A Long Turkish Jaunt

After four weeks of traveling in Turkey, I returned to Cairo last night. While we were ostensibly "on vacation" in Turkey, I hesitate to use that term because this trip was anything but a relaxing, beach resort experience. We traveled nearly 2,500 miles by bus (including several overnight trips), and we spent many hours under the hot August sun visiting historical sites, hiking, and, of course, gorging ourselves on delicious Turkish food.

Our itinerary included pretty much every region of Turkey: we spent a week on the Aegean coast, a few days in the middle of the country, another few days near the Black Sea in the northeast, a week in eastern Turkey ("Kurdistan," as many easterners prefer to call it), and then a week in Ankara and Istanbul.

Aside from our ambitious schedule, the biggest challenge of the trip was certainly the language barrier. While Turkish contains some words imported from Arabic (colloquial Arabic also has borrowed a number of Turkish words), the grammatical structures of the two languages are completely different. Because so few Turks spoke English, we were compelled to communicate using the most basic of basic vocabularies (we managed to learn simple questions and numbers) and hand motions. That caveman-esque communication system enabled us to scrape by, but we had very few opportunities to connect with Turks in the way that we are able to connect with Egyptians.

Thus, while we learned a great deal about Turkey throughout our four weeks there, I cannot write with any authority on the subject of Turkey's politics or culture. For now, I will sum up my experience in Turkey with a few photographs. Because of my aversion to taking photos, the credit for these pictures goes to my travel partner Chris Opila.


An ancient volcanic eruption at Nemrut Dagi, Turkey's second tallest mountain, left a huge crater with a beautiful lake perfect for swimming.


Ataturk, the founder of modern-day Turkey, made his name at the battle at Gallipoli in WWI, holding off a joint Australian, British, and French assault aimed at taking the Bosphorus.


Ani, once an old silk road city in northeast Turkey, has been reduced to ruins on a grassy plain.


The Sumela Monastery, carved into the mountains near the Black Sea coast, was one of the most breathtaking sights that we saw during our four weeks in Turkey.


With its several thousand years of history, Turkey often combines the very old with the very new. The hilltop ruins of Pergamon, an old Roman city, overlook the new town of Pergamon.


The hot springs at Pamukkale, Turkey's version of Yellowstone.


Finally, despite Ataturk's militant secularism, Turkey is still very much a Muslim country and has a rich Islamic history as well. The Suleymaniye Mosque in Istanbul was built in the 16th century during the reign of Suleyman the Magnificent, one of the most famous Ottoman sultans. The inside of the mosque is just as beautiful as the outside.

The End and the Beginning of Summer

I apologize for my two week hiatus from posting - it's been a busy last few weeks of summer classes, political developments, and a few trips outside of Cairo. While I would love to sum up all of those events with a nice long post, it is now late at night and I have still not packed yet for my trip to Turkey tomorrow. After finishing summer classes on Monday, I spent the day yesterday with my friend Galal at his house in the countryside. My "summer" (summer vacation, that is) officially begins tomorrow afternoon in Istanbul. Four friends and I will be spending a month traveling around Turkey. I'm not sure if I will have internet access there, but, if I do, I will certainly try to update this blog as frequently as possible with news of my travels in the land of Ataturk...Now it's time to pack!

Article about Tweet Nadwa

Last week I was invited to write an article about the Tweet Nadwa and the general economic situation in Egypt for Fikra Forum, a website associated with the Washington Institute for Near East Policy.

You can find the article here. It was also translated into Arabic here.

Tahrir Comes Back to Life

Since last Friday, Tahrir Square has once again become the center of the Egyptian revolution. What started as a nationwide day of protest calling for police officers and government ministers accused of murder and corruption to be brought to justice has now turned into a full-fledged movement demanding the resignation of Field Marshal Hussein Tantawi (the leader of the ruling military council) and Prime Minister Essam Sharaf.

I am not going to spend a lot of time going into the specific political demands of the protesters. For that information, I suggest Al-Jazeera or the blog of my housemate Chris, both of which provide constant analysis of the latest political developments. Instead, I want to provide some general perspective on the overall environment in the square.

