old Egyptian pictures . part 1

Every now and then I still, in this day of tweeting and fb-ing randoms, get forwards. Not exciting, but sometimes I do get something from that thoughtful friend who sends it because they know I'd like it.

Well I like these so much I wanted to translate them and put them up to share. They're images from Egypt at the turn of the 19th century. There are so many, and remember: the captions are the translations... (unfortunately, I have no source for these pictures)

Man w water: This was a common job to have. At the time, there were no shops nor refrigerators for people in the then growing city of Cairo to drink water while out around the streets. These men used to have cooling tanks with water and give people cups of it.

Hand made silk: Taken in 1880. These men would take the silk strings from the worm and then use these wooden tools to turn it into thread.

The barber 1872: this picture needs no caption, its clear what is happening here. I wonder where these three men have gone, where would they be now?

Among the streets of old Egypt: notice on the left of the picture, there are two metal tracks. They aren’t for trains though. They are for transporting heavy and hot things in special carts, just like he is doing in the image.

Al Nahaseen St: Faces, houses and streets very different from today.

Wood suq: taken in 1890. The man on the right sits with a drink of coffee. This is a scene that would not be found in Egypt today.

Tarbouche maker: taken in an inner Egyptian street. Though it was taken in 1905, people seemed much happier. (a 'tarbouche' is otherwise known as a 'fez', a velvety red cap with a black tassel, like the one on the man second from left.)

Simple farmer: the simple farmer goes by with his findings in his basket. Smiling. A simple life being granted gifts from God.

Water man and figs lady: The water-man here is shown sitting with a lady who sells figs. These figs, a type with pricks in them, are still sold on the streets today. They can only be bought from women who sell them, such as this one, as part of her duty is to also remove the pricks from them.

I have never been to Egypt, myself, so I am unable to make any personal comments on the pictures. I wonder how true all the captions are. And there are more of them... coming soon..

London welcomes Arabs

Londoners, for as long as I've known, have always felt encroached by shopping Arabs. I remember, back in the 80's, hearing English men in the tube complain about how much Marks & Spencers Arabs buy in the summer. We've read bits and bobs from the newspapers everyday for years about the 'wealthy Arab' season and how much is spent and how shiny the cars are, how loud the cars are, and so on and on. Some articles are somewhat rude, classifying Arabs as those wealthy savages in that classical tone we become so used to. Other articles explain how in tuned the Oxford Street and Knightsbridge shops are with the Islamic calendar and Arabs' pace, staying open later. So keeping aside the nasty undertones of London's free tube-tabloids, like the Evening Standard, Londoners are more increasingly doing what's right ... for business, of course.

Spending money is high on the list of West London's expectations of Arabs in the summer. Besides the big huff made around town about how loud or flashy Arabs are, its hard not to notice all the small products in the market geared towards the everyday shopper. From Selfridges to the Covent Garden markets, one will see plenty of trans-marketables building further that commercial relationship between London and those wealthy Arabs.

Armani has created a scent made of the highest grade oud, a uni-sex scent that is selling exclusively at Selfridges.

I'm not sure if this (below) means that we, in the Middle East, really do get the bottom of the barrel stuff or if these down-home Arabic branded Flake boxes are just meant to be a welcoming visual.

And how about some kids' stuff? Burj Al Arab is among the Tower Bridge 3D puzzles and children's books on international towers of fame, among the Leaning Tower of Pisa and the Petronas Towers...

This is no less than the continuation of a beautiful friendship...

What I learned from Rude Britannia (Or what really is funny)

What is humour, really? I’ve been trying to look for types of definitions for a while. It has always been my dream topic to look at comedy, types of comedy, what makes it, how come people have different ideas of it? Imagine the first laugh; I wonder what the first joke was.

So Rude Britannia kind of goes there (in a British context - not really a universal human one like I'm seeking). It takes a look at the first comics, or printed satirical narratives, displaying ones from the 16^th century till just about the 1980’s. The display was set up with humour, different rooms being presented in different ways – one room had a funny character (who is popular on British television, but I, unfortunately do not recognize) leading the information. It was really a nice change from the regular museum exhibition atmosphere and an interesting one at that. In the hall where it took place, it was very quiet – no mobile phones, no kids – a bit too quiet. But then every few moments a break of laughter would come through one of the other rooms, something I found amusing and fitting.

There were many different artists displayed, there was a trajectory of the development of the caricature, various mediums done by various methods: waterc olour, animation, puppetry, PhotoShop, etc. I wish that the show went more into the concept of what is British humour, a humour that I find very particular; jokes in Britain are more ‘droll’ than ‘funny’. Or maybe I’m too much of an outsider to expect to be fed concept of British humour at a British humour art exhibition in London. After all – after going through this exhibition, I see how engrained it is into the culture, social history and social outlook of the British people. A conversation with a friend afterwards introduced me to Cockney Rhyme Slang (is that correct?), which I'm not sure if humour was it's point, is to me a vernacular based on funny! Anyway, the wide and open span that the show did cover gave a good introduction to how humour is visually relayed, rather than what it is.

