photo montage... best of autumn outside Cairo

(Oxford, Wales, and London; Rome; Fayoum)

Truth

There are days when truth slips between the cracks of your mind like a nugget of soap amidst sudsy fingers…
each conversation a new layer of convolution.
As a blister pops, painful awareness bursts in
of each perspective’s limitations.
Is there even a nugget amidst the suds?
The wise is one who knows she does not know
but continues her quest for more of the elephant’s anatomy.

There are days when truth is a jigsaw puzzle, a half-finished mosaic, a jungle –
alive and growing and covered in green.
These are hopeful days – pieces can be gathered, fit together, explored or envisioned,
brimming with possibility.

There are days when truth is not objective:
can be felt but not spoken.
These days are heaven and hell,
sunlight and snow,
wells of eyes,
nothingness.

There are days when truth is oppressive,
when powers pretend we don’t live in a compassionate world.
They seek to construct walls of identities,
make us lose sight of problems of collectivity
and their lack of progress,
their engines of greed-soaked apathy.
Days that numb us from action.

But there are days when truth blossoms like a flower,
its sweet perfume enhancing
the togetherness of petals showcasing a delicate pistil.
These are days of unity,
an ocean of relief,
a harmony of termites building a skyscraper
with common vision.

Just as there are days when truth is like quicksand -
an hourglass running out
and decisive actions impinge on the future.
And you are a tugboat on rough waters
navigating between barges… trying to guide them to the same harbour.
And on these days you must call yourself to account for hiding
the truth of your own feelings,
and you know you have been avoiding
facing it,
and sharing it
in all its complicated beauty.
Truth.

being women in Egypt

What does it mean to be a woman in Egypt? How do we live amidst and relate to the constant assault of our bodies by hungry male eyes and hands and words? This is a frequent topic of conversation among female friends in Cairo as we each struggle with the all-too-frequent harassment in our own ways.

Do you respond with anger? Tit for tat – words for words, a punch for a grope, send the message that their behaviour is unacceptable and that you (and we women of Egypt) will not stand for that kind of treatment? If you do not respond or ‘retaliate’ does it imply that you are encouraging them to continue in this behaviour, or at the least that they can ‘get away with it’? Or does this actually serve the man’s cause… he has successfully provoked or upset you, and therefore taken power from you? Is venting anger cathartic or does this leave you distrusting or resentful of all men you encounter on the street after awhile - your anger barely below the surface, walking with a chip on your shoulder all the time?

Do you respond with law? Hold the offender accountable by going to the police, send a message to society that there are repercussions for this type of inappropriate behaviour as Noha did? Will winning a few court cases change this behaviour, and more importantly the mentality behind it?

Or radically, do you respond with empathetic sadness and, as appropriate, patient words? Do you see the brokenness in the man and in the society that has shaped him to seek power over others… perhaps because of the powerlessness he feels in his own life? Do you try to have a reasoned conversation with him, tell him you do not appreciate his remark, that you are just like his grandmother, his sister, his daughter, his wife… (re-humanizing women!) and ask him, ‘Would you treat your loved ones in this manner’?

Do you sometimes choose not to outwardly respond at all – and mentally to not to let yourself be triggered with anger at his words or behaviour… Practicing mindfulness, inhaling ‘forgive him for he knows not what he does’, and exhaling love. Where is the balance between justice and forgiveness in this world?

These thoughts have swirled in my head over the last 14 months as I have explored many of these approaches.

The first time I was grabbed (one week after my arrival in Egypt) I responded in a shocked reflexive outburst, “Hey you can’t do that!” before I knew the words were out of my mouth. Other men nearby quickly apologized for the offending man’s actions, and then yelled at him in Arabic. That affirmed for me that it is not ‘normal’ or ‘acceptable’ to violate a woman this way and that it can be important to speak out. It was insightful as I navigated new cultural terrain.

Often I choose not to outwardly respond to derogatory comments and looks. They are too frequent to waste energy on and if I allowed myself to get angry every time I would not have any peace of mind ever. So, sadly I often move about in a private bubble of sound, ipod phones wrapped around my ears. Part of me wonders if this is a manifestation of desensitization… or complacency in the current situation…so much so that I only become angry and saddened when a man ‘accidentally’ brushes a hip or buttock as he passes.


