Zahi Hawass gave a lecture on Sunday July 2nd in Tokyo to promote tourism in Egypt. The “Egyptian Day in Japan” was a whole day event arranged by Egypt’s Tourism Authority under the supervision of the Director of Egypt’s Tourism Authority, Mr. Hesham El-Domairy and Ambassador Ismail Khairat, the Egyptian Ambassador to Japan. Eleven governmental departments of Japan supported the publicity and the organization of this event. There was a performance by Reda Egyptian Dance Company, who performed several beautiful folkloric numbers along with over 30 Japanese young girls who were trained in Egyptian folkloric dances. The performance was followed by a lecture about the Japanese team’s contribution to the ongoing excavation project of the workmen’s village at Giza with Dr. Mark Lehner, the Director of the excavation. Afterwards, Dr. Hawass was introduced by a 4-minute video and gave a one-hour lecture that was translated by Dr. Mo’men into Japanese. After this beautiful day, the audience took pictures with Dr. Hawass and he was presented a lovely letter from Ms. Mukita, a 50-year old fan of Dr. Hawass’s, who gave him a beautiful card. We hope that this will be the first of a series of events to promote tourism in Egypt, which is supported by Egypt Air’s initiative to organize direct flights once a week between Tokyo and Cairo. we hope Japanese tourists can come and visit Egypt.
