Arriving in Cairo

I’m fascinated by what’s happening in Egypt right now. 

The people are calling it a second Revolution.  It’s all that’s on anybody’s lips. Revolutions and reminiscing about freedom. Horreya. Al khamsa wa ashreen yaneir. Tahrir. I met a man from Libya today. He is living in the Safir Hotel with his family and has been there for the past year.  The first thing he told me was that he was injured early on in the Libyan Revolution, the Jasmine Revolution, and he had shrapnel scars to prove it.  I tried to look away from what was left of his right hand and wrist, but couldn’t. He told me not to worry, he was going to Italy in three days to have a surgeon look at it. And by look at it, he meant amputate the rest. His little brother, about 6 was playing in the pool.  Too cute, really.  He looked like he was missing part of his bottom jaw, and somehow his smile seemed fully whole regardless. Heshal did not hesitate to tell me about how a missile had crashed into the car that his little brother had been in.  He seemed upset by the damage, but I could sense that underneath he was glad it hadn’t been worse.  It could have been.  Much worse. 

Skipping backwards through my day, I spoke with a woman about her opinions of the Revolution and the elections. She spoke with both resignation and frustration as she molded melted globs of sugar in her hands and used it to rip the hair off of my arms. Al sweed can hurt, but its too strange in Cairo for women to have arm hair not to risk it. I asked her who she had voted for fii al intikhabat al owal, in the first elections. Sabbahi, she said. I asked her who she would vote for now and she told me she wouldn’t vote, because both options were wehish. Ugly. I agreed with her. Then she elaborated. Shafiq was just more of the same, like Mubarak. But Mohamed Mursi was worse because the Muslim Brotherhood was just a name. Ism bas, she said. She called them haram, or against Islam. This surprised me. A taxi driver I spoke with later in the day on the most absurd ride from Dokki to Maadi, confirmed this point. Then he stopped along al Corniche Maadi and bought me umm ali. It didn’t make up for the hellatiousness half as much as the conversation did. 

Outside my hotel window. Small group, advocating for Shafiq.

I went home but was locked out of my apartment so I ran to this Italian café I’ve come to love in the two days I’ve been in Maadi, and ate rabidly. I’m less pleasant to talk to hungry than I am any other time of day, and these days that’s saying something. I’ve missed Cairo since I lived here before the Revolution, but it never seems to be easy on me. The table next to me was full of men discussing the Revolution. Eid Al Shorta. Day of the Police. The waiter came over and asked, in English that was only slightly less broken than my Arabic, if I believed in freedom. I nodded and showed him my tattoo confirming it. Horreya, in my childish Arabic scrawl, written on the inside of my left ring finger. He laughed and said he’d like to take me to Tahrir Square to see for myself. I told him I’d been on the twenty-fifth of January, but I’d like to go again. He then told me about how his friend was recently shot by police and that he was disbanded from the military under Mubarak for supporting the Revolution and the last time he was in Tahrir was cut along the back of his arm by a policeman wielding a knife, but I’m still optimistic.

Lema nshoof. We shall see.