MASQ to launch ‘The Tree of Life’ in ‘City of the Dead’

CAIRO – 21 September 2017: Maqad of Sultan Qaitbey (MASQ) teamed up with Shagrha initiative to launch a program entitled “The Tree of Life” in the “City of the Dead”, Cairo intending to bring to the neighborhood plants that can improve the environment of the local community.

The trees that will be planted will be chosen to be specifically suitable for the increasing climate change.

The ‘City of the Dead’ known also as Cairo’s el-Arafa necropolis, stretching for miles at the outskirts of the capital, was so crowded for more than 700 years with cemeteries in the form of rooms. Among these cemeteries lives a community of urban poor, forming an illegal society.

Previously, Cairo rulers chose the area to house their tombs outside the crowded city in a deserted location. This area was used as a burial ground for the Fatimids, Abbasids, and Ayubids.

Due to the population crisis and lack of affordable housing, many Egyptians have made these rooms their permanent homes.

MASQ, operated by the Sultan Foundation, aims at promoting heritage preservation, creativity and cultural diversity, and at improving the quality of life of the inhabitants of this underprivileged but culturally important neighborhood through various programs that involve the local community in inclusive ways.