| A Ministry of State for Antiquities plan to raise ticket prices in Islamic Cairo seems bound to backfire |
| By Kate Durham |
| While on my daily news trawl, I ran across an Al-Ahram Weekly interview with the latest Minister of State for Antiquities Affairs (MSAA) Mohamed Ibrahim, in the January 12-18, 2012 issue. I don't envy the guy's position — he's got a new ministry full of unhappy, underpaid and largely untenured workers to satisfy and an overflowing basket of conservation and restoration projects to kickstart. One of the ways Ibrahim plans to boost the ministry's budget, according to this interview, is to start charging admission for nine monuments on Al Moez Li Din Allah Street, between Al-Azhar Street and Bab El-Fotouh. The admission price per monument is to be LE 100 for foreigners and LE 1 for Egyptians, with proceeds going directly towards preserving Islamic monuments.It sounds good on paper, but I hope he’s got other plans. This one is not going bring as much to the ministry coffers as he thinks. Because unless there are serious changes in how the tourism industry works, with the existing packaged tours of Cairo the agents provide, the majority of tourists will never find out these monuments exist.In 2003, amid much fanfare, the Ministry of Tourism opened up Souk El Fustat (Fustat Market) between Amr Ibn Al-Aas Mosque and the ancient churches of Old Cairo. To this day, I believe it was a brilliant idea: a mini mall dedicated to Egyptian handicrafts with set prices. In the souk's very brief heyday, you could find folkloric puppets, embroidered clothing, natural cosmetics, pottery and more; then take a break with lunch at the tourist restaurant. Today, Souk El Fustat stands mostly empty, with maybe a dozen shops still operating. The restaurant was shuttered years ago, and in all the years I visited it, the mall never reached full occupancy of venders. The souk is right next to one of the must-see tourist sites in Cairo, but the majority of tourists never knew it was there. The bulk of tourists coming through Egypt are on package tours — protected herds, I call them. A bus takes them to a site, a guide tells them all about it, then they're back on the bus to the next site. If they’re lucky, the herd might get some time to wander, but not much. Souk El Fustat never made it on the itinerary. At Old Cairo, the buses drive right past the relatively nondescript building that is the souk and let their passengers out in front of the Coptic monuments. The visit ends, the tourist get back on the buses and drive right past the souk again on their way to some other piece of history. Since the venders weren’t making any money, they abandoned the souk. Souk El Fustat is a shopping opportunity, which tourists love. Islamic architecture is a much more specialized interest. The standard Islamic sites on a Cairo guided tour are the Mohamed Ali Mosque at the Citadel, Al-Azhar Mosque and Khan El-Khalili (with a drop-off in front of El-Hussein Mosque). Trust me when I tell you: for the first, second and even third timer, the Khan is overwhelming even without a tour guide’s deadline. With a deadline, the protected herd is never going to make it to Al Moez Street. There are some really interesting things worth seeing in Islamic Cairo, but even the most dedicated wanderer cannot find them all without help. But if the Tourism Ministry can’t coordinate with tour agencies to promote a local crafts outlet, how is the MSA going to convince tour guides to take their herds to obscure monuments on Al Moez Street. It’s time for the MSAA to team up with tour operators to create some new guided tours. How about a Naguib Mahfouz Walk, led by an Islamic architecture conservator, to the medieval monuments that formed the backdrop to some of Mahfouz’s novels. Or a Gate-to-Gate Walk, checking out the buildings between Bab Zuwayla to Bab Fotouh. While repackaging Islamic Cairo, repackage that pricing scheme as well, because LE 100 for a single Islamic monument is gouging the tourists. General entry to the Egyptian Museum is LE 60; LE 100 gets you in to see the Royal Mummies. A trip to the Giza Plateau will cost you around LE 250 in admission fees, including the separate tickets for the plateau, the Solar Boat Museum, the Great Pyramid and one of the smaller pyramids. Tourists don’t mind paying high ticket prices for those world-famous sights, but it won’t take them long to figure out that none of the nine monuments in question are blockbuster exhibits. It is easy to spend several hours at a museum or the Giza Plateau, but a general interest tourist will not spend more than an hour at an Al Moez monument. Realistically, if you're spending an hour at a sabil [public water fountain], you’ve probably fallen asleep in the cistern. Not to mention the fact that if a tourist has made it to that section of Al Moez Street, he’s already run the gauntlet of Khan shopkeepers and their litany of “How can I help you spend your money.” Assuming said tourist has any money left at that point, he’s not going to want to shell out LE 100 every time he sees an interesting doorway. Charging LE 100 per monument will actually kill guided tours of Islamic Cairo by driving the price of an excursion up by hundreds of pounds. That’s a bit counterproductive when the goal is to encourage tour guides to take their groups to Al Moez Street. A more reasonable approach, one that would actually encourage tourists to explore Al Moez Street, is to make that LE 100 ticket good for entry to three or four monuments, sold at any of the nine buildings on Ibrahim’s list. This type of ticket brings the admission price more in line with the antiquities sites around the nation and lets the tour industry set affordable excursion prices. Almost every ministry is in panic mode trying to resolve their budget and labor issues, and I don't begrudge the MSA for trying to find a solution. But it will be awfully ironic if the ministry in charge of protecting our heritage fails to learn from past mistakes. |
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