Once Upon A Time In Egypt: Recent Episodes

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He returned. Mahmoud is back. It's been thirteen years since he took out on that fishing boat, and we all assumed he was dead. Boats like this never make it to their destination. He had arranged everything already and just had to confront our mother. He sold our land. The fields that my grandfather worked in, planting and cultivating cotton for the Pasha that owned it. The fields that my father then owned and planted with wheat after Nasser's agricultural reform. He sold it against my mother's will and told me that he'd send me my part of the inheritance once he settled over there.

I didn't care about the money, it wasn't the end of the world. I worried more about him. Mahmoud didn't have the same opportunities I had growing up after my father passed away. While I was in university, he had to step up and take care of the field and of our mother. He came back at the end of a hot, humid summer day; one that had me busy treating ill stricken folk. My ten-year-old son came running to the clinic, telling me that his uncle, the uncle he had never seen, had returned.

I didn't know what to make of that news. For years now, I had assumed that Mahmoud died, even if my mother never stopped believing he's out there. I thought that the small fishing boat he was on capsized somewhere in the Mediterranean, or that he was shot by some Greek coast guard while trying to disembark on the coast of an island. Best case scenario, I assumed he was in prison somewhere, either here or there, rotting.

We quickly took the car back home. During the fifteen-minute drive, I could only think of the day he left us. On a similar humid summer, I accompanied him to the shores of Burullus Lake. We went together to the bus stop that isn't really for buses, looking for a 7-seater Peugeot 504 station from the 60s, or a 14 passenger van heading towards the lake. At that time of day, our options were limited. We had to wait for an hour before the 7-seater we were in had filled up with 6 passengers, and not wanting to miss the boat Mahmoud told the driver that we'll pay for 3 passengers instead of 2 if he'd just go.

He had nothing with him, following the commands of the middleman that set up the operation. He left all his belongings, only taking a backpack with a couple of shirts and an extra pair of pants. For months afterwards, I would catch mother sleeping in his room and sniffing the clothes that he left.

The two-hour drive was excruciating. I had a lot of things to say, but it just didn't come out. I wanted to tell him that I'll miss him, that he doesn't have to do this, that in a year or so I'll finish university and return back to the village and share the responsibilities there with him. But I knew it wouldn't matter. He had already made up his mind years ago, it was just a matter of time. Besides, we shouldn't discuss the reason for us going towards the lake that late in the small tin can we were riding anyways. The decaying car dropped us off fifteen minutes after we passed the Kafr ElSheikh Fish Stock exchange, where the road passes over a small, nameless canal that drains into the Burullus Lake. We barely made it in time. The middleman, a middle-aged obese guy with a growing bald spot and a prayer bump on his forehead, arrived a few minutes later in a white pick up truck loaded with other men in the back. He parked, got out of his car and shouted at Mahmoud that he brought someone with him. Mahmoud apologised, saying that I'm just his brother, that I refused to let him come alone. The man grunted and asked for his money. Mahmoud reached out in his backpack, took out a fat envelope, and handed it to the man. The man cursed and told him to hop on quickly. He went back behind his steering wheel and started counting the money.

This was our goodbye. I had nothing to say. For years afterwards, whenever I would go to bed I would lay there, insomniac, for maybe an hour sometimes, just thinking of things that I could've said before Mahmoud jumped in the back of that truck. I reached a point where to push down my thoughts, I would force myself to do trivial things for hours so that I'm too tired to think when I actually go to bed. But at the time, I had nothing to say.

Mahmoud understood. He also didn't say anything. We hugged for so long. I grew to think that it was better that way, it was better to let the hugs and tears carry us through the moment. A moment that was interrupted by the middleman shouting again for Mahmoud to hop on. One thing that I regret about that moment is that I should've punched that man right in his prayer bump, that ugly callus that supposedly grew from his frequent prayers. I should've hit him, but maybe also tell him that he should probably go check it out as the hyperpigmentation might be a sign of insulin resistance from type 2 diabetes.

Mahmoud hopped on the back of the truck, and while it started to move, he reached out, handed me an envelope and shouted: "Give this to mother if you don't hear back from me". I never did hear back from him. I never gave the envelope to our mother. I read it on the way back to the village that day, and I've read it a thousand times since then. It was more of a suicide note than a farewell letter. I couldn't make mother go through this.

But now he's back. Now I'm on my way home to see Mahmoud. I'm sure that this is Mother's happiest day ever. She's probably preparing a large homely meal for Mahmoud now like she always said she'd do if he returned; when he returned. We parked the car in the courtyard of the house, and I could already smell the duck being cooked in the kitchen. I sprinted, probably without even turning off the engine, and went through the door. Mahmoud was there. He was really there, sitting on the couch wrapped in my mother's arms. Of course, now that her son came home, she would cuddle him not stand in the kitchen to cook. That's her daughter-in-law's job now. I ran to him to hug him, but before I could reach him, I fell on the ground, weeping.

Those; those weren't the tears of yearning for someone. I cried because I thought he was dead. Because I had lost hope years ago. He leant over, took me by my arms and helped me stand up. And I hugged him; like it was the day he left; like I'll never hug him again.

I spent the next few hours talking to Mahmoud, telling him all the stories he had missed. Telling him how I ended up marrying the girl I loved when I was a teenager, and how when we had a son, we named him Mahmoud. Mother just kept pampering and cuddling him, probably trying to give him all the affection he missed in the past years. We finally sat down for dinner; for the royal meal that was prepared. Mahmoud didn't speak at all, or very little, during the whole evening.

"How was your trip there?" - "Difficult."

"How long did it take you to find work?" - "Some time."

"What did you do for work?" - "A bit of this and that."

"Did you meet some girl there?" - "I was mostly working."

"How's life in Europe, The Promised Land?" - "Tough."

"Did you earn enough?" - "Enough."

"Are you staying for good?" - "Not sure."

"Did you bring me anything with you, uncle?" - "My luggage hasn't arrived."

"Let him be, the boy is tired", Mother shouted at us. "Tomorrow he'll tell you everything". Mahmoud smiled at her peacefully.

After dinner, mother took Mahmoud to his old room, the one where my Mahmoud sleeps in now. She gave him some of my clothes and left him to sleep off the tiring journey. The whole house followed suit, and I was left alone.

I tended to my nightly routine of doing random trivial things to push down my thoughts. That day I was reading a silly pocket novel that one of my teenage patients forgot in my office, the second of a newly published novel series by a young doctor my age that attended university with me. I was laughing about how a man from a big city like him was able to portray a small village, just like ours, without ever setting foot in one.

Mahmoud came out of his room. I thought I had woke him up, but he told me that he wasn't getting any sleep anyway. He sat next to me, and I set the small book aside. "You've changed", I said. "You look exactly the same, but you've changed".

"Yes. I know. It wasn't easy. I tried not to, but it's more powerful than me. The loneliness, the longing, being a stranger in a place where you don't belong. It takes a toll on you. I barely made it in the first place."

"After I left you, the truck took me for a short drive. We stopped somewhere on the shore of the lake. The driver dropped me with the seven other men and told us to go between the reeds that line the shores of the lake. Once we did that, he just left. We waited there for an hour, between the mosquitos and the stench of the lake, until we saw a small fishing boat with faint lights approaching in the darkness. We swam for a few metres, and a man helped us onto the boat. He told us to climb down into the tanks where they store the fish. There, drenched, I found ten other men hiding. I settled into an empty corner and started praying. They did two other stops, and two groups joined us into the storage tanks. We were around twenty-five people on that boat from all ages, from teenagers with sad moustaches that just started growing, to middle-aged men with grey hair. One of the fishermen came down and told us to hold our breath and left. We then heard a distant conversation and a lot more footsteps on the deck. The boat was passing through the mouth of the lake into open waters and was being checked by the coast guard. I'm not sure if they bribed someone, or if they the coast guard knew them well, but no one checked the storage tanks."

"We spent the next two days cramped up together, with orders not to go on deck. On the second day, sometime after midnight, one of the fishermen came shouting at us to grab all of our belongings and follow him. They pushed us all on deck. Everything around us was blue, just blue water with a tiny dot approaching; a bigger ship. It came closer and closer then dropped a rope ladder onto our boat. They hurried us onto the ladder like sheep being led into their pen. We embarked onto the bigger ship, just to be led again into another storage tank. This time, having twice as many people."

"They kept us into the larger tanks for four days, picking up another batch of people. The second ship had no Egyptian crew on it, all Greeks. And the cargo, the people, were from a multitude of nationalities. Iraqis, Palestinians, Sudanese, Ethiopian. And those were the only ones I could understand. Every day a crew member would open the hatch, throw us a box of dry food and a few jerrycans of freshwater. By the dawn of the fifth day, when the stench of urine and faeces had become the new normal, the hatch was opened, and we were signalled to come on deck."

"The crew kept yelling at us, they gestured towards the sea where land was barely visible. They kept yelling, and no one understood. They kept pointing at the sea, and the voices just kept rising and rising as if that would make the other person understand your language. The crew started pushing us, chaos broke, until one of the other Egyptians that were with me on the truck went overboard. At that point, everyone understood what the crew meant and started getting ready to swim."

"I think land was at least 10 kilometres away. People started jumping, voluntarily this time. Some seemed to know exactly what they're doing, making makeshift floaters out of plastic bags that held their belongings. I followed suit, wrapping my backpack into a black garbage bag that I found on the first boat. I was one of the last to jump, seeing the ones that jumped before me struggling against the waves in the faint lights of dawn."

"The water was freezing. It was the middle of the summer, and the water was freezing cold. Swimming was an ordeal. It was the first time I swam in the sea. The waves came crashing from everywhere, and I could barely keep my head on top of the water. After the initial shock, I was able to gather my powers a bit and started swimming towards land. Of course, I couldn't see land. I could only see the stream of people that were swimming ahead of me, and assumed they were heading towards land."

"After some time, it felt at least hours, I lost track of others. I couldn't see the swimmers, I couldn't see land, just waves after waves thrashing at me. The bag I had made into a floater started leaking water inside and was dragging me down. I saw a head floating in the distance. I gathered all my strengths and swam towards it. I approached the floating head, just to discover it's another makeshift floater. I couldn't find the man that used to hold it, and assumed he had already sunk."

"I held onto the new floater I found, drifting in and out of consciousness from being tired. All the while, hearing the same voice I heard on the shores of Lake Burullus. I listened to the same voice, soft and gentle, calling my name. Promising me safe passage and a good life. An angelic voice, a delicate melody. I completely blacked out."

"I opened my eyes to her face. I was lying on a pebbly beach, face up. She was leaning on top of me, trying to resuscitate me. I convulsed, not knowing where am I or how I got there. She held me back with my shoulders and pushed me back to the ground with a calming voice. I blacked out again."

"Pontoporeia, her name. Over the next few days, she nursed me back to health. Every time I woke up in the middle of the night feverish and hallucinating, she was there for me. Ever time I was vomiting and unable to hold my back up, she was holding me. I fell in love. I couldn't not fall in love. She represents everything beautiful and kind in this world. I owed her my life and my heart. And she, for some reason, also fell in love with me."

"In the beginning, the weeks became months and the months years. I was happy. I lived with her the best days of my life on a heavenly island. Her parents and sisters also lived close by. They accepted me in as one of their own. But I was never one of their own. I longed for you, I longed for mother. I yearned for everything that I left behind., even things that made me leave in the first place. I had to come back and see you."

