Aswam Dam 2-6-2006 The Aswan High Dam

By Bob Van Leer

(Aswan, Egypt, Monday, Feb. 6, 2006) - This morning we went to see the two dams that define Aswan, the British-built Low Dam and the Soviet Union and Egyptian built High Dam.

The High Dam changed Egypt. Prior to its completion in 1971, after 10 years of construction, the Nile flooded from August to October. The Low Dam was not able to hold back the flood waters. Our guide said stopping the floods enables farmers to grow three crops per year instead of one. He said the floods used to destroy whole towns and killed people. Irrigated acres have been increased by 20% since building the dam. There have been downsides, one an increase in a disease, bilharzia, that flourishes in slack water. Our guide, Hussein, said medication is controlling this. Another is a rise in water tables which threatens monuments and mummies. Many Nubians were left homeless for 10 years. Some tombs were covered by the rising water. He said farmers now have to use chemical fertilizer now that new silt is not brought down river. But he said the dam was so much needed. And there were 400 deaths during construction of the dam.

The Low Dam, 3.5 miles downstream from the High Dam, was built between 1899 and 1902 and has been remodeled several times since. The two dams produce 15 billion kilowatts per year, 10 billion of this at the High Dam. Hussein said this is 60% of all the power used in Egypt. The rest is produced by oil generation and Egypt is now a power exporting state. We are told the High Dam has a capacity of 2.1 gigawatts annually but can't now produce at full power due to a lower lake water level. It has 12 turbines and 9 are now operating.

The dam backs up Lake Nasser, which we are told is the largest man-made lake. The dam is 111 meters high with a width of nearly 1000 meters. It backs up a lake that is 290 miles long and up to 10 miles wide. Part of the lake extends into Sudan.

Construction of the High Dam is considered the greatest public work to be undertaken in Egypt since the pyramids.

After viewing the High Dam we took a boat ride to see the Temple of Philae on a small island south of Aswan. It is a beautiful temple complex and extremely well preserved. Well preserved that is except for vandalism of relief statues by Christians to try to obliterate the old gods. Like Abu Simbel, it was raised above the high water created by the High Dam.

The site is a complex and on the right side of the temple precinct stands Trajan's kiosk. It is a building rebuilt by the Roman emperor Trajan and is decorated with scenes of Trajan making offerings to Isis, Osiris and Horus, Egyptian gods. Egyptian, Roman and Greek architecture are blended together. The temple was built in 200 B.C.

Hussein said Egypt was largely Christian by the end of the 4th century, but the old gods were kept another century at Phylae before being conquered and the temple turned into a Coptic Christian church.

While our group was at a papyrus factory, I visited with two young men on a bench outside. One of them, Ali Khaluf Sayed, greeted me by saying, "You are welcome in Aswan". They know somehow we are Americans even before we speak. We have tried, so far unsuccessfully, to find out what the signs are. We have now been in Egypt a week and have not seen anything that could be remotely described as anti-American. We are welcome wherever we go. The Danes are still being castigated in the Muslim world for the cartoons published in a Danish newspaper. Today the building in Beirut, Lebanon, housing the Danish consulate was burned.

At 1:00 p.m. today we left our dock at Aswan and proceeded downstream to Kom Ombo 27 miles downstream, a city of about 275,000 people. Aswan is the big city of the region with 1.2 million residents. The Nile is described as a "river of green", and it lives up to the name. There is a strip along boat banks with green grass and waving palm trees, and a few feet behind them there is sand and rock desert.

The main tourist attraction here is the Temple of Kom Ombo, built during the Greco-Roman period of 332 B.C.-395 A.D. I did not go on the tour of the temple. One temple a day is about my quota.

This evening's dinner is to be Egyptian food with Egyptian dress suggested. I bought a galibeya, a type of flowing robe favored by many Mideast men, to wear to the dinner.
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