It was crisp weather on an early morning when Ahram Online was invited to Kela headquarters in Helsinki, Finland. A smiley communication representative, Olga Gassen, expecting a child herself, was quick to introduce the place that is associated with one of Finland s oldest traditions: the maternity box.

Casablanca is the name of the ship on which the main incident in the eponymous Eid film by Peter Mim takes place. It is also the name of the Moroccan city where most of it is set. The top grossing film this season with a revenue of LE5,082,209 (out of a total of LE11,730,936 total for all five new Egyptian films) on its fourth day of screening, the 104 min film is the story of four friends-turned-enemies from Alexandria and employs the Hollywood action formula with car and motorcycle chases against the backdrop of the Moroccan landscape which is included in every scene including the trendy, bird s-eye shots made with a drone.

There is no authenticated information about the origins of the Egyptian Jewish actor Elias Moadeb, who died 28 May 1952. Some sources say that his father was of Syrian nationality, while others say Lebanese nationality, and who immigrated to Egypt in the early 20th century and got Egyptian citizenship when the Egyptian Nationality Law was issued. owever, all sources confirm that Elias s mother was an Egyptian Jewess born in a village nearby Tanta, in Al-Gharbia governorate.

One in five people in war zones has depression, anxiety, post-traumatic stress, bipolar disorder or schizophrenia, the World Health Organization said , with many suffering severe forms of these mental illnesses. The findings highlight the long-term impact of war-induced crises in countries such as Afghanistan, Iraq, South Sudan, Syria and Yemen, the UN s health agency said, and the numbers are significantly higher than in peacetime populations, where around one in 14 people has a mental illness.

The Egyptian ministries of antiquities and foreign affairs have called on Christie s auction house and UNESCO to stop the sale of a quartzite head from a statue of King Tutankhamun. The sale is scheduled to take place at Christie s auction hall in London on 4 July. Shaaban Abdel-Gawad, supervisor-general of the Antiquities Repatriation Department at the Ministry of Antiquities, told Ahram Online that the ministry has asked the auction hall to provide the documents showing proof of the object s ownership.

Where did Ramses go?/ Maybe to Khufu in the Pyramids/ We searched for him but we did not find him/ He might be visiting Hatshepsut/ But we still did not find him/ Oh, here is he/ Where have you been, Ramses?/ I was getting Ice Cream/ Where from?/ From Misr Dairy, its products are everywhere.” - These are the lyrics to the Misr lil-Alban (Misr Dairy) advertisement, one of Egyptian television s best known, dating back to the late 1960s-early 1970s. Today Misr Dairy, a public sector company, is no longer very successful. But the ad, directed by animation pioneer Ali Mohib (1935-2010) and produced by Al-Ahram Advertising Agency, remains a nostalgic reminder of a specific time in Egyptian pop culture and social history.

Omar Al-Fayoumi in 40 years” is the title of an exhibition which took place last month at the brand new Tahrir Culture Center at the American University in Cairo old campus in Tahrir. Held at the Margo Veillon Hall — two spacious rooms and a small attic — the exhibition included some 95 paintings in acrylic and oil. Al-Fayoumi s usual themes — cafés, portraiture and street life — are clearer than ever now as they recur at different points in the artist s career. But it is the vividness of his palette that continues to enthrall.

Egypt is set to host the African Anti-Corruption Forum (AACF) on 12-13 June in Sharm El-Sheikh. The main objective of the AACF is to encourage African countries to adopt policies, programmes and work plans that contribute to the eradication of corruption and to establish a knowledge linkage base between different regions of the continent on the risks of corruption and its severe negative effect on development.

Egyptian theatre comedy star Mohamed Negm died early on Wednesday at the age of 75 at a hospital in Dokki, Cairo after suffering a stroke. Negm began his career in the 1960s with the troupe of iconic theatre director and actor Abdel-Monim Madbouly. He appeared in numerous films and TV series before eventually establishing his own theatre.

For Eid El-Fitr, Cairo cinemas will be showing five films. Three of are action oriented: Al-Mamar featuring Ahmed Ezz, Hamlit Faraoun featuring Amr Saad, and Casablanca featuring Amir Karara. The two others are comedies: Sabaa El-Boromba with Ramez Galal and the film Mohamed Hussein with Mohamed Saad.

Within the first few days of Economics 101, one can expect to learn about the global supply chain. This is the first time many begin to understand that, for example, the apples in their fruit bowl didn t magically materialize on the shelves of their local grocery store but rather through a complex system of coordination. The apples in your grandmother s pie could have been harvested on a Chinese farm, for example. But what about the trees on that Chinese farm? They didn t magically materialize either. While most can grasp the supply chain nature of our produce, few understand its evolutionary nature Researcher Robert Spengler has spent a decade and a half searching for apple seeds in an attempt to answer this question.

The State Department is now requiring nearly all applicants for U.S. visas to submit their social media usernames, previous email addresses and phone numbers. It s a vast expansion of the Trump administration s enhanced screening of potential immigrants and visitors. In a move that s just taken effect after approval of the revised application forms, the department says it has updated its immigrant and nonimmigrant visa forms to request the additional information, including “social media identifiers,” from almost all U.S. applicants.