While Tahrir is technically a public place, a strong security contingent has sprung up at every entrance to the square. In order to avoid potential conflict, there is absolutely no police presence in the square. Instead, the protest organizing committee has enlisted groups of young men and women to check ID cards, search bags, and perform pat-downs for everyone entering the square. When I attended the protests on Friday, the makeshift security apparatus was initially hesitant to let me in to the square, but they were mollified when an Egyptian friend who I was with vouched for me. In what seems to be a holdover from the Mubarak regime, there are still people who believe that there are rogue actors and foreign conspiracies attempting to hinder the revolution. Nevertheless, despite a few wary glances and three requests to see my AUC ID card, I found nearly all of the protesters whom I talked with to be quite welcoming and interested in hearing my perspective on this new occupation of Tahrir.

During the large protests last Friday, Tahrir resembled a summer music festival in the U.S. There were stages in various parts of the square with politicians and activists addressing the crowd and chanting slogans. Large, colorful banners adorned all parts of the square, echoing the chants of the protesters who were calling for justice, freedom, and an end to military rule. Some vendors, taking advantage of the mass of people and the oppressive heat, hawked drinks and food throughout the day, and others sought to capitalize off the revolution by selling patriotic flags, shirts, and hats. It is impossible to estimate exactly how many people came to Tahrir on Friday, but the number was certainly in the tens of thousands.

It is hard to generalize the types of people who have been in Tahrir for the past few days. While there is a large youth contingent, I also saw plenty of middle-aged and older protesters, too. While there are women in Tahrir, the square remains largely male-dominated. I would estimate that it is about an 80/20 ratio of men to women. Public space in Egypt is often male-dominated (especially at night), and Tahrir is no exception.

Although the Friday protests came to an end and there were no specific activities in Tahrir on Saturday, a diehard group of revolutionaries continued to occupy the square. They have set up a large tent camp in the middle of Tahrir, and the square has remained under the supervision of the volunteer security guards and closed to traffic. The protesters intend for their occupation of Tahrir to be a symbol of resistance to the military council, but they have achieved another significant accomplishment: there has been a dramatic reduction in traffic and noise-pollution in downtown Cairo. The dowsha and zahma that often characterizes the square has been replaced by lively political conversations, live music, and poetry readings. While Tahrir will certainly re-open to traffic at some point, I can’t help but wish that the square would be made into a pedestrian-only area…

As Egypt is back in the middle of the work week, the square is fairly calm during the day. Everyday after 5 PM, however, when most Egyptians have finished work and the weather has cooled off, the square comes back to life. While it is unclear whether these protests will actually force the military council to bend to the demands of the protesters, it is undeniable that the spirit of the revolution has once again returned to the center of Cairo.

The Focus Turns to Midan Al-Tahrir (Again)

"Friday, July 8 is the single most important day in Egypt since Mubarak's ouster on February 11." -- Alaa Al-Aswany, Egyptian writer and political commentator

Hundreds of thousands (possibly one million) Egyptians are expected to descend upon Tahrir Square tomorrow in what will likely be the largest protest in the square since Hosni Mubarak relinquished power in February. The protest enjoys the support of all the major political parties in Egypt (including the liberals and the Islamists), and the parties are claiming to have cast their ideological divisions aside in order to come out as a unified force tomorrow. All the groups have gathered under the banner of economic reform, freedom, and social justice. There is also a big focus on pushing the military council to speed-up the judicial process for both the elements of the Mubarak regime charged with corruption and the police officers charged with murder during the January revolution.

In general, many Egyptians that I have talked to over the past few days feel that this is their best chance to "put the revolution back on the right track." There have been several clashes between protesters and police over the past few weeks - largely in response to several trial postponements that have been interpreted as attempts by those on the military council to protect their former cronies. In addition to the growing discontent with the military council, many people have become disillusioned by the petty fighting between the many political parties and the growing rift between the liberals and the Islamists. Furthermore, the country's economy is still suffering from a drop in tourism and foreign investment after the revolution.

