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WEDNESDAY NOSTALGIA: LANTERN SLIDES WEEK IX

By | December 5, 2012 | Egypt, History, Wednesday Nostalgia | Comments Off on WEDNESDAY NOSTALGIA: LANTERN SLIDES WEEK IX

By Islam El Shazly

One of the main reasons for reminiscing is to escape the present, it is undeniable, the urge and the yearning for better times or better quality of life, or cleaner air. It makes for a good flight away from the grind of modern day life that has become the most common feature throughout the later part of the 20th century and the current century!

Fact is concepts like “quality of life” are an invention of the second half of the 1900’s, when we began to dissect every aspect of our lives, granted, quality of life is a very important aspect of our livelihood, and it is most certain that it preoccupied our predecessors, but I doubt that it was the driving force behind their existence. Read more…

WDNESDAY NOSTALGIA: LANTERN SLIDES – WEEK VIII

By | November 28, 2012 | Egypt, Heritage + Conservation, History, Wednesday Nostalgia | Comments Off on WDNESDAY NOSTALGIA: LANTERN SLIDES – WEEK VIII

By Islam El Shazly

Egyptian builders over the ages were very ambitious; and their patrons were even more so. Only in recent years has the grandiose gone away and got replaced by mediocre concrete construction attempting to mimic some of the European and North American architecture, with few exceptions of real architectural marvels.

From the early builders Djoser and Imhotep to the Khedive Ismail, they all left monuments as a testament to their vision, some visions were more attainable than others, and some put the country in debt. However their monuments remain as a reminder of the  sheer willpower and imagination they had. And maybe a little bit of ego! Read more…

OPULENT: THE TOP 11 BOUTIQUE HOTELS IN EGYPT

By | November 27, 2012 | Egypt, Reviews, Travel + Leisure | Comments Off on OPULENT: THE TOP 11 BOUTIQUE HOTELS IN EGYPT

By Islam El Shazly

Back in the early 20th century and the late 19th century travelling was a more relaxed affair; because of the nature of travel at the time which was predominantly by either trains or ships, people were away from their homes for months at a time, and that called for a different kind of hotel.

The extended nature of the stay meant that only the well to do and the wealthy could travel for any sustained period of time, and hotels became a sort of a home away from home. Hotels of the day defined luxury, unlike most fancy hotels of today that are mostly glitz and glamour, those ones were truly palatial and decadent. Read more…

WDNESDAY NOSTALGIA: LANTERN SLIDES – WEEK VII

By | November 14, 2012 | Egypt, Heritage + Conservation, History, Wednesday Nostalgia | Comments Off on WDNESDAY NOSTALGIA: LANTERN SLIDES – WEEK VII

 

By Islam El Shazly

A picture is worth a 1000 words, even more so when they are from this calibre, then they really become a a window to the past, they provide moments in time that are now lost. In a sense like the great art of the ancient world, left for us by master artisans, on walls of temples and villas, they might not be as intricate but they are still every inch fascinating.

Read more…

WDNESDAY NOSTALGIA: LANTERN SLIDES – WEEK VI

By | November 7, 2012 | Egypt, Heritage + Conservation, History | Comments Off on WDNESDAY NOSTALGIA: LANTERN SLIDES – WEEK VI

 

By Islam El Shazly

What started out as just a nostalgic post about the beauty of Egypt and the sights that are for the most part gone from our lives – some buried under the waters of Lake Nasser and some abroad! – has turned into musings about what could have been and what could be.

The fact is, these amazing, almost magical, stills of a time gone by awakened a sense of belonging Read more…

PRIMAL FITNESS II

By | November 5, 2012 | Survival, Travel + Leisure | Comments Off on PRIMAL FITNESS II

 

By Islam El Shazly
Exercise by Darryl Edwards – The Fitness Explorer

There are a lot of ways to completely mess up your health and well being; gluttony is definitely up there on the top of the list same as not eating enough, not enough sleep and too much sleep, and something a lot of people (me included) don’t give a second thought too: irregular or haphazard exercising.

Not working out at all is not good for your well being, but chances are you’ll still be good, but on and off exercising actually traumatises your body and muscles might lead to chronic and regular injuries, which is definitely not fun at all. A lot of people only remember to hit the gym with zeal right around the summer, when the need to show off their “fab abs” becomes almost obsessive in nature, others only do it when they have a chance, because of a busy schedule or just simple laziness. It does more harm than good.

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WDNESDAY NOSTALGIA: LANTERN SLIDES – WEEK V

By | October 31, 2012 | Egypt, Heritage + Conservation, History | Comments Off on WDNESDAY NOSTALGIA: LANTERN SLIDES – WEEK V

 

By Islam El Shazly

Looking at the state of affairs in modern day Egypt makes me wonder: have we totally lost our innocence and simplicity?

Over the last 7,000 years Egypt has seen her fair share of pretty much everything, from natural disasters to human wrought disasters and multitude of invasions and occupations. However, we’ve always to learn from them, adapt, then advance further. All while still maintaining the simplicity that was characteristic of the Egyptian. So the question should rather be: what went wrong in the last 60 to 200 years? When did that dramatic shift in the Egyptian persona happen?

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AN APPOINTMENT WITH AGATHA

By | October 28, 2012 | History, Travel + Leisure, Travel Chronicles | 1 Comment

By Islam El Shazly

Throughout the ages, Egypt has seen her fair share of foreign celebrities, philosophers, Scientists, and state men and women; from Herodotus to Caesar, from Napoleon to Churchill, and from Homer to Agatha Christie and beyond.

The Queen of suspense gets her fair share of the pie though; her visits to Egypt, the Levant and Mesopotamia spawned some of the best, most memorable tales of crime and suspense, with a backdrop of archaeology and history of days gone by and history in the making.

Read more…

15 EXCEPTIONAL TRAVEL READS

By | October 17, 2012 | Retail + Shopping, Reviews, Travel + Leisure | 4 Comments

 

By Islam El Shazly

One thing that should be indispensable is a good book to read while travelling, but how to choose the right one for you from the millions out there is the trick.

This here is an eclectic mix of books that make for an enjoyable, thought-provoking, and even humorous read; from the tales of a fictional archaeologist, to the tantalizing tales of murder and suspense, and from a challenge of the socio-political colonial pretext of orientalism to the good-natured humorous adventures of the indomitable Gauls. There is something here for everyone, even the child in all of us. Read more…

WEDNESDAY NOSTALGIA: LANTERN SLIDES – WEEK II

By | October 10, 2012 | Egypt, Heritage + Conservation, History, Wednesday Nostalgia | Comments Off on WEDNESDAY NOSTALGIA: LANTERN SLIDES – WEEK II

By Islam El Shazly

Last week I took creative liberties with the quote about nostalgia, the proper quote is more like this “nostalgia is a seductive liar“, and that is probably down to the fact that as time slips by and we get older, our memory becomes a bit skewed. we are predisposed to readily remember the good and selectively forget the bad. So driving past one’s old stomping grounds one remembers every tree they climbed, every nook they hid in while playing hide-and-seek, and where they played on for hours on their bicycle, while keeping at bay the memories of bad moments, or painful experiences, Read more…