"Did you give Mother the letter?" Mahmoud asked. I answered that I haven't. And, now that he's back, no need to give it to her.

"Right. Yes, of course", he replied.

Mahmoud finished his words, took my palm between his hands, and gave me a calm smile. He left me in my shock of the story he had just told and went to sleep. I had so many questions. But, I didn't want to put him through the agony of all the details at once. I went into my room, tiptoeing not to wake up my wife. I reached into my nightstand and took out the crumbling papers that Mahmoud had given me the day he left. I went back outside and started reading it for the thousandth time.

"Dear Mother, I'm sorry. I'm sorry that the boat sank before I made it there; that I wouldn't be able to repay you and my brother the money I took to pay for this failed trip. I'm sorry that I had to sell our land in the first place; the land that my forefathers had worked for thousands of years. I'm sorry that I drowned and they couldn't find my body; that you wouldn't be able to bury me alongside Father in the dirt I should've been buried in. But, at this point, finding my body would only give you the hassle of paying for transportation, burial, and funeral."

"I'm not sorry that I left, I shouldn't be. They are the ones that should apologise for not leaving me with a reason to stay. They robbed us of the promise of a good life, of a place where our dreams can come true. They took our livelihood, put it into building another pyramid, and forced us to build it for them. They are the ones that made me wager my life for a good living and a safe refuge. And, when the opportunity presented itself, I never thought about it twice."

"A month ago I went to visit a friend who's working in Lake Burullus. And, just before dawn, I was standing in the narrow strip separating the lake from the sea. It was a new moon night. I could barely see my own fingers. To the north, the vast dark carpet of the sea was dotted by faint distant lights of ships. And to the south, the dark carpet of the lake looked precisely the same. The only way I could distinguish them is by the sound of the waves breaking on the beach of the sea."

"Between the sound of the waves crashing, I heard a voice. Soft and gentle, calling my name. Then she came out of the sea, the most beautiful woman I had ever seen, crowned with branches of red coral and dressed in white silk robes trimmed with gold. She was far away, 50 metres maybe, but I heard her voice as if it was in my head. An angelic voice, a delicate melody, promising me a safe passage and a good life. Then she vanished. As fast as she appeared."

"That moment I decided to leave. Whatever that was, a hallucination my subconscious invented as a reason to leave, or El Nadaha calling my name to lure me into the depth of darkness, it must be better."

"I'm sorry, Mother. I'm sorry that I had no power to change anything."

I finished reading the letter and went to check on my brother. He was sound asleep, with a childish smile on his face. I had so many questions for him, I had so many things to say that, again, I had no chance to tell him. In the morning, when I went to wake him up, he had the same smile on his face.

But he never woke up.

Music:

She’ Men Be’id Nadany (Something from Afar Called Me) - Mohamed Mounir

Shantet Safar (Travel Luggage) - Angham

AlHoroob (Escape) Soundtrack (1991) - Modi AlEmam

ouatie.com/stories/nadaha

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Transcript:

Part 2 of 2

To understand what he was doing differently, we need to talk to the man himself, Sheikh Sayed Darwish. After a week in Alexandria, we were able to reach Darwish who was busy heading the preparations for Sa'ad Zaghloul's return. He agreed to sit down with us on the sixteenth of September, one day after the celebrations. In the meantime, we sat down with his closest collaborators, Badee' Khairy and Naguib AlRehany.

Khairy and AlRehany are to Egyptian theatre what Darwish is to Egyptian music. At the turn of the century, the Egyptian theatre scene was a backwater of European plays and operas. Productions in Cairo and Alexandria were either remakes of famous Italian operettas or productions by failed British and French theatre companies in their native lands, that had much more success in the eyes of Egyptian high society that aspired to be European.

Khairy was one of the first Egyptian playwrights that wrote original scripts and presented them to the public. His plays all included musical numbers that were mostly composed by Darwish, whom he collaborated with on various political and societal songs outside of the theatres.

AlRehany was the mastermind behind that renaissance, heading the theatre company named after him where Khairy and Darwish were able to rise to stardom, producing and starring in the plays and operettas that shaped Egyptian theatre.

"I met Sayed in 1918.", Khairy says. "I had just joined AlRehany's theatre company and started to garner some fame, but we were missing something crucial. We were missing the music that represents the Egyptian street."

"Sayed had just come from Alexandria to join a rival theatre company. Someone told me about his music, so I attended the play he was composing and singing in. I immediately got drunk hearing him as if I just had a hundred glasses of fine Whiskey."

"Afterwards, I went backstage to introduce myself. The porter wasn't letting me into the actors' room. I started shouting for his name until he came out on the commotion. And, when I introduced myself, he just jumped over the porter and hugged me. He told me that he was a big fan and that he had composed a poem that I published in a newspaper that year. He didn't leave me until he had sung it to me, and it was genius."

"The song was about the unity between Egypt and Sudan that was being questioned at the time. He composed it in a five-note key, not like the usual seven-note keys that you hear in Western and even Eastern music. Later I figured out that the key he used was an Ancient Egyptian one. He took it from The Pharaoh's ears."

AlRehany interrupts, and picks up the story saying "Who can compete against a guy like that?" Khairy and AlRehany laugh uncontrollably, and the small crowd gathered around us laughed with them.

AlRehany continues, "He's a man different from any other. I knew Sheikh Sayed before I saw him, and I respected him long before we met."

"The first melody I heard from him was in the same play that Badee' mentioned. I was exceptionally mesmerised by it, and I saw in it a completely different form of music than the forms we were used to hearing at the time. I felt that he was transposing us from a world of sleepy, passive music to a world of strong and active one. After Badee' met him, I sent Sayed an invitation to my office to make him an offer."

"He came in, said Salamo 'Alikom, 'Alikom AlSalam, who are you? I'm ElSayed Darwish. You! No way. How can the composer of the beautiful and soft melody that I heard be so tall and strongly built like that? He laughed and told me, why not? Do you hire musicians in your troupe by weight? Let me go find you a sickly composer then. I ran after him, laughing, and didn't leave him until he signed a contract."

"Weeks later he had composed songs for our first play together. The play opened from here, and people's wallets opened from the other side. You couldn't walk anywhere in the streets without hearing the song that just debuted in the play, Elhelwa Deeh Amet Te'gen."

"But the real fascination here is that me, with this same voice that you hear now; this harsh deep voice of a man that only sang before as a joke. He wrote me a song that, when I performed it on stage, would captivate audiences to the point that they would break their fingers clapping. I think all the famous singers that came to the opening night felt threatened by my singing because of him." The small crowd gathered around us started laughing again.

When we first contacted the duo, we suggested meeting them at the hotel they were staying at in Alexandria to attend Zaghloul's return, or at the nearby Greek Club that was a hub for upper-class Egyptians and Greeks to enjoy the fresh Meditteranean fall. Instead, they set our meeting in a local cafe in Alexandria's Mansheya neighbourhood.

The Anfratto, ravine in Italian, is what the locals call that cafe and it's a name that describes it well. The cafe lies in an atrium covered by a captivating glass roof and encircled by three magnificent Italianate buildings. The only entrance to that cafe is through a twenty yard long, three feet wide passageway between the buildings. You enter the passageway from the bustling, noisy main street outside, and you exit it onto the quiet, calm atrium on the inside. A busboy greets you with a cup of water immediately on your table, harbouring you from the crazy Alexandria on the other side.

Once Khairy and AlRehany arrived in the cafe and joined us, a few people gathered around, shaking their hands and admiring their works. But, when word goes around the cafe that we're interviewing them about Sayed Darwish, the small crowd gathers around. Men leave their tables. A couple quit the game of backgammon they were playing, others stop talking about the stock market, and everyone gathers around. They turn our interview into a small show in front of the lucky cafe visitors, the perfect analogy of the folksy nature of them and Sayed Darwish.

"I think what made him famous though was the revolution." Khairy continues, referring to the civil unrest of 1919 following Zaghloul's first exile. "We're always conceiving songs with political and societal connotations. Sayed is like me. We have a great sense of responsibility for this country. We write songs talking about construction workers, songs about doormen, baggage handlers in train stations, horse carriage drivers, everyone. We would never be what we are without them. One of our first collaborations in that was Salma Ya Salama, a song about an Egyptian conscript returning from the European front in The Great War."

"But we found our calling, and our fame, during the revolution. I remember when the demonstrations started, we were at the theatre rehearsing. I went to Sayed and told him that we should join the protests. He refused. He told me that if we go out there, we should be prepared to lead the whole demonstration, we should be contributing. So, we spent a few hours at the theatre. I wrote 'Om Ya Masry, and he composed and sang it. Do you know what type of music he chose for an anti-colonial Egyptian protest song? A Waltz. Thousands of Egyptians were marching in the streets singing a Waltz, and it was brilliant. We took a horse carriage to the city centre in Cairo and joined the protests there. That day the demonstration kept going through the streets of Cairo, and Sayed kept singing this song, among others, for hours. Until the carriage broke in half and he fell from it while still singing and holding a flag in his hand. He insisted on going back to Alexandria to join the demonstrations there as well. He also worked with all other patriotic poets and songwriters on multiple songs, all about Egypt, all supporting the revolution. That year alone, I think he produced more than seventy songs."

"You know, Sayed didn't just sing and compose, he also helped in many of the songs I've written.", Khairy continues. "Do you know what's Balah Zaghloul?". I told him I knew that Balah meant dates in Arabic; that my years serving in the British Army on the Palestine Campaign had taught me a lot of Arabic, especially the local food and delicacies. But that I didn't know what's the relationship between their political figure and dates.

Everyone listening in started laughing. I'd like to think that they didn't laugh at my pitiful accent in Arabic, and instead they laughed that I didn't know that Zaghloul wasn't just the last name of the Egyptian returning from exile in five days, but also a type of rich, red, half-ripe dates for which Egypt is well known.

"Two years ago when Sa'ad Zaghloul was exiled, again, a law was passed to criminalise any mentions of him in media, including songs. I sat down with Sayed trying to come up with a song that would pass through the censors filter. We started writing Ya Balah Zaghloul, singing metaphorically for a type of dates, saying that it has been long since they were in season, and how happy I would be when I see those dates again. Did you get it? You know what's the word for happy in Arabic, right?" He, of course, meant the word Sa'ad.

"Sayed also started writing a new song as a celebration for the return of Sa'ad Pasha Zaghloul.", AlRehany leans towards me whispering. "We should go now". He left me mesmerised while he thanked the gathering audience, taking a bow as if we were just on his stage.

AlRehany and Khairy take me by my arm swiftly through the narrow passageway back to the other Alexandria. They stopped a horse carriage and told the driver to take us to Teatro Mohamed Aly Pasha. "They should be starting their rehearsals now. If you're lucky, we'll get him to play the new song."

Less than ten minutes later, we arrive at the theatre in Rue Fouad, the main street of the city since Alexander The Great built it more than two millennia ago.

We enter the theatre from the street outside through a white marble archway, only to be greeted on the other side with a courtyard. In the centre of that courtyard, lies a statue of Noubar Pasha, the first Prime Minister of Egypt, overlooking the entrants. We pass the statue to enter the main French-style building. Once inside, the red velvet seats, curtains, and booth walls along with golden arches everywhere make you wonder if you've travelled great lengths just to land inside the Odéon Theatre of Paris. Only to be awakened by the middle eastern music played there.