Over the past month, I have felt that Tahrir has become more of a "Speaker's Corner" than the center of a revolution. Everyone is always eager to talk, but it is unclear that those gathering there have anything to show for it. Tomorrow, however, may well be different. The sheer spectacle of a mass of humanity once again in the square, united by a list of simple demands, might push the military council to bow to the will of the protesters. On the other hand, there is also a chance that tomorrow's protest could lead to violent clashes (especially if a group of people try once again to attack the Interior Ministry). As Egyptians like to say: "rabina yestoorna" (may God protect us).

I will be back with an update tomorrow. For those of you following on twitter, use #tahrir, #jul8, and #egypt

Across the Egyptian Twitterverse

Tonight I attended a “Tweet Nadwa” in Cairo. This nadwa (which translates into English as “seminar” or “conference”), as its name suggests, was organized via twitter and facebook and brought together Egyptians for a discussion about social justice and the future of Egypt. Try as I might to summarize the meeting in 140 characters or less on twitter, I simply cannot do it. Instead, I’ve turned to the blog, which gives me much more space to discuss and analyze tonight’s nadwa in detail.

The event was held in a theater nestled in the alleyways of downtown Cairo, and the room was already packed when I arrived a few minutes before 6:30. I was one of the lucky ones who was able to find a spot on the floor – a few minutes after I sat down, the theater was filled entirely to capacity with people in seats, on the floor, and in the aisles. This being my first twitter-organized event I didn’t quite know what to expect…I assumed that everyone might be spending the entire time with their noses buried in their blackberries, focusing more on their tweets than on the actual content of the discussion. As the moderator explained, however, the event was meant to be much more of a town-hall style meeting and, while a projector screen displayed a live feed of tweets from the audience members, audience members who wanted to contribute would be given a microphone instead of a smartphone. The moderator posed a topic for discussion, and then passed the microphone around to audience members and five prominent tweeters who were sitting on chairs in the front of the theater. Each person could speak for no more than 140 seconds (a nod to Twitter’s 140 character limit). Knowing what sort of rhetorical gems town hall meetings in the U.S. have yielded (e.g. “Keep your government hands off my Medicare”), I was quite excited to see how this concept would play out in an Egyptian context.

Before getting into the actual content of the discussion, a few observations about the overall feel in the room. The audience was generally young, quite politically and socially liberal (both from the nature of the discussion and their preferred styles of clothing), and clearly very tech-savvy. As far as I could tell, there were no Salafis (who often sport long beards and traditional robes called galabiyyas) and no one who publicly identified with the Muslim Brotherhood. A sense of excitement pervaded the room as the discussion began, and as an outside observer it was hard not to get swept up in the moment. I never imagined last year when I was in Alexandria that this sort of discussion would be taking place just one year later in a post-Mubarak Egypt. It was impossible not to be inspired by several hundred people voluntarily coming together to talk about the future of their country. The level of energy and passion in the room – fed by the feeling that there is a real window of opportunity right now to shape Egypt’s political and economic future – was infectious.

Tonight’s topic was social justice, and the conversation mainly focused on economics. The microphone swiftly changed hands in the beginning of the meeting, with most of the attendees striking idealistic notes about the necessity of improving healthcare and education, raising the minimum wage, etc. Nothing revolutionary, but nevertheless a good way to start the program. After a brief digression in which the attendees argued amongst themselves about how the stock market functioned and whether it was or wasn’t necessary for the country’s future, the discussion heated up when a proud Communist stood up and admonished the crowd for not focusing on the real issues. “You all are forgetting the critical problem here,” he declared, “we need to stop talking about the minimum wage and the stock market and start talking about how to end the capitalist plague that is destroying our country! We must return to the basics and realize that capitalism is inherently unfair!”

