El Moulid: Egyptian Religious Festival (1990)

Fadwa El Guindi takes her camera to Tanta, north of Cairo, where millions come every October to celebrate the moulid of Sayid Ahmed el-Badawi, a 13th century Sufi leader. Tanta's moulid, which means birthday, has a 700-year history, probably the first of Egypt's 200 such local annual celebrations of venerated personages. She talks to pilgrims, observes circumcisions, and follows the parade led by a Sufi caliph, who wears a turban woven from cloth that was el-Badawi's. The festival's mix of religion, pageantry, and politics, against the backdrop of current economic conditions, creates a swirl of activity in which Ahmed el-Badawi's mosque and tomb are at the center.