A group of ten musicians and four singers are practising some song, Ana ElMasry (I, The Egyptian) if my memory serves me correctly. Sayed Darwish was standing in the middle, leaning over a pianist's shoulder while singing like no other Maestro ever did.

AlRehany calls him over. He introduces me to Darwish as "The British journalist that's going to interview him in a few days". Darwish shakes my hand vigorously. In an extremely slow Arabic, probably so that I can understand, he says "I'm sorry I had to postpone our interview till after the celebrations, as you can see I'm swamped with the preparations during the next few days". He hugs the other two, asks us to take a seat, and jumps back over the stage.

Khairy tells him to play the new song he wrote for the occasion. Darwish shouts from atop the stage "You know Badee'. You're the only songwriter I know that likes to hear other people's songs more than his own", they all laugh hysterically.

Darwish signals to the band, and they start.

Bilady, Bilady, Bilady. Laky Hobby Wa Fouady.

My homeland, my homeland, my homeland.

You have my love and my heart. Egypt! O most beautiful of all countries, You are my hope and my ambition, And above all people, Your Nile has countless graces!

My homeland, my homeland, my homeland. You have my love and my heart.

By that time, Darwish's eyes were tearing up, and when I looked over to my left, and both Khairy and AlRehany were also in tears. They say their goodbyes, not wanting to disturb the band's practice, and we leave the theatre. Neither of us seeing Sayed Darwish ever again.

A day later, Darwish returns from rehearsals to his home where his heart just stops. A rumour circulates that it was because of an overdose of cocaine. The leading rumour between Egyptians, however, says that a family friend, who was secretly an agent of The King, invited Darwish to dinner and poisoned him. In all cases, we didn't get a chance to interview Sheikh Sayed Darwish who, at thirty-one years of age, died.

At thirty-one years of age, Darwish had contributed to Egyptian and Arabic music more than any other in the past four hundred years.

He passed away two days before Sa'ad Zaghloul returned and heard Bilady Bilady.

End of Part 2 of 2

Music:

All the following music was originally composed / sung by Sayed Darwish.

Sheikh Qoffa’a - Alexandria Orchestra

Dengy Dengy - Yalalan Band

That Pretty Girl (ElHelwa Deeh) - Mohamed Saleh

Rise Up Egyptian (‘Om Ya Masry) - Sayed Darwish - Remastered

Zaghloul Dates (Ya Balah Zaghloul) - Cairo Ceremonial Choir

My Precious (Ya ‘Azeez ‘Einy) - Mohamed Mounir

Egyptian National Anthem (Bilady Bilady Bilady) - Sayed Darwish

Visit Me Once Every Year (Zourouny Kol Sana Marra) - Hanine Y Son Cubano

Link To Part 1 of 2

Link To Footnotes and Commentary

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Transcript:

“On a frigid December night, a shaggy looking man comes into the cafe. A horse carriage driver, a Arbagy. You could not distinguish the man from his horse. They had the same brown long face, and they even smelled the same, manure. The man was holding in his hands an unfeathered slaughtered duck. He stood in the middle of the cafe and asked for Sheikh Sayed. We all laughed at once. Everyone sitting in this cafe was waiting for Sheikh Sayed.”

“He's famous now. He used to sing for tips in this cafe years ago before Sheikh Salama Hegazy discovered him. It's good for business, though. Everyone knows that he sits here because it's close to his home. So they wait for him, wait for a handshake. Or maybe, if he had a good day, he'd take out his Oud and sing for them for free.”

“So, this man sits in a corner chair for hours. He doesn't order anything, not even a cup of tea. I don't usually let scum take places that paying customers could use, but I felt sorry for the guy. I approach him and ask him why he is waiting for Sheikh Sayed. And why he's stinking my cafe with his duck.”

“The guy tells me that Sheikh Sayed had performed for his son's Sobo' yesterday, the celebration for a new baby. You, Englishmen, probably don't do that. Of course, I don't believe the man. An impersonator must have scammed him or something. Then he tells me that Sheikh Sayed didn't take any money for the performance. And that he, as a proper Sa'idi, wouldn't accept that. So he came here with the duck as a gift for Sheikh Sayed.”

“Around two in the morning, Sheikh Sayed arrives. He sees the man sitting in the corner and goes directly to him. He hugs him and keeps telling him that he shouldn't have done that, he shouldn't have gotten him that gift. And after the man swears on his mother's grave, Sheikh Sayed takes the duck.”

“It turns out; Sheikh Sayed was riding with this man in his carriage. The man didn't recognise him in his Effendi suit, instead of the normal Azhari Jalabiya and headwear. They pass another horse carriage driver, and the man tells him not to forget about his son's Sobo' tonight. The other driver laughs at him and says 'Why is it so important? Is Sheikh Sayed performing?'. Sheikh Sayed, angry at the other man, sneakily asked the carriage driver where does he live, then surprised him and sang for 3 hours straight in the Sobo'."

I have this conversation with an old, fat, and, frankly, a dishonest looking Egyptian cafe owner in Alexandria's Kom El-Dekka neighbourhood. His cafe was once called something else that doesn't matter, like The Pearl of Kom El-Dekka Cafe or something of that sorts. Now, it's called The Sayed Darwish Cafe. Sayed Darwish, a phenomenon that swept across all of Alexandria and Egypt, not just that ragged cafe with its old wooden chairs and sawdust laden floors.

I head to Alexandria on the twenty-sixth of August, where this story, like many other stories, begins. I was tasked to write a story about Saad Zaghloul's life and how he became a national hero in the eyes of the locals. The avid reader of The Manchester Guardian Weekly would know Zaghloul, the former member of The Egyptian Legislative Assembly, who had led the Egyptian Delegation to The Paris Peace Conference four years ago to appeal for more Egyptian independence from the British Protectorate. He was exiled to Malta first, then returned to Egypt to negotiate with the British High Commissioner after civil unrest broke out in 1919. After those negotiations broke down as well, he was exiled again to The Seychelles.

Now, he returns. Egyptians planned a grand celebration for his return; when the ship that has him on board docks in Alexandria. The ceremony was a golden opportunity for us to bring you, our readers, a comprehensive report on Zaghloul's life. And a chance to also bring you a story that I wanted to write for quite some time now. The story of the singing Sheikh, Sayed Darwish.

Darwish is a thirty-one year old Alexandrian. The singer and composer has risen to fame over the past six years, to become the most sought over Egyptian singer. It is widely accepted that in his short tenure, he had transformed the face of Egyptian and Arabic music, bringing it to the twentieth century.

"Yes, I used to work with him". The cafe owner referred me to a man sitting outside, enjoying his cup of tea and water pipe under the pleasant Alexandrian autumn night sky.

Abdelaziz, the man narrating, is a firm looking man from the south of the country. With an accent so thick, I couldn't understand most of his Arabic and had to resort to the local police officer accompanying me for translation. He, like many others, had fled rural Egypt to the cities. Disease ridden poor villages that had lost their source of income gradually when American cotton flooded the global markets after the end of The American Civil War. They fled their homes to find Alexandria suffering the same economic strides that impacted the countryside, with the remaining job opportunities contested by Alexandrians and non-Alexandrians alike.

In those conditions, Darwish was born in Alexandria's Kom ElDekka, a few yards from the cafe we were sitting in. He enrolled in religious school as a child, then went on to study in Al-Azhar, the most prestigious Islamic university.

"We used to work for the same construction crew", Abdelaziz continues. "He had just finished his religious studies and enrolled in a music school. He worked for some time as a wedding singer, but I guess he didn't earn a lot of money, so he started working in construction."

"He always used to sing while working; most of the time, it was labour songs to encourage us to work. He really did have an impact on us. The crew foreman noticed that, and instead of paying him to work, he started paying him to sing for us, to cheer us while working."

"One day we were laying some bricks in Labban when two Syrians barged on us. They were passing by and liked his singing. Two weeks later, he bid us farewell. They took him to Syria to learn more about music. I didn't see afterwards for some time, four years I think, when I heard him singing in this cafe here."

The two Syrians that Abdelaziz referred to were the Alexandria-born Lebanese Amin and Selim Atallah, two famous artists in Egypt. They took Darwish with them in 1909 on a trip to Syria as part of their music ensemble. There he learnt the basics of Middle Eastern music, a tradition spanning hundreds if not thousands of years. There, he also learnt the basics of the more sophisticated modern European music, blending it with the local traditional music to form his new style.

He came back to Egypt, the real stage, armed with what he had learnt in Syria. And he failed. He went back again to Syria, learnt more, tuned his music style to the audience, then returned to Egypt.

This time his musical style was more innovative, it gathered more and more attention from the famous artists of Alexandria and Cairo, but not of the audiences. Another legendary Sheikh, Salama Hegazy, heard of Darwish's new contemporary style and went to Alexandria to listen to his music. He was captivated with Darwish's music and offered him to join his theatre group, composing music for plays and even singing to audiences between acts.

Another aspect that begs for exploration in Darwish's life is what he has in common with Hegazi, being Sheikhs. Is there a connection between religious Islamic studies and music?

"Yes, of course. It's one of the most important things you learn", Sheikh Aly Mahmoud replies. Sheikh Mahmoud is a distinguished Qur'an reciter and religious singer in Egypt. He is the Imam of one of the biggest mosques in Cairo, by virtue of his enchanting voice when reciting the Qur'an. He sings Nasheeds, a form of Islamic songs that are typically accompanied only by percussion and relies heavily on the musical strength of the singer.

"Arabs are poets; they always have been. They were known for their eloquence and fascinating oration. God bestowed His prophet, Mohamed, with many miracles, but The Qur'an is the greatest of them all. It's a form of poetry that no man, however eloquent he was, could come up with."

"The Prophet said (Whoever does not recite Qur'an in a nice voice is not from us). He ordered us to try our best at reciting The Qur'an, so we learn and teach that."

Sheikh Mahmoud continues, "Arabic music is traditionally composed in one of eight different keys, Maqamat we call them. They are not the same keys that you use in Western music. We use those traditional keys when reciting The Qur'an. It's not singing. It's not just reading. It's reciting. And it's a science.”

"You harmonise your voice in a key that represents the verse you're reciting. You use the Rust key when you're reciting a verse talking about the glory of God, and you use the Nahawand key when you're reciting calm verses, promising faithful Muslims with the joys of heaven."

"You go between keys seamlessly. And, you repeat verses. You repeat verses to deliver the message that this verse conveys. You know. There's saying that The Qur'an was revealed in Mecca, it was written in Iraq, and it was read in Egypt."

"It's a basic science that we learn while young. We use it to recite The Qur'an, and we use it to compose music. In my case, I use it to sing Nasheeds, but what Sayed Darwish is doing is; it's different. He's using those Maqams in singing to convey the meaning of the song while composing his music with both Arabic and Western orchestral instruments. He took orchestral music from the royal courts, the Maqams from religious songs, the folk songs from the common people, and blending all that in one form of art."

To understand what he was doing differently, we need to talk to the man himself, Sheikh Sayed Darwish. After a week in Alexandria, we were able to reach Darwish who was busy heading the preparations for Sa'ad Zaghloul's return. He agreed to sit down with us on the sixteenth of September, one day after the celebrations. In the meantime, we sat down with his closest collaborators, Badee' Khairy and Naguib AlRehany.