The crowd’s attention instantly turned to broad, ideological issues. Instead of clapping, the moderator told the audience members to raise their arms and wave their hands when they agreed with a certain point, and judging by the amount of raised hands and smiles after that mini-Communist manifesto, the man had many allies in the room. Several like-minded thinkers expressed their support for the idea of completely overhauling Egypt’s system, inveighing against the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (among other foreign countries and institutions) for making the rich richer and the poor poorer while tacitly approving the pervasive corruption in the Mubarak regime.

The capitalists in the room were not as vocal, but a few brave souls did stand up to defend their position. “What we had in Egypt for the past 30 years,” one said, “was not capitalism. It was simply despotism.” Another chimed in: “we’ve tried socialism and it didn’t work!” While nobody endorsed the Mubarak regime’s version of capitalism, the capitalists did win a fair amount of head nods and raised hands during their responses to the communist and socialist salvos.

The back-and-forth debate between the capitalists and the communists/socialists continued for some time, but there were two speakers who I found particularly engaging. One man stood up in the middle of the debate and, quite calmly and skillfully, attacked both the capitalists and the communists at the same time: “This question of whether we should have a capitalist or a communist system here in Egypt is not as important,” he declared, “as this question: who will administer the system? If there is anything we have learned in the past 60 years, it is that no matter what ideology we follow, we are ultimately doomed to fail if we have bad leaders. Pick either one of these ideologies, but remember that our success or failure will ultimately be determined by who is making the decisions and not some theoretical framework for how things should work.” While I didn’t speak at the meeting and generally refrained from reacting to any of the statements from one side or the other, I couldn’t help but raise my hand in support of that statement. Soon afterwards, another man stood up and brought up an equally important point: “While it is important to talk about macroeconomics and large companies,” he said, “we also have to focus on small-scale issues. So many young people have business plans or inventions that they want to capitalize on, but our system makes it unbelievably hard for anyone to open their own business. Why should we have to get 15 permits from the government to open a small shop, and why is it so hard for us to get any start-up capital? Change has to come from the bottom, too, and we need to start by completely overhauling the system to make it easier for us young people to go into business for ourselves.” I, and many of the other people in the room, raised our hands in support of this point, too.

Finally, I was very interested by the constant comparisons of Egypt to other countries. Many people backed up their statements by saying “in America they do this” or “in Scandinavia they do that,” and there were several points in the discussion when people used specific examples from American political or economic history. Many of the moderates in the room advocated that Egypt look to northern European countries as models for how to balance capitalism and social justice, but just as many people shook their heads emphatically whenever someone said that Egyptians should look to foreign countries as they design their own system. One speaker garnered a sea of raised hands when he declared simply: “screw capitalism and communism, let’s invent a new and better system here in Egypt!” Nevertheless, America was certainly the most commonly referenced foreign country throughout the discussion. Interestingly, while there were occasional mentions of developing countries such as Brazil and Korea, no one said anything about the Chinese model.

As a whole, I would characterize the discussion as decidedly more focused on social justice and closing the gap between the rich and the poor than most discussions about economic issues in the U.S. Despite a rising culture of consumption here in Egypt and a tendency for the rich to flaunt their wealth, I think people are very conscious of the huge class divide that emerged during the Mubarak regime, and they want to take definite actions to solve the problem. “We must judge our government,” one woman declared, “on the basis of how it treats the weakest people in our society.” If this twitter nadwa is actually representative of the Egyptian liberal movement as a whole, I would expect to see a definite shift to more populist policies if they liberals gain a significant amount of seats in the parliamentary elections.

As I have written before, someone walking the streets of Egypt these days who didn’t know about what happened in January and February would probably not think that this country is undergoing dramatic changes. There are specific times, however, when the gravity of what is happening in Egypt hits you like a tsunami. Tonight was certainly one of those times, and I will certainly be returning to the next twitter nadwa. The attendees’ enthusiasm, optimism, and genuine desire to change their country for the better was truly inspiring.

