In Old Cairo, residents reconnect with their heritage

"The first time we opened a monument to the children, they exploded with joy," architect May al-Ibrashy told AFP from his office on the rooftops of the al-Khalifa district, supervised by two 14th century minarets.

This fine connoisseur of Old Cairo launched the "Athar Lina" initiative in 2012 ("the heritage belongs to us" in Arabic) which multiplies workshops, guided tours and even afternoons of play in monuments such as Ibn Touloun, the one of the oldest mosques in Africa, built nearly 1.200 years ago.

In the maze of alleys of Old Cairo, in the heart of a megalopolis of 20 million inhabitants, old constructions and apartment buildings touch each other.

But the separation remains very real between inhabitants and monuments, say the specialists.

Since Egypt adopted a strict conservation policy in the 1980s, the monuments have been "locked up" because "it seemed to be the best way to preserve them", reports Omniya Abdel to AFP. Barr.

Ideas inherited "from the 19th century, when it was thought that the Egyptians did not deserve their heritage, that it was necessary to build walls between them and the monuments so that they did not damage them", continues this specialist in heritage preservation .

Slaughterhouse and library

The result, his colleague May al-Ibrashy noted: "the older ones were much more linked to the monuments because they had plenty of childhood memories there that their children did not have."

So, at Athar Lina, we mix present and past. The women of an embroidery workshop in an old renovated house make hangings that represent all of their Egypt: minarets and arcades but also a mango tree, the neighborhood dyer, a traveling merchant and the stray dogs of Old Cairo.

Through this reappropriation, such as childhood memories, local or religious festivals, "the inhabitants feel that this space is theirs and it is the best strategy for heritage protection", says Mrs. Abdel Barr.

Childhood memories, Mohammed Tareq, 39, has in spades in his popular district of the citadel of Cairo, built by Saladin in the 12th century.

As a child, he regularly walked past Beit Yakan, a 17th century patrician house, then nicknamed "the dump". Older, he brought an ox there before his sister's wedding, because a butcher had taken over the place to make it his slaughterhouse.

Today, he works there and takes visitors around in the scent of aromatic plants that escape from the moucharabieh that Alaa Habachi had sculpted by cabinetmakers.

In 2009, this professor of architecture bought the house from the famous butcher, to save it from a demolition order.

Of the 600 patrician houses – recognizable by their central patio – in Old Cairo, only 24 are today classified as national heritage, assures Mr. Habachi to AFP.

Others, like Beit Yakan, with its two-storey library and wooden Mamluk and Ottoman ceilings, have no legal protection.

"Nobody really knows what state the ones that are still standing are in, and every day a new one is demolished," laments the academic.

The "soul" of Old Cairo

However, he continues, "these patios, all oriented north-west to ensure natural air conditioning, played a major social and economic role in the urban environment."

To revive these areas of socialization in a city where public spaces are eaten away by developers and development works, Beit Yakan regularly hosts workshops, heritage protection awareness campaigns and events for local residents. .

Without these places open to all, Old Cairo could be "abandoned", alarms Mr. Habachi.

But "these buildings are only the body, it is the local community that is the soul" of Old Cairo, he recalls.

A community that has "very few places to meet, apart from cramped apartments and crowded streets", notes Ms. Abdel Barr.

She wants to remain optimistic. Beit Yakan, Athar Lina and the others could change the game and "bring a little serenity", she says.

"These houses could become sort of neighborhood squares where women could bring their children and enjoy a little garden space for a while," she hopes.