End of Part 1 of 2

Music:

All the following music was originally composed / sung by Sayed Darwish.

The Horse Carriage Drivers’ Song (La7n El3arbageya) - Alexandria Orchestra

That’s What’s Happened (Aho Dah Elly Sar) - Andrew Wadid and Ramy Maged

What’s The Reason (Eh El ‘Ebara) - Masar Band

The Sa’idis’ Song [Oh My Cousin] (La7n El Sa’ayda [Ya Weld ‘Ammy]) - Iman ElBahr Darwish

I Scream From Love (Mowasha7 Se7to Wajdan) - Beirut Oriental Ensemble

The Painters’ Song (Yours Truly Was Stomped Upon) - Rabab Nagy

Link To Part 2 of 2

Link To Footnotes and Commentary

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Transcript:

"Am Essa" or rather The Gold Man, as his peers like to refer to him; is a man of rich demeanour -a rare phenomenon in existence nowadays- a true descendant of Nubian origin. His brown sugar complexion, pearly white smile, and reverie like greyish green eyes made him a vivid embodiment of the authenticity of the River Nile. A hundred per cent depiction of a Nubian soul

"Nubia" is derived from the word "Nub" meaning Gold! And this couldn't be more true, for Essa himself belongs to one of the most renowned Nubian families; who has inherited the craftsmanship of being goldsmith from one generation to another. However, in Essa's case, we can say that the apple has fallen a little bit far from its tree, in Alexandria to be precise! Owing the respect to his family's heritage; Essa still resumes his family's profession "that of Gold". But not exactly that one found in mines, rather the ones found in the heart of Hot Sweet Potato! "The Edible Gold" as he likes to call it. You see, Essa is a freelancer and a proud Sweet Potato vendor!

His anchors settled in an intrinsic location; between "The Alexandria University's Campus" and the famous "Bibliotheca Alexandrina" in a branched street from one of the busiest main streets in Al Shattby Neighbourhood; "The Suez Canal Street" or "Kanat Alswes Street". This neighbourhood was the starting point to the cradle of Cosmopolitan Alexandria in the past; where many foreigners lived in its streets and alleys, forming hives of nationalism. Nowadays, new generations form another sort of profitable hives! To Essa, it is a fruitful place to monitor your targeted consumer and record their behaviours!

I wouldn't ever forget my first encounter with Essa. It was one of the coldest Mid-winter nights in Alexandria! And as a Neurologist, I had to attend an international convention held in the beloved Bibliotheca Alexandrina. Amid the hustle and bustle of scientists and doctors chit-chatting, and the echo of extravagant terminologies amplified by horrific laughter that my neurons couldn't bear any more. I felt the need to stroll for a walk … perhaps light a cigarette in my car, and make a couple of phone calls.

My car happened to be parked in the same darkened street across the Potato vendor's cart. I haven't noticed him until I have consumed half of my cigarette and got stood up by all the phone calls I attempted to make. I decided to remain in the car for a while, trying hard to preserve the little heat in my body & the sanity in my brain!

They say there is no such thing as coincidence, and that all is carefully planned. On that night, I was entailed by destiny to glance to my right side and capture through my fogged window the majestic scene I'm about to describe:

A wooden cart with so many colourful Nubian patterns. Adorned with joy, delightful warmth & cosy scent of lots and lots of Sweet Potatoes piled up over one another! In the middle of the cart, lies a Coal-lit Furnace through which the sweet potatoes are being roasted. Besides the cart, resides a Man with a grandeur posture. Dressed in a Jalabiya; a woollen shawl, & seated cross-legged sipping a shimmering glass of hot tea with mint. Getting Euphoric and high with the warmth of his drink on the rhythms Of his Favorite Nubian singer known as "The King" Mohammed Mounir.

It was a pleasant sight, seeing him really! Something about how those simple gestures put him into a good mood, touched my heart. But to be honest; I anticipated that he might pursue me as a customer and come nagging, trying to sell me a sweet potato and I - annoyed, of course - would ward him off! But, the man didn't move a muscle, and remained seated like a king in his own oasis!

Tempted by his attitude. I decided to check him out and buy myself a warm treat.

Me: "Al-Salam Alikom".

Vendor: "Wa Alikom Al-Salam Wa Ra7mat Allah Wa Barakatoh" replied the man with a soothing smile.

Me:" One hot Batata Please," I demanded

The vendor: "With pleasure," said the man, and grabbed a chunky one full of flesh and placed it inside the furnace to juicely roast in the augmented flames.

Me: "Where are you from?" trying to initiate a conversation.

The vendor: "I'm Essa, from Nubia", replied the man.

Me: "hmmm Nubia, a long way from home !" I commented.

Essa shrugged his shoulders and smiled a cunning smile saying "Home is where the heart belongs and the soul finds peace." "Here is your Batata, that would be 3 Pounds".

Essa served me the Batata on a hardened carton paper with a plastic fork to dig into its sweet indulgence. To my surprise, the man has served me half a portion only, and he has chopped the chubby sweet potato into two, providing me with one half only! I was taken aback by his behaviour, and found myself in an impulsive child-like manner saying,"But I want my Whole Batata!" Essa looked me in the eye and with a decisive tone said, "Trust me, this is your share, you need no more." Offended and definitely unsatisfied I said, "I’ll give you 5 pounds and you give me my whole sweet potato."

In a Fatherly manner, Essa explained, "Kind Man, money can't always buy us what isn't ours. You see, God Almighty divides our fortunes fairly and justly. Every man ought to have his 24 carats "NO MORE NO LESS" just like gold. And this is your share, in consideration to your status, looks & manners. You have had your share of both edible and adorned gold."

His words sounded paradoxical to my ears. Although they might sound simple to the hearer, my brain found it deeply complex to fathom; I just couldn't know why? Is it because it was coming from the mouth of a simple vendor -who hypothetically- supposed to have a limited educational background and thus, not expected to utter great words? Or could it be the absurd occasion of buying Batata and getting lectured about religious inheritance?! Regardless of the debate, I remember that my half Batata share was so golden and sweet in taste, and that Am Essa stressed on the fact that I should sincerely be thankful for that!

I wanted to hear more from that man, and thought to myself that; if I can't get my other sweet potato half, at least I can get a free of charge entertaining story . and since the man looked like he doesn't like to talk much; I had to ask him something tempting that would encourage him to open up. So the question was as follows: "why did you choose this darkened street to set in your Trojan horse?"

Essa proudly and swiftly answered, "It is a strategic place, my token of luck to be precise" "You see all shades of humans with all their social hierarchy pass me by. And all share one common defect "Gluttony" they are all glutinous to the edible gold; even if they don't actually need it."

I showed a sign of not being able to follow what he meant. Therefore the man resumed his thorough explanation summarizing. "Here, the Bibliotheca holds a lot of important gatherings and events. Which embraces either a lot of foreigners with coloured eyes and blond hair or highly regarded class people - the ones you perceive as Elite; while they might be nothing more than mere nouveau riche! But in both cases, they are tempted to try my sweet gold. Either out of touristic memory or simply yearning to days gone by where old was gold and life was simple and true!

"The Other category is "college students". Well, they are my favourite, though! They rush in like grasshoppers after they are done with their lectures. Some to satisfy their hunger and snap a few shots with their phones; bragging about the fact of how simple, authentic, and traditional they are with their taste.While others are simply a couple of love birds, in which the man wants to impress his sweetheart with an affordable few pounds without sieving his pockets.

"There is also the visitations of newly mothers; who have just given birth and delivered their babies in the "Shattby Hospital" at the end of the street. They are the sincerest, they seek the nutrients in the sweet gold, to help them nurture the young while nursing and strengthen the soul and bones."

"And all of them my man buy my Batata; rich and poor alike. What they really don't know is that the sweet potato isn't always sweet & wealthy! It is all a matter of share, luck and fortune!"

"What do you mean ?" I interrupted

"I mean that people are eager to know their fortune & would do anything to have a glimpse on their future and what life holds to them. Will it smile, or will it frown at their faces?!" "They all pay the same tax - 3 Egyptian Pounds- hoping to dig and scoop a lot from the elixir of life. But it is never granted that the taste will be sweet and the size will be big! But again, no man goes empty-handed; they all have their 24 carats of Luck and Fortune!"

"You know young man; I was asked one day to attend a wedding with my "Aroussa"". referring to his vendor cart - which means bride in Arabic - "asked to provide the guests and serve them with pre-paid Hot Batata by the parents of the Bride & Groom."

"Although the guests were all seemingly rich; and despite the fact that the wedding was held in a seven-star place and had an open buffet that can feed the entire of Nubia; yet the guests hailed on my Batata like predatory hawks trying to guarantee their share."

I was astonished by Essa's philosophy and his ability to see things for what they truly are. This Spiritual insight in his words that made him; dissect, construct and analyze the laws of universe, human nature and the study of social ladder. He resembled God's justice in my poor mind, and how all are given and sufficed with what they need, whether they were rich or poor.

I couldn't guess Essa's age, nor could I have control over the time that passed with the speed of lightning as if time stopped for a while in Essa's presence. But one thing I was sure of, That Essa, was the sweetest potato I have ever seen "cinnamon roasted skin from the outside, and a golden mushy heart from the inside."

By then, I had to truly head back to the convention and pick up what I've missed. But again my greediness urged me to ask Essa one more question.

"Hey, Essa What brought you truly to Alexandria?"

The man giggled and lightened up like a child and answered, "Samak El Batatah !" ( the Batatah fish) a special breed of silvery striped fish with thorny fins that is a true delight to the taste and a speciality of Alexandria sea.

Music:

Bilad ElDahab (Land of Gold) - Ahmed Mounib

Ya Marakby (Oh Sailor) - Ahmed Mounib

Ya Leela ‘Ody Tany (Oh Night, Return Again) - Mohamed Mounir

ElRizq ‘Ala Allah (Livelihood is Allah’s) - Mohamed Mounir

ElKoon Kollo Beydoor (The Whole Universe is Orbiting) - Mohamed Mounir

Rabbak Howa El’Alem (God Knows) - Ahmed Mounib

Link To Footnotes and Commentary

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The story behind the story of King Netjerkare Siptah. The real story of King Netjerkare Siptah, and why he was thought to be a woman for a long period of time. How Manetho and Herodotus solidified the story in their writings before we discovered that it's probably just a misunderstanding. And, how does all of that relate to weird Japanese Character RPGs.

Link To Story.

Sources:

Abydos King List

Histories II 100 - Herodotus

The Fragments of Aegyptiaca - Manetho (via Sextus Julius Africanus and Eusebius of Caesarea)

The Late Old Kingdom in the Turin King-list and the Identity of Nitocris - K. Ryholt

Queen Nitocris of the Sixth Dynasty - Percy E. Newberry

An Index of Ancient Egyptian Titles, Epithets and Phrases of the Old Kingdom - Dilwyn Jones

List of Provinces (nomes) of Ancient Egypt - University College London

Notes:

Fate/Grand Order Nitocris (also known as: My Eyes! What did I just see?!)

This commentary is not sponsored by or affiliated with the Pizza Hut in front of the Pyramids of Giza

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Transcript:

In the year after the thirty-first count of his glorious reign, after the arrival of Hapi for the sixty-third consecutive time, on the twentieth day of the first month of Peret, King Pepi the second left our world to sit on Osiris’s throne and rule over the living.