The Arabeezy Phenomenon

The American University in Cairo is by far the most well-endowed university in Egypt. Its facilities resemble those at most universities in the United States, and its tuition is comparable to its counterparts in the U.S. as well. Because the cost of an AUC education is well beyond the means of an ordinary Egyptian family, the Egyptian students at AUC are primarily from the upper crust of society. As part of CASA’s “cultural exchange” program, we have had the opportunity to get to know a group of Egyptian AUC students. After several potlucks lunches, picnics, and other get-togethers, I have become particularly close with a few of the Egyptians. Like many of my friends in Alexandria, my AUC friends are smart, charismatic, and intellectually curious. They are just as interested in learning from us as we are in learning from them.

Most if not all of these AUC students speak English very well. Like other Egyptians who speak English with a high level of proficiency, however, they often speak a mixture of Arabic and English. This hybrid language is known in Egypt as "Arabeezy" (a mixture of "Arabic" and "Ingleezy," the Arabic word for English). Arabeezy speakers generally combine basic Arabic verbs, pronouns, and conjunctions with more complex English nouns and phrases. Sometimes an entire sentence will be in Arabic save for one key word (e.g. "I had a tough day at work today because there were so many customers" - every word would be Arabic except for "customers"), but I have also heard people intersperse Arabic and English words one after another throughout the sentence (e.g. "I'm studying economics because I want to work at a foreign company that has an office here in Cairo").

This code-switching seems to occur completely naturally. At the same time, I am highly skeptical that they are simply unable to distinguish between languages when they are speaking. Instead, I view Arabeezy as a status symbol related to class and education.* English is taught in every Egyptian school, but often not very well. When I taught English last year in Alexandria at a private learning center, for example, my college-aged students who had taken English throughout their primary and secondary education were still making entry-level mistakes. For them, Arabeezy consisted of trying to speak a few words in English followed by a lapse back into Arabic because they couldn't find the appropriate English word to finish their sentence. For these AUC students, however, their seemingly unconscious code-switching between English and Arabic clues anyone listening to them into their command of English -- a skill that is intimately tied to class and means. While I am not sure if they are purposefully trying to impress us Americans, there definitely seems to be an element of superiority compared to the average Egyptian who knows only the most basic English words and phrases.

There are two other factors that encourage the Arabeezy phenomenon as well. First is the tendency of many upper-class Egyptians to follow Western pop culture religiously. Many of the AUC students have seen more American movies than I have, and I was shocked by how many of them knew the lyrics to American songs that we sang together on our outing to a public park in Cairo last weekend. The desire to speak English instead of Arabic follows from this general interest in pop culture. Secondly, it is undeniable that English proficiency is a huge advantage in the Egyptian labor market. Many of the well-known companies in the Egyptian private sector conduct their business partially or sometimes fully in English, and English is also a basic requirement for anyone going into a tourism-related business. Thus, Egyptians may see Arabeezy as a way to practice their English - especially when they are speaking to native English speakers whom they know will understand the English words that they use.

As a student of Arabic, I find Arabeezy incredibly frustrating. While I understand the factors that drive Egyptians to want to speak English with me, I would much rather have them speak to me fully in English or fully in Arabic. Combining the two languages, however, prevents both of us from learning anything. One of the most important benefits of listening to native speakers speak is that you learn how to construct sentences and use vocabulary in the proper context. Code-switching in the middle of sentences distracts attention from sentence construction, and it also does not help the speaker learn how to use English phrases and words in the proper context. Having the ability to speak more than one language is truly a gift, but with great ability comes great responsibility. So, to all the Arabeezy speakers out there, I beg you: at the beginning of every conversation, just pick a language and stick with it!


* I am not this first to make this argument. For an excellent window into the political and social developments in Egypt over the past 60 years, see Galal Amin's book Whatever Happened to the Egyptians?.

The AC Revolution

Just a month after graduating from Tufts, I am now back in the midst of academia. Classes have picked up, and I took a weekend trip to Alexandria last weekend that prevented me from posting anything new on the blog. Today, however, is the closest thing we will ever have to a snow day this year. Clashes occurred between protesters and the police in Tahrir Square last night and this morning, and the program has canceled classes today due to ongoing uncertainty about the situation there. I would recommend logging on to Al-Jazeera or BBC to follow the situation, and for those of you who use twitter the best hashtags are #tahrir and #jun28.

