Την 8η Μαρτίου πραγματοποιήθηκε στο Ελληνορωμαϊκό Μουσείο Αλεξανδρείας η προγραμματισθείσα εκδήλωση με διοργανωτές το Ροταριανό Ίδρυμα Αλεξανδρείας, από κοινού με άλλους φορείς. Μεταξύ αυτών και ο Σύλλογος Ελλήνων Επιστημόνων «Πτολεμαίος Α΄».
Ομιλήτρια στο πάνελ μαζί με εκπροσώπους του πολιτισμού ήταν και η Πρόεδρος του Πτολεμαίου Α΄ και του ΕΝΟΑ κα. Λιλίκα Θλιβίτου.
Παρόντες διπλωμάτες, όπως Πρόξενοι κρατών αλλά και πολλοί εκπρόσωποι και θεσμικοί παράγοντες της οικονομίας, των γραμμάτων και των τεχνών της πόλης μας. Παράλληλα λειτουργούσε και έκθεση εικαστική πριν την έναρξη της εκδήλωσης, η οποία στέφθηκε με απόλυτη επιτυχία.
Την όλη εκδήλωση τίμησαν αρκετοί Έλληνες εκπαιδευτικοί των Ελληνικών Σχολείων της ΕΚΑ.
Οι ομιλητές απευθύνθηκαν προς το κοινό στην αγγλική γλώσσα και προς τούτο παραθέτουμε κάτωθι, την παρουσίαση του Πτολεμαίου Α΄ από την πλευρά της Προέδρου του κας. Λιλίκας Θλιβίτου.
ΣΥΝΟΠΤΙΚΗ ΠΑΡΟΥΣΙΑΣΗ ΤΟΥ ΣΥΛΛΟΓΟΥ ΣΤΑ ΑΓΓΛΙΚΑ
As president of the oldest active Alexandrian nonprofit Hellenic association, I welcome all the distinguished members of our society and all our friends. Your presence honors today’s event of the Rotary Club in Alexandria, which we collaborate too.
Ι have am embarrassed whenever I have to say a few words about the Hellenic Scientific Association “Ptolemy 1st” which established since 1908.
I am concerned about what I must choose from the one hundred and sixteen years of its dynamic presence in the society of the great city of Alexandria.
We started in times of a golden age for Alexandrian society. Since then, our Association has given a special color to the pre-war cosmopolitan life of the city. Our Presidents were personalities of human values and high cultural awareness, all prominent members of the Alexandrian Society.
Our Association supported with her own way the first decade of its life when major historical problems arose during the Balkan Wars and 1st World War. Our members voluntarily participated actively in the medical care of the soldiers in the war zone of Greece.
During the same period here in Egypt we even medically assisted the ordinary Egyptian citizens. This medical supply was so extensive, that for fifty years two independent departments, the Medical and the Blue Cross were active within our Association.
During the second twenty-five years of that life (1933-1958), our Association made a distinguished contribution to letters and art. We supported literary editions up to theatrical performances.
The villa of Angeliki Panayiotatou –the first female medical professor in a Greek University, member, and President of our Association- was the place where the “Greek Women Writers’ Association” of the city met regularly.
In 1954, fifteen days before her death, Panayiotatou with her covenant granted us her “Garden Villa” as she called it, in which permanently we settled since 1957.
During the second fifty years of Ptolemy’s life (1958-2008), thanks to the selfless sacrifice of its Presidents, our Association survived, despite the mass exodus of most Greek Alexandrians from Egypt.
The contemporary cultural life of our Association moves in Alexandria works under the supervision of ministry of Social Affairs. In addition to the lectures, our activities include poetry, music, and even film documentaries, with the physical presence of their creators or actors. Besides the Greek language, we use English and French.
It is a big honor for us that in our activities is personally present His beatitude Theodoros II pope and patriarch of Alexandria and all Africa, and all members of the Patriarchal holy court. The same exists with the Governor of Alexandria Dr. Abdul Aziz Qansua, the General Consuls of Greece, the Presidents of the Greek Community of Alexandria, and the Greek Brotherhood of the Egyptian Cypriots in Alexandria·
Our events are also honored by all the existing Diplomatic Corps of Russia, China, the United Kingdom, Spain, Lebanon, Turkey, and the State of Palestine in Alexandria, as well as the Coptic representatives and the Presidents of all the Christian associations of Syrians and Armenians in Alexandria.
During the past ten years, the number of our members has started to increase. We now exceed the number of years of pre-war Alexandrian prosperity. This modern boom has now given us the power to expand our activities.
We have begun common activities with institutions inside and outside of Egypt. We are cooperating with the Bibliotheca Alexandrina, the Archaeological Society of Alexandria as well the Municipal Museum, the Historical Archive, and the Center Studies of Limassol in Cyprus, and in Greece with the University of Ioannina or the Greek-Egyptian Friendship Forum.
Now, in the 2nd centenary of our Association’s life, we are inspired by a dream:
We do not exist only as a historical institution of the internationally known cosmopolitan life in Alexandria. As Alexandrians of the Greek Diaspora, we are looking forward to the level of ecumenical cosmopolitanism.
Most of all, we feel proud and happy to work under the same vision with all our Egyptian brothers in our second-mother homeland of Egypt; together we have a deep common conscience because of millennia of tradition, friendship brotherhood, civilization, and peace.
Since the period of the age of bronze Greeks and Egyptians have been coexisting on that historic-geostrategic point where the most prominent part of human civilization has been produced.
In the east part of the Mediterranean Sea, our mother lands bond the southern part of Europe and the northern of Africa. Both we exist at the only point of earth that historically and globally orientates as a naval what belongs to the East or West, to the South or North. So, it becomes evident why our historic brotherhood was beneficial not only for us but for all humans.
Our association acts under the human duty, to keep alive and fruitful the coexistence our motherlands, not only as a benefit for us at the present, but as a benefit for the future citizens of the Cosmopolis during the third millennium.
In closing, I would like to confess something to you. Throughout the duration of my speech, a feeling penetrated me. my presence here at the Greco-Roman Museum reminded me of our fellow Greeks when they contributed financially during the period of its building. They had realized the need for this museum in our city, so today we can admire the cultural fruits of the prosperous coexistence of our Greco-Egyptian ancestors.
