The Ancient Nile: The Longest River In The World | TRACKS

paper was light gold in medieval times [Music] i want tobacco sugar [Music] that everything we thought we knew about the world might turn out to be completely wrong [Music] from the beginning of history the nile has been the lifeblood of one of the greatest civilizations on earth its waters have flowed at the feet of aristotle and cleopatra joseph and moses the crusaders and the pharaohs of ancient egypt all have bathed in this stream [Music] the egyptians have always believed this river to be their own exclusive gift from the gods and up until recently it was allowed to flow unhindered to their lands but now all this is set to change upstream ethiopia is busy building dams which threaten to cut off egypt's water supply at the source many of the wars of the 20th century were all about oil but wars of the 21st will be over water with the nile the longest river in the world at the center of the conflict [Applause] fresh running water has always been the lifeblood of our world but is now more precious than ever over the next 20 years the amount of water available to everyone is expected to decrease by a third [Music] but this story isn't just about water it's about the nile as an icon for deeply held beliefs and about a sense of belonging which stretches back a thousand years this epic journey will follow the river back to its source in ethiopia and as the nile winds its way back home its waters will wash through the lives of people who cannot survive without it the nile flows from the heart of africa in two main channels the white nile which rises from lake victoria in uganda and the blue nile which flows from the mountains of ethiopia and which has nourished the growth of egypt and its capital cairo pounding traffic and pulsating crowds formed the backdrop to an exhilarating mix of present and past and right through it all flows the river nile the lifeline and the heart of this city most of the citizens here take this river for granted for them it's a nice place to take a walk with the family a great location for an apartment or just a place for a bit of peace away from the cacophony of the streets they probably don't even think that without this river they wouldn't even be here [Music] in a country with hardly any rainfall the nile gives the people water work food life for some it also gives them a place to live like abdullah in his family who live on the nile all year round [Music] of course life is hard especially when the weather is cold some people live very comfortably and others have a hard life like us but we try not to aim too high some people are born rich and we are poor and humble such is life with 17 million inhabitants and still growing cairo itself has more than doubled in size over the past 50 years the city is now home to nearly the same number of people as the whole of australia all in one confined chaotic sprawling city there's just not enough room here for everybody and so some people have been pushed off the land and onto the river my wife was from the village of el manufa i told her that she could stay there with her parents that she refused and said that we have to be together on the boat abdullah safa and the young family live in a small community these wooden boats are their homes they fish on them by day and sleep in them at night they get all their water directly from the river wash their clothes bathe their babies in it they also earn a meager living from it taking home between 10 and 20 us dollars a day for their catch abdullah can only buy the bare necessities of life they could never afford an apartment or a house [Music] but in spite of their difficult living conditions abdullah still loves his life on the nile well [Music] [Music] you take me away from this river and i die i love the night [Music] this love affair with the nile lies at the heart of the egyptian psyche and has existed since the age of the pharaohs and their pyramids [Music] these monumental structures are about an hour's drive away from the nile in giza far enough through the pounding traffic and hot messy cairo suburbs to seem completely divorced from the river and its concerns [Music] but it wasn't always like this [Music] in ancient times the nile flowed right by here because during the summer months the river flooded and broke its banks with the flood waters reaching as far as giza and beyond this naturally recurring phenomenon was the secret behind egypt's success the life-giving floods provided the pharaohs with a dynamic surge of water which allowed them to grow their crops and feed their people it also allowed them to carry giant rocks so that they could build their pyramids [Music] the ancient egyptians had no idea how the floods came to them during the hot summer when other nations withered and died in the dry heat but they gave their gods eternal thanks for the miracle on which not just the pyramids but their whole nation was built and to this day even though the floods have dried up and their gods are long gone the monuments that were built in their honor remain as testimony to egypt's historic right to own and control the nile but ancient rights to the river don't always answer the needs of people today shoprament is a village on the outskirts of giza and right on the edge of the desert [Music] compared to some locals here are fairly well off but they still haven't got what they need most [Music] fresh running water [Music] most of the homes here have a tap but the murky stuff that comes out of it is just too dirty to drink and so the locals have to either carry their water from distant standpipes or buy their water from private vendors at twice the rate of meat consumption the water from the taps is no good for drinking and cooking you can use it for domestic tasks but