New academic year, new edition of the AGU Intercultural Series!
Organised by the AGU International Association (student club), with support from the AGU International Office, our Intercultural Series are the opportunity for the University’s international students to showcase their culture to their fellow students and AGU employees, via presentations, music, dance, food, games…etc.
The AGU International community had already successfully organized three previous editions in the last two years, starting with Kenya, followed by Morocco and Pakistan at the beginning of this year.
It was not difficult to find new contenders for the fourth edition, the activities of the AGU International Association (AIA) having been presented by the club President to the new incoming international students during their Orientation Week and already raised interest among them.
With the growing number of Egyptian students on campus, it was only natural that this semester’s edition, the fourth in the Series, would feature: EGYPT.
AGU’s Egyptian students and the International Association members prepared thoroughly in the weeks prior to the event, in order to bring their audience a variety of content, including presentations, videos, games, performances and food.
While the audience was settling into their seats, the International Association played a promotional video of past events, including the three previous editions of the Intercultural Series; and newcomers were greeted at the door by… Pharaohs!
The event was kicked off by a joint Kahoot session; an online multiple choice question game, where all members of the audience can participate by logging into the quiz session using their phones. For each question, the correct answer (out of four possible options) is displayed at the end of a countdown, as well as the statistics of the number of audience members who voted for each option.
For this Kahoot session, audience members were invited to answer (or guess the answer to) general knowledge questions on Egypt. At the end the Kahoot winner’s idendity was revealed.
After the game, our Egyptian students started their presentation with a promotional video, showcasing the different landscapes and touristic highlights of the country and then gave key information on the geography, interesting facts and findings of ancient Egypt and interesting facts on the three historical phases known as the “Three Kingdoms” (Old, Middle and New Kingdom).
After giving some interesting insight into the architectural marvel of Egypt’s historical sites (such as the temples of Abu Simbel), our students moved on to present-day history: Modern Egypt, the country under French and then British rule, the Egyptian Kingdom and finally, the establishment of the Arab Republic of Egypt in 1953.
At this point, the presentation was interrupted by a performance prepared by some of the students: a traditional “sword”-fight dance!
After this entertaining interlude, key aspects of Egyptian culture were presented, including traditions, values, religion and music; after which the presenters moved on to popular culture: famous singers, actors and sportsmen.
For another playful section of their presentation, our students played two videos which they had filmed during the previous week: Turkish AGU students trying to pronounce words/sentences in Arabic and, to the delight of the audience, our Egyptian students trying to pronounce tongue-twisting sentences in Turkish!
By the time traditional foods were presented, our participants were already hungry, so after a final video presenting the “New Cairo Capital City” urban project and a quick group photo with the Egyptian flag, the audience exited the conference hall and lined up to taste the Koshari* and Roz B Laban (rose-water rice pudding), which had been prepared by our international students on the morning of the event.
*”made of rice, macaroni and lentils mixed together, topped with a spiced tomato sauce, and garlic vinegar; garnished with chickpeas and crispy fried onions” (source: wikipedia)
The audience was very enthusiastic about the event, which had been prepared by our Egyptians and International Association members with a lot of motivation and dedication (and also brought a lot of laughs).
The result was very positive and prompted some audience members to already ask excitedly who would be hosting the fifth edition!