Pyramids Meroe in Sudan. Courtesy of Stuart Butler
Pyramids Meroe in Sudan. Courtesy of Stuart Butler
Pyramids Meroe in Sudan. Courtesy of Stuart Butler
Pyramids Meroe in Sudan. Courtesy of Stuart Butler

Sudan is full of stories for the intrepid traveller


  • English
  • Arabic

The heavy wooden door swings open and the white robed guardian waves his arm, beckoning me to enter. Beyond the gate lies a huge expanse of hard-packed sand, its surface scarred with geometric squiggles, lines and circles. To my non-expert eye, these hypnotic patterns remind me of crop circles, those bizarre patterns occasionally found in fields of wheat that some people attribute to alien spacecraft. However, the lines in the earth here indicate something that’s arguably much more interesting than little green men. Together the lines merge into one giant circular pattern, at the centre of which sits an enormous, tumbledown mound of mud brick, which looks as if it has melted in the heat. This is the Western Deffufa: the largest mud brick structure in sub-Saharan Africa. Not far away from here is the Eastern Deffufa, this one surrounded by a cemetery containing the remains of about 30,000 people; many of whom appear to have been ritually sacrificed.

Not only is the deffufa the largest mud brick building in Africa, but it is also thought to be the oldest. In fact, archaeologists now think the area around the deffufa, which is today part of the small market town of Kerma, has been occupied for at least 10,000 years - making Kerma arguably the oldest continually inhabited town on Earth. Yes, this dusty and overlooked place is older than Rome, older than Jerusalem, older even than the great Pyramids of Egypt. And yet, despite its antiquity and clear importance to humanity, here I was, standing atop the deffufa, looking across the date palms to the far glint of the Nile and, aside from the sites guardian, I was all alone.

I am in Sudan. Until the partition of the country and the creation of South Sudan in 2011, this was Africa’s largest country. Yet, for most people, it’s also one of the continents least known nations. This is probably due, in no small part, to people being put off visiting by the country’s unsavoury reputation as a war racked and politically unstable place. However, as is so often the case with such generalisations, the reality on the ground is slightly different. Yes, the country has had more than its fair share of military coups and war, but the Sudanese heartland, where I am now, which stretches from the capital Khartoum north along the Nile to the Egyptian border, has rarely felt much in the way of a ripple of disturbance from the violent upheavals elsewhere in this vast country. In fact, so calm does this part of the country appear that many people consider it one of the safer parts of Africa for a foreign visitor. I for one was quickly becoming smitten with Sudan. Here was a country with a visible history stretching back to the very earliest days of civilisation, a place with buildings that could make the temples of Egypt look brash and modern, but where other foreign tourists seemed as rare as crop circle creating alien spacecraft.

Although Kerma has been inhabited since at least Neolithic times, the deffufa, which is thought to have been a temple of great religious importance, dates back about 5000 years. At that period in time, Kerma was a major town of about 10,000 inhabitants and was the capital of a powerful kingdom, which spread along the Nile and into what is today southern Egypt. The kings of Kerma were demi-gods along the lines of Egyptian pharaohs, and when a king died, hundreds of his subjects were sacrificed alongside him - as were cattle. Today Kerma is surrounded by sandy desert waste, but back then the climate was very different, with savannah grasslands spreading away from the lazy Nile waters and supporting wildlife of the type more commonly seen today in eastern Africa. It was also ideal cattle grazing country and Kerma society was built on cattle. On ancient temple walls throughout this part of Sudan, engravings depicting cattle are commonly seen and in the cemetery surrounding the Eastern Deffufa, archaeologists have found not just sacrificed humans but the skulls of thousands of cattle.

A few moments drive to the north of the deffufa, an elderly French couple oversee an archaeological dig at a site called Duki Gail. Charles Bonnet and his wife have been working in both Egypt and Sudan for decades. Charles is considered the doyen of ancient Sudanese history and when he talks about Sudan the pitch of his voice rises slightly in excitement. “Working here as an archaeologist”, he tells me, as we stand in the midday sun peering down into a trench containing a history we are only just beginning to understand, “Is how it must have felt to have been digging in Egypt a hundred and fifty years ago. Maybe this is even better. Everywhere you look here there are ancient sites; every time you put your foot down you stand on a fragment of pottery or a piece of ancient brick. Look at this site, Duki Gail. To be honest, we still have no real idea at all what was, but yet look here and you can see the walls of a building - maybe it was a palace - that are two metres thick. Whatever this site once was, it must have been hugely important”.