He ruled long and prosperous, strengthening Egyptian footholds in Byblos and establishing various caravan routes with Nubia and the oases of The Western Desert. It was an age of stability and wealth. His eternal wisdom graced upon his people good fortunes and plentiful harvests.

Alas, by the time Anubis came for his earthly body, King Pepi’s long reign had overcome the lives of most of his prospective successors. His last years were an excellent opportunity for the nomarchs, the rulers of the 42 nomes of Egypt, to extend their influence. To overreach and grab powers that were divinely granted only for The Pharaoh himself. One of them had even started to build a pyramid for himself. They bribed false priests that in exchange gave them the holy word of the gods.

King Pepi had only two children left, a son and a daughter. The son was soon to become our glorious King Merenre the second.

King Merenre was, like his father and grandfather before him, a fierce and righteous king. He curbed the ever-growing powers of the nomes. His first order was to gather all the nomarchs from the 42 nomes that constitute The Egyptian Kingdom in a meeting. After they travelled from their respective seats of power, King Merenre refused to meet them. He then ordered that they can’t leave the white walls of Menefer without his permission. They begged for his holy presence day after day, and he only accepted after 40 days.

The nomarchs would enter his royal court one by one, kneel in front of him, pledge their nome’s allegiance to The Pharaoh, and beg him to go home and rule in his name. Forty-One nomarchs did that. And the one that didn’t, the nomarch on Imty-Khenty, he paid for his sin. The Pharaoh, by his holy self, led an army North East to PerBast and besieged it for a month, until its nomarch came to him crawling. With his graciousness, he stripped that local governor of his titles and ordered his execution. He then gave the title of nome to the eldest son of that ruling family, they had been loyal to the throne for generations, so they had to be kept satisfied.

The same war that King Merenre declared on the emerging powers of the nomarchs, he proclaimed on the priests. The main temple in Menefer, of Ptah master of justice, was led by a vicious gang of priests that had used the false words of the gods to enrich themselves and gain more and more power. They had controlled the harvest of wheat in the whole country, skimming what they skimmed for themselves, in the name of Ptah lord of the truth, who is above what they do. The high priest Sabu was even the last vizier in the age of King Pepi the second.

King Merenre had no chance. He was fighting those battles on every frontier. A few of the nomarchs united and decided to give the capital a significantly less harvest, feigning a decline in The Nile flood as an excuse. The priests, who held control over the flood measures in most the kingdom, had conspired to falsify numbers to The Pharaoh.

Citizens of the capital grew angry day by day. It started by the nobles in the royal court, then crept onto the commoners. Priests began spreading rumours that The Pharaoh had kept all of the harvest to the army to keep its leaders happy. Then one day, King Merenre’s convoy was on its way to The Great Temple of Ptah when an elderly commoner stepped out of the crowd, running, begging The Pharaoh for sustenance. When the guards saw him approach the convoy, they did not think twice. To this day, years later, it’s said that the head of the guards was bribed by the priests to use excess power.

By the time the convoy reached the temple, news had broken out of what had happened. Commoners from all over Menefer gathered around the gates of the temple, shouting at guards of The Pharaoh. King Merenre had taken onto the sanctuary of the temple, The Holy of Holies, where he bunkered in with his guards. This was, in the point of view of the priests, sacrilegious. The Holy of Holies was meant only for The Pharaoh and the highest of priests.

It’s said that in the hours the King was barricaded in the sanctuary he went mad. Those are, however, only rumours. He did not ask for The High Priest’s head, he did not have his way with His Queen for the last time, nor did he relieve himself in The Holy of Holies. Those were mere lies the priests had spread within the slowly boiling crowd that gathered in front of the temple.

They overpowered the last of the guards that were holding the gates. The crowd of commoners entered into The Great Temple of Ptah and, after being joined by a mob of angry priests, the mob made way to The Pharaoh. His earthly body was defiled. They did not leave his heart intact, leaving him nothing to offer Maat to weigh her feather against in the afterlife.

King Merenre the second had no heirs, except his sister. She was the sole heir of the dynasty, a fragile woman that lost her father and elder brother recently, and was a perfect puppet for the priests and nomes. The day her brother was killed, she tried to escape from Menefer and head to Imentet, where her maternal grandfather ruled. She was caught. Her handmaiden, who had helped her escape, was killed in front of her. Then she was taken over to the seat of The High Priest, Sabu.

There she had to kneel in front of the false representative of the gods. She had to apologize for her brother’s demeanour. The High Priest, Sabu, told her that he’s sad for her loss. That King Merenre was, like his father before him, a great king. But he made some avoidable mistakes that led to all of this happening. It was his fault that the capital is now in utter chaos. That she can help them amend Merenre’s mistakes instead of being a liability. Sabu told her that she will be crowned Pharaoh as the last of her royal family. That she would be crowned King Netjerkare Siptah the first, but for that she would have to get rid of her effeminate looks. She would have to go out to the public as a man. But still, let the real men rule the country in her name. No one knew as much about the royal family except the highest of priests and the noblest of nobles who were behind those plans, they just needed someone with a resemblance to the royal family to play the part.

It took less than two days to restore order to the capital. It was as if the guards were already there all of the time, just refusing to act. It was announced that great King Neitiqerty the first would be crowned in a matter of 15 days. That he, being a gracious and kind king, would undo the wrongdoings of his predecessor and grant the public an enormous amount of gifts for this joyous occasion.

The new King spent the days behind closed doors. The priests and nomarchs gained all the powers in the country, while she was locked away in her royal palace surrounded by loyalist guards to The High Priest. On occasions, when The Pharaoh’s presence was needed, or on religious festivals, She, King Neiteqierty would don the costume of The Pharaoh, wear the fake golden beard, and become shown off to the public.

This act went on for a year, every day passing proving to be a satisfying parade of her obedience and fear of the priests and nomarchs. All of the harvest had been controlled by them, leaving breadcrumbs to the royal court. The state of commoners was not getting better either, but the horns of priests were playing to the tone of the humble and gracious Pharaoh, doing all he can to satisfy the needs of his people.

King Netjerkare understood full well the role of the royal court in governing the kingdom, none. Pharaoh is just a front for thieves and lords. For the rich to become even wealthier, and for the noble to stay apart from the commoners. And in every chance she got, she reminded The High Priest that she understood her part loud and clear.

On the first days of Shemu, the commoners were gathered in The Great Temple of Ptah to celebrate the beginning of the harvest season, offering the gods gifts of salted fish and onions. The Pharaoh was in attendance, and after finishing her parts of the ceremony, she leaned down to The High Priest and asked for a private conversation with him. They finished the religious proceedings and retired to his chambers, where King Neiteqrity asked him to let her build a temple in the name of the god Ptah that she was named after. She told him that she knows that the limited funds that the royal court has will not do the temple justice, but that would be the least she could do to atone for her brother’s wrongdoings.

Sabu was wary of her intentions. Nevertheless, he accepted. He knew that such an offering would show the nomarchs how much control the priests have over The Pharaoh, which would solidify their powers even more. She was filled with joy. Excited, yet thankful to The High Priest who gave her this opportunity. She told him that she’ll put the royal architect to the job, to scout for a location, and set the plans. She promised him that by the time the nomarchs gather in Menefer to present their harvests, she would be breaking the ground on the new temple.

Indeed, two months later, when they gathered in Menefer for the annual gathering of harvests, limited work had been started. King Netjerkare had chosen lands on the southern edge of the capital to build the new temple. Those had been shallow marshlands that were dried up by her great-great-grandfather, King Pepi the first. He built a dam along the streams feeding into those marshes years before, to construct a temple there. But his soul had left for the next world before he could see it happen.

In a letter to The High Priest, she said that this temple was a continuum of the work her generous family had done for the gods. She also asked him if he would bless the work they were doing there by taking the nomarchs on a visit, to show them her commitment to her role as Pharaoh in this new order. This was the opportunity Sabu was waiting for to show off his new grip over The Pharaoh. To prove to the nomarchs that no one in Egypt now has more power than the religious establishment that could turn on them one by one if need be.

A great convoy of the powerful men of Egypt headed towards the site of the new temple. The High Priest accompanied by his entourage of the 12 highly ranked priests, and nomarchs from the forty-two nomes of Egypt along with their aides. They went over there from The Great Temple of Ptah, a two-hour journey to the outskirts of the city. When they reached there, The Pharaoh himself and his royal architect were waiting for them.

The architect started explaining the various plans he had put for the temple to The High Priest, who noticed that only 41 nomarchs had arrived at the site of the temple. He dismissed that quickly as an effect of the scorching heat in these dry lowlands. After the architect had finished, The Pharaoh stood up to address the crowd. A soft rumbling sound was coming from far away.

It is said that The Pharaoh had taken off her crown and threw it on the ground. She took off her fake golden beard, and her white linen clothes, to the astonishment of the small crowd of nomarchs, priests, and nobles. The rumbling grew louder.

She started screaming at them, in an eerily, calm voice. She started reminding them of what they did to her brother. Chaos began to break, The High Priest ordered the guards to stop her. She shouted. Reminding them of what they did to her brother, killing him with their lies. They spread the false words of the gods into the ears of his murderers. They conspired to turn the commoners against him. They fought him, and they stole from him. The rumbling sound became so loud that everyone was trying to figure out where it came from instead of listening to the half-naked shouting woman pharaoh.

She told them that she had destroyed the dams. That the water would come for them now. For all of them. That Hapi, the god of The Nile, is coming. Coming to cleanse this world from the false words that were said in her name. That she was coming to take back what was rightfully hers, the fortunes that she gave to this country that those nomarchs stole.

Queen Netjerkare laughed hysterically while noblemen and fat priests scrambled around trying to flee the scene, but the whole area would be flooded in a matter of minutes.

Queen Netjerkare rid the lands of the false priests and the corrupt nomarchs that had killed her brother. She knew that she couldn’t withstand other conspirators coming for her life after this, so she committed suicide at the same time. She thought she’d be saving the country from those corrupt men that caused those difficult times, only to pave the road for more corrupt men and more difficult times.

It started with her grandfather, the nome of Imentet, who declared himself King over the whole country. After that seventy kings ruled the country for seventy days. An oligarchy took control of Menefer, and it lost control of the rest of the country. Egypt has been in a state of chaos until today.

Music:

Desert Caravan - Aaron Kenny

Arab Egypt Music Theme - Free Music TV

The Anunnaki Return - Jesse Gallagher

Spirit of Fire - Jesse Gallagher

Al-Atlal - Ghalia BenAli

Link To Footnotes and Commentary

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Transcript:

S: You’re safe. No one can touch you here. Not your father, or your aunt, or The Sultan himself for that matter. I’ll just ask you some questions and my associate here will transcribe. You’ll give me some answers that you gave me before. Be calm, you’re not in any trouble, and remember to focus on the women.

B: Ok.

[Sound of matches, lights up cigarette]

S: Let’s start.

Case number 43, AlLabban Public Prosecutor office, year 1921. Witness questioning by Public Prosecutor Soliman Bek Ezzat.

Can you tell us your name, young lady?

B: Badee’a, Sir.

S: Your full name?

B: Badee’a HassabAllah Sa’eed.

S: How old are you Badee’a?

