Egypt Guide
The Nile Valley
Sohag
Set on a rich agricultural plain bounded by the hills of the Eastern and Western deserts, SOHAG (pronounced "Sohaj") is a city of 221,000 people with a large Christian community and a small university. Before the troubles of the 1990s, tourists used it as a base for visiting the nearby Red and White monasteries or Abydos Temple, further away. Today, the government is trying to woo back visitors by building an archeological museum and touting a colossal statue of an Ancient Egyptian princess in Akhmim, across the Nile.
While hotels and stations are on the west bank, the tourist office and museum are over the river in Medinet Nasr. Akhmim is 3km further east: a statue of a princess with a harp marks the municipal boundary. For visitors, this entails shuttling back and forth, hampered by the tourist police. The museum is intended to showcase some five thousand artefacts found within the governorate, from the Middle Kingdom until Greco-Roman times – to be joined by finds from ongoing excavations in Akhmim.
Meanwhile, Sohag's attractions are episodic. Its weekly Souk el-Itnayn (Mon 6am– noon) is a huge animal market, held just off the Girga road. The whole city celebrates the Moulid of Al-Aref – Sohag's patron saint – a few weeks before the nationwide feast of Eid al-Adha. Among other deeds, Al-Aref is remembered for hiding Murad Bey, the only Mamluke to escape the infamous massacre at the Citadel, who fled to Upper Egypt. City Day (April 10), commemorating a local victory over Napoleon's troops in 1799, sees a parade of folk-dancers and soldiers at the stadium, otherwise shared by three football clubs – all hopeless, locals admit.
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