A few days later I see what Charles means when he talks about standing on fragments of pottery every time you put your foot down. Afloat in the muddy waters of the Nile, Sai Island is a peaceful place where little disturbs the silence, but the thump of the occasional generator. With the remains of a medieval church of which nothing but a few forlorn pillars remain and an Ottoman fort, which in itself sits atop the foundations of a 3,500 year old Egyptian town, Sai Island is something of a synopsis of Sudanese history. And as I slowly amble between the sites, I suddenly realise that with every footfall I was stepping on shards of pottery - big and small. It was everywhere, it seemed to carpet the island, tens of thousands of broken pots, bowls and urns. I was literally walking on ancient history.

If the ruins and monuments of Sai Island were largely a record of foreign invasion and ideas, my next destination, a day-long drive to the south-east, took me back in time to a period when the Nubians (or Kushites) of Sudan battled for supremacy of the Nile with the pharaohs of Egypt. Karima is a small town with a big past, beautifully situated between the Nile and the sacred mountain of Jebel Barkal, which both Egyptians and Nubians alike believed was the home of the god Amun. Its religious importance meant that Karima swayed backwards and forwards between being the southern limit of the Egyptian kingdoms and the centre of Nubian kingdoms, which at times controlled much of present day Egypt. This see-sawing past has left little old Karima with an impressive array of ancient art and architecture. Setting off early one morning, I scrambled and clambered up onto the table-top summit of Jebel Barkal for an eagle-eyed view of the towns illustrious past. From up here, with the wind whipping through my hair, I gingerly (in my case very gingerly) peered over the edge of the mountain and looked down onto a jigsaw of temples, tombs, columns and pillars - all built to glorify whoever was in control at the time. As I gazed down something else caught my eye; something very familiar to us all, but totally unexpected out here. A pyramid. And there was more than one. Even if you’ve never seen them in real life, the great pyramids of Giza in Egypt are so well-known to all of us that we tend to assume that they are unique and exist nowhere else on Earth. The reality is that Sudan is home to more pyramids than Egypt.

Sudanese pyramids come in myriad forms, there are big ones and little ones, fat squat ones and tall tapering ones, some are well preserved, some are mere dusty piles of nothing, but what unites them all is their solitude, their lack of commercial hustle, their total and utter romance. And none come more romantic than those of Meroe, my next destination a few hours drive further down the Nile.

I arrived in Meroe as the heat of the afternoon faded and the sun glowed in the dying light. Apricot dunes rippled across a flat plain and flooded about the base of about a hundred steep-sided pyramids. Eons of exposure to a merciless desert wind and the relentless erosion caused by hungry, marching sand dunes has left many of Meroe’s pyramids the worse for wear. However, despite being more weathered, and much smaller, than their more famous Egyptian cousins, there was something bewitching about these pyramids. For a start, as at every Sudanese historical site I had visited, I had the place completely to myself, but it was more than just solitude that lent such a romantic air to Meroe. It was the way the encroaching sand dunes gave a sense of personal discovery to the place. In order to examine hieroglyphics created by a hand thousands of years ago, I often first had to use my own hands to sweep away the sand covering them, and although treasure hunters have long ago picked these royal graves clean, it was impossible not to let the mind run riot with thoughts of secret passageways linking the tombs and hidden chambers glittering in gold.

As darkness fell, I sat at the base of a pyramid where kings were once buried and thought how sweeping away the sand in order to read the message hidden below could have been a metaphor for my journey to Sudan. Just to have first contemplated coming here involved me brushing away clouds of misinformation, but by doing so, I had discovered a country blessed with treasures we are only just starting to understand and it had left me infatuated in a way few other places ever had.

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The Bio

Favourite vegetable: “I really like the taste of the beetroot, the potatoes and the eggplant we are producing.”

Holiday destination: “I like Paris very much, it’s a city very close to my heart.”

