Egypt’s gem of a museum gears up for grand opening
CAIRO: Nestled near the iconic Giza pyramids, the Grand Egyptian Museum (GEM) is preparing for a lavish opening, featuring a towering statue of Ramses II and more than 100,000 artefacts, including Tutankhamun’s golden treasures.
After two decades of planning, the GEM is set to open fully on July 3, following a partial opening in October.
Its long-awaited debut comes after years of delays caused by political instability, economic crises, and the global pandemic.
Ahmed Ghoneim, the museum’s director, said the inauguration could span several days, with celebrations extending beyond the museum and pyramids to sites across Egypt and even abroad.
“It will be a spectacular showcase of Egypt’s historical and touristic potential,” Ghoneim told Egypt’s ON TV.
President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi has invited US President Donald Trump and Spain’s King Felipe VI to attend the ceremony.
“This museum is the (world’s) largest museum for a single civilization, which is the Pharaonic civilization,” El-Sisi said in December.
Spanning 50 hectares (120 acres), the GEM is twice the size of both Paris’s Louvre and New York’s Metropolitan, and two and a half times the British Museum, according to its director.
Statue of Ramses II
“The landscape of Egypt contributed to this rich civilization and we wanted to reflect that in the design,” said Roisin Heneghan, co-founder of Dublin-based Heneghan Peng Architects — the firm behind the museum’s design.
“You see the pieces in the museum in the context of the pyramids. You are reminded of the place where this all happened,” she told AFP.
An 11-meter (36-foot) statue of Ramses II greets visitors, leading to a grand staircase lined with statues of pharaohs, gods and sarcophagi, and ending at a window framing the pyramids.
Currently, 12 galleries display around 15,000 artefacts arranged chronologically from prehistory to the Greco-Roman period.
They include Queen Hetepheres’s treasures, such as her intricately carved armchair, in sophisticated lighting after years of being tucked away in the old Egyptian Museum in Tahrir Square.
Even before the official opening, the museum left some of its first visitors awestruck.
“I cannot get over how the lighting is. It is just atmospheric and helpful, and you end up just drawn to everything that is around,” said Philippa Hunt, a tourist from the United Kingdom.
South African visitor Leon Wolmarans said the GEM was a significant upgrade from the old one.
“This is much better organized, much better lit. The architecture is impressive,” he told AFP.
Among the most anticipated displays for the grand opening are the treasures of Tutankhamun, including his iconic gold mask, which will take pride of place in a dedicated gallery.
Attracting tourists
More than 5,000 Tutankhamun artefacts have been transferred to the GEM, though his full collection, including his sarcophagus and the embalmed remains of his daughters, will be revealed at the official opening.
The GEM will also showcase the 44-meter-long cedarwood solar barque, buried near the Great Pyramid around 2,500 BC.
Another boat, still being restored, will offer an immersive experience, with visitors watching conservators at work over the next three years.
With cutting-edge technology such as virtual reality and interactive exhibits, the GEM promises a fresh take on storytelling, making history come alive for younger generations.
The museum website lists entry prices starting at 200 Egyptian pounds (about $4) for adult nationals, and 1,200 pounds for foreigners.
Beyond archaeology, the GEM is central to Egypt’s efforts to revive an economy battered by inflation and debt.
With tourism recovering from the Covid-19 pandemic, the GEM is expected to attract five million visitors annually, adding to a record 15.7 million tourists in 2024.
Elhamy Al-Zayat, former chairman of the Egyptian Tourism Federation, said the museum’s proximity to the newly opened Sphinx International Airport, the pyramids and a growing number of nearby hotels will be a game-changer for Egypt’s tourism sector.
“There will be easy transportation options to and from the museum, making it accessible from anywhere,” he told AFP.
“This will definitely transform Egypt’s tourism industry.”
Palestinians struggle to restart their lives in the ruins of Gaza
BEIT LAHIYA, Gaza Strip: When night falls over northern Gaza, much of the cityscape of collapsed buildings and piled wreckage turns pitch black. Living inside the ruins of their home, Rawya Tamboura’s young sons get afraid of the dark, so she turns on a flashlight and her phone’s light to comfort them, for as long as the batteries last.
Displaced for most of the 16-month-long war, Tamboura is back in her house. But it is still a frustrating shell of a life, she says: There is no running water, electricity, heat or services, and no tools to clear the rubble around them.
