Cairo International Book Fair No. 42

Today, Thursday 28 January 2010 CIBF was opened officially by the president of republic & tomorrow Friday 29 January, it will be open for the people.

It is continuous for two weeks. It will be closed on Saturday 13 February.

Neturei Karta International (Jews United Against Zionism & Israel)

I tried to contact the Rabbi Yisroel Dovid Weiss, & nkusa.org told me that he has no an email address, a blog or a website & he is not on computer at all.

They gave me his phone number, but I want to greet him from here for his noticeable activity against Zionism & Israel.

I watched him since a while in a TV program on the Egyptian satellite (Nile Sat.). He was a very good spokesman.

The Difference between the Novel and the Fiction

According to Wikipedia,

The fiction is a branch of literature which deals, in part or in whole, with temporally contra-factual events (events that are not true at the time of writing).

There are also the definitions of non-fiction & semi-fiction in Wikipedia.

The novel is a long narrative in literary prose.

According to English-to-Arabic dictionary,

The fiction is a short story, a novel, a novelette (novella), a tale, a narrative, children's book or story, but it must be an imagination or a fantasy (fable, myth, legend).

The novel is a long story only. Maybe it is a fiction, maybe it is a true.

If anyone knows other definitions, please he tells us.

Stop the wall between Egypt & Palestine

To the last pharaoh, to our Egyptian stubborn president Muhammad Hosni Mubarak: Who gave you the right to build an underground metal barrier on the eastern borders of Egypt?!

Who gave you the permission to separate between the Egyptians & the Palestinians?! USA, Israel or yourself!!!

You wanted really to block tunnels used to smuggle weapons into the Palestinian land or you wanted to leave the Palestinians as a prey for the Israelis!!!

Please, our aged president: don't isolate our brothers from us!

2010 & 1431

Happy New Year

Today 2010 started & before two weeks ago exactly on Friday 18-12-2009 the new Islamic year 1431 started.

1430 years passed since the great migration (Hijra) of our prophet & messenger Muhammad from Mecca to Medina (the light city).

Muhammad & his close friend Abu Bakr As-Siddiq emigrated at night & were hidden for three days in a cave in the mountain.

When the unbelievers arrived to the cave, they thought that the cave is empty & went without killing Muhammad & Abu Bakr!!

As there was a spider weaved a web closed the entrance of cave & two doves built a nest & laid eggs in front of the cave.

If one of the conspirators looked under his feet, he would see the two men, but this didn't happen & the two friends reached Medina safe. And from The Light City, the message of Muhammad arrived to the whole world & the Islam became spread till now.

The First Chapters of My Novels on Scribd.Com:

All of them in Arabic Language:

The first chapter from "Be luckier than us"

The first chapter from "Qenawy ollas"

The first chapter from "Memories in the corridor"

The first chapter from "My heart is zigzag"

The first chapter from "Made in Egypt"

The first chapter from "Messages to Allah"

The first chapter from "A hole in my heart"

The first chapter from "Reda"

The first chapter from "Chechnya"

The first chapter from "Cabin no. 9"

The first chapter from "America Brunei Egypt"

The first chapter from "Foreigner, but!!!"

The first chapter from "12 Circassian roosters"

The first chapter from "A Somali pirate"

Sufi Literature & Sufi Novel

In the websites, there is focusing on the Persian (Iranian) and Indian Sufi literature only, although the Arabic Sufi literature is very rich also.

So, I hope from International League of Islamic Literature or www.adabislami.org to create an annual prize especially for the Arabic Sufi fiction.

The Ban on Construction of New Minarets in Switzerland

Although my blog this mainly interests in literature & writing, but any cultured human can't ignore the current political events, especially if he was a Muslim because the true & good Muslim doesn’t separate between the religion and the policy. Any other religion is a part of life, but the Islam is the whole life. It enters in all details of our daily life.

So, I'm as a religious Muslim, not a Secular Muslim, I was not surprised when Switzerland banned on 29 November 2009 the construction of new minarets for mosques, while it allows with the towers & bells of churches!!!

I didn't feel angry because I realize well that the conception of freedom in the most of European countries is unbalanced & the scales of justice in these countries are not equal.