B: 14 years old.

S: And do you know your home address?

B: Yes Sir. Number 38, ‘Alibek AlKabeer neighbourhood. My parents told me to memorize it in case I get lost.

S: Is that so? Tell me more about your parents then. Do you know what they do for a living?

B: My dad does some work every now and then. He loads and unloads cargo from boats that dock in the canal. My mother has a house with her sister.

S: What kind of house, Badee’a?

B: You know sir, a house. Women come wearing nice clothes. Men come drunk and smelly. My mother and her sister facilitate their time together. But they have a license I swear, because whenever my father is mad at my aunt he tells her “you’re such a whore that you have a license for it”.

S: Well honey, I’m afraid to tell you that your aunt’s license expired years ago when she was still young. But don’t worry we’re not here to talk about that. Tell me more about your father. Does he get mad often?

B: Yeah, he does. I’m afraid of him. I’m afraid of my aunt. I’m afraid of the rest of my family. Whenever they sit down and eat they give me a plain piece of bread, and when I ask for something to eat it with they hit me and swear at me. They tell me “go outside, daughter of the whore”. So I run away, scared, like a stray dog. I go outside, wander in the neighborhood, and play with the kids in the street. At night they lock me inside the house, and it’s very dark and lonelt. I get afraid and...and sometimes I pee myself. One time when they opened the door on me in the morning I was half out of the window, trying to escape. I was planning to go freighthopping, and take a train to Kafr ElZayat to my uncle and grandmother who live there. But I couldn’t.

I only like my mother in my whole family. She’s good. She loves me and gets me good things. My father hits me and threatens me with his wooden stick when I watch him eat the good food. My aunt is always drunk, and she hides money from my mother and doesn’t want to lend her money. One day I wanted to buy a headband to wear, like all the other girls, but they didn’t want to buy it for me. My aunt even wanted to give me the headband of one of the women they killed, but I didn’t take it. I knew that someone might see me in the street and recognize the headband of one of the missing women. Then I would be in big trouble.

But my mother would always tell me to ignore them, that they were cheap. And she would tell me that when I wanted something new I should always come to her first.

S: Ok Badee’a. Tell me more about those women.

B: The first woman I know of was Khadra, she used to work with my mother and aunt at the house. I remember her because my father would always look at her and ask her why she wears a lot of golden jewelry. My mother would tell me later that those types of women transform all of the money they make into gold, and wear it wherever they go. Even when they’re on the job. They think it’s the only way they can safekeep their earnings. After she left my father would look at uncle AbdelAl, my aunt’s husband, and tells him how a disgrace it is that promiscuous women like her would get all that money and hard working men like them don’t have enough money even to get some Hashish. Hard working men who provide for a place for her to hold her business.

S: Let the record show that she’s talking about Khadra Mohamed ElLamy, victim number one, and Mohamed AbdelAl, defendant number four. Please continue, Badee’a.

B: I remember that day. We were at my aunt’s house. It was raining a lot and most streets were flooded, so there was no business. I remember I was picking stones from lentils with my mother and two other women that work for her. Khadra was there, and my aunt told her to go to our house because a customer was there looking for her. Khadra left, and minutes later my aunt asked my mother to accompany her to our house because her leg was hurting her. I remember my aunt giving my mother a strange look when my mother exclaimed. So she just stood up and accompanied her. I asked to go with them but my aunt cursed me and told me to keep doing what I’m doing. But minutes after they left, I followed.

When I reached our house I sneaked from the window of my room inside, the same way I used to do when they used to lock me up. I saw them in my parents’ room. Khadra, my parents, my aunt, her husband, and a friend of his.

S: This friend, is he Oraby Hassan?

B: Yes, sir. They had a lot of food and drinks as if they were celebrating something. But even though there were a lot of bottles, I could notice that Khadra was the only one drinking. The rest would only pretend to drink. After thirty minutes or so Khadra was very dizzy and laid on the ground. My mother and aunt left the room. Oraby and my father jumped on her. One holding her feet and one her hands. And...and uncle AbdelAl covered her mouth and nose with a wet handkerchief, and smothered her. There was no sound coming from her. She moved and shook for some time, then just stopped.

S: He smothered her? The medical examiner in his preliminary report says that the women were strangled from their necks. Was it only Khadra that was smothered?

B: No, sir. They always did that. Covered their mouths with wet handkerchiefs and smothered them to death.

S: Write a note for Dr. Sidney Smith. Continue Badee’a. What happened afterwards?

The room had a white tiling floor. They stripped her of all her jewelry, my aunt even came in and took her gown because she liked it. Then they removed the tiles genty, dug into the dirt underneath, left her there, and put back everything as if nothing happened.

S: At the time your aunt was still living in ElNagat neighborhood, right? She lived on a first floor apartment and you lived in a ground floor house?

B: Yes, sir. A week after Khadra, my aunt moved to another ground floor apartment. I guess it was easier for her that way.

S: Are you referring to the ground floor apartment in Macouris that she currently resides in?

B: Yes, yes. Did you search her apartment? I’ve seen them burying other bodies there at least twice. You should find them there, I’m sure. It was all her idea you know. My mother had nothing to do with it.

S: Yes we did search her apartment. But tell me, who was the next woman?

B: The next one I think was Nazla. Yes yes, it was definitely her. My mother sent me one day to her place. Nazla had borrowed from my mother a set of drinking glasses. She asked me to go tell her that my mother needs them back urgently. I went and accompanied Nazla back to our place. When we reached our place I found my father, my aunt, her husband, and their friend Oraby there waiting. They had with them a lot of food, the good kind of food. Grilled fish and sardines. And they had a lot of liquor as well. They invited Nazla to have dinner and drink with them. I had a couple of bites when my dad shouted at me to leave and go play. I didn’t really want to play. So I just stayed in front of our entrance playing in the dirt and waiting for them to finish dinner. An hour or so later, most of them left. My aunt left first, her husband AbdelAal, his friend Oraby, and my father then left heading for the cafe. I went back in immediately expecting to see my mother and Nazla. But I only found my mother. She was trying to clean the gown she was just wearing. She had peed herself. I assumed that they did to Nazla what they did to Khadra before.

S: Did your mother and aunt know all the women before they were murdered? Were all of them prostitutes that worked with them?

B: No. Just in the beginning. I think only the first three or four worked with them. After that my aunt would roam some of the markets, like the textile market in Zan’et ElSettat, the fish market in Anfoushy, or the Piazza in Mansheya. She would try to scout for some woman that’s shopping alone and that’s wearing valuable jewelry. She would approach her and get to know her. She would then lure her into her house or ours, signaling to someone else from the gang that would be close in the market. She would tell the women that she has better merchandise than whatever they were trying to buy at the market, at a cheaper price. Or sometimes, thos naive women trust her when she tells them to come rest at her place until what they just bought is ready. I know of 7 other cases of women like this. Plus, of course, the soldiers they lure into the house.

S: Soldiers? There were no men at all in the bodies that we found. We found 17 bodies all belonging to women scattered between your house and the two houses that your aunt lived in during the past two years.

B: No, there were four or five soldiers that I saw being lured into our house and never came out of it. The last one, the last woman, the Sudanese you were searching for…

S: You mean Fardous AbdAllah?

B: Yes that one. She came to our house with her boyfriend, a British soldier. Both of them didn’t come out of the house.

S: No honey. I think you’re mistaken. Corporal Golding, her boyfriend, was the one that reported her missing. He reported it to the police and said that he last saw her with your mother. Then a police officer came to your place and questioned your mother, when he noticed that she lit up a suspicious amount of incense. When he searched the place he smelled rot, that your mother was trying to cover up, which led to the floor of her bedroom where Fardous was. Corporal Golding was the one that reported it.

I know that you’ve seen too much. You’ve seen a lot of things that a grown up human should never see during their lifetime, let alone a teenager. I can imagine that things might be a bit confusing and the details can sometimes escape you. That’s why I want you to focus on the women in our conversations here.

B: Maybe.

S: I think that’s enough for today. Remember Badee’a, no one blames you for this. You’re only a scared little girl. You’re not in trouble, and now you’re safe from them. All of them.

B: Ok.

S: My colleague here will escort you back to the orphanage. Let’s pick this up tomorrow.

[Footsteps leaving room, door opens and closes]

[Lights up cigarette]

S: What do you think?

[On telephone]

I: You told me she wasn’t going to mention the soldiers.

S: Well, she isn’t anymore. I think I made that clear for her.

I: You don’t understand Soliman Bek. We can’t have anyone knowing about the soldiers this gang killed. Egypt is in a state of chaos, it’s been like that for the past 3 years. We’re this close to giving the country a constitution. We don’t need a gang of murderers to be hailed as national heroes for killing a bunch of British soldiers that were looking for a cheap shag. It doesn’t even matter if those soldiers were mostly Australian. In this country anyone with blonde hair and blue eyes is British. Make this go away.

S: Yes sir, Major Ingram. Don’t worry. The medical examiner had already listed all the bodies we found as women. We’re going to find a couple of unknown women that went missing in Alexandria and say that their families identified them to fill the gap.

I: And the girl?

S: She’s just a frightened little girl. She has a lot of valuable information to at least indict Sekina and the others. As for Raya, I think she’s the mastermind of all of this but the girl loves her mother. Worst case scenario we’ll get Raya for accessory to murder, best case Sekina will confess and flip on her.

I: Good.

[Phone hangs up]

Link To Footnotes and Commentary

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The story behind the story of Case-43 Labban-21. The real life case of a serial killer gang that murdered 17 women in Alexandria in 1921. Why I chose to tell the story from the prespective of Badee'a, Raya's daughter. How a Public Prosecutor was able to motivate her to testify against her parents. And notes about the socio-economic status of Egypt after World War 1, that led to the gang starting their activities. Story: ouatie.fm/stories/case-43-labban-21

Sources:

The Men of Raya and Sekina: A Socio-Political Tale - Salah Eissa

The British Community in Occupied Cairo, 1882-1922 - Lanver Make

Court Transcript, Case #43, ElLabban District, 1921

The Women Killers - Dr. Yunan Labib Rizk, Al Ahram Weekly

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Transcript:

King of Kings,

Strategos Autokrator,

Hegemon of The Hellenic League,

King of Persia,

Son of Zeus,

Son of Amoon,

My Lord, Alexander III of Macedonia,

Three years ago I had an idea for a project. I went around between a variety of my countrymen and nobles, asking that my introduction to your royal presence would be facilitated. All of them kindly received me, and promised to accomplish my wish at the earliest.

I knew that they promised me fairly, but they were slow in performing; waiting, as they alleged, for a proper occasion. I also knew that you were setting out of Macedonia with the army. So I had to take my own course.

I came to your royal tribunal, when you were judiciating cases with your immense wisdom. I had anointed myself with oil, crowned my head with a wreath made of poplar leaves, and threw a lion’s skin around my shoulder. I looked as glorious as I would ever be, just to seek your attention.

And it worked. My appearance caught the attention of the people in the court. And when you discovered what they were fixated upon, you ordered the crowd to make way for me and demanded to know who I was.

“A Macedonian architect”, I replied. “A Macedonian architect who suggests designs and schemes, worthy only of your royal renown”.

I suggested building a city in your glory on top of Mount Athos, carving the mountain itself in your shape. With your left hand you would be holding the city, and with the right a cup, into which all the streams running down the mountain would be collected, which shall then be poured into the sea.