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Speaking of revolutions, I was involved in a mini-uprising last weekend on the train from Cairo to Alexandria. While many aspects of Egyptian public transportation either don’t work or are very uncomfortable for anyone with long legs, the train between Cairo and Alex is a clear exception. Roomy, air-conditioned, and fast, it is by far the easiest and most comfortable way to travel between the two cities.

Last Friday, however, the train service fell short of my high expectations. After leaving 30 minutes behind schedule (no explanation given), I and my fellow passengers soon realized that the air-conditioning in our car did not work. While a broken air-conditioner would not have been an issue in the winter, riding a train in the early afternoon on a summer day without air-conditioning is not very fun.

Ordinarily, this would have been what I call a “Maalesh” moment. Maalesh is a staple of Egyptian dialect, which means, in this context, “oh well, there’s a problem but it’s not going to get fixed and we’ll just have to grin and bear it.”

One woman, however, decided that she was not going to surrender her right to air-conditioning without a fight. She looked to be about 50 or 60 years old, from the middle or upper class, and spoke both English and Arabic. She began to complain right when the train left the station, and she continued to do so until the ticket-taker walked down the aisle in our car about five minutes later. “Where’s the AC?” she demanded to know. The ticket-taker shrugged and was about to continue his journey down the train when the woman piped up again, “How is it that the AC always work on these trains during the winter, but it breaks during the summer?! Go bring the maintenance man and fix this, please!”

The exasperated ticket-taker sighed and asked her to please calm down. That was a mistake. “Calm down?! The AC is broken and you refuse to do anything about it! This is not right!” The woman then turned to the rest of the passengers in the train car, who, up until this point, had been quietly listening to her exchange with the ticket-taker. “Nobody should be silent right now!” she said. “We cannot accept this sort of second-class treatment. We have to demand our rights as passengers!”

“Demanding rights” was one of the trademark phrases of the January revolution, and it effectively stirred up feelings of indignation amongst the other passengers on the train. Amidst a chorus of calls demanding that he bring the maintenance man, the ticket-taker retreated from the train car and muttered that he would be back soon.

After the ticket-taker had left, everyone on the train worked themselves into a frenzy. A woman in a niqab (a full-face covering with a small slit for the eyes) stood up in the aisle and encouraged everyone to get off together and demand a refund when we arrive Alexandria. Several riders used newspapers to fan themselves as the temperature continued to rise. A few men joined with the woman in the niqab in calling for everyone to work together in order to secure a refund in Alexandria.

A few minutes later, the ticket-taker just came back to tell us that the AC was broken and that neither he nor the maintenance man could fix it while the train was running. Before the entire car erupted in fury, he assured us that we could get a partial refund in Alexandria. "How can we be sure that is going to happen?!" simultaneously cried the woman in the niqab, the father of two young girls sitting next to me, and the middle-aged woman who started the whole issue. “Don’t worry,” the ticket-taker said, “everyone who has a ticket showing that they rode in train car number five can bring it to the ticket office and they will give you a refund.”

About twenty minutes later, with the temperature continuing to rise and perspiration visible on everyone’s foreheads, the maintenance man came back into the car and tried to improve the situation by opening up the four small windows in the front and back of the train car. The plan backfired. Upon opening the first window, a cloud of dust blew into the train, further agitating the riders in the front of the train car. Then, as he went to open a window at the back of the car, an old man began to yell at the maintenance man that he didn't want that window to be opened. The maintenance man claimed that it wasn't the man's choice, the whole train needed air, which only made the old man angrier. As the maintenance man left the car, the man continued to yell at him, screaming “kalb!” (dog!), which is considered a serious insult in Arabic.

