Assyut

In recent years Assyut has become the hub of fundamentalist Islamic activity in Egypt, often serving as an arena for violent collisions between Egyptian security forces and militant Muslims. If times are tense, as in summer 1993. you may want to drop .Assyut from your itinerary; follow the news and check with your consulate beforehand.

Assyut’s most famous native son, the 3rd-century philosopher Plotinus, once remarked that “every beautiful vision requires an eye that is able to see it.” The eye that truly appreciates the beauty of Assyut has been trained in the tourist camps of Luxor and Aswan; when you become afraid your own reflection will try to sell you a souvenir, you are ready to come to Assyut.

Located at the geographic center of Egypt, Assyut has always been an important market and commercial center; today, Assyut is the most important city in Upper Egypt and the third-largest in the country, with a large university and an economy that thrives on everything but tourism. Aside from a few scattered tombs, some nearby churches, and the Nile-splitting Banana Island, Assyut has little that fits nicely in a tourist brochure or on a roll of film. But the city’s ancient market and its renowned carpet district, the novelty of an Egyptian city with a large and visible Christian presence, the relative care with which its buildings and streets have been maintained, and the natives’ indifference to tourists make the town seem almost beautiful, at least to Nile Valley veterans.