It would’ve been the greatest structure man had ever made. The Pharaohs of Egypt would have felt jealous in their modest tombs. Queen Amytis would’ve left Nebuchadnezzar to come and live at your hand.The gods would’ve descended from Olympus just to come and steal a glance at it.

I was wrong. I now understand why you asked me whether the surrounding soil is fertile enough to yield sufficient produce for the city. I understand why you looked into the practicality of such a city, rather than it being a wonder. Architects like me always go for the opportunity of a lifetime, for designing what was thought impossible to design. Not practicality. But I see now that a city built in your glory, needs to be exactly like you. Immortal.

I only understood that when I came here. The location you’ve chosen for the new city is perfect. It’s nestled between the sea in the north and Lake Mareotis in the south, giving it both a defensive advantage and harbours on both the sea and The Nile. I can see now how this city will survive for thousands of years. The sea port will connect Egypt to Greece and the rest of The Mediterranean. While the port on Lake Mareotis will connect the city to the rest of Egypt, Nubia, and Punt.

I overheard Cleomenes once telling a story that when the army was camping on your way to Amoon’s Temple in the oasis, you had a dream. Homer came to you in the dream and started reciting parts of his Odyssey.

“Now off Egypt, about as far as a ship can sail in a day with a good stiff breeze behind her, there is an island called Pharo. It has a good harbour from which vessels can get out into the open sea when they have taken in water”.

Cleomenes said that you woke up and decided to choose the island of Pharos and the village on the shore in front of it, Rhakotis, to build your city. It seems that Homer is not just a great poet, my lord, but also a great architect.

The weather is very predictable. The locals here know a year ahead exactly when it will rain, exactly when there will be a sand storm, and exactly when The Nile will flood. They’ve arranged their whole life around this consistent yearly schedule. Usually cities built around lakes have heavy stifling air in summers, because the heat evaporates water turning lakes into filthy marches. Not here. The flood of The Nile coincides with summer, so the canals that flow into Mareotis provide the lake with freshwater.

Since you were here, we’ve started laying out the plans for the city based on your orders. Cleomenis and I started gathering the men that will work on the city. We then went on to mark the circumference of the city in the shape of a Macedonian chlamys, the famed military cloak. The long sides of it are those that are washed by the two waters, having a diameter of about thirty stadia, and the short sides are the isthmuses, each being seven or eight stadia wide, pinched in on one side by the sea and on the other by the lake.

My king, the scale of the city is so large that workers had already run out of chalk to mark the design of the city on the second day. And, when that happened, they started using barley flour to mark the layout of the city. This of course was a feast for flocks of birds from every kind and they ruined what was laid down. The Egyptian priests though say that this is a good omen. It means that people from every land and colour will come flocking to this city that will feed them all.

Cleomenes is worried, my lord, that when we finish building a city so large we wouldn’t find enough men to inhabit it. And even if we find enough men, he says, the lands would not be able to provide for enough necessities of life to support them. I told him of our plan to move people out of Canopus and into Alexandria, and turn Canopus into farm lands. I regret doing so, Hegemon. When he heard the plan his eyes glew with evil and said that those people would pay anything not to be moved from their lands. I do not trust Pseudo-Greeks, ones that came out of generations of Greeks living in outposts like Naucratis where he’s from.

We laid out the city in a grid shape, with one main road extending from the eastern gates of the city to the western gates, called the Canopic Road. All other roads in the city are either parallel to it or perpendicular. The city will be divided into five sections: Alpha, for Alexander, will hold the royal quarters. Beta and Gamma, for βασιλεύς and γένος, being the Greek quarters will hold The Gymnasium and Library. Delta, Δίος, will be the Jewish quarter, and Epsilon, ἔκτισε, for the Egyptians.

Alpha, Beta, Gamma, Delta, Epsilon.

Alexander βασιλεύς γένος Δίος ἔκτισε.

Alexander, The King, Son of God, he who built it.

I’ve also set the construction plan for The Heptastadion, the road that’s going to connect the mainland with Pharos. This will also create two separate ports instead of just one, The Great Port on the east of The Heptastadion and the Portus Eunostus, the safe return harbour, on its west. I have in mind a magnificent project for the ports and the island of Pharos that will rival The Pyramids themselves. And don’t worry my lord, it’s not just a vanity project. It will lighten up the future of your greatest city for eternity.

Moreover, we’ve commissioned Crates of Olynthus, the most esteemed hydraulics engineer, to design the waterways and sewage system of the city. He is planning the most advanced plumbing system I would ever see. He is planning to build tunnels under the city that would bring in fresh water from Mareotis and the sea to cleanse the city from underneath. He came up with an ingenious idea to design those tunnels that, frankly, I will be copying when designing the streets. He plans to get a set of mirrors that in the light of day would reflect a perfect straight line of light, which we would follow to lay the cornerstones of the streets. This will ensure that we build everything in perfect straight lines. This city will be perfect in each and every aspect.

In my calculations, all of the work listed above will take no more than one year to accomplish. In two years from now, I’m anticipating that the city will grow to be the biggest port in the whole world. And, in less than two generations, will be the biggest city in the whole world.

This city, as we’re planning, will not be a part of Egypt. The citizens will want nothing more from Egypt than trade. They will also want nothing to have with the rest of the world than trade. They will live, generation after another, being envied by others. Looking at their glorious city. Trying to come to it and failing. Trying to conquer it and failing. Then trying to be it, and failing.

This will be the greatest city that ever was and will ever be. Founded by the greatest, Alexander, that ever was and will ever be.

Your humble servant,

Dinocrates of Rhodes.

Sixth of Loios,

Alexandria-by-Egypt.

Music:

Alexandria - ElDor ElAwal

Alexandria (Ya Salam) - Giannis Kotsiras and Alkistis Protopsalti

Footnotes and Sources available here

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Read more about the foundational myths of Alexandria-By-Egypt.

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Transcript:

“موسى نبي ، عيسى نبي ، محمد نبي ، و كل من له نبي يصلي عليه”

He always starts like that.

“Moses was sent by God, Jesus was sent by God, Mohamed was sent by God. So whomever you follow, just pray for them.”

And people, always reply in one voice: Peace Be Upon Them All.

His name is Hassan, the Rababa player, and also the protagonist of our story tonight. A very special night, because it’s the wedding of the eldest daughter of the village’s richest man; Haj Metwally.

Haj is a title, given to people who went on pilgrimage to Mecca. And although the man never actually went there, he earned the title based on the villager’s respect for him.

It’s his eldest daughter’s wedding. Her name, is irrelevant to the story. What’s relevant though is that he called for Hassan by name from one of the neighbouring villages. He only has two daughters, and he’s going to give them the weddings they deserve. This means, among a lot of other things, getting the most famous and expensive Rababa singer in the area.

And on that night Hassan was at his best. He sang songs of long gone folk heroes, songs about lovers who defied all challenges, and songs about revolutionary figures fighting the Ottomans and the outside rulers of Egypt for the last two thousand years.

On his last song, a sad love story about an Arab prince being held in jail in Tunisia, he glanced at the great house across from him. The biggest in the village, and where the women’s part of the wedding was held.

He glanced, through the semi open wooden window on the first floor and saw her. Starting at him. Listening to him with all her senses. He didn’t know it yet, but her name is Naʻema.

Maybe it was the song he was singing, maybe it was the way she was looking at him and singing along with no voice. Or maybe, just maybe, like the cliché love story he was telling, it was love from the first sight.

Hassan finished his act and paused for the awes and applause. He excused himself from the crowd and left, like he always does, not to steal the show from other performers. The father of the bride, Haj Metwally, came to him personally and appraised him for the great performance. He asked him to stay till the end of the wedding. Hassan politely refused, and left.

He walked around the great house that the wedding was in. Almost no one was on the muddy streets of the village. Almost everyone was in the wedding, a testimony for the wealth and generosity of the family. Almost no one, except her.

If Hassan didn’t know better he would’ve said she was “El Nadaha“. A daemon, in a lady-like figure that lures men into the darkness to their death. But that’s a story for another day. It was Naʻema, it was most definitely Naʻema. And now he knew her name.

They talked and talked. For minutes, ten or fifteen. If you want to be precise, it was the duration of one song by the guy that followed his act. The sound of the applause far away startled them, and made them realise the limits they were breaking just by talking. She left in a hurry, back to the women’s section of the wedding. But not before she asked him how can she listen to him sing again.

Whenever Hassan wouldn’t be travelling to perform in some wedding or religious festival, he would go sit near the bridge on The Nile separating their villages. And that’s where Naʻema would go. Hassan would go on his side of The Nile, play his Rababa, and sing. And Naʻema would go on her side of the river, and hear him sing in the distance. Whenever he ended the night by singing a song about a travelling Rababa player she would know that he wouldn’t be there the next night, he would be in some other village performing. They did that almost every night for forty nights. Until one night, Naʻema crossed the bridge.

They talked and gazed at each other’s faces. It was a full moon night and they stole two hours of it before anyone noticed that she was away. And in the end of it, Hassan told her that he would come and ask her father for her hand in marriage.

Naʻema was ecstatic. She didn’t know exactly how she reached home, but it seemed like the wind was blowing her there. She didn’t sleep that night, thinking of when Hassan would come to ask her hand for marriage. Thinking of the dress she’s going to buy with her elder sister from the city. Hassan didn’t give her a chance to wonder the next night, because he came.

She heard him knocking the door. She heard Haj Metwally greeting him. She ran downstairs when her father asked her to prepare some team for him and Hassan. And after serving it, she hid on the other side of the wall to hear their conversation.

“Do you think my daughter is a belly dancer to marry a common singer like you!“

That’s all she heard, before running crying upstairs to her room.

Hassan left. Naʻema heard her father later that night go to sleep between her sobs, but she didn’t. She stayed awake, for a different reason this time.

She collected her favourite clothes, the necklace her mother gave her before she died, and waited. Once she heard the call to prayer for the Dawn Prayers, Naʻema knew she would have twenty minutes before the men of the village would start waking up and start heading for the mosque to hold the prayer in time. Twenty minutes are enough time for her to leave the village and go to the bridge, to Hassan’s side. After all, she didn’t know where else to go. She just wanted to escape. And Hassan, for some reason, was there.

He didn’t understand what she just did. She just crossed a lot of limits. Nevertheless, love is stupid. He took her back to his place, woke up his elderly mother, and explained to her what had happened. She took her in her arms, calmed her down and put her to sleep. She then yelled at Hassan to leave the house. After all, Naʻemais not his wife nor his blood relative, and no house can have them both overnight together. That’s a limit you can not cross.

Next day came and Haj Metwally didn’t know what to do. Naʻema didn’t go to her sister’s place and she’s no where to be found. He, of course, chose to neglect the obvious answer because he knew his daughter wouldn’t do that. Nevertheless, not knowing where else to look, he went over to Hassan’s village.

As a man of his stature would do, he went directly for the village’s mayor who of course knew him. Who doesn’t know Haj Metwally! The mayor called for Hassan, who came by the time Haj Metwally had finished his cup of tea.

“Yes she’s here“, Hassan bluntly said. “And we’re getting married. She doesn’t need your consent“. For four hours straight, the men discussed, argued, and shouted at each other and the mayor mediated between them. Until Haj Metwally accepted.

