IV. “You are always welcome in Egypt” Part I

I know that I should be overwhelmed, but
strangely I am not. This morning I walked out onto the dusty balcony,
all decaffeinated and groggy, but couldn’t help but feel how everything
was just as it should be. I coughed instantaneously as the smoke of
al-Qahira hit me, like that harsh, inexperienced drag from your first
cigarette. The bawwabs (doormen) were
chatting up and down the street, occasionally giving a car directions
or helping an expat load luggage into a cab. The many police officers
sat in gangs drinking tea and coffee with their presumably-unloaded
rifles pointed all whichaway. It’s just a matter of time before I
lecture one on gun safety.  Wherever there was a load of rubbish there
would be stray cats in twos or threes, and the children filled the
streets with football (soccer) games and other devices.  Maadi is a
quiet neighborhood, but there’s a wealth of life that gives it a 1920’s
New-York kind of charm. It is also the tropical paradise of town, very
green and shady, with little traffic. That does not eliminate, however,
the abundance of honking, for in Cairo you honk  everywhere, for no
other reason than to let pedestrians and stray animals know you are
nearby.

When I arrived Wednesday night, my cabbie Ahmed told me Maadi was
the preference for Americans, but ungodly expensive by Cairene costs. 
He had been animated and warm from the moment I got in the taxi at the
airport, gesticulating to aid his broken English and laughing at my
minimal Arabic. After a brief exchange and a pause he exclaimed,
“Welcome to Egypt”! Which was funny, as the young man who had arranged
the cab for me had also uttered these words with a look of amusement. 
I had simply told him my Arabic was “shwy shwy bas” (only so so). We
headed out of the airport at breakneck speed while I struggled with the
apparently non-existent seatbelt. As I conceded defeat, the window
rolled down and a cop stuck a notebook into car, asking me to sign.
“English?” “No, American. Should I sign bil’arabiyya?” “No problem.
Welcome to Egypt…” Again, a slightly humored grin.

Cairenes adore Americans very much, and it becomes clear talking to
anyone at random. Ahmed the cabbie had worked for an American company
on contract and made a fine salary until Obama’s presidency, when the
contract ended. Now working as a driver, he lamented the loss of
his “Big Am’rican Company” 9 or 10 times throughout the ride. “And Egyptians all love Am’rica – all
things Am’rican! Love all Am’ricans!” A friend later postulated that
Cairenes might be used to Americans thinking Arabs don’t like them, and the hospitality effort is an attept to amend the notion.

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I’m staying with an American student for a few days until I work out
housing details.  Nicole is a talented dancer from Seattle and has been
in Cairo for 7 months out of an eventual year.  After waking up at dawn
(damn jet-lag) and biding my time until Egypt actually woke up (well after
dawn), we went to her work, a belly-dance costumer’s shop in a
poorer part of town called al-Haram. While crossing the Nile, with
Arabic music blasting and the windows rolled down in classic
Cairene-cabbie fashion, I looked to the skyline to notice that larger
and more prominent than any high-rise were two golden, ancient
pyramids. P-Y-R-A-M-I-D-S. Listen, friend. It does not matter how often
in your life you’ve looked upon that image. It does not matter how
many screensavers, desktop wallpapers, dormroom posters, bookmarks,
doodles you’ve drawn on SAT practice tests, paintings you’ve done at 3
am on school nights, effigies of them in the movies, scenes that take
place at or around them in the movies, cartoons that have animated
them, Facebook friends who have uploaded photos of them, readings that
you’ve done about them, or computer games from the ’90’s that take
place in their midsts you have seen before, you will never. EVER. be prepared – to see THE PYRAMIDS – in real life.

Upon getting into al-Haram, we got out and into the open lobby of
the building, only to startle two cats fighting – Mau’s, or pyramid
cats, the kind ancient Egyptians worshiped. To our left a mangy kitten
ran out of a room where I saw a young, tired woman on the floor,
nursing a baby. Her hair covered and surrounded by several other small,
dirty children sitting in filth, the first thing I noticed were her
circle-ringed eyes – because they noticed me right back. On the first floor there was a red splattering
on the wall, and Nicole explained that when a new flat is
purchased, the inhabitants slaughter an animal like a lamb or goat and
share the meat with everyone in the building and the poor people in the
area. The blood is painted on the wall to ward off the Evil Eye
(jealousy, evil spirits, etc.).

At the door to the shop she rang the bell – WHICH SOUNDS EXACTLY
LIKE A COMMUNICATOR FROM THE ORIGINAL STAR TREK SERIES. This is a
staple of all Egyptian doorbells… Fellow Trekkies, we need to import
this immediately. One very large but very beautiful
woman greeted us and
introduced herself as Ola. After making us Arabic coffee
– amazing – thick, gritty, with milk, cardamom and sugar, she left to find the owner, Halla, a Then Halla,
the owner, came out looking tired and worn-down but decidedly American. Her blondish grey hair hardly sat in one
direction, her eyes ringed with red bags, and her
fingernails were remarkably yellowed from smoking. Kind of hard and
sarcastic, she took a liking to me and began to elaborate on her 10 years in Cairo.

Within an hour of talking to Ola and Halla, we were joined by
Nicole’s language exchange partner Mohammed Ali. Tall and skinny,
softspoken and extensively knowledgeable of fuss’ha (classical and
Qu’ranic Arabic) and ameyya (Egyptian dialect), Mohammed is easily one
of the most earnest people I’ve ever met. We stood on the balcony as he
patiently coached Nicole with an expertise for socratic questioning. If
I interjected he didn’t hesitate to point out the grammatical
variations of the fuss’ha from the ameyya, but would then take my
question further and work it back into a line of conversation for
Nicole.

When I wasn’t listening to their practice in fascination, I was
marveling at the impoverished world below. Directly across from the
shop’s building was a garage that had evolved into a dumping ground for
waste and sand, and in its serenity a wild dog slept in the shade.
Little boys covered in white paint hauled slabs of moulding twice their
sizes down the dirt road to a building project. Occassionally, a donkey
cart would pass through on the verge of break-down and the owner would
yell distinctively while clanging pans. At his call, a hijab-covered
girl or a brown man in a flowing galabeya would bring old clothes or
used plastic containers for the poor. And after an hour or so the Call
to Prayer ceased all conversation with its great volume and proximity.
During the rhthymic pauses in the singer’s phrasing, dozens of other
calls could be heard like simultaneous echoes from miles around. All at
once beautiful and yet eerie.

I also wondered at Mohammed and the ineffable kindness of Egyptians.
I don’t know why it should have affected me, but for lack of
socialization to Arabs in their native land. Yet I was startled by how
pure of intention and platonic his relationship was to Nicole, how
happy he was to help and how poised an individual. In one’s own home,
far away from the world, it’s so easy to forget that people are the
same everywhere. So it was with my first real Egyptian friend. I am
indebted to Nicole for the introduction, and grateful to know him.