I know I could never deny anyone the right to progress. But it is a little sad that the quietly unobtrusive, non-polluting shadouf has been largely replaced in Egypt by the very loud and incredibly smelly diesel machines for irrigation of crops along the Nile.
Here is a You Tube example of a 5,000 year old ancient Egyptian technology still operating today on a small plot of land in Egypt. It may be more manually intensive, but this juxtaposition of effective, soft and gentle set against intrusive, polluting and loud, really makes we wonder about ‘progress’ in today’s world – what are we really losing? and what are we really gaining??
Special thanks to Jane Akshar for obtaining this wonderful footage of a Shadouf in action:
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