |
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| .578. Instead, their cattle are fed by hand, in yards enclosed by walls made of mud brick, or tethered close by. As at Siwa donkeys rather than camels are used to get around and to move produce to market. (Upstream from Kom Ombo) |
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| .579 The fellahs go to the fields at dawn and return at dusk, and have little or no time to relax. They have benefitted in part from the year-round cropping made possible by the high dam at Aswan, but the standard of living possible on their smallholdings is clearly limited. (Upstream from Kom Ombo) |
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| .580. Farm life is hard; and they now have alternatives following the modernization of the Egyptian economy. This is reflected in part in the increased role of women and children in farm work ... in families where men have found jobs in town. (Near Kom Ombo) |
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| .581. Some will supplement their income by weaving baskets from palm fronds. (Between Kom Ombo and Edfu) |
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| .582. And those who own boats can collect firewood for sale to riverbank communities. (Near Edfu) |
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| .583. The fellaheen traditionally live in houses which they themselves have built ... from sun-dried bricks. (Bricks drying downstream from Kom Ombo) |
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| .584. These bricks are then plastered over with mud, rather like those in the other oases ... typically with a courtyard and stable in the centre offering access to two rooms. (Above Kom Ombo) |
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| .585. One of these rooms will have an oven, used not just for cooking but also for heating in winter ... when the family will sleep close by. There will be few windows and only rudimentary furniture. (Kom Ombo) |
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| .586. The courtyard and/or the roof will be used for storage of firewood, corn stalks, cotton plants, compost and earthenware pots containing grain and oil. (Kom Ombo) |
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| .587. Elaborate pigeon houses are also a distinctive feature in many Nile villages. (Kom Ombo) |
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| .588. They provide birds with nesting recesses and roosting perches: and in return their owner receives both meat and fertilizer. (Kom Ombo) |
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| .589. Men and boys can bathe in the river (or canal), and women wash their clothes and crockery there, and collect water in jugs, shooing away their geese and ducks if need be. The water they collect will be run through a zir -- a rudimentary earthen filter -- before it is drunk. (Children playing beside the river at Karnak) |
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| .590. The standard of living is such that their diet is often lacking in both quality and quantity. Of necessity, they live mostly on cooked vegetables, plus some fermented cheese and cornmeal cakes. Meat is eaten only on special occasions. Some may improve their diet by fishing and/or setting fish traps in nearby wetlands. (Between Kom Ombo and Edfu) |
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| .591. With improved means of transportation (buses and shared taxis) fellahs can now reach regional centres with ease, and sell their produce at bigger markets, buying in return the fruits of technology -- butane stoves, radios, televisions and refrigerators. But life is still hard here. (Sleeping space at Kom Ombo) |
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| .592. Many fellaheen have moved into the cities, where conditions are a little better. The lucky ones find jobs in the textile, chemical, cement, and food industries: but many remain unemployed. (Crowded street in Alexandria) |
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| .593. The tourist industry was once a big employer but has been undermined in recent years by acts of terrorism and political instability. For a hundred years or so, cruising was a magnet that drew rich Europeans and Americans to indulge their interest in the temples of the Nile. (Above Edfu) |
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| .594. From the 1960s onwards, with rising living standards in Europe and America, a dramatic increase in the number tourists generated many jobs on large boats based in Cairo. With deteriorating political conditions many boats stood idle; but when there was a demand they carried tourists from Cairo to historic sites upstream. (Cruise boat alongside new “tourist attraction” at Kom Ombo) |
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| .595. Following the construction of the High Dam and the relocation of Abu Simbel, Aswan, too, was a busy port of call ... till politics intervened. (Aswan) |
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| .596. For much of the time now the boats lie idle and their crews are unemployed. (Aswan) |
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| .597. Other boats were anchored permanently, and served as restaurants and nightclubs. In this case, as the oldest person present, the author was seized by a belly dancer who stuffed a lot of table napkins up his jumper to give him a more nubile figure, before dragging him on to the dance floor! |
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| .598. Other fellahs crewed the feluccas that often operated higher up the river. During the era of the pharaohs, sailing boats like these carried much of the stone used to build their pyramids and temples, but today these same boats carry tourists. This one was contracted to a British tour company. (Below Aswan) |
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| .599. Compared with the big cruise boats this was travel “backpacker style” with the most basic of facilities. Passengers slept on the open deck, and were fed there also by an on-board cook. (Below Aswan) |
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| .600. The felucca made scheduled stops at historic sites along the way where the river's gods were worshipped long ago, which passengers then explored ... in this case the “nilometer” at Aswan. |
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| .601. Since there was no toilet on board, the boat pulled into the bank of the river as and when required. The money earned by those fellahs lucky enough to crew these boats exceeded that earned from sale of farm produce. (Below Kom Ombo) |
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| .602. A few have also found work at the newly created “rest stops” for travelers. This one, at Kom Ombo, in addition to serving food and selling souvenirs, also had an open-air museum demonstrating irrigation techniques. |
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| .603. There were even a few snake charmers to entertain visitors. And much the same thing is happening throughout Egypt and the Sahara; people are moving to towns and cities, or to more favoured agricultural regions near the coast. They prefer paid employment to herding camels or growing dates in a hostile environment. This decline in traditional practices is regrettable in some ways but the lives of those who live here have been changing for thousands of years, and will continue to do so. |
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