my water is good the villagers can use it for drinking and cooking as well seller he used to have a spice stall in the local souk but saw an opportunity to make more money selling something far more valuable than saffron i've been doing it for eight years the more i work the more i get clients the inhabitants of the village all the cafes and every household now buy my water [Music] the recent population growth in egypt hasn't been matched by a growth in the country's infrastructure and so for the people living on the outskirts like here in shopremont there's a desperate shortage of basic facilities [Music] forsyth muhammad however business is booming with people throwing money at him [Music] there are 800 water cellars in cairo and giza and with the country still growing at an alarming rate they're working overtime to try and meet demand so syed mohammed is soon planning to buy another horse and cart to expand his business [Music] it's easy to sympathize with egypt's need for more water and the government is now desperately trying to find new ways of stretching the nile's supply to satisfy the needs of its burgeoning millions but some people say that the country's already using up more than its fair share [Music] its right to its own water supply is now being challenged by a desperate and determined neighbor who is prepared to go to extreme lengths to secure its own stake in the nile [Applause] [Music] the situations never been so volatile and egypt has been threatening war with ethiopia set firmly in its sights [Music] the nile in egypt flows almost entirely through desert apart from the thin strips of green watered land which border the river on either side the whole country is made up of inhospitable wasteland [Music] since the stone age most egyptians have lived very close to the nile dependent on it for everything [Music] from the urban centers of cairo and giza the nile winds its way back through the flatlands of egypt to the agricultural regions of the nile valley where once again the river plays a central role in society [Music] [Music] who own a small piece of land in the nile valley muhammad however may be the last of a long line my grandparents and my great-grandparents were farmers and i am a farmer aman and muhammad have worked together from dawn till dusk since muhammad was old enough to carry a faz or a minjal the pace of life for them has an ancient rhythm and this scene could have been witnessed a thousand years ago they inherited their skills and their tools from their forefathers and used the same irrigation channels and canals first commissioned by the pharaohs to ensure that the nile never fails to reach their crops [Applause] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] muhammad and his ancestors have always played a crucial role in egyptian life but their age-old position is now under threat [Music] the longevity of this ancient civilization reflects more than anything else the time-honed skills of these farmers but also the eternal fertility of its soil a power which is unparalleled in human history where other civilizations withered and died as their soils were exhausted egypt's land was continuously replenished by the annual floods which inundated the country every year [Music] these floods had allowed the pharaohs to build their tombs but far more importantly they gave egypt an annual deposit of rich and glorious mud from which they could grow an abundance of food [Music] is everything for the egyptian farmer and everything for the land in the good old days the nile stood flooded for three months so it softened the soil then when the nile's water subsided we could start cultivating [Music] but times have changed [Music] huge damning projects upstream have been built to provide egypt with a much needed supply of electricity but they also stemmed the flow of the river and wrecked the lives of the egyptian farmers [Music] egypt used to have some of the best soil in the world but the damming schemes destroyed the silting process which had naturally enriched this land for thousands of years muhammad's fields now yield a very poor return we used to grow our crops without chemicals but now we have to use chemicals without them we get a poor harvest but the sprays are very expensive the artificial fertilizers simply aren't as effective as mother nature and they're also a big drain on his profits it's a bleak situation and muhammad no longer sees a future here for his sons [Music] as a direct result of modern damning methods agriculture in egypt is in decline for the first time in its history and farmers are being forced out of a way of life that has supported this nation for thousands of years [Music] as the river journeys towards egypt's southernmost border it's hard to avoid the signs and signals that this is fast becoming a very modern nation with tourism now replacing farming as the mainstay of the egyptian economy and with the old ways gradually disappearing into the sand [Music] but no matter how much life changes along its banks the nile remains an eternal and constant presence in egypt whether people plow the land or relax in linen suits on the decks of cruise ships the river is always close and ever-present the star attraction for locals and visitors alike [Music] [Music] in aswan however a city very close to egypt's southern border the river is upstaged by a colossus which took 10 years to complete and used up enough building materials to have constructed 17 great pyramids at giza [Music] the aswan dam [Music] hailed as egypt savior when it was completed in 1970 the dam provided the country with 90 percent of its electricity [Music] but perhaps the most important reason for building this dam had nothing to do with generating power egypt is the driest country in the world [Music] the nile although an