Egypt s Ministry of Tourism, represented by the Egyptian Tourism Promotion Authority, signed a contract with the African Football Confederation (CAF) to be the official regional sponsor of the 2019 African Cup of Nations (AFCON), scheduled to be played in Egypt from 21 June to 19 July. In a statement issued Thursday, the ministry said the sponsorship agreement comes in the context of its keenness to exploit the major events of AFCON for marketing Egypt internationally.

Netflix has announced that it will be producing its third Arabic original series and its first venture into Egyptian drama with Paranormal (Ma Waraa Al-Tabeea), to be directed by Amr Salama and produced by Mohamed Hefzy. The series is based on the best-selling books by late novelist Ahmed Khaled Tawfik. The horror stories are set in the 1960s in Egypt -- where the show will be filmed -- and follow the character of Dr. Refaat Ismail as he encounters various supernatural events, mostly inspired by Egyptian folk tales and mythology.

Renowned Egyptian investigative journalist Maggie Michael, Egyptian photojournalist Nariman El-Mofty, and Yemeni video journalist Maad Al-Zikry were awarded Atlantic Media s 16th annual Michael Kelly Award for their reporting on Yemen for The Associated Press, nearly a month after they won the 2019 Pulitzer Prize for International Reporting. “The on-the-ground complexities of the ongoing civil war in Yemen, supported and exacerbated by outside powers, are nearly impossible for outsiders to follow. Confronting continual threats from all sides, these journalists filed stories for The Associated Press that consistently broke new ground, brought the nature of the conflict vividly alive, and exposed the ruthless cynicism of those perpetuating the conflict,” the judges said. Last April, Michael, El-Mofty, and Al-Zikry won a Pulitzer in international reporting for their coverage of abuses in Yemen’s civil war. According to AP, the trio spent a year uncovering atrocities and suffering in Yemen, shining a light on “a conflict largely ignored by the American public.” The series of reports including documented civilian casualties of a US drone campaign drew attention to the presence of child soldiers on the front lines and showed evidence of torture by both Houthi rebels and US-backed forces. Michael, who is based in Cairo, joined the AP in 2002. She covered political and religious conflict in the Middle East and, as part of AP s investigations team, has written about civilian casualties in Iraq and Yemen. El-Mofty is a Canadian-Egyptian photographer. She worked first as a photo editor, then since 2016 as a photographer covering Egypt, Yemen and other parts of the Middle East. Al-Zikry is a video journalist who has spent years chronicling the war and its horrors. His photograph of an emaciated infant dying at a hospital in 2016 helped bring world attention to starvation in Yemen. Michael and El-Mofty are the first Egyptians to win the prize.

For the second year in a row, the Palme d Or at the Cannes Film Festival has gone to an Asian film. Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu s jury gave this year s top prize to Bong Joon Ho s “Parasite,” one of the most critically acclaimed films of this year s festival, one year after Hirokazu Kore-eda s “Shoplifters” won the 2018 award. The film is about a close-knit family of con artists. The Grand Prize, the jury s second place award, went to the first black woman director ever in the Cannes competition, Mati Diop, for “Atlantics.”

"On this day [26 May] in 1954, one of the oldest and largest boats on earth was found buried near Egypt s biggest pyramid. Today s Doodle celebrates the discovery of the Khufu Ship, which has survived more than 4,600 years, although its true purpose remains a mystery," writes Google in the description of the doodle celebrating Egypt s famed pharaonic boat. The doodle has a large outreach and is visible across Asia, North Africa, all Russia, Australia, New Zealand and chosen parts of Europe.

The Egyptian tourism ministry, in cooperation with the National Council for Women (NCW) and the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) office in Egypt, has announced its intention to obtain the UNDP s Gender Equality Seal (GES) in the tourism sector. The ministry made the announcement during a ceremony where it discussed the steps required to earn the GES.

Omani Writer Jokha Alharthi, has been announced as the winner of the 2019 Man Booker International Prize for her novel Celestial Bodies (Sayyidat Al-Aqamar), translated into English by Marilyn Booth and published by Sandstone Press. The £50,000 prize, which celebrates the finest works of translated fiction from around the world, has been divided equally between its author and translator. Each shortlisted author and translator also received a further £1,000 for being shortlisted. The winner was announced by Bettany Hughes at a ceremony at the Roundhouse in London.

The Egyptian Cinema Syndicate, under the helm of Mosad Fouda, has signed a cooperation protocol with Waey NGO, led by Tamer El-Shehawy, to boost an initiative titled Baheb El-Cima launched by director Sameh Mostafa, CEO and founder of a company of the same name. The project, which aims to “develop Egyptian cinema production,” is planned to produce 12 films a year to be screened in various cities and villages across the country s governorates at affordable ticket prices.

The Arab Cinema Centre (ACC) has announced the winners of its third Annual Critics Awards during a ceremony held on the sidelines of the current Cannes festival. The winners are from five different Arab countries and were selected by 75 film critics from 34 countries. The awards are given to feature and documentary films that premiered at international film festivals outside of the Arab world during 2018, and at least one of the production companies must be Arab.