Book: “Das Kapital, by Karl Marx. I am not a communist, but there are a lot of lessons for the capitalist system, if you let it get out of control, and humanity.”

Musician: “I like very much Fairuz, the Lebanese singer, and the other is Umm Kulthum. Fairuz is for listening to in the morning, Umm Kulthum for the night.”

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UAE central contracts

Full time contracts

Rohan Mustafa, Ahmed Raza, Mohammed Usman, Chirag Suri, Mohammed Boota, Sultan Ahmed, Zahoor Khan, Junaid Siddique, Waheed Ahmed, Zawar Farid

Part time contracts

Aryan Lakra, Ansh Tandon, Karthik Meiyappan, Rahul Bhatia, Alishan Sharafu, CP Rizwaan, Basil Hameed, Matiullah, Fahad Nawaz, Sanchit Sharma

Mobile phone packages comparison
How to watch Ireland v Pakistan in UAE

When: The one-off Test starts on Friday, May 11
What time: Each day’s play is scheduled to start at 2pm UAE time.
TV: The match will be broadcast on OSN Sports Cricket HD. Subscribers to the channel can also stream the action live on OSN Play.

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COMPANY%20PROFILE
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Sole survivors
  • Cecelia Crocker was on board Northwest Airlines Flight 255 in 1987 when it crashed in Detroit, killing 154 people, including her parents and brother. The plane had hit a light pole on take off
  • George Lamson Jr, from Minnesota, was on a Galaxy Airlines flight that crashed in Reno in 1985, killing 68 people. His entire seat was launched out of the plane
  • Bahia Bakari, then 12, survived when a Yemenia Airways flight crashed near the Comoros in 2009, killing 152. She was found clinging to wreckage after floating in the ocean for 13 hours.
  • Jim Polehinke was the co-pilot and sole survivor of a 2006 Comair flight that crashed in Lexington, Kentucky, killing 49.
MATCH INFO

Argentina 47 (Tries: Sanchez, Tuculet (2), Mallia (2), De La Fuente, Bertranou; Cons: Sanchez 5, Urdapilleta)

United States 17 (Tries: Scully (2), Lasike; Cons: MacGinty)

Indoor cricket in a nutshell
Indoor Cricket World Cup - Sept 16-20, Insportz, Dubai

16 Indoor cricket matches are 16 overs per side
8 There are eight players per team
9 There have been nine Indoor Cricket World Cups for men. Australia have won every one.
5 Five runs are deducted from the score when a wickets falls
4 Batsmen bat in pairs, facing four overs per partnership

Scoring In indoor cricket, runs are scored by way of both physical and bonus runs. Physical runs are scored by both batsmen completing a run from one crease to the other. Bonus runs are scored when the ball hits a net in different zones, but only when at least one physical run is score.

Zones

A Front net, behind the striker and wicketkeeper: 0 runs
B Side nets, between the striker and halfway down the pitch: 1 run
C Side nets between halfway and the bowlers end: 2 runs
D Back net: 4 runs on the bounce, 6 runs on the full

If you go...

Fly from Dubai or Abu Dhabi to Chiang Mai in Thailand, via Bangkok, before taking a five-hour bus ride across the Laos border to Huay Xai. The land border crossing at Huay Xai is a well-trodden route, meaning entry is swift, though travellers should be aware of visa requirements for both countries.

Flights from Dubai start at Dh4,000 return with Emirates, while Etihad flights from Abu Dhabi start at Dh2,000. Local buses can be booked in Chiang Mai from around Dh50

Labour dispute

The insured employee may still file an ILOE claim even if a labour dispute is ongoing post termination, but the insurer may suspend or reject payment, until the courts resolve the dispute, especially if the reason for termination is contested. The outcome of the labour court proceedings can directly affect eligibility.


- Abdullah Ishnaneh, Partner, BSA Law 

MATCH INFO

UAE Division 1

Abu Dhabi Harlequins 12-24 Abu Dhabi Saracens

LILO & STITCH

Starring: Sydney Elizebeth Agudong, Maia Kealoha, Chris Sanders

Director: Dean Fleischer Camp

Rating: 4.5/5

The specs

Engine: 3.5-litre twin-turbo V6

Power: 380hp at 5,800rpm

Torque: 530Nm at 1,300-4,500rpm

Transmission: Eight-speed auto

Price: From Dh299,000 ($81,415)

On sale: Now

Results

Final: Iran beat Spain 6-3.