Regardless of all that, I walked out with a few facts from humour history from this exhibition:

§ 18^th century humour took a lot from mythology and biblical stories. It’s interesting to see that these two sources of imagination really did lend themselves to so many different ways of expression and metaphor.

§ Printed satire actually became of great value in the 18^th century, becoming a collectable.

§ In the 1830’s was when people actually started to respond critically to propaganda. In that vein, the Penny Satirist was a publication created to address the politicization of the working class.

§ Beano was the first comic to be geared towards children. It was the first to steer away from satiric narratives to shorter formats introducing the speech bubbles to the British audience. They were made by hand, on large paper (about A3) using collage techniques.

§ Political cartoonists, during the War, were not called in to fight because it was considered a “reserved occupation” (or essential service).

§ Contemporary to Hitler, were political satires about him. I found that fascinating that such a tyrant could be subject of satire during the fact. I suppose it is parallel to today’s (well, yesterday’s thankfully) satires about Bush.
But what’s even more interesting is that this started to carry out into film. Charlie Chaplin’s The Great Dictator was made in 1940, completely satirizing Hitler reign, five year before his death.

§ The satirist David Low tried to warn people of the ills of fascism through his cartoons but was banned after drawing Hitler and Mussolini.

The show goes on at Tate Britain till September 5 – I do recommend it. But my advise would be: take time. There’s quite a bit to read, many formats to enjoy and even a small reading room. The raunchy (bawdy) room is not to be missed and there's a room of silliness that made me want to spend the whole day there.

A fine review of the show from the Guardian by Will Self

take a tour of the show with comedian Harry Hill, who helped put the it together.

Are women saving architectural heritage? comparing Moscow to Muharraq

Not completely comparable to what is happening in Moscow, but similarities between the two in architectural renaissance and urban rethought definitely resonate.

Having just read an article in the Guardian about “oligarch’s wives” being the people saving Moscow’s built heritage, it made me realize that we, Gulfies, have more than Dubai in common with the Russians! Though we can look at this critically – in the sense that I hope this does not turn into something of a cultural monopoly – in Bahrain, most people are happy to see this ‘renaissance’ jump started by our very own culture crusader, the Minister of Culture herself.

Justin McGuirk starts his story citing the advent of post-industrial re-use of spaces, in the same vein as it is seen in Europe and US (see the Wapping Project and the Tate Modern in London, and PS1 in NY). He explains that this was not seen in Moscow, until very recently due to the Russian taste for newer things, including buildings. Sounds very familiar.

Whether or not one agrees with this Russian taste for the ‘new’, Russia was home to many budding, sprouting, practicing and dying architectural theories. Being the home to many avant-garde and constructivist examples, many architecture enthusiasts travel there to look at this aspect of history and relish these unique structures. The point (among the points being made by the article) that these structures are going into derelict state is a shame as this architectural heritage, having a relationship within world politics (communist architecture, etc) is important internationally.

My point, however, is this, McGuirk goes on to explain: destroy-and-rebuild is the model favoured here, with over 1,000 historical buildings knocked down in the last decade. There's no pressure from heritage bodies and no incentives to convert industrial buildings. Indeed, there tend to be disincentives, such as the regulation that only new buildings can qualify for class A office status. It's no wonder that developers have been either demolishing the factories to build luxury apartment blocks or turning them into business parks. This is the sentence that made my mind switch rite over to Bahrain. There, we don’t exactly have the ‘class’ system to attach to buildings, but saying that, that is only relevant on an official level. Socially, it is very unlikely that a company that can afford it will go into a building that is anything less than (what is parallel to) a class A, after all, as mentioned above – the tastes are for newer things make that kind of address a more prestigious one. This outlook isn’t only among the businesspeople, but among the policy makers of the urban development too.

So in comes the vital role of ‘saving old buildings’. In Moscow, one of the examples sited is that of the Garage Center for Contemporary Culture; once a bus terminal is now an art center spearheaded by Dasha Zhukova, an heiress and wife of Chelsea football team owner, Roman Abramovich. Thus, would this mean that most of time that saving a building means re-defining its use?

(taken from: http://www.momondo.com/blogs/marusha/archive/2008/12/26/garage-the-biggest-the-best-and-simply-the-first.aspx)

In Bahrain, we have nothing nearly comparable in terms of magnitude, but definitely in terms of initiative and outlook, what I have referred to as a ‘movement’ to save buildings, has taken some architecturally valuable buildings and brought them back to life through art or other cultural events, again – a ‘movement’ initiated by the Minister of Culture. Unfortunately, many old buildings of social significance, buildings like the first schools, pre-colonial courtyard houses, and other such places are endangered. On the plus-side, however, this being the Minister's project means that a class-system towards preserving buildings is being development by the government heritage bodies. Meanwhile, at least 20 houses are now being refurbished towards preservation. Muharraq is now the host of a chain of museum houses that make up a ‘living museum’ while the Bin Mattar House, a refurbished 19^th century pearl merchant’s house, recently held the first exhibition in the Gulf for Zaha Hadid.