As the journey continued, the train car remained abuzz with chatter. People declared that they were tired of things not working, we planned our group march to the ticket office to secure a refund, and others inveighed against the employees of the train company. There was an army officer on the train, too, and as the chatter continued one of the riders asked him to speak up: "Are you not a citizen just like us?!" The woman in the niqab led the charge, standing up next to her seat in the front of the car and exhorting the rest of the riders to be sure to stay together when the train arrives in Alex and march together to the ticket counter to get our refunds. "We won't accept this kind of second-rate treatment from the train company!" she asserted.

Train trips are usually solitary adventures. While I sometimes strike up a short conversation with the person sitting next to me, I often spend the two and half hours between Cairo and Alexandria reading, sleeping, or gazing at the scenery outside the train car. On this journey, however, everyone in the car became the best of friends. I spent a few minutes talking to the woman in the niqab (the first time that I had ever spoken directly to a woman wearing one), and I schmoozed with the other passengers for the remainder of the journey as well.

As the train pulled into Alexandria, I hurried out and onto the platform because I had to buy a ticket for my return journey and I didn’t want to get caught up in the mass of humanity that surely had the same idea. I reached the ticket office before the rest of my compatriots from train car number five. After a few minutes of standing in line, a group of the train revolutionaries suddenly appeared inside the ticket office and instantly recognized me (probably because I was the only tall blond in the building). I waved them over to my line, and was planning to wait with them until it was our turn to talk to the ticket agent. The woman who started the AC revolution, however, was not as patient. She forced her way to the front of the line and rapped on the glass with her wedding ring, instantly gaining the attention of the bewildered ticket agent. “Refund! Refund!” she demanded. The ticket agent, after consulting his colleagues for a minute, returned and proceeded to disburse the refunds. Each of us received 6.50 Egyptian pounds (a little more than $1), which was 20% of the original ticket price.

The middle-aged female revolutionary received her money first. As she turned to walk away, I congratulated her on a job well done. She turned to me with a mischievous gleam in her eyes and said: "Nobody messes with Egyptian women! We get what we want!"

While maalesh moments still happen quite often in post-revolution Egypt, I do not think that this AC Revolution would have happened last year. It would never have begun without the middle-aged, upper-class female revolutionary, but when she began to speak up everyone soon joined in. This type of mini-social movement is easily exportable to other aspects of daily life in Egypt. When one person speaks out against injustice or mistreatment, frames it in the context of "demanding our rights," and manages to attract supporters to the cause, things can change for the better. Here's to the continuation and escalation of the AC Revolution!

Taking the Long View in Egypt

One of the nicest things about being in Egypt this year is that I have been able to see many of my friends from Alexandria University again. I had the pleasure of hosting Omar (pictured above), one of my best friends last year, last night at my apartment in Cairo. He is in Cairo this weekend because he is being honored at a ceremony today as the top student in Egypt! After being named the top student at the Alexandria University Medical School, he went through a series of interviews and tests on the national level and emerged in first place. Omar was quite modest about his achievement (I didn’t realize that he had won the top spot until we were about to go to bed last night and I asked him about the specific details of today’s ceremony), but, from what I can tell, this is the real deal! The award is well-deserved.

As is usually the case with conversations these days, we talked primarily about politics and the changes that have occurred since the January revolution. I was impressed by Omar’s ability to articulate what exactly the revolution meant to him and what type of effect it will have on the country as a whole, so I will share some of his thoughts here:

1) On Mubarak – Omar recalled a friend of his posting a question on Facebook after the fall of Mubarak along the lines of “if you could say one thing to Mubarak right now, what would it be?” Omar wrote that he would ask Mubarak how he felt when he saw the outburst of patriotism that emerged during the revolution. “What do you think,” he wanted to ask Mubarak, “when you see people so inspired and optimistic about their future, waving Egyptian flags, chanting inspiring slogans and writing about and drawing their hopes and dreams for a better Egypt in all of these public spaces? Does that not make you feel that your 30 years in power did more harm than good?”