Play-off 3rd: UAE beat Russia 2-1 (in extra time).

Play-off 5th: Japan beat Egypt 7-2.

Play-off 7th: Italy beat Mexico 3-2.

The specs: 2018 BMW X2 and X3

Price, as tested: Dh255,150 (X2); Dh383,250 (X3)

Engine: 2.0-litre turbocharged inline four-cylinder (X2); 3.0-litre twin-turbo inline six-cylinder (X3)

Power 192hp @ 5,000rpm (X2); 355hp @ 5,500rpm (X3)

Torque: 280Nm @ 1,350rpm (X2); 500Nm @ 1,520rpm (X3)

Transmission: Seven-speed automatic (X2); Eight-speed automatic (X3)

Fuel consumption, combined: 5.7L / 100km (X2); 8.3L / 100km (X3)

ATP WORLD No 1

2004 Roger Federer

2005 Roger Federer

2006 Roger Federer

2007 Roger Federer

2008 Rafael Nadal

2009 Roger Federer

2010 Rafael Nadal

2011 Novak Djokovic

2012 Novak Djokovic

2013 Rafael Nadal

2014 Novak Djokovic

2015 Novak Djokovic

2016 Andy Murray

2017 Rafael Nadal

2018 Novak Djokovic

2019 Rafael Nadal

EMERGENCY PHONE NUMBERS

Estijaba – 8001717 –  number to call to request coronavirus testing

Ministry of Health and Prevention – 80011111

Dubai Health Authority – 800342 – The number to book a free video or voice consultation with a doctor or connect to a local health centre

Emirates airline – 600555555

Etihad Airways – 600555666

Ambulance – 998

Knowledge and Human Development Authority – 8005432 ext. 4 for Covid-19 queries

MATCH INFO

Alaves 1 (Perez 65' pen)

Real Madrid 2 (Ramos 52', Carvajal 69')

THE BIO

Bio Box

Role Model: Sheikh Zayed, God bless his soul

Favorite book: Zayed Biography of the leader

Favorite quote: To be or not to be, that is the question, from William Shakespeare's Hamlet

Favorite food: seafood

Favorite place to travel: Lebanon

Favorite movie: Braveheart

History's medical milestones

1799 - First small pox vaccine administered

1846 - First public demonstration of anaesthesia in surgery

1861 - Louis Pasteur published his germ theory which proved that bacteria caused diseases

1895 - Discovery of x-rays

1923 - Heart valve surgery performed successfully for first time

1928 - Alexander Fleming discovers penicillin

1953 - Structure of DNA discovered

1952 - First organ transplant - a kidney - takes place 

1954 - Clinical trials of birth control pill

1979 - MRI, or magnetic resonance imaging, scanned used to diagnose illness and injury.

1998 - The first adult live-donor liver transplant is carried out

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UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
Company%20profile
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The White Lotus: Season three

Creator: Mike White

Starring: Walton Goggins, Jason Isaacs, Natasha Rothwell

Rating: 4.5/5

Infobox

Western Region Asia Cup Qualifier, Al Amerat, Oman

The two finalists advance to the next stage of qualifying, in Malaysia in August

Results

UAE beat Iran by 10 wickets

Kuwait beat Saudi Arabia by eight wickets

Oman beat Bahrain by nine wickets

Qatar beat Maldives by 106 runs

Monday fixtures

UAE v Kuwait, Iran v Saudi Arabia, Oman v Qatar, Maldives v Bahrain

UAE Team Emirates

Valerio Conti (ITA)
Alessandro Covi (ITA)
Joe Dombrowski (USA)
Davide Formolo (ITA)
Fernando Gaviria (COL)
Sebastian Molano (COL)
Maximiliano Richeze (ARG)
Diego Ulissi (ITAS)

Jetour T1 specs

Engine: 2-litre turbocharged

Power: 254hp

Torque: 390Nm

Price: From Dh126,000

Available: Now

Results

Stage 5:

