By Australian journalist Philip Luker

Bellydancing was born in Cairo and so were Tutankhamun, Moses and Cleopatra.

This dancer, Jasirah, was born in Poland, which shows how international this blog is. Her dance here has been downloaded 25 million times.

She is not as plump as some other bellydancers.

That’s how many Middle Eastern men prefer them.

Cairo’s first music hall

Badia Masabni (1892-1974) was the godmother of Bellydancing.

She was a Syrian-Lebanese actress who opened Cairo’s first music hall in the 1920s.

Cairo has had many unofficial bellydancers, including some who danced nude for ANZAC World War 1 servicemen returning from Gallipoli and having a break before carnage on the Western Front in France.

Cairo is a city of conservative social customs becoming more liberal, more people dressing in Western fashion, more women working than elsewhere in the Middle East, a bloody succession of conquests from Alexander to the British, crazy traffic, blaring car horns, a unique atmosphere, little back streets and three pyramids.

The Great Pyramid took 20 years

Pharaoh Khufu used a thousand paid workers and slaves who took 20 years to finish the Great Pyramid in 2540 BCE (Before Christ).

They hauled the huge stone blocks up ramps with sledges, rollers and levers. There were no welcome breaks in music halls after work.

Pharaoh’s son built the Great Sphinx

The Great Pyramid is the oldest of the Seven Wonders of the World and the only one to remain largely intact, a tribute to the pharaoh and his skilled engineers and workers.

The six other Wonders are: The Colosseum, the Christ statue above Rio de Janeiro, the Great Wall of China, the Petra historical city in Jordan, the Taj Mahal and the Machu Picchu ruins in Peru.

Pharaoh Khufu’s family were keen to leave mementoes of themselves behind: His son built the Great Sphinx, with a body of a lion and the face of a man who looks like he did. It’s surprising other dictators have not copied the idea.

Egyptian men have several wives

Life in ancient Egypt was not very different from life for many Egyptians outside Cairo today. Families were and are important.

Most men had several wives, including a chief wife, but women were often treated as equals and were allowed to own property and conduct business although they were expected to obey their husbands

Taxes were imposed on crops.

Most ancient and modern Egyptians live on the banks of the Nile.

It is regarded as the world’s longest river at 6,853km (4,258 miles) although Brazil claims the Amazon is longer.

The Nile gives Egypt irrigation, hydropower, a steady water supply and rich soil.

Cairo has population of 20 million

Cairo has a hectic atmosphere of crazy traffic and 20 million people, twice the number in Sydney and Melbourne combined.

Thirty-five per cent of Cairo people are aged under 15 and only one per cent are aged over 75. In Australia, 13.6 per cent of people are aged 65 or over.

Cairo is enchanting, although not if you struggle to survive, as the general living standard is low. Its culture is a mix of Eastern, Western and Arab cultures.

My photo of women in Middle Eastern dress shows a Pepsi sign in the background.

The three pyramids and the Sphinx are only seven kilometres away and are its main tourist attraction.

Islam discourages dating

Almost all Cairo people follow Islam to a greater or lesser extent. Islam discourages dating so single men and women are not supposed to be alone together if not related.

Lower-income families often negotiate marriage with another family.

Once a couple is introduced, the families meet to discuss who will pay for the marriage and the dowry to be paid by the wife to the husband or his family.

Then a supervised meeting is arranged, when either person can say no to the marriage. All very unromantic.

Egypt was conquered eight times

Alexander very bloodily conquered Egypt in 323BCE.

Then the Romans did so in 30BCE, followed by Arab Muslim armies in AD 639, then the Mongols, then the Mamluk Sultans, then the Ottoman Empire until 1798, then by Napoleon but for only three years until the British occupied Egypt in 1882.

Egypt became important for trade after Ferdinand de Lesseps, a French diplomat, built the Suez Canal through it in 1869.

Like most people conquered by a foreign army, the Egyptians were not in love with the British and in 1952 some Egyptian generals led by Garnal Abdel Nasser took their country back and made Nasser President.

Nasser’s popularity skyrocketed

Australian and British schoolchildren were taught how terrible Nasser was.

Actually, he was personally incorruptible, accessible to ordinary Egyptians, introduced land reforms and in 1956 his popularity among Egyptians skyrocketed when he nationalised the Suez Canal.

Britain, France and Israel invaded Egypt but withdrew when the United States and Russia protested.

As a result, bellydancing did not spring into fashion in London or Paris and certainly not in Jerusalem.

But otherwise it has spread around the world.