2) On the country’s future – “When I look at Egypt right now, I a country that is poor but that has hope. People wanted instantaneous change after the revolution, but we have to realize that we are looking at a country that needs 15, 20, 25 years to get where we want it to be. The most important effect of this revolution is that we have finally have a chance to put ourselves on the right course. All the focus on the upcoming elections is well-warranted, but people should not think of them as a make-or-break. The Egyptian people have said with certainty that they no longer want a strong man like Mubarak to stay in power for 30 years, and I am sure that peaceful turnover of power from party-to-party or president-to-president will occur no matter who wins the first round of elections. This country is too diverse for a single party to rule for a long time (assuming that that party plays by the rules, instead of changing them or applying them selectively).

3) On what the revolution meant to him – I have never been more proud than I was during the 18 days of protests that brought down Mubarak. I don’t think that this revolution will have much of an effect on my career – I was already in good position to earn my medical degree before it happened, and I would have been able to live a perfectly comfortable life despite Mubarak or his son being in power. Still, I was constantly frustrated during the Mubarak era by the idea that I, a medical student on the verge of becoming a full-fledged doctor, would walk down the street and be afraid that I might fall victim to a policeman exercising his authority arbitrarily. Why was my country like this? We have such a wealth of resources here – both human and natural – and yet we had a government that was so visibly wasting them. The most important thing to me in the new Egypt is that each person receives his just rewards. If you work hard, you deserve to succeed. It shouldn’t be like the past, when personal connections and a few well-placed payments were the key to getting a job. This revolution was about Egyptians standing up and saying “enough!” to that old system. Judge me on the basis of my talents, as opposed to who I know or how much money my family has.



I think Omar’s observations are spot on. It is easy to get caught up in the electoral politics right now in the country. All sides seem to be accusing their opponents of having anti-democratic intentions, and there is a fear-mongering all around. Nevertheless, I agree with Omar that Egypt is generally headed in the right direction and that we should make sure to maintain a long-term view even when engaging in these short-term debates. Much as I think that this year is one of the most exciting times ever to be in Egypt, we won’t know the real impact of Mubarak’s overthrow until 15 or 20 years down the road.

A Rooftop Oasis

It’s Friday, which means that I have just finished up the second week of summer classes. It’s also 1:00 PM here, which means that I am currently writing this post in the midst of the single calmest hour of the week. Friday prayers usually start around noon and run for one or two hours, and during that time everything else in the city comes to a halt. Cairo’s streets, which are normally home to all sorts of dowsha (an Egyptian Arabic word that can be loosely translated as “an inordinately large amount of general noise”) and zahma (another Egyptian Arabic word, which means “congestion”), are nearly empty and devoid of sound.

For the rest of the week, the dowsha and zahma continue unceasingly. Whether riding in a car or walking on the side of the road, car horns, vendors hawking their wares, the chatter of the street, and more car horns are simply a fact of daily life. Sidewalks, which should ideally provide at least some shelter from various noise and congestion on the street, are effectively impassable because of various obstacles and the pervasive risk of falling victim to an “Egyptian shower” (as a result of water dripping from a leaky air conditioner or someone dumping water out of their window). This daily dose of dowsha and zahma used to irk me, especially if I was in a bad mood or in a hurry to get somewhere. At this point, however, I don’t think about it too much on a daily basis.

That being said, maintaining my personal sanity for the year hinges upon finding places that are removed from the constant clatter of daily life. Luckily, our new apartment is on the top floor of our building, which means that the dowsha that floats up to my window from the street is quite muted. The best part about having the top floor apartment, however, is that we have access to the roof. The roof of our building at 40 Mesaha Street in Doqqi, Cairo, is a true urban oasis. As the pictures shows, we have a view of the Nile and downtown Cairo. While it’s hard to spend time on the roof during the day because of the lack of shade, it is perfect for dusk and nighttime relaxation.

I was exhausted last night from a long week of class, and so my roommates and I decided to stay in and take the night off. I dusted off an old chair that was up on the roof and spent a few hours reading up there, surrounded by a beautiful, panoramic view of Cairo at night. The dowsha and zahma on Cairo’s streets remain just as bad at night, but the roof is completely insulated from all of it. As a matter of fact, the muffled sounds of car horns and other aspects of city life at night were almost mildly pleasing.