Hassan will marry Naʻema. Under one condition. Naʻema goes back home with her father tonight, and her wedding is held three weeks later at her village. Like every other respectable woman from every other respectable family.

Hassan accepted. The mayor shook their hands and everyone left happy. At least that’s what Hassan thought.

You see. That’s the thing about artists. The live in their own world, built by their own art. And Hassan’s world was that of bravery, successful revolutions, love, and where the hero marries the heroine.

Ten days later, Haj Metwally sent a messenger to Hassan asking him to come over to review wedding arrangements. Naʻema was of course…with her sister buying a wedding dress from the city. They went over a lot of unnecessary arrangements. Haj Metwally stalled and stalled and stalled. Hassan ended up leaving for his village around midnight, where a shadow was waiting for him in between the plants on the corn field, near the bridge over the river.

One shot was all it took. No one knows exactly who pulled the trigger, but everyone knows who was behind it. The mysterious shadow went over to the dead lying body and threw it into the river. Almost exactly where Naʻema used to sit, and listen to him sing.

Two days later, news broke out that Hassan went missing. His elderly mother barely made it, along with three young men from his village, to Haj Metwally to ask about Hassan. But Haj Metwally knew nothing.

On the day he was supposed to get married, Hassan’s body washed up three villages downstream. His killer was never found.

Haj Metwally left the village years later. People say it was only him leaving that day, because no one had ever seen Naʻema since then.

And now. A hundred years later. The great house is still standing there in the middle of the village. Reminding everyone, not of its previous rich inhabitants, but of the tale of Hassan w Naʻema. Their love story being told by other Rababa players, with the perfect backdrop of the Rababa.

Music:

Sayyidi Rabab (Egypt) - Yosuf Majed

Egyptian - Rababa Online

Checkout out the story on our website at ouatie.com/stories/hassan-w-na3ema

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The story behind the story of Hassan & Naʻema. The original folk tale, and how it was transformed in Egyptian mass media. How "The Egyptian Romeo and Juliet" shaped modern Egyptian cinema. And the probably maybe true story behind it.

Story: ouatie.fm/stories/hassan-w-na3eema

Sources:

Hassan wa Naimah - IMDB (Full movie on YouTube)

Hassan And Naʻema - AbdelRahman AlKhameesy

Memoirs Of The Saint That Discovered Soʻad Hosny - Ahmed AlKhameesy

Folk Love Stories: Hassan and Naʻema - El-Warsha Theatre Troupe (Arabic Recitation on the Rababa, English Poem)

The Story of Hassan and Naʻema - Recitation by Mohamed Taha

The Story of Hassan and Naʻema - Recitation by Sayed Ragab

Hassan and Naʻema: The Egyptian Love Story that was killed by the difference in religion - El Meezan

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Transcript:

It all started at her funeral. Princess Shamma, queen of The Helaly Tribes. She’s been ill for the past six years, and with her illness came the draught. She was the greatest leader of all the tribes, having one third of the votes for important decisions all by herself.

Even through her illness, my grandmother has been trying to convince the tribe leaders to leave. The desert we live in had become harsher and harsher in the past years. We’re Bedouins. We’re always on the move, looking for the next green pasture and the next blue oasis. And she knew it was time to go now.

In the funeral, they all knew it was time to follow her orders. Her eldest son, Sultan Hassan of Jereed of Helal, the sultan of all The Helaly Tribes, and his brother King Sarhan, my father, called for a vote of the elders. Everyone knew that it had to be done. Everyone knew that we had to leave where we lived for the past hundred years. Everyone knew that a mass exodus was coming.

The elders quickly settled on the need to leave. Princess Nour, who had inherited from her mother the third of the votes, suggested west. Libya, Tunisia, Morocco, maybe even Andalusia. Everyone in the room agreed, and quickly looked to whom they knew would carry the mission, my uncle from my mother’s side.

Salama Barakat, son of Rizk, son of Nael, of Aamer, of Hawazen of Helal. Also known as Abou Zeed Al Helaly. He was the bravest and greatest knight of all the tribes. He had fled when he was young, along with his mother, from his cruel uncle, cam back seeking justice and won. He helped us defend our lands from the Cypriot invaders, readied our men to battle the armies of Iraq, and came back victorious. He’s the greatest hero The Helalies had ever seen, and now he has to save us again.

When he got a chance to speak, he asked the elders of the tribes to give him 3 scouts, from the noble youths of the tribes. They would go first, scouting the roads, desert paths, and narrow valleys; finding new pastures and moving our tribes to the west, to previously uncharted lands by Arabs like us. I had to volunteer. Both my brothers had to volunteer. He specifically asked for youths from the noble families to set an example to other men in the tribes, because one day they might have to be in the same place we’re in.

It was decided. Abou Zeed will go west to scout, along with his sister’s sons: Younis, Yahia, and Marey; sons of King Sarhan of Helal.

Four days later we found ourselves, the four of us along with our camels, in an abandoned Coptic monastery in the middle of the desert. This was the border of the Helaly controlled region. Abou Zeed took us to the inside of the monastery, which turned out to be one of his famous hideouts. It was full of costumes and various disguises. He told us to take the disguise of travelling poets and him, an elderly Rababa player, with his famous sword hidden in the Rababa. We went into the monastery princes of the greatest Arabian descent and came out of it having nothing to our names.

Before we left Abou Zeed asked Yahia to read the sands. He said he always likes to know how his adventures are going to end. Yahia, who was known to have a third eye for predicting the future, took a loose lime stone that had probably fell from the monastery’s structure a hundred years ago, and put it in between us. He reached down to the ground, grabbed a fist-full of sand, and let it slip gently onto the lime stone. He blew a bit of air onto the sand then swiped his hand on his forehead, looking for a drop of sweat that he dropped onto the sand. We all followed his lead. We looked at him and waited, until his face turned white. He looked at Abou Zeed and told him that he sees him in the sand, going back home. He sees him returning alone. We looked around to each other and to Abou Zeed, who started laughing and told us that he never believed in those things. I guess he said that to make us feel better at the time, but little did he know that it was all correct.

We kept moving, going through Egypt, Alexandria, and the Libyan Desert disguised as the travelling poets we were. We reached the ferry that would take us to Tunis, where it seemed that rain and green pastures were abundant. The ferrymen had never seen camels as big and glorious as ours. Those people here only use horses, and they weren’t accustomed to larger animals like those. We only had enough money to buy our passage but not that of the camels. Abou Zeed, who everyone till that point mistook as our elderly servant because of his darker skin colour, took out his Rababa and started singing. The complements of the kindness and generosity of the ferrymen made them sympathise with us, so they let us pass with the camels.

The ferry dropped us off on the outskirts of Tunis. Great Gardens of Eden surrounded the whole city. We rested a bit from the tiring unloading of the camels under the shadow of a palm tree. There was lots of trees, fruit, and greenery that we haven’t seen before. It looked like we might’ve found a new home for The Helaly Tribes. Now, the hard part started. We had to figure out more details about the rulers of the land and whether they would accept us or not.

While resting under the palm tree we saw a man approaching us. He was dressed in white and green, and riding a great mare. We didn’t know it yet but he was your cousin, Allam. The Prime Minister of Tunisia. We also didn’t know at the time that he had the same gift that Yahia has, and he had seen three men from The Helalies coming to Tunis in his sand.

We knew he was an important man from his looks. So, when he approached us we only replied to his greetings. He asked us who we were and we answered “Three travelling poets, discovering God’s earth with his grace, and their elderly servant“. Allam responded that those camels don’t look like the camels of poets that have nothing to their names. Abou Zeed, who went by the name Masood, replied that they were a gift from a Meccan silk merchant who grew fond of our singing in the markets of Alexandria. Allam asked us to sing for him, so Abou Zeed reached out for his Rababa and started.

He began by praising God. Then praising His prophets. The praising the last of His prophets, Mohammed. The praising the close followers of the last of His prophets, Mohammed. The praising the great Imams that had followed them. Then praising the Abassid Caliph. Then, when it came to praising the rulers of Tunisia he stopped. He asked Allam “What’s the name of the ruler of Tunisia?”, Allam said “Al-Moabbad“. Abou Zeed continues his praise then stopped abruptly. He asked Allam “What’s the name of the minister and leader of the army of Tunisia?“. Allam started laughing and told us that we have a very cunning servant.

He asked Abou Zeed to put his Rababa away and to tell him who we really are. Abou Zeed replied with the same, “Three travelling poets, discovering God’s earth with his grace, and their elderly servant Masood“. Allam iterated, and asked the same question again. And Abou Zeed gave him the same response again. Allam looked like he’s getting tired from our charade. He told us to say what we want, but we looked like three Helaly men and their elderly servant. We didn’t respond.

He gave us his Koffeiyah, his head scarf. He told us to go into Tunis and we would be safe there. If we had any trouble we should show people his Koffeiyah and they would know we’re under his protection. And if we are not who we say we are, and want to talk to him in the palace, we should show his Koffeiyah to his guards. He rode his mare, and left.

An hour later, we were still resting in the gardens outside of Tunis, when Marey asked Abou Zeed if had any food on him. The last encounter had had its toll on us. But after the money we paid on the ferry we had nothing left. Abou Zeed took off his shirt and told Marey to go into the city and sell it for food. But we all refused. This was the time I knew I had to step up.

My grandmother, Princess Shamma, had given me a piece of her necklace before she died. This was a necklace that she had gotten from a Cypriot man back home and no one had ever seen something like it. She gave it to me, knowing that one day we would take her advice and head west to find a new place to live in. She told me that when the time comes, I should sell it - and only me - because in her own words, I had the prettiest face in the whole world, and that people would trust that I was not a thief.

I took out the necklace and showed it to Abou Zeed, who knew that this is our only option now. He gave me three pieces of advice:

Don’t under sell the necklace; otherwise people would think you stole it.

Don’t deal with women; you’re as handsome as Joseph son of Jacob and you know what happened to him.

Don’t enter a palace; go straight to the market, find the wealthiest merchant and sell it to him.

With those words I left them in the gardens and entered the city.

I went through the gates of Tunis along with various people. Egyptian convoys, Aegean merchants, Palestinian noblemen, and Tuareg coming to barter. I went inside as the nomadic poet that I am, and headed directly to the Souk, the greatest market in the country. I started scouting the market for the wealthiest merchant to sell the necklace. I saw an elderly man standing alone in a tent without any merchandise, and people coming to him one at a time, talking for a few minutes, shaking his hands and leaving. I went to him directly. I knew he is the merchant I’m looking for, because the wealthiest merchants have no merchandise to sell.

I said my greetings and asked him if he would be interested in buying the rarest necklace he would ever lie his eyes upon. He looked at me with disdain, but I knew I had intrigued him. He told me that buying necklaces is for women, and merchants looking for a quick Dinar by scamming idiots like me. I took out the necklace, showed it to him and told him not to worry about me getting scammed. He looked at the necklace, then looked up at me three times. He asked me where I stole the necklace from, but then took it back and said that I don’t look like a thief.

He asked me who am I, and I told him that I was a travelling poet, discovering God’s earth with His grace, and told him that I got the necklace from a Cypriot merchant in Alexandria in exchange for a great Arabian camel. The merchant looked at me and apologised. He said he doesn’t have the money to buy such a rare necklace. And even if he had, an ignorant man like him