They criticize our Islamic headscarf, while they clap the hands for the nuns who wear the same headscarf. It is the Swiss freedom!!!

Standing on Arafat Mountain

To who doesn't know; Arafat is a mountain in Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.

Like every year, today 26-11-2009, millions of Muslims from all nationalities stand on Arafat from the daybreak till the sunset, according to the rites of Islamic pilgrimage.

Of course Arafat day belongs to the lunar year or the Islamic calendar, so it returns 11 days every solar year. The next year, it will be mostly on 15-11-2010.

Arafat day is one of the most important days as for the Muslims & the best day the sun rose on it. It's the day before the Muslims' Greater Bairam.

Tomorrow, on the Muslims' Major Feast or the Feast of Immolation (Sacrifice), all the Muslims around the world will butcher millions of sheep, goats, cows & other on. They do that like the Prophets' Father Ibrahim who would slaughter his son the prophet Ismail as he saw in the dream, but at the last moment, Allah ransomed Ismail with a great ram.

Boycott Algeria till they apologize officially, The dream of 80 million Egyptian

I don't invite to boycott Algeria for ever; I'm against that any Islamic Arabic country boycotts its sister whatever happened between them. However, Egypt must boycott Algeria till it apologizes.

That the Algerians carry knifes & swords in a football match, that is a usual behavior!!!

That the Algerians throw the Egyptians by stones, smash the Egyptians' buses & cars by rubble in Sudan on 18-11-2009, although they were the winners, that are expected things!!!

That the Algerians abuse the Egyptian women, crash the Egyptian buildings & foundations in Sudan, that are not new things!!!

That the Algerians chase the Egyptians till the airport of Sudan, that is an understood thing!!!

But the not acceptable thing, that the Algerians burn the Egyptian flag, trample it by their shoes and pass above it many times by their cars back & forth!!! As if it was the Israeli flag!!!

So, it is a duty for every Egyptian to boycott every Algerian, till the Algerian president by himself apologizes to Egypt & the Egyptians.

To all the Algerians, it seems that you forgot what Egypt & Gamal Abdel Nasser did for you until you take your independence from France in 1962!!! You forgot the Arabism & the Islam!!!

To all the Egyptians, you proved that you are a very civilized nation. But the civilization doesn't mean the forgiveness in the rights!!!

Important events this week:

Tuesday 10 November 2009:

Opening of Cairo International Film Festival no. 33, it is continuous till Friday 20-11-2009

Wednesday 11 November 2009:

1. Opening of Cairo Arab Media Festival no. 15, it finished Sunday 15-11-2009

2. The fifth anniversary of the Palestinian president Yasser Arafat death

3. Alex Wiens was found guilty of the murder of Marwa El-Sherbini and sentenced to life imprisonment

4. The shining star Leonardo Dicaprio birthday no. 35

Saturday 14 November 2009:

The football match between Egypt & Algeria in Cairo International Stadium, for 2010 FIFA World Cup qualification. Egypt won 2-0 & there will be a final match in Sudan on the next Wednesday 18-11-2009

The Madman of Layla:

One of the most beautiful love poetries, that which was said by the sheikh Abu-l-Hassan ash-Shadhili about the Manic of Layla:

The madman saw a wolf in the desert

He dragged a tail from the charity for it

The people blamed him for what came out from him

And they said: you made the wolf obtain a great obtainment

He said: let the blame, my eyes saw it once nearby

Layla's house!!!

رأى المجنون فى البيداء ذئباً *** فجر له من الإحسان ذيلاً

فلاموه على ما كان منه *** و قالوا قد أنلت الذئب نيلاً

فقال : دعوا الملامة أن عينى *** رأته مرة فى حى ليلى !!!

I translated it a semi-literal translation, to let you taste the words of the Arabic love.

Love Day in Egypt

4 November is love day in Egypt; of course it is different from 14 February or Valentine's Day.

4 November this year 2009 is the 87^th anniversary of discovering the tomb of Tutankhamun by Howard Carter, that very famous tomb no. 62 in the Valley of the Kings or KV62 at the west bank, Luxor.

62 is the last number in VK, as the 62^nd tombs took their serial numbers according to the sequence of their discoveries. So, KV62 is the last tomb was discovered in the royal valley.