almighty river has sometimes revealed itself as an extremely vulnerable force it is almost entirely dependent on upstream rains to feed and renew its flow and in the past when these failed the nile and the whole of egypt also failed [Music] one of the worst ever droughts happened during the times of the pharaohs and is recorded on this stone known as the famine steely these hieroglyphs tell of a seven year long drought when the rains did not come and when the nile was turned into a mud big trench as if dug out especially to receive the dry corpses of the nation [Music] but the aswan dam changed everything it allowed egypt to store vast quantities of nile water in lake nasa and gave the country direct control over its most precious resource for over 30 years the dam has supplied egypt with enough electricity and water to satisfy the needs of all its people during the 1980s when ethiopia suffered years of terrible drought and famine egypt was able to bask in the reserves held in lake bassa [Music] but not anymore with 63 million inhabitants now filling up all the areas along the nile and with the population explosion set to continue the aswan dam may not be enough to save egypt from dying of thirst in the future the solution to this seemingly impossible situation may be found in the most unlikely of places the toshka project seeks to relieve population congestion and reclaim some 4 000 square kilometers of land for agriculture by irrigating [Music] as they talked about the pyramids the aswan dam and the pharaohs irrigation secretary ahmed masih is the government's representative in toshka he believes that by diverting water from the nile and pumping it into the middle of the desert egypt's future will be assured but to turn toshka from desert to settlement requires an extra 5 billion cubic litres of water every year a situation which has greatly angered the other african nations the niles waters flow through ten countries but it's egypt which has always been allowed to use most of it a massive 65 leaving next to nothing for the other nations to share between them the distribution and ownership of the nile has nothing to do with the amount of water which flows through each country it is in fact the result of an old colonial agreement the 1929 treaty between egypt and great britain whose empire at the time stretched over a great swathe of the nile basin gave egypt the power of veto to stop any upstream developments from affecting the amount of water reaching its lands in return for cotton and an easy trade route to india the british gave egypt full control of the river and a lion share of its flow [Music] these rights are still maintained today whilst other nations are prevented from harnessing a single drop of the nile egypt is now diverting even more of this precious river to grow crops in the middle of the desert [Music] ahmed however is promising faithfully to offset the use of extra water here by limiting consumption elsewhere in egypt [Music] the project has not and will not cause any differences between us and the other nile countries none of the rights of other countries are lost and neither do we take more than we deserved but critics say that egypt will soon be demanding an even greater share of the nile than it's getting already [Music] with the other nile nations fed up of taking a backseat and now claiming their right to the river water wars could soon become a very real and potent danger with ethiopia a country on the front line [Music] [Music] [Music] from egypt the nile snakes back through the deserts of the sudan before splitting into two separate streams from this point the nile becomes two rivers the white nile with its source in uganda and the more powerful blue nile which now takes us to the source of our story ethiopia [Music] the ethiopia we expect to see is a parched and barren country ravaged by dictatorship and civil war and left to rot in the midday sun [Music] but this isn't the whole picture ethiopia is an incredible country of immense beauty with an abundance of one of the most precious natural resources in the world [Music] water [Music] this is the country which provides egypt with 90 of its water supply and is the source of the nile itself but despite its apparent water wealth ethiopia's problem has always been a crippling inability to use the vast percentage of it [Music] as the nile flows through a lush but almost impenetrable valley named the blue nile gorge it becomes clear that this is a country with a very different relationship to the one that egypt has with the river far from being ever present never close the nile in ethiopia is often trapped by terrain making it impossible for the river to seep out and irrigate the surrounding lands it seems almost to be swallowed up by the landscape consumed by some dark force superstition has long held that the blue nile gorge which stretches for 400 kilometers right through the heart of ethiopia is an evil place populated by dangerous spirits this along with its extremely harsh geography has always been a serious obstacle not only in accessing the nile but also in the search for its source the ancient egyptians probably traveled upstream as far as this point but weren't able to penetrate any further it was only in 1968 that the gorge was finally navigated and to this day rumors of deathly rapids huge crocodiles and ruthless bandits deter would-be travelers the cruel paradox for locals is that even though this is the country which feeds the nile ethiopia has never been able to use it to feed itself as this journey to the river source continues through to the farming heartland of ethiopia it becomes difficult to grasp why this fruitful country should still be dependent on food aid for its survival but nu temazgen knows only too well why this is still the case he and his