Arabic Language Blog

     Yesterday, Egypt celebrated the 31st. Sinai Liberation Day عـــيــد تــحــــريـــر ســـيــنــــاء commemorating the withdrawal إنـــســـحـــــاب of the Israeli troops from Taba طــابـــا ; the last occupied part of the Sinai Peninsula  شـــبـه جــزيـــرة ســـيــنــــاء. The day is a national holiday أجـــازة قـــومـــيــة in Egypt and is celebrated by all people and the government الـــحـــكــومـــة in different ways. People of all ages enjoyed themselves and their families in the parks or took a walk by the  Nile banks. In Sinai itself the Ministry of Higher Education وزارة الــتـــعــلــيـــم الــعـــالــى in cooperation with the North Sinai government held many celebratory activities in Al-Arish  الــعـــريــــش; capital of the governorate. 

      On this occasion, I am going to present a short beautiful poem to one of the Egypt’s contemporary مــُــعـــاصــِـــر poets; Yusuf Khaleef يـُـــوسـُــف خــلـــيــــف . Khaleef worked as a professor of the Arabic Language literature الأدب الـعـــربــى for a long time both in Egypt and other Arab countries. The poem is dedicated to Sinai and reflects its status مــكـــانـــة in every Egyptian person’s heart.

ســَــــيــنـــَــاءُ ..أرضُ الــفـــَــــيــْـــروز

Sinai; Land of Turquoise

 سَــــــيـنـــاءُ عــــَــــــروسٌ بــَــــدويــّــــــــة          سـَــــيــنــــاءُ خـــُـــيـــُـــــولٌ عــَـــربـــيــّــــة

Sinai is a  Bedouin pride … Sinai;  Arabian horses   

ســَــــيــنــاءُ حـــَـــمــَّــــامـَـــاتٌ بــــيــــــضٌ          و ســَــنـــَـــابــلُ قــَــمــْـــــحٍ ذهـــــبــيـــــّــــة

Sinai; white bathrooms … And golden wheat spikes

و جــَـــداوِلُ مـِــن عـِـــطـــــــرٍ رَقـــــــــراقٍ           فَـــــَــــــــوقَ ضــــِـــفــــَـــــافٍ ورديــــّــــــة

And streams of running perfume … Above rosy banks

سـَــيــنــَــاءُ مــَـــنـــَــاجــِـــمُ فــَـــــيـــــــرُوز          و كـــُــــنـــُــــوزُ عـــَـــقـــيـــقٍ سِــحــريــّـــة

Sinai: turquoise mines … And magical garnet treasures

سـَـــيــنــاءُ تــَــمــيـمـَـــة وادِى الـــنــيــــــلِ           تــَـــعـــُــــودُ إِلــى صـــَـــــدرِ الـــــــــــــوَادِى

Sinai: the amulet of the Nile Valley … Returns to the Valley’s arms

سـَــيــنــاءُ تــَــعــُــودُ وَ سـَــاقـِــى الـــنــُّــورِ          يــَـــصــُـــــبُّ كـــُـــــــؤوسَ الأضـــْـــــــــواءِ

Sinai returns and the light bartender … Pours glasses of light

و حــَـــمــَـــامٌ أبــيــــضُ  مــِــثــلَ الــنـــُّـــورِ          يــُـــرَفــْـــرِفُ بــَـــيـــْــــنَ الأَحـــْــــيـــَــــــاءِ

And white pigeons, light-like … Flies amongst the alive

و غــُــصـُـــونٌ مـِـنْ شـَــجـَـــرِ الـزَّيـْــتــُــونِ          تـــُــغـــطــــِّـــى وَجـــْــــهَ الــصـَّـــحــَــــــراءِ

And branches of olive trees … Covers the face of the desert

و طــُـــيــُـــورٌ خــُـــضـــْـــرٌ فَــوقَ الأُفـــُـــقِ          تـــُـــحــْـــيـــِـــى ذِكــْــــرَى الـشــُّــهــَــــــداءِ

And green birds in on the horizon … Commemorate the martyrs

و غـِـــنــَــاءٌ فــَـــوقَ شـِــــفــَـــاهِ الــحــُــــورِ          يــُـــحــَـــيــِّـــى أَغـــْـــلــــَــى الأَســْــمــَـــاءِ

And songs on the lips of angels … greeting the dearest of all names.