On 4 November 1922, when Howard Carter found this tomb, he was charmed & asked himself: if all these treasures exist in a tomb of 18 years old king, so what is about tombs of the old pharaohs?!

Carter couldn't answer this question until he died after 17 years from this historical discovery.

The pain in the writer's life

The writer, who suffered from a lot of unsuccessful love stories, is creative more than the others.

Except for the lovesickness, the novelist didn't become a creator. That is because he realizes in his novels & fertile imagination what he failed to realize in fact!

Maybe, we meet in the paradise who we couldn't meet in life.

Briefly, the pain makes the miracles.

Mustafa Mahmud

Today Saturday 31-10-2009 at 7:30 am Dr. Mustafa Mahmud died.

He was one of the most famous & important Egyptian scientists in the current time. And his famous TV program (the science & the faith) was one of our favorite programs when we were young children.

May Allah have mercy upon him!

Marwa El-Sherbini – The Martyr of Veil

Today, Monday 26 October 2009 is judgment of Marwa's killer in the court of Dresden, Germany.

Marwa El-Sherbini (32 years old) was an Egyptian pharmacist from my city (Alexandria), but she was studying & living with her husband & young child in (Germany).

On 1 July 2009, a Russian-German racialist called (Alex W) suffers from Islamophobia, killed (Marwa) in the courtroom by a knife, while she was a pregnant with her second child, because she wears the Islamic headscarf!!! So, he killed two spirits.

Dear Marwa, we will never forget you!

http://www.marwaelsherbiny.com/

Today & Ramesses II

Every year on 22 October & 22 February, the rays of the sun fall down vertically on the face of king Ramesses II inside his temple in Abu simple, twice every year… in his birthday & Coronation day. Thousands of tourists come to watch this immortal moment in the early morning! It's the miracle of the ancient Egyptians!

Top 100 universities in the world

A lot of people are angry because list of the best 100 universities in the world doesn't include any Arabic or Egyptian university. This is an expected thing as long as a lot of westerners are still thinking that we ride the camels & live in tents!!!

A light spot, don't be angry because one of the foolish American actors called his dog (Sadat), the name of the Egyptian ex-president, as an Iraqi journalist threw (Bush), the American ex-president, by shoes!!! So, an eye for an eye!

The Egyptian belly-dancers in USA!!!

During the search on the internet, I found by chance a lot of Egyptian belly-dance schools in USA!!! I was surprised that many Egyptian belly-dancers live in the United States to teach the Americans this art!!!

Are these women our cultural attachés abroad?! Why there are no schools teach the Arabic literature?!

The Egyptian minister of culture

Unfortunately, the Egyptian media gave an impression that the Egyptians are depressed because Farouk Hosny, the Egyptian minister of culture, failed to be the general manager of UNESCO on September 22, 2009!!!

No one in Egypt is sad for that, except Farouk Hosny himself!!!

Mr. Farouk is 71 years old & he is a minister of culture since 1987 (22 years ago)!!!

He has a lot of strange announcements which provoked the Egyptian street. So, what will this aged minister does in the UNESCO?!

On the light side, today 13^th of October, 2009; on this day in 1988, the international Egyptian novelist Naguib Mahfouz won the prize of Nobel in literature.

Although, I disagree with the novels of Naguib Mahfouz, but I can't deny that he was one of the most magnificent writers of Egypt & the Arabic world.

The twelve women who won Nobel Prize in Literature:

Serial	Name	Country	Year	Age in that year
1	Selma Lagerlöf	Sweden	1909	51
2	Grazia Deledda	Italy	1926	55
3	Sigrid Undset	Norway	1928	46
4	Pearl S. Buck	USA	1938	46
5	Gabriela Mistral	Chile	1945	56
6	Nelly Sachs (with an Israeli man)	Sweden	1966	75
7	Nadine Gordimer	South Africa	1991	68
8	Toni Morrison	USA	1993	62
9	Wisława Szymborska	Poland	1996	73
10	Elfriede Jelinek	Austria	2004	58
11	Doris Lessing	UK	2007	88
12	Herta Müller	Germany	2009	56

Why did not get this prize any woman under age 40?!

Why did not get this prize any Arabic or Muslim woman?!

Why did not get this prize any famous woman or who has bestselling novels?!

These are just questions!!!