1. Jonas Vingegaard (DEN) Team Jumbo-Visma  04:19:08

2. Tadej Pogacar (SLO) UAE Team Emirates  00:00:03

3. Adam Yates (GBR) Ineos Grenadiers

4. Sergio Higuita (COL) EF Education-Nippo 00:00:05

5. Joao Almeida (POR) Deceuninck-QuickStep 00:00:06

General Classification:

1. Tadej Pogacar (SLO) UAE Team Emirates 17:09:26

2.  Adam Yates (GBR) Ineos Grenadiers 00:00:45

3. Joao Almeida (POR) Deceuninck-QuickStep 00:01:12

4. Chris Harper (AUS) Team Jumbo-Visma 00:01:54

5. Neilson Powless (USA) EF Education-Nippo 00:01:56

The specs: 2018 Chevrolet Trailblazer

Price, base / as tested Dh99,000 / Dh132,000

Engine 3.6L V6

Transmission: Six-speed automatic

Power 275hp @ 6,000rpm

Torque 350Nm @ 3,700rpm

Fuel economy combined 12.2L / 100km

MOUNTAINHEAD REVIEW

Starring: Ramy Youssef, Steve Carell, Jason Schwartzman

Director: Jesse Armstrong

Rating: 3.5/5

GAC GS8 Specs

Engine: 2.0-litre 4cyl turbo

Power: 248hp at 5,200rpm

Torque: 400Nm at 1,750-4,000rpm

Transmission: 8-speed auto

Fuel consumption: 9.1L/100km

On sale: Now

Price: From Dh149,900

MATCH INFO

Red Star Belgrade v Tottenham Hotspur, midnight (Thursday), UAE

2025 Fifa Club World Cup groups

Group A: Palmeiras, Porto, Al Ahly, Inter Miami.

Group B: Paris Saint-Germain, Atletico Madrid, Botafogo, Seattle.

Group C: Bayern Munich, Auckland City, Boca Juniors, Benfica.

Group D: Flamengo, ES Tunis, Chelsea, Leon.

Group E: River Plate, Urawa, Monterrey, Inter Milan.

Group F: Fluminense, Borussia Dortmund, Ulsan, Mamelodi Sundowns.

Group G: Manchester City, Wydad, Al Ain, Juventus.

Group H: Real Madrid, Al Hilal, Pachuca, Salzburg.

How to come clean about financial infidelity
  • Be honest and transparent: It is always better to own up than be found out. Tell your partner everything they want to know. Show remorse. Inform them of the extent of the situation so they know what they are dealing with.
  • Work on yourself: Be honest with yourself and your partner and figure out why you did it. Don’t be ashamed to ask for professional help. 
  • Give it time: Like any breach of trust, it requires time to rebuild. So be consistent, communicate often and be patient with your partner and yourself.
  • Discuss your financial situation regularly: Ensure your spouse is involved in financial matters and decisions. Your ability to consistently follow through with what you say you are going to do when it comes to money can make all the difference in your partner’s willingness to trust you again.
  • Work on a plan to resolve the problem together: If there is a lot of debt, for example, create a budget and financial plan together and ensure your partner is fully informed, involved and supported. 

Carol Glynn, founder of Conscious Finance Coaching

The specs

Engine: 3.0-litre flat-six twin-turbocharged

Transmission: eight-speed PDK automatic

Power: 445bhp

Torque: 530Nm

Price: Dh474,600

On Sale: Now

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The burning issue

The internal combustion engine is facing a watershed moment – major manufacturer Volvo is to stop producing petroleum-powered vehicles by 2021 and countries in Europe, including the UK, have vowed to ban their sale before 2040. The National takes a look at the story of one of the most successful technologies of the last 100 years and how it has impacted life in the UAE.

Part three: an affection for classic cars lives on

Read part two: how climate change drove the race for an alternative 

Read part one: how cars came to the UAE

From Zero

Artist: Linkin Park

Label: Warner Records

Number of tracks: 11

Rating: 4/5

About Housecall

Date started: July 2020

Founders: Omar and Humaid Alzaabi

Based: Abu Dhabi

Sector: HealthTech

# of staff: 10

Funding to date: Self-funded