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Peace  ســــلام /Salaam/

Today, the UN General Assembly has voted to grant the Palestinians the status of non-member observer state  (دولة مراقب غير عضو).

138 member states voted in favour (لصالح), while 9 voted against (ضد), with 41 nations abstaining (امتنعت).

This is a great day for the Palestinian people, as it is a step forward on the way to having international recognition (الاعتراف الدولي ) of the Palestinian state (دولة فلسطينية) .

Although Israel and the US have strongly opposed (عارض) the move, and described it as a step backward for the peace process (عملية السلام)!

I believe this is a great historic decision that can make a big difference for the region by improving the prospects of peace and ending the historic injustice done to the Palestinian people! It would be really great to have two states (Israeli and Palestinain) living together in peace! We are probably one step closer to this today than we were yesterday, and it is very exciting!

        The two temples at Abu Simbel أبو سمبل are among the most magnificent monuments آثار in the world. Their removal and reconstruction was a historic event in itself. When the temples (280 km from Aswan) were threatened by submersion الغمر – الغرق in Lake Nasser, due to the construction of the High Dam السد العالى , the Egyptian Government asked for the support of UNESCO اليونسكو and launched a world wide appeal. During the rescue operation عملية إنقاذ which began in 1964 and continued until 1968, the two temples were dismantled and raised over 60 meters up the sandstone cliff where they had been built more than 3.000 years before. There, they were reassembled, in the exact same relationship to each other and the sun, and covered with an artificial صناعى mountain. Most of the joins in the stone have now been filled by antiquity experts خبراء , but inside the temples it is still possible to see where the blocks were cut. You can also go inside the man-made dome and see an exhibition معرض of photographs showing the different stages of the massive removal-reconstruction process.

 The Temple of Re-Harakhte (The Sun Temple of Ramsis II):  

     The main temple was dedicated to Ramsis II and to the four universal gods آلهة Ptah, Re-Harakhte, Amun-Re, and to Ramsis II himself. Of the seven temples he built, Abu Simbel is considered to be the most impressive.

     Above the doorway مدخل in a niche, stands the sun god, a falcon headed representation of Ramsis, holding a war-scepter which shows the head and neck of an animal which is read as user, in his right and a figure of Ma’at in his left. This setup ingeniously creates the Kings Throne عرش name of User-Ma’at-Re. At the top of the facade is a row of apes which are thought to be greeting the morning sun and indeed the monument looks best at that time. The sides of the thrones next to the entrance are decorated with Nile gods symbolically uniting Egypt, while below are prisoners, representing conquered nations الأمم المهزومة , to the left, African and to the right, Asian.

     The entrance leads into a Grand Hall which is 57 feet high and 52 feet wide and was cut from the rock. It is supported with eight pillars with statues تماثيل of Ramsis.

      To either side of the Grand Hall are smaller rooms, two to the South الجنوب and four to the North الشمال . Most suggest that these rooms were for storage التخزين (treasure كنز rooms) but elsewhere it is suggested that they were used for festivals مهرجانات related to the Kings Jubilee.

    Beyond the Grand Hall is the second hypostyle hall with its flowered pillars أعمدة . Scenes in this hall show the King and his wife, Nefertari نفرتارى making offerings to Amun and Re-Harakhte (the Sun God), and beyond that is the three chapels, the central one containing the four deities worshipped in the temple (including Ramsis II).

     The sun shines on the face of the statue on February 22 ‎and October 22 every year, the birthday and the coronation date of Ramses II.