Nearly 600,000 Palestinians flooded back into northern Gaza under the now month-old ceasefire in Gaza, according to the United Nations. After initial relief and joy at being back at their homes – even if damaged or destroyed – they now face the reality of living in the wreckage for the foreseeable future.
“Some people wish the war had never ended, feeling it would have been better to be killed,” Tamboura said. “I don’t know what we’ll do long-term. My brain stopped planning for the future.”
The six-week ceasefire is due to end Saturday, and it’s uncertain what will happen next. There are efforts to extend the calm as the next phase is negotiated. If fighting erupts again, those who returned to the north could find themselves once again in the middle of it.
A massive rebuilding job has no way to start
A report last week by the World Bank, UN and European Union estimated it will cost some $53 billion to rebuild Gaza after entire neighborhoods were decimated by Israel’s bombardment and offensives against Hamas militants. At the moment, there is almost no capacity or funding to start significant rebuilding.
A priority is making Gaza immediately livable. Earlier in February, Hamas threatened to hold up hostage releases unless more tents and temporary shelters were allowed into Gaza. It then reversed and accelerated hostage releases after Israel agreed to let in mobile homes and construction equipment.
Humanitarian agencies have stepped up services, setting up free kitchens and water delivery stations, and distributing tents and tarps to hundreds of thousands across Gaza, according to the UN
President Donald Trump turned up the pressure by calling for the entire population of Gaza to be removed permanently so the US can take over the territory and redevelop it for others. Rejecting the proposal, Palestinians say they want help to rebuild for themselves.
Gaza City’s municipality started fixing some water lines and clearing rubble from streets, said a spokesperson, Asem Alnabih. But it lacks heavy equipment. Only a few of its 40 bulldozers and five dump trucks still work, he said. Gaza is filled with over 50 million tons of rubble that would take 100 trucks working at full capacity over 15 years to clear away, the UN estimates.
Families try to get by day by day
Tamboura’s house in the northern town of Beit Lahiya was destroyed by an airstrike early in the war, so she and her family lived in the nearby Indonesian Hospital, where she worked as a nurse.
After the ceasefire, they moved back into the only room in her house that was semi-intact. The ceiling is partially collapsed, the walls are cracked; the surviving fridge and sink are useless with no water or electricity. They stack their sheets and blankets in a corner.
Tamboura said her 12-year-old son lugs heavy containers of water twice a day from distribution stations. They also have to find firewood for cooking. The influx of aid means there is food in the markets and prices went down, but it remains expensive, she said.
With the Indonesian Hospital too damaged to function, Tamboura walks an hour each day to work at the Kamal Adwan Hospital. She charges her and her husband’s phones using the hospital generator.
Many of Tamboura’s relatives returned to find nothing left of their homes, so they live in tents on or next to the rubble that gets blown away by winter winds or flooded during rains, she said.
Asmaa Dwaima and her family returned to Gaza City but had to rent an apartment because their home in the Tel Al-Hawa neighborhood was destroyed. It was only weeks after returning that she went to visit their four-story house, now a pile of flattened and burned wreckage.
“I couldn’t come here because I was afraid. I had an image of my house in my mind – its beauty, and warmth. ... I was afraid to face this truth,” the 25-year-old dentist said. “They don’t just destroy stone, they are destroying us and our identity.”
Her family had to rebuild the house once before, when it was leveled by airstrikes during a round of fighting between Israel and Hamas in 2014, she said. For the time being, they have no means to rebuild now.
“We need to remove the rubble because we want to pull out clothes and some of our belongings,” she said. “We need heavy equipment … There are no bricks or other construction tools and, if available, it’s extremely expensive.”
Desperation is growing
Tess Ingram, a spokesperson with UNICEF who visited northern Gaza since the ceasefire, said the families she met are “grieving the lives that they used to live as they begin to rebuild.”
Their desperation, she said, “is becoming more intense.”
Huda Skaik, a 20-year-old student, is sharing a room with her three siblings and parents at her grandparents’ house in Gaza City. It’s an improvement from life in the tent camps of central Gaza where they were displaced for much of the war, she said. There, they had to live among strangers, and their tent was washed away by rain. At least here they have walls and are with family, she said.
Before the war interrupted, Skaik had just started studying English literature at Gaza’s Islamic University. She is now enrolled in online classes the university is organizing. But the Internet is feeble, and her electricity relies on solar panels that don’t always work.
“The worst part is that we’re just now grasping that we lost it all,” she said. “The destruction is massive, but I’m trying to remain positive.”
