The Big Pharaoh

A depressing post from The Big Pharaoh about Egyptian methods of preparing a USAID funded school for the First Lady’s visit.

Sunday, June 05, 2005
I didn’t want to write what you are going to read right now

I admit I thought countless times before writing today’s post. I signed in to Blogger twice only to sign off again. My hesitation was a result of me not wanting to “hang our very dirty clothes” in front of this blog readers. After much thought, I decided to post just to inform you of the humiliation many of us feel and what this “humiliation factor” can lead to.

Upon Laura Bush’s recent trip to Egypt, it was planned that she, along with her host Mrs. Mubarak, would visit a USAID funded school in Alexandria. One week before the scheduled visit, the tattered school was painted anew, tidied up, and the sewage system was fixed. The dirty roads around the school were cleaned up and trees were miraculously planted all around the area. A sign in English was written to welcome the 2 first ladies.

Nevertheless, the Alexandria education officials didn’t like how the Om el Qura school kids looked like! The girls were poor and wore dirty school uniforms. Instead of cleaning them out and distributing clean clothes that would have definitely drew a huge smile on their faces, the officials decided to replaced the kids with new kids brought from a language school! Not only that, they gave the entire school staff a one week leave! Can you imagine how humiliated the school kids and the teachers are feeling right now!

(via Clive Davis)