Manga'ouna: Port Said's Easter Pastries
Step inside the honour city and learn about it's history of resistance.
Welcome to Port Said
Port Said, the city reclaimed from the sea, was established with the digging up of Suez Canal. The Universal Company of the Maritime of Canal of Suez (Companie universelle du canal maritime de Suez) which constructed Suez Canal under French supervision, later fell into British hands in 1881.
Port Fouad mosque (2018-12-07) by NawayaNawaya
The city of resistance
Port Said, the city of resistance, has its unique place in the history of modern Egypt as a border city that was part of the contentious history of the European presence in Egypt. Post WWI was an intense time of demands for Egyptian independence. Edmund Allenby, the British High Commissioner of Egypt used excessive force to control these demand, and ordered the execution of Egyptian leaders of resistance. To mark the departure of the High Commissioner, the people of Port Said burnt an effigy of Allenby. Ever since, this new symbolic tradition has been continued as a symbol of resistance.
Celebrating Easter in Port Said
Sham El Nessim, is a Spring celebration which continued since the ancient Egyptian time. It is celebrated the day after Easter throughout Egypt - that always includes salted herring and fesikh - a fermented mullet dish.
Easter in Port Said
But in Port Said this festivity takes a different flavor, where hundreds of thousands of people, young and old, Christian and Muslim spend that night in the streets of the port city, singing, dancing and burning
Singing in a semsemeyya circle (2014-04-21) by NawayaNawaya
Dancing to the tunes of the Semsemya
Circles form around local music bands that play the string instrument Semsemya, and dance the unique dances of Suez Canal cities.
Effigies in Port Said (2014-04-21) by NawayaNawaya
Symbols of the new season
The carefully made effigies (of corrupt employees, terrorists and hated politicians) are burned in squares along the city, with old and broken furniture, to symbolize the advent of the new season.
Burning effigies (2014-04-21) by NawayaNawaya
This extreme ‘Spring Cleaning’ practice, burning the old to clear the way for the new in time for Spring is attributed to the Greek community that thrived in the port city in the first half of the 20th century, attesting to Port Said’s cosmopolitan history.
Manga'ouna: Port Said's Easter Pastries
Eggs are an integral part of Easter in many culture. Ancient symbolism links the egg to the renewal of life at the advent of spring. In Port Said people celebrate Easter with nest like pastries decorated with colored eggs, called Mangaouna. This European inspired pastry recipe is a remnant of the cosmopolitan past and the colonial history of the once major port on the trade routes.
Mangaouna - a sweet dough typically eaten in Port Said during Sham el Nessim (2020-08-31) by NawayaNawaya
A delicious sweet pastry
Manga’ouna start the special day of Sham el Neseem. Literally meaning “smelling the breeze” this day has been celebrated since Ancient Egyptian times. Eggs and salted fish (feseekh) marked this day for thousands of years, where Egyptians go out to picnic in gardens, parks and by the seaside.
Mangaouna bread ingredients (2020-08-31) by NawayaNawaya
Mixing the ingredients
The pastry ingredients of flour, milk, ghee and eggs are mixed together and the dough is left to rise.
Mangaouna decorated with colored eggs (2020-08-31) by NawayaNawaya
The joy of cooking
Children participate in making the Mang’ouna to celebrate Easter. They are encouraged to cut the pastry and braid it then it is left to rise again before being baked and enjoyed in the morning of Easter, after the night of Allenby festivities.
Mangaouna out of the oven (2020-08-31) by NawayaNawaya
Curator: Laura Tabet
Research: Dalia Basiouny, Hashim Morsi
Photography: Hashim Morsy, Waleed Montasser