So would this mean, if it weren’t for these women who are looking at built heritage from the Gulf to Russia, much of it would be gone? I’d hate to think so, after all, we can't forget Prince Charles' passion on the subject. But nonetheless, thank God for these women!

More on women in the Gulf fostering the arts

an 18th century take on "Fortress Europe"

As a Bahraini citizen, I, like many, many others from my country, region, ethnicity, hemisphere, etc. are unable to travel the world freely. We are unable to treat the world as one. We are barred from entering areas unless a list of documents, quite a personal and time consuming process (for those of you lucky enough not to endure such humiliation, this includes: 3-6 months personal bank statements, insurance, letter from employer, hotel reservations, trip tickets, and 2 passport pics after which an appointment is to be made with the relevant embassy, most of which require the date to be organized by phone through which one pays 1British pound/minute with the phone call lasting a minimum of 20mins; after which a wait that can last up to months follows) are shown to an embassy personnel and then granted a visa (or rejected in worst case scenarios) which states that entry into the country is still at the discretion of the visa control officer of the airport.

In his Perpetual peace: a philosophical sketch Kant writes that the “’cosmopolitan right’, the basic right of all world citizens, should rest on conditions of universal hospitality. That is, on the right of a stranger not to be treated with hostility when he arrives on someone else’s territory.” Since the 2001 attacks on NYC, the attack that started this snowball of ethnic divide in terms of the ‘right to visit’, I, even though only one of my criteria fits that of he who was named ‘public enemy no. 1’, which is that I am Muslim, had been treated with ‘hostility’ several times. This hostile treatment ranged from consistent ‘random checks’ for drugs and explosives to a thorough search of my bags at one point to the extent of going through photos asking me who each person was and what their jobs are (a particular enquiry into my sister’s wedding invitation: “Who is she? Who did she marry?” – really sent me flying!) Hostile? Indeed – perhaps US immigration should have brushed up on their Kantesian theory of universal hospitality.

But today, learning of the fact that the idea to abolish class based, agrarian societies goes way back to 18^th century writings of Jean-Jacques Rousseau makes me question this trajectory of the ‘new world order’ even more. In this case, we can say that all, Kant, Rousseau, Locke – are twisting in their graves at the state of what is happening today with the people’s ongoing division. In particular it does not in the least bit have to do with any kind of ‘natural’ course, as it was reflected on by Rousseau. In fact, it is quite the opposite: today these restrictions are being supported by the wars fought for whatever misleading reason the government at the time gave. The reasons for these barriers are entering the shady area where we are unsure what they are anymore, did they follow the war or vice versa? Slowly, the restrictions are dependent on details of people’s wealth and social standing. Applications are questioning, more and more, towards people’s class, as in, if one has money, for example, a relative of mine when getting his Schengen visa was questioned about how many credit cards he had, and how many were working, what the limits were, etc. Did this assist him in receiving his 2-year Schengen, a new and open limit in terms of what is usually given for multiple-entries into Europe? Most likely so. Requirements clearly state that a certain amount of money is to be available for each day of one’s stay within the EU. So one can argue that today, it is not about the ethnicity anymore, it is turning into a crowd control of class basis. Hart writes, “Rousseau was concerned not with individual variations in natural endowments which we can do little about, but with the artificial inequalities of wealth, honour and the capacity to command obedience derived from social convention which can be changed.” He spoke of ‘human freedom’ in that sense, where “hunter-gatherers” were able to exercise this freedom on the metaphysical level not having to adhere to the day-to-day rules of what must be done in order to achieve everyday aspirations and necessities: from eating to traveling, no matter the distance, a stark contrast to today’s everyday of bureaucratic banality. This was a pre-economic structure to the acquired wealth in the way that we know it today, even more starkly different from the modern capitalist notion of virtual wealth and debt systems that came about and is getting more and more hyper with the each passing season. The notions of property and government do even more to make this a more stringent and exclusivity based social system. Rousseau, whose ideas look at humanity before the imposition of social orders argued, in his 18^th century context, that this is not the nature of our existence. An idea that we hopefully do not have to turn to anyone’s writing to realize.

Despite not being able to go to almost an entire continent (mainland Europe) due to these 21^st century restrictions, Africa, Asia, South America, and the rest of the world are indeed the brighter side of “Fortress Europe.”

This entry was my response to “Towards a new human universal: rethinking anthropology for our times” in which Keith Hart revisits Kant’s writings on the popularization of anthropology and its uses as a guide to life for Radical Anthropology where all quotes are taken from.