The One About the Aswan High Dam for Dummies

Category: weekleez

The One About the Aswan High Dam for Dummies
Tuesday, May 08, 2001

hi kids,

last week i said that this week’s weekly was going to be about the suez crisis of ’56….for dummies, right? well, gimmie a little longer on that ‘k? i left all my notes at the shop this weekend and well, i had no material to go by.

ok so i’ve been dying to write a series of articles on historical events, people, and/or places-things.
only i want the articles to be funny. ACCURATE and funny. well, mostly sorta accurate. i mean, if the accuracy is funny i’ll keep it, if it’s boring then i’ll rosh it.

but i wasn’t sure how to write such a thing.
do i write it as if i’m talking to a complete dunderhead? (could be very interesting)
do i write it like an actual paper i’d turn in for submission for a class or historical magazine? (i mean, gag, how dry would THAT be?)
besides i’d have to use proper speling and punctuation marcs.!

the other horrible part of all of this is that i have to research things. and though i do love to read, especially about history, well i don’t have as much spare time as i would like, and i do feel it necessary to provide you with accurate facts and such. meaning good for you bad for me.

so THIS time i’ve picked something that is easy to make fun of as it pretty much makes fun of itself. and as an added bonus (for me) it’ll be good background info for The One About the Suez Canal for dummies.

without further ado,
The Complete Idiot’s Guide to the Aswan High Dam… For Dummies, Morons, and Elves.

Let’s start out with the basics shall we?
The Aswan High Dam is located on the Nile River in south Egypt near the city of….Aswan.
That’s easy enough then isn’t it?

moving on.

Construction on the dam started in 1960 and it was completed in 1970 much to the amazement of probably everybody.

This dam is four (4) miles upstream from the old Aswan Dam. This lesser dam has been around since 1889-1902. Unfortunately it had a bad habit of not being a very good dam and so in 1907 they made it taller, and also in 1912. Then in 1929 they started renovating it again because as far as dams go, it still sucked. They did this once again in 1934. And once again in 1946 when the water almost reached the top. After all this the Egyptians decided they needed another dam entirely, which the rest of the world replied with,
“But you can’t even take care of the one you already have.”
Egypt responded with, “But please daddy? I promise to take care of THIS one!”
So the world said, “It’s alright with me if it’s alright with the U.S. and Britain.”
And so in 1952 the World Bank (suckers) agreed to finance the building of the Aswan High Dam.

After a while the Soviet Union wanted to get in on the action and so they provided some fundage and even some “engineers”. After hearing that Egypt and the USSR are becoming fast friends the U.S. pulls out of the deal because they hate the soviets and so the U.S. takes it’s ball and goes home much to the chagrin of the other Allied powers who are still financing this thing. Now the Allies are all kinds of “maybe we should just forget this thing and go home.”
So Egypt panics and seizes the Suez Canal so as to use it to finance their dam.
okay enough politics. on with the dam.

Well now everyone is mad at everyone and Egypt lets Russia build it’s dam.
As it turns out, Russia is VERY good at the whole cement and concrete thing. They excel in that catergory.
Unfortunately they aren’t so good at that whole “architecture/engineer” thing.

So the first time they build it in a wrong sort of way in that they didn’t make the drainage system… at all. An adverse effect of this was that the algae and scum built up and the Nile became this red nastiness of a river. This horrible event really smelled quite awful and as one could imagine it drew flies.
Lots of flies.
The flies in turn “upped” the frog population by about a billion percent.
As the frogs died off the vermin population grew.
Do you see where i’m going with all this?

Anyway they “tweak” the dam and voila! In 1971 it was inaugurated by President Sadat.

And now instead of the Nile flooding once a year to provide the rich silt that farmers had been depending on for centuries, the High Dam keeps the river from flooding and provides no outlet for the much wanted silt that now just comes to a complete stop in the reservoir (man-made lake) Lake Nasser (named after a real classy guy).

So the farmers must now buy tons of artificial fertilizer. And of course, when these chemicals run off into the Nile it does wonderful things to the fish. Thanks Aswan High Dam!

By the way, Lake Nasser is one of the biggest man-made lakes in the world. It’s a great source of hydro-electric power and provides electricity to half of Egypt. The other half of Egypt doesn’t need electric power as it is now underwater. That’s right, Lake Nasser is so big that the government had to move over 90,000 Nubians that had been living in the area. oops! Sorry Nubian Kingdom! (have you ever noticed that Sudan always gets the shaft?)

You can’t walk through Egypt without tripping over an ancient artifact or temple of some sort. I wonder if they gave any thought to the ancient temples and relics in the area? Oh sure they did. After they were underwater. Of course, these temples and ancient cities are only underwater for MOST of the year, not the WHOLE year.
Hydro-electric power!
Yes, the art and culture of the past is slowly (and in some parts very quickly) eroding away, but keep in mind the Egyptian government has provided a means of hydro-electric power to its people AND it controls the flooding AND it allows for better navigation by keeping the waterflow of the Nile consistent.

Of course all this “control” means that the water is more easily evaporated. The reservoir loses about 13% of its water each year. Which isn’t a big deal, except that it leaves all the sediment behind thus the reservior keeps losing storage space.
Hydro-electric power!
Hydro-electric power!

Yes, but will hydro-electric power cure the parasitic disease schistosomiasis that has spread due to the stagnant water of the reservoir? will it help the deteriorating soil? will it stop the erosion of the delta?
Well?

It completely blows my mind that the ancient Egyptians were able to build massive, highly mathematical pyramids with many chambers, tunnels, and secret tombs using crude tools and manpower. While the modern Egyptians can’t even HIRE a decent crew to build what many people call a “modern wonder”. i WONDER if Mr. Nimoy isn’t right about those aliens building the pyramids.

So now when i read or hear something about the Aswan High Dam, i get a visual of some guy slapping his forehead and uttering a “d’oh!”
And now, so do you.

i got most of this information from some notes i took in college and a book and a website.
those are pretty good sources, eh?

but really, who cares?

you guys have a good week.
try not to spend all your money on a crappy dam ok?

jaimie “d’oh!” pickle

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