Map of Cairo Egypt -circa. 1933 Poster

Vintage map of Cairo Egypt from 1933. Owing to its geographical location Cairo became a major hub for air traffic in the 1930s. The city was the jumping off point from Imperial Airways' routes to the rest of the world, whether it was South Africa, southeast Asia, or Australia. Cairo became one of the busiest airports in the world. Today Cairo is the capital and largest city of Egypt. The city's metropolitan area is the largest in the Middle East and the Arab world, and 15th-largest in the world, and is associated with ancient Egypt, as the famous Giza pyramid complex and the ancient city of Memphis are located in its geographical area. Located near the Nile Delta, modern Cairo was founded in 969 CE by Jawhar al-Siqilli ("the Sicilian") of the Fatimid dynasty, but the land composing the present-day city was the site of ancient national capitals whose remnants remain visible in parts of Old Cairo. Cairo has long been a centre of the region's political and cultural life, and is nicknamed "the city of a thousand minarets" for its preponderance of Islamic architecture. Cairo has the oldest and largest film and music industries in the Arab world, as well as the world's second-oldest institution of higher learning, Al-Azhar University. Many international media, businesses, and organizations have regional headquarters in the city; the Arab League has had its headquarters in Cairo for most of its existence. With a population of 6.76 million spread over 453 square kilometres (175 sq mi), Cairo is by far the largest city in Egypt. An additional 10 million inhabitants live in close proximity to the city. Cairo, like many other mega-cities, suffers from high levels of pollution and traffic. Cairo's metro, one of only two in Africa (the other is in Algiers, Algeria), ranks among the fifteen busiest in the world, with over 1 billion annual passenger rides. The economy of Cairo was ranked first in the Middle East in 2005, and 43rd globally on Foreign Policy's 2010 Global Cities Index.