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Al-Ahram Weekly 2 - 8 September 1999 Issue No. 445 
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Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Al-Ahram Weekly 2 - 8 September 1999 Issue No. 445
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| Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Misleading abuse
Egypt Region International Economy Opinion Focus Culture Features Profile Travel Living Sports People Time Out Chronicles Cartoons Letters Sir- Nehad Selaiha's article, "Time for Reflection" (Al-Ahram Weekly, 26 August-1 September), starts out with several factual errors and goes downhill from there. John Elsom has not been in Cairo "for weeks". He arrived on 21 August with his colleagues, Richard Martin from Marseille and Ricard Salvat from Barcelona, and we started work on the following day. We have seen about 60 videos and written reports about each one for Dr Fawzi and the Festival's Executive Committee. We are unpaid consultants. We do not make the final selection and the Executive Committee sometimes goes against our choices, as happened last year. This is Dr Elsom's third (not fourth) visit as a member of the Viewing Committee.
Performance videos can be misleading. They can be badly made or consist of promotional extracts. About two thirds come from European or American companies. To guess what the performances are really like, it is helpful to know something about the groups and the theatre scenes from which they come. Our role is to provide that background experience as advisers and (with others) we have put forward alternative names and suggested other ways of meeting the problems of selection, but unless the productions were seen and chosen in advance by an artistic director, an advisory panel with similar qualifications would still be needed.
We have been careful not to be dogmatic about companies from Arab countries, where the Executive committee is more aware of their strengths and weaknesses than we are.
Finally, we were sorry to see that a writer of Ms Selaiha's ability should try to support her arguments by indulging in what amounts to sexist, racist and age-ist abuse. We have known her for several years. It is not like her to do so.
Richard Martin
Ricard Salvat
John Elsom (Chair, Viewing Committee)
Cairo
Not a porcupine
Sir- We read, with great interest, Mahmoud Bakr's article about the Zaranik Protected Area (Life with the Birds, Al-Ahram Weekly, 5-11 August).
However, we would like to point out that when giving the names of the birds and mammals Mr Bakr has made several errors. Firstly, all scientific names should be written in a typeface that is different from that of the main text; this is normally italics. Some further errors as follows:
There is no such bird as the 'Chinese duck,' the species to which Mr Bakr is referring is the garganey not the teal. Mr Bakr has apparently confused the jerboa with the gerbil. As no species of jerboa has been recorded from Zaranik, the animal in question is probably Gerbillus gerbillus, the common gerbil. The author refers to the 'rat' (Rattus rattus) and does not differentiate between it and the fat sand rat (Psammomys obesus).
Hemiechinus auritus is a hedgehog not a porcupine. However, the porcupine (Hystrix cristata) has never, as far as we can discover, been recorded from the protected area. The 'fink' is a misspelling of fennec which is now called, by many workers, Vulpes zerda. The generic name Felis in Felis margarita is misspelled as is auritus above.
Finally, the picture of a quail caught in a net is hardly an appropriate picture for an article on a protected area where hunting is forbidden. The Zaranik Protected Area is in need of greater protection than has hitherto been afforded it.
It might be worthwhile to mention here that Zaranik contains the largest breeding population of little tern and Kentish plover in the Mediterranean and, for these two species, is a breeding area of international importance.
Very few non-scientific journalists are able to navigate the shoals of scientific nomenclature without making mistakes. However, it is generally not too difficult to check whether the names are correct and in Mr Bakr's article, regrettably, this was not done.
Patsy Gasperetti
& Dominique Tawfik
Maadi, Digla, Cairo
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