Egyptian Chronicles: Ramadan Arabian Nights 2022: Tale of Al-Ashkeef “The Princess and the stable boy” Ep.2

Ramadan Kareem as we use in Egypt, “we are not used to Ramadan Mubarak”

Here is our second night of Ramadan Arabian nights.

Before we go into our routine, I want to speak a little bit about the One Thousand and One Nights TV series and its crew.

You may think it was poorly produced but during then in 1989 in Egypt, that production meant a lot of effort especially since the series was hit since its start in 1984.

Tonight I will speak about one of the most trademarks of that series: Shahryar and Scheherazade’s animation.

Scheherazade and Shahryar's famous animated version in Egypt "1989"

The intro and outro of Shahryar and Scheherazade use the original recordings of our favorite radio show. That illustrated animation was made by the late famous Gamal Kotb.

It was a surprise for me to find his name in the credits.

Another interesting name I found in the credit was Egyptian pioneer editor and animation director Shewkar Khalifa.

This woman had hundreds of intros and outros in her portfolio made in the old way in Pre-Adobe Illustrator and After Effects time.

Yes, Egyptian women were working in film and TV animation editing for decades.

You may think that this is a bad acid-trip TV series from the 1980s but I can’t keep thinking if Fahmy Abdel-Hamid and Shewkar Khalifa lived in the days of CGI, green screen and after-effects.

Now to our nightly routine in Ramadan.

First, you can refresh your memory and listen to last night’s episode.

Now, here is the second episode of our tale tonight. It was episode no.584 of our favorite show.

The festival is over at the Kingdom of King Luqman and the kings return to their islands after paying their respect to their wise man and grand ruler.

Meanwhile, Luqman summons his son to ask him about his marriage and Prince Rihan and reminds him that his promise that he would accept the girl his son would choose and bless their marriage.

A man of his word, Luqman tells him that he was a man of his word and so Rihan announces that he found his bride, Princess Hanom of the fourth island; the daughter of King Sadoom.

He recounts their unusual meeting then to Luqman. On the first day of the festival, he goes hunting alone without the servants and during the hunt he sees in the forest the sound of a monstrous animal attacking another knight.

He kills the animal with an arrow and goes to the knight only to find that it was not he but rather she, a very beautiful lady.

He expresses his admiration, but our lady aka Princess Hanom brushes him off thinking that he was a servant (in a very arrogant way).

She goes on her way, only to get lost in the forest and to be saved by Rihan who claims to be a stable boy.

Her entourage finds her, and she tells Rihan as she goes with them that she will tell her father, King Sadoom to offer him a job at their stable after King Luqman’s permission.

Here is the second episode of the tale televised.