Tamer Abdou. Journalist. Giza.

I live in Giza, on the eastern slope between the Cairo-Alexandria desert road and the Pyramids Road, in a neighbourhood that was countryside when I was a child and is solidly residential now. From my balcony on the fifth floor I can see, in the distance on a clean morning, the apex of the Khufu pyramid. From the same balcony, on a hazy August afternoon, I cannot see anything beyond the next building. This is the city I write about.

What I do

I am a journalist. I cover archaeology, museum policy, and antiquities for a small weekly published in Cairo, plus occasional commissions in English for a handful of regional outlets. I have been doing this for about ten years. Before that I was, briefly, a translator working on a UNESCO-funded restoration project at the Citadel.

The day-to-day of the work is not what people imagine. Most of it is reading ministerial press releases, attending site visits, calling curators who do not pick up the phone, sitting in the press section at openings, and writing five hundred words at a time. Once a month, on a slow Tuesday, I go to a museum on my own and walk it without a notebook, just to remember what visitors do.

Why this site exists

Two reasons. The first is that I write down, before every visit, a short structural summary of the building — what's where, why it matters, what to skip. After ten years there is a folder of these on my laptop. They are useful. They are not useful only to me. So I started publishing them.

The second reason is that the long-read museum review is a particular kind of work, and I am not the right person to write it. Karim El-Sherif in Alexandria writes long-form criticism beautifully. Nadia Farouk writes the warm practical guide. The space I can fill is the briefing — short, structural, factual, not narrative.

What the briefings will do

• Give you a layout of the building before you walk in.
• Name the three or four collections that matter most, and where they are.
• Note the recent changes — closures, rehangs, new acquisitions — that the official channels may not yet reflect.
• Place the building in its neighbourhood. The Citadel museums in their citadel; the Mahmoud Khalil collection in its Giza street; the Bibliotheca's small museums in their disc on the Alexandria corniche.
• Each piece comes in at about a thousand words. Five minutes, slow read. Three minutes, scanning.

What the briefings will not do

• They will not sell anything. There are no products on this site, no prices, no booking, no commerce, no affiliate links, no advertising.
• They will not recommend specific guides, tour operators, drivers, restaurants or hotels. The choices are personal and the recommendations are too easily out of date.
• They will not authenticate antiquities. That is a matter for the Supreme Council of Antiquities and is not the work of a journalist.
• They will not promise current opening hours. Hours shift; please check with the museum directly.
• They will not pretend to be neutral. Where I think a rehang is wrong, I say so. Where I think a museum has done something well, I say so. The briefings are short but they are not bland.

How I write the briefings

1. I visit the museum twice in a six-week window.
2. I read the most recent ministry release and at least one published catalogue.
3. I write a draft of about 1,500 words.
4. I cut it to 1,000.
5. I publish.
6. I revise on the basis of reader corrections.

The cutting is the slowest part. The first thousand words come quickly; the cut from 1,500 to 1,000 is where the briefing actually becomes itself.

A briefing is not a short version of a long piece. It is a different shape. The cut is the writing.

Who I write for

People who have between one and seven days in Egypt and want to spend some of that time inside museums. People who have already read the long-form criticism elsewhere and want a structural summary before the visit. Egyptian friends who are visiting their own country and want to know what has changed in a museum since they were last in it. Journalists from outside Egypt covering the museum beat. Students preparing a thesis. Anyone, in short, who reads quickly.

What I will not write about

I do not cover the antiquities market, repatriation politics in any detail, or the looting question, except where it directly affects a museum's holdings. These are important subjects but they need different reporting and a different writer. I am happy to point readers to colleagues who cover them.

How to reach me

The contact page has the address. I read everything that comes in. Replies are usually quick — under a week — except when I am at a multi-day site visit out of Cairo, in which case it can be longer.

Thanks for reading.

— Tamer, from Giza