And often I think about something that Einstein once said, “We cannot solve our problems at the level of thinking that created them. We must learn to see the world anew”. And I wonder how we can see this situation anew to move towards addressing the root causes of gender-based violence and broader violence in this society and every society.

While I certainly don’t have things all figured out I believe that on a personal level it is important to begin dismantling the walls we construct for ‘protection’… and instead create that protection in the community around us.

I live near an embassy that is heavily guarded. The corridor beside the embassy is well lit and so at night it would be a comfort to walk there were it not for the gauntlet of hissing men to pass. I now recognize that when I collapse into my own head-phone bubble I seek only to ignore them… begin feeling anger towards and judging all male police officers here and actually begin to dehumanize them back.

Sometimes the best defence is a good offence!

With these thoughts in mind I’ve begun a new experiment with these guards… greeting them with peace before I pass and they mutter dirty words in my ear. And after a month and a half I have to say that it’s working! Now, instead of sexually charged hellos I get greetings of peace in return! And I feel safer! I wonder if this kind of positive approach could be tried on a larger scale… perhaps not greeting every man on the street before he can look you up and down, but at least seeing him as a human being first instead of a chauvinist. I’ll keep you posted on further experimentation. =)

a thread, yoyo, a dream

He careens around pot-hole-ridden corners:
desperate for one more trip -
ten pounds tanni.
His poverty is reckless -
gutted van and soul.
A makeshift door-latch
barely contains
the revolving sardine-can
and not his anger -
Don’t get too f***ing close!
He could care less
if pedestrians are forced to scatter in his wake.
It is autumn in Cairo and all feel his chill.
Eyes well up as we tear down the road.

I too am hanging by a thread today.
A spider’s web of hope,
carefully woven while abroad,
is ripping apart one strand at a time.
Yoyo, yella, and here we go.
“This being human is a guest house…”


An oasis arises from the desert,
sweet Fayoum, with salty shores and
mystic sky
below desert of sky.
Where smiling sunflowers poke through cornfields in peaceful nonconformity,
and people play with clay like home,
being beautiful difference in the world.
If only this place could knit him together
(I feel my web re-spinning before my heart)
to face another week.
But he cannot afford this luxury
and he knows it.

One thread is left asunder
(and we are not yet on the road).

moments

two flashes from the past few months...

1. A September morning: wind up the mountain

Today Doweika is a ghost town… a prison.
No boisterous music blasts from ramshackle microbuses:
Police suffocate the bottom, drown the top…
white uniforms pressed with a pompous starch.

It is the poor who suffer at the hands of the law.

I am so angry I could cry,
witnessing powers at play.

And yet there is our little friend Ahmed…
hanging onto a teeming bus as it flies around the bend.
A baby drops its shp shp,
and smiles exchange as it is restored.
A woman marches in dignity:
don’t you dare tell her who she is or stand in her way!
A myriad forms of angry and loving resistance flourish here in stagnant puddles,
hide amidst the garbage,
slip past on the knowing smile of a dog.
This too shall pass.


2. zebaleen dreams

Atop a tenuous building hides
a nesting-wedded-penthouse:
easter egg hues and love adorn
happy chambers that catch only putrid perfume
and a sea of satellites as the wind shifts.
Garbage piles line streets like trees,
growing voraciously
as sorters continue the messy work.
Here, NGOs, almost as prevalent as the rats and pigs,
pedal solar energy, needlework, or shampoo bottle solutions to a poverty paradise
where people somehow make enough to stay where they are:
the cliffy fringes of sprawl.
A shocking blend of ambition, brilliance, peace, and generosity are etched
in the souls of these friends,
as used to a wandering khawagaya as the flies.
What is needed here?
Change – how?
What are your desires, apart from the great Canadian escape and a family?
A wisdom,
too seldom tapped by professional egos
(whose expertise often falls short of listening)
springs from lively spirits
in this place of miracles and mud,
hepatitis and tottering two-year-olds.
Thank you for sharing this space with us,
may we be worthy of your friendship
and support you as you continue on your paths.