saudis and the last egyptian bellydancer

Posted under current events, ummah by rahma

From Newsweek:

At the Grand Hyatt Cairo, a mile upstream along the Nile, the five-star hotel’s Saudi owner banned alcohol as of May 1 and ostentatiously ordered its $1.4 million inventory of booze flushed down the drains. “A hotel in Egypt without alcohol is like a beach without a sea,” says Aly Mourad, chairman of Studio Masr, the country’s oldest film outfit.

Although I rarely have a chance to say this, I give a reserved bravo to these Saudi investors.  Imagine a hotel in a predominantly muslim country, owned and operated by muslims, not selling alcohol.  It’s sacrilige is what it is.

Egyptians deplore what they call the Saudization of their culture

Although I’ll have to check back to get an exact quote from my inhouse egyptian, I’m calling bs on this one.  Perhaps some egyptians deplore this, but not all.   I know the husband talks glowingly of his year in Saudi Arabia, so I don’t really see him deploring this.

There are two ways egypt could be saudizied:

1. Their “version” of Islam is funded up the wazoo, drowning out native interpretations of the religion and stifling a more “traditional” (aka madhab based) version of Islam.  This I wold give a thumbs down to.  I would assume it’s been going on for decades already, just as it has been in the rest of the muslim world.

2. And/or they could take the business approach, as the Grand Hyatt owner did, and encourage halal business ventures.  I give this two thumbs way up.

Also, the article is completely ignoring the effect non-native dancers are having on the egyptian bellydance scence.  From my understanding, it’s pretty much dominated by russians.