Tom in Egypt // توم في مصر

 Seasonal greetings from Cairo: "Happy Thanksgiving" to those Americans amongst you (yes yes, for yesterday I know), "Eid Mubarak" to my Muslim readers, and a mixture of the two for those who are lucky enough to be both!

This year Thanksgiving and Eid al-Adha have fallen in the same week, so there are plenty of festivities and a nice couple of days off work. I have to confess to being something of a novice at the Thanksgiving part of the holiday, but I was given a great introduction by the CASA fellows at Rebecca's Zamalek apartment last night. A veritable feast, turkey and cranberry sauce included, was provided by the 35 or so attendees and the hosts and a good time was had by all! Andrea was particularly pleased that her stuffing was so well received (real pork, that's the trick), and we even managed to come away with some leftovers, which will be breakfast for the foreseeable future.

I like reading. Slowly, deliberately, thoughtfully. Fiction, more often than not, although that's something that is steadily changing as I learn to greater appreciate the subtleties of travel writing and memoir.

Last summer in Tucson, during one of my many visits to the Aladdin's cave of used books and CDs that is Bookman's whilst waiting for Andrea to finish her physiotherapist appointment, I picked up a lightly thumbed copy of a novel entitled Snow. I noted the author's name, vaguely recognising Orhan Pamuk as a recent Nobel laureate and recalling a story I'd read about a legal case against him in Turkey over remarks made about the Armenian genocide. I decided to take the plunge; a Nobel prize winner must be worthy of my attention, and if it turned out to be trash - or, more probable, elevated to the point of unintelligibility (I love Neruda on this, and his idea of a "fetish of the incomprehensible" ) - then I'd only lost out on 10 dollars, and could probably recoup most of that by selling it back.

I don't want to review Snow here, not now anyway. Margaret Atwood does an excellent job of that here, for the New York Times. It suffices to say that I found it mysteriously enchanting, and the early chapter written as a dialogue between a university professor and his soon-to-be assassin is a tour de force. More than once I have considered copying it in full on here, but it's no short chapter and I don't want any legal trouble.

Perhaps the best thing about reading Snow was that it led me to read more by Pamuk. On my return to the US in the Spring, I picked up a collection of essays and short writings: Other Colors: Essays and a Short Story, and in my most recent visit to Pakistan I grabbed Istanbul. It is in these two remarkable books that the author discusses his true loves: books, childhood and Istanbul. With a beautiful innocence and a refreshing honesty, Pamuk depicts his childhood in Istanbul, as the younger son of an upper middle class, once wealthy family, interweaving the influences of social class, religion, Westernization, melancholy, the Bosphorous, the Ottoman empire and Isntabul's sense of a forever lost greatness on his own experience and maturity as a writer. His memoirs and musings about counting ships on the Bosphorous, his mother, and his relationship with his daughter are particularly touching, melancholic and at times comical.

What I love most, though, about Pamuk's writing is that he seems to spark a desire in me to write that no author I can think of has before. It's hard for me to put my finger on exactly why that is the case, but his evocative depictions of Istanbul leave me wanting to spend hours sitting, thinking, jotting notes and eventually composing something vaguely coherent. In many ways it makes me jealous of the obvious talent, and superlative location, of SoD up in Alexandria. Sadly, the reality is that I lack the self-discipline, training and financial muscle to be able to spend extended periods of time pen in hand. At most times, I must confess, I also lack the desire. As I re-read the short entries that make up Istanbul and Other Colors, though, it's difficult to want to do much else. Maybe one day.

I shall leave you with a short extract on writing from the moving Nobel speech given by Pamuk, also published in Other Colors:

"A writer is someone who spends years patiently trying to discover the second being inside him, and the world that makes him who he is: when I speak of writing, what comes first to my mind is not a novel, a poem, or literary tradition, it is a person who shuts himself up in a room, sits down at a table, and alone, turns inward; amid its shadows, he builds a new world with words. This man – or this woman – may use a typewriter, profit from the ease of a computer, or write with a pen on paper, as I have done for 30 years. As he writes, he can drink tea or coffee, or smoke cigarettes. From time to time he may rise from his table to look out through the window at the children playing in the street, and, if he is lucky, at trees and a view, or he can gaze out at a black wall. He can write poems, plays, or novels, as I do. All these differences come after the crucial task of sitting down at the table and patiently turning inwards. To write is to turn this inward gaze into words, to study the world into which that person passes when he retires into himself, and to do so with patience, obstinacy, and joy. As I sit at my table, for days, months, years, slowly adding new words to the empty page, I feel as if I am creating a new world, as if I am bringing into being that other person inside me, in the same way someone might build a bridge or a dome, stone by stone. The stones we writers use are words. As we hold them in our hands, sensing the ways in which each of them is connected to the others, looking at them sometimes from afar, sometimes almost caressing them with our fingers and the tips of our pens, weighing them, moving them around, year in and year out, patiently and hopefully, we create new worlds."