wife wubit own a small farm just at the end of the blue nile gorge in the foothills of ethiopia and even though the nile here finally breaks free of its confines to flow right through their fields and you can hardly use a single drop of it so the nile is far for me i cannot afford a motor pump and i cannot fetch it with my bare hands so only my cat will drink from it if i could i'd be very happy to bring the nile to my land but it is beyond our ability enu used to be a builder's laborer with nothing to his name but he worked hard and saved up his meager wages to buy a small plot of land and get married his family now work together on the farm the days are long and hard with each one of them contributing not just to their livelihood but to their survival unlike egypt there are hardly any irrigation or water storage systems in ethiopia and so farmers here are entirely dependent on the annual rainy season to grow their crops when there's rain there's plenty of food but for nine months of the year not a drop will fall from the skies then this place will become a dry and barren dust bowl the most frustrating thing for enyu is that since a little tributary of the nile flows through his land he could potentially irrigate their fields all year round but instead all they can do is carry little quantities of it in plastic jerry cans this is woo bits job she has to make this trip four or five times a day to provide just enough water to cook clean and wash ennu's dream is to someday be able to afford a water pump so that will it won't have to do this back-breaking work and so that he'll be able to properly irrigate their fields then our country will be like a flower hand labor will be replaced by machines and water will be used for development if the nile is given to the farmer the farmland will be so all this should be possible [Music] this vast country has an estimated 37 000 square kilometers of good farmland an area larger than belgium that if properly irrigated could feed all its people all year round to do so however would reduce the river's flow to egypt dramatically and result in almost certain conflict between the two nations it's a political stalemate and in the meantime nothing is being done to help the starving people and struggling farmers of ethiopia enu and his family just have to make the most of the summer reigns and hope for a better future when ethiopia will be able to realize its potential and blossom into a fully developed nation [Music] but for now the unavoidable truth that this is a country still struggling to provide its people with the bare essentials to survive is still as glaringly clear as the bright ethiopian sun in a place where human beings are so entirely at the mercy of nature and its forces on good soil and good reigns with hunger and thirst their old companions it's hardly surprising that some people here still cling to the comfort of ancient beliefs [Music] it's not uncommon throughout this country but especially in the areas closest to the nile to find small groups of people huddled by the river quietly chanting verses and throwing offerings into the water a piece of bread a cup of coffee or sometimes a live sacrifice to give thanks or perhaps appease the great river the waito tribe is one of the oldest in africa and their way of life has not changed for thousands of years they live on one of the niles tributes only 30 kilometers away from its source and still make boats out of papyrus reminiscent of those that would have been used in ancient egypt gebre simachu is one of the tribe's elders [Applause] it is known that the life of the waito tribe is on the water poverty is a big problem for us more than ever the fish harvest is disappearing and papyrus is not found near like before it is a difficult life these people are utterly dependent on the nile for everything their food and their faith apart from the little money they make by selling baskets in the local market they live a hand-to-mouth existence with no land to farm and no animals to rear their relationship with the river is one of complete respect believing that the nile is an awesome force there to serve the needs of all the people but belonging to none the nile is the earth's resource it belongs to the earth as it goes on its travels on earth it belongs to no one once in a while a sheep is bought to be sacrificed but today a chicken seems to suffice the animal's blood will be poured into the water making sure that not a single drop touches the earth if it did the niles roth would be incurred and then who knows what might happen it did not harm us this is because we sacrificed for it over recent years the village elders seem worried that their sacrifices aren't working as well as they used to the nile and its environments are changing they say and they don't know what to do about it as the sun sets on the waito village we can but ponder on gabriel's words the nile belongs to all and yet to none wise words that a wise world would choose to hear [Music] for more than 6700km the nile snakes through forests slashes through gorges and floats through deserts offering some of the most graceful sights in africa it journeys past monuments and mountains through lush fields and urban expanse but its home is here in lake tahoe the source of the nile over 60 small rivers run into this vast inland sea but only one flows out the blue nile it's here hidden in ancient texts that we will unlock the secret why ethiopia has never been able to unleash the power of its river the ethiopian or coptic church is among the world's oldest christian denomination christianity here goes back to the 4th century with the ark of the covenant said to be hidden somewhere in these mountains one of the most important sites is lake tana itself with many ancient monasteries founded on tana's 37 