Cairo, Egypt
From Condemnations
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Basic Information
Cairo, which means "The Vanquisher" or "The Triumphant", was the capital city of Egypt. While Al-Qahirah is the official name of the city, in Egyptian Arabic it commonly shares the dialect's name for the country, transliteration: Masr. It used to have a metropolitan area population of about 17.285 million people. Cairo was also the sixteenth most populous metropolitan area in the world, and the most populous metropolitan area in Africa. The city was founded in AD 969 as the royal enclosure for the Fatimid caliphs, while the actual economic and administrative capital was in nearby Fustat. After Fustat was destroyed in 1168/1169 to prevent its capture by the Crusaders, the administrative capital of Egypt moved to Cairo, where it has remained ever since.
Cairo is located on the banks and islands of the Nile River in the north of Egypt, immediately south of the point where the river leaves its desert-bound valley and breaks into two branches into the low-lying Nile Delta region. The oldest part of the city is somewhat east of the river. There, the city gradually spreads west, engulfing the agricultural lands next to the Nile. These western areas, built on the model of Paris by Ismail the Magnificent in the mid-19th century, are marked by wide boulevards, public gardens, and open spaces. The older eastern section of the city is very different: having grown up haphazardly over the centuries it is filled with small lanes and crowded tenements. While western Cairo is dominated by the government buildings and modern architecture, the eastern half is filled with hundreds of ancient mosques that act as landmarks.
Currently it is one of the main bases of operation for the Revival Project and as such contains one of the several main field locations for the project. Lands found between the Nile and the Muqattan Hills are considered safe environments but the Revival Project wishes all survivors to stay within the main city limits for your surest road of safety.
City News
By March 13th, the Revival Project authorities put out a warning that there had been an increase in infected sightings within the city. Unfortunately, their Force Groups were unable to combat the threat and the city was overwhelmed and deemed a lost cause by March 15th, 2009. Efforts to reclaim it are underway.
Noteworthy Locations
- Khan el-Khalili — A major souq in the Old City of Cairo. The district is a major tourist attraction, and is considered by many, tourists and natives alike, to be one of the most interesting parts of Cairo. It is mostly shops, but some of the shops have also their own little factories or workshops.
- Cairo Citadel — The location, part of the Mokattam hill near the center of Cairo, was once famous for its fresh breeze and grand views of the city, and was fortified by the Ayyubid ruler Salah al-Din (Saladin) between 1176 and 1183 AD, to protect it from the Crusaders. The citadel stopped being the seat of government when Egypt's ruler, Khedive Ismail, moved to his newly built Abdin Palace in the Ismailiya neighborhood in the 1860s. There are two other mosques at the Citadel, the 13th/14th c. hypostyle mosque of al-Nasir Muhammad from the early Bahri Mamluk period, and the 16th c. Mosque of Suleyman Pasha, first of the Citadel's Ottoman-style mosques. The citadel also contains Al-Gawhara palace, the National Military Museum and the Police Museum.
- Al-Azhar Park — A major park in Cairo's Darb al-Ahmar neighborhood in Egypt. It was inaugurated in May 2005.
- Old Cairo — A part of Cairo that contains the remnants of those cities which were capitals before Cairo, such as Fustat, as well as some other elements from the city's varied history. For example, it encompasses Coptic Cairo and its many old churches and ruins of Roman fortifications. Modern tourists visit locations such as the Coptic Museum, the Babylon Fortress, the Hanging Church and other Coptic churches, the Ben Ezra Synagogue and the Mosque of Amr ibn al-'As. Fort Babylon is a Roman fortress around which many of the Egyptian Christians' oldest churches were built.
Survivors
- None as of yet.
Deceased
- None yet.