It appears that the title of my last post was wistfully inaccurate. I've only just seen this and spoken to Clarabelle (a Zamalek resident), so I'm perhaps not best placed to comment at the moment, except to say that this has shocked me almost to the point of disbelief. Here are some pictures from Khaled Zohny's Facebook page (apologies in advance for any copyright infringement):

 

You could hear the party going on in Boursa from streets away. Hundreds upon hundreds of people in eager anticipation of Egypt's return to the international football elite and the chance to see their side in action against the world's best. An hour before the match, there wasn't a spare seat to be found and the noise was simply deafening - typical football songs through mixed with chants with a curiously religious overtone. I admire the Egyptian passion for football, it's a wonderful feeling to be in amongst the dancing, music, flag waving. It wasn't just young men either, there were women, scarved and unscarved, of all ages present, and a real feeling of community that I haven't experienced in a long time.

After all that singing, drumming and dancing, the match itself was something of a let down. Algeria played a hard game and scored a great goal, but their time wasting antics coupled with some inept refereeing meant the match wasn't the spectacle it should have been. Egypt spurned chance after chance whilst Algeria scraped their one shot and one goal. The crowd's cheers of "Ya rab!" (Oh Lord!) for Egypt's set plays turned from expectant, to hopeful, to desperate, and the fans seemed to have given up hope by the time the fourth official signalled an astonishingly short 4 minutes of time to be added on. Alas, it wasn't to be, and now Egypt has to wait another 4 years for a shot at World Cup qualification.

Football aside, it's been a busy week since getting back from Karachi, I feel like I've not had five spare minutes as I try and catch up with Meedan, teaching, and copy editing. In amongst all this I'm trying to prepare applications for universities and funding in the UK, a process which takes more time than you could ever imagine. The most frustrating thing will be the wait after I send the applications, as I may not know where I'm going to be next year until months after the deadlines - all I can do is pray and sit tight. It's quite astonishing to think I've already been back here for over 5 months and have only four short weeks before I go home for Christmas, something I'm looking forward to greatly.

More tomorrow, I hope. I have a rather wonderful book and some nice music I want to tell you about.

Back in Cairo after a great time in Karachi, and the football fever that was ubiquitous on my leaving has only intensified on my return. Sunday night witnessed a huge game here in Cairo, one that I sadly missed, with Egypt scraping the 2-0 win they needed against Algeria, forcing a play-off in a neutral venue. That game is tonight, and right now the tension and excitement here are tangible.

School has been cancelled tonight, happily meaning I can watch THE game, and I have a spot booked at a place I reckon will make a good venue. Cars are honking their horns, the 'ahwas were filling up at 4pm (are they ever empty) and Egypt flags are everywhere; cars, balconies, shops, faces. If Egypt win today, this place will go nuts - I can't wait!

Photos and match experiences to follow! Yallah Masr!

Here's my plan for keeping updated regularly from Pakistan. I should be able to update the below feed via mobile phone, so check back here and there should be at least daily updates displayed. Welcome to the wonderful world of Twitter.

As I've written many, many times before on this blog; Once you stop writing, even for a week or two, it gets very difficult to get back into it. The longer you leave it, the longer the list of things you have to write about gets. It becomes a daunting task. Without further ado...

First things first, and with updates demanded from parents, grandparents and even members of the Twitterati: The girls I mentioned in my previous post - now enjoying almost rockstar-like fame after the coverage they received on the Egyptian blogosphere - are fine, doing well and by most accounts enjoying their time here. When I saw Katie a few weekends ago, she was looking well and was raving about teaching English at the university. They eventually managed to navigate the Egyptian judicial system and get the man pardoned and let off with the beatings he'd already received.

Andrea is also doing well - she's admirably determined to read the impossibly difficult novels she is given each weekend, and has far more patience with them than I would have. The content seems to range from the sublime to the ridiculous, and the books seem to have a consistently depressing and/or violent theme. Just how you want to spend a weekend!

As for me, well I'm working hard, keeping busy, and still very much enjoying the madness of life in Cairo. Teaching is going well, although 4 evenings a week somewhat takes its toll. I've also started teaching a private student, which is great fun. She's a marketing manager at a firm owned by her and her husband and we have a good time practising business emails and discussing articles I find each week.

A few weeks ago Son of a Duck, SoD's housemate John and I headed for an only-in-Egypt style adventure to a camel market a little ways north of Cairo. I hope to write fully about this soon, for now I recommend SoD's thorough entry on our excursion.

I'm currently excitedly preparing for short break in Pakistan, I leave on Tuesday, arrive on Wednesday, see Michael (of Michael in Pakistan) ordained at the cathedral on Sunday, and am back in Cairo on Monday in time to teach Level 2. International flights are a wonderful thing.

In addition to packing, teaching, Meedan-ing and writing, I'm looking at options for next year. As fun as this year is/has been, I'd really like to find something a little more financially consistent and stable for next year. Suggestions on a postcard! I'm currently preparing applications for scholarships in various locales.

All for now, more soon. I'll try and figure out a way of blogging each day whilst in Pakistan to let everyone know I'm well and safe, although this may rely on Andrea relaying posts as I will be sans internet for a few days after I arrive.

One final thing; a word of congratulations to my granddad Philip Slack, from whom it seems I have inherited most of my good looks, who yesterday got married to Vivien. Sorry I couldn't be there, I hope my message reached you safely.

Salam and, as always, thanks for reading.