islands one of the most celebrated and revered is kibran gabrielle which still houses a small community of monks all of whom are entirely dependent on the lake and the nile because of the monasteries but more so because the abbay or nile flows right through it it's a place that's mentioned in the bible and is one of our most precious resources [Music] since he was 15. ethiopia is one of the most devout and christian countries in the world religion is extremely important here with politics and faith always closely intertwined ethiopia's spiritual makeup has been one of the main reasons why the country has not been able to utilize the sacred nile to understand more we have to follow abba mariam into the monastery's old scriptorium where they keep priceless religious artifacts and ancient texts this is where it explains about egypt this book was made of parchment and it was written a very very long time ago in this book from the early middle ages there's a note referring to anaboon or archbishop being sent from egypt to ethiopia [Music] in the crucial area of religion ethiopia was for centuries under the rule of the egyptian church even their archbishop their boon was sent to them from egyptian hq with that kind of dependency on egypt for their spiritual health ethiopia was always kept under their yoke afraid that if they ever dared interfere with egypt's lifeline then they would lose their archbishop and their own religious heartbeat [Music] but then in 1959 in an act which expressed a growing national self-confidence the ethiopians broke away from the egyptian church by so doing they released themselves of any spiritual dependency and set the stage for what could be a conflict of apocalyptic proportions but it will always be there we'll use it all in our lives [Music] with hardly any contact with the outside world abba mariam and his small community on lake tana seem unaware that the future of the nile may now hang in the balance [Applause] [Music] 200 kilometers from lake tana on one of the main distributes of the nile looms a huge concrete structure which could change the nile basin forever when completed the takisi dam will be one of the largest in africa [Music] although the plan at the moment is to use it to generate hydroelectricity it has the potential to retain a vast amount of water for irrigation blocking much of its flow to egypt if the takisi scheme is successful ethiopia plans to build many more dams just like it and if this happens some experts say that egypt's water supply could be reduced by 40 percent or more [Music] is to change the life of the poor give them power build dams to provide drinking water there are some people who have to walk six to seven hours to fetch water the priority here is our people [Music] as for shigra is the ethiopian site manager and has been working on this project for six years he hardly ever sees his family who live in the capital addis ababa but all the effort and sacrifice he says will be worth it his children were very young during the famine of the eighties and he says that he never wants to live through a period like that again [Music] ethiopia in the past had a lot of problems at first our problem was that we were unable to use our natural resources especially unable to use the cheap resources the rivers hence there was big famine in our country now is the time to eradicate that famine [Music] the takisi project was on the drawing board for many years but potential western investors such as the world bank were always scared off by belligerent noises from the egyptian capital so ethiopia went east in search of help and in 2002 found a chinese backer for this project the takizi marks a definite turning point in ethiopia's history and in its potential to harness the nile it also marks the realization of many of egypt's fears after thousands of years of just letting it slip through their fingers ethiopia's new determination and ability to utilize the blue nile is likely to put it on a collision course with egypt the country which makes most use of the water downstream conflict has been threatened by both sides but asphalt believes that all this doesn't have to lead to war measures when we take such measures to feed our people egypt our neighbor and brother should not be nervous and should never be before there was not much understanding between us now we know each other very well downstream inhabitants for the first time in history all 10 nile basin states are meeting around one table to discuss how best to share the river despite asphalt optimism relations are still tense and agreement between the countries is a long way off [Music] there is hope however with ethiopia and egypt now starting to work together to face realities and find a solution to their conflicting demands [Music] one thing is certain to avert disaster there will have to be compromise on both sides war can only be avoided if every country begins to see the river as a gift for all but a prize for none [Music] the nile more than any other river in the world evokes a feeling of continuum and everlasting presence [Music] from aristotle and moses through to present-day politics the nile flows through the world's consciousness and its history now is the time to make sure that it flows through its future

Channel: TRACKS

Views: 389,797

Keywords: TRACKS, tracks travel channel, tracks travel, Documentary movies - topic, full documentary, travel documentary, culture documentary, Rivers, Water, Water Power, Powersource, Brasil, Rivers and Life, Egypt, the nile river, the nile river documentary, the nile river ancient egypt, ancient egypt, egyptian gods, nile river egypt, river nile source, river nile egypt, nile river ethiopia, north africa, middle east

Id: nyoseTzaoHo

Length: 51min 42sec (3102 seconds)

Published: Thu Oct 21 2021