Noura’s biography is still repeated on the tongues of the people of the village, and the apricot season is still an annual date to remind the woman who was deprived of the land from offering apricots two years ago, so she resorted to work as a maid in the homes of the Cairenes, and her daughter’s device cost her a large amount of debt from the owners of the installment fairs, and the end came as he did not expect Uhud, Nora got sick and her health would not guarantee her to pay what she owed, so the major disaster that led her to prison was the fulfillment of her debts, the price of a new life for her daughter, in which she may deposit a life based on the velvet fruit.
The history of apricots in the village of Al-Amar
The apricot tree - which the Egyptians have known since the time of Muhammad Ali, and the people of Al-Amar village know nothing but it since it took root in the land of the village in the Qalyubia governorate - commented on it their wishes, marriages, girls’ dreams, and even funerals, so if the people of the village died for them, they would not raise their voices except by crying over him. After the departure of the sun and making sure that the apricot collectors have completed their tasks for the day and are able to bid farewell to the departed, they say, "The dead person's funeral awaits, but the apricot is not waiting for anyone."
The color that resembles the sun in its brightness covers the trees of the village of Al-Ammar, promising them that this year will be due to the differences in temperature, which will be easy for the crop they are waiting for and for which their village is famous. The intense heat during the day and its low at night did not destroy the good of the whole season, but with all this, Sabah had to look for other crops that were not afraid of the sun. Al Jazeera.net spent a day with the people of the village of Al-Ammar while they received the harvest of their only crop.
Trees without apricots and mornings without life
Sabah and her seven sons live on the best crops in which the whole family works. The men grow and collect, and the mother and daughters take care of packing and selling. “Life is hard, and apricots used to make it easier for us every season, but the situation has changed now.”
Sabah seeks to complete the marriage of her son, which was postponed for two consecutive years due to the crop that was burned by the temperatures. This year it was different. The sun left their apricots for them, but she promised them cold every night. To lessen the effect of the night cold at times that were supposed to be constant at one temperature that helps the ripening of the crop.” The only night I secured a morning for the temperature, I woke up in the morning to find apricots on the ground.
The apricot crop needs balanced temperatures, as the hot sun eats it and the cold damages its kernels, causing them to fall prematurely. Trees in other areas give better productivity at a lower cost, and climate change comes to Egypt to be the reason for the camel’s back, and the temperature fluctuation between extreme high or unexpectedly low in the harvest season made Al-Amar lose its reputation for being an apricot village and its way was free of apricot cartons, which are famous for selling on Banha free road.
The apricot crop needs balanced temperatures, as the scorching sun eats it, and the cold wilts its kernels, causing them to fall prematurely (Al-Jazeera)
Hakim Al-Ammar tells the story of the apricot
From the farthest corner of the village came Mr. Abdul-Wahhab, dressed in an eloquent peasant outfit. He has the experience that enables him to be the language of his village and its reference in solving problems and crises. He holds customary sessions to repay the divorced woman and reform between the quarrelsome and end hostilities. The people of Al-Ammar do as he does, for he is the role model and the experience he trusts. everybody.
Al-Sayed knows that climate change is the reason for the fate of the “Fatima” tree, so the mother apricot tree was called, the remaining legacy of Muhammad Ali trees, its name remained and its fruits disappeared.
Al-Sayed is neither able to read nor write, but he is a good follower of news bulletins, television programs and agricultural association seminars. Egypt does not have an apricot that can stand in comparison with the apricot of Ammar.
In Abdul Wahab’s hand is an apricot that does not leave him, he does not eat it quickly like everyone else, he feels its texture at a time and then opens it slowly, looks carefully at the consistency of its inner skin and then nibbles from it a phone: “God.. apricots on his father, this taste only comes from here ', referring to the apricot of his village.
Al-Sayyed asserts that climate change was the main cause of the death of the Fatima tree, the tree that Muhammad Ali brought to be the nucleus of the elderly in Al-Amar and all of Egypt, despite the multiplicity of reasons associated with the shortage of the apricot crop, such as the multiplicity of places of cultivation in the reclaimed lands and the change of farmers’ type of cultivation due to the lack of output and its low price. Al-Fasih relates this to climate change, saying, “People wonder when they find us understand what climate change means. The farmer is the person who feels the consequences of climate change the most, because we see with our own eyes what happens when the high temperature causes the crop to fall from the trees, and the consequences of the severe cold disrupting the flowering of the fruit.” Girls' marriages are delayed.
"Climate change, which they tell us about in the agricultural association's seminars, we have seen with our own eyes for years," Abdel-Wahab added.
The apricot harvest season in 2022 was the most productive (Al-Jazeera)
When did the lean years begin?
Mr. Abdel-Wahhab chronicles the collapse of Mishmish El-Amar since “Shurbat Youssef Wali”, the medicine that was distributed by the Ministry of Agriculture during the Mubarak era and its most famous Minister of Agriculture, Youssef Wali, to improve the quality of the land and eliminate insects. Without a single apricot, then the fruits began to come back slowly.
He added, "But the winds brought what ships did not desire. The trees began their recovery journey and their crops began to regain their throne."
Mr. Abdel Wahab describes the apricot as a plant whose spirit is light, its time on trees is limited, and the temperature in Egypt has changed, sometimes summer comes in March and sometimes it comes in May, which prompted the farmers to change the planting to citrus, okra or eggplant.
The apricot planting season begins in December with pruning the land and placing the seeds, then the irrigation stage begins. At this time, the tree needs constant rates of heat. Excessive height harms it, and the fruit quickly spoils, and the intense cold atrophies the fruit and drops it to the ground.
And the 2022 season was the fat year after the lean years, as seen by Mr. Abdel Wahab, hoping that it would not be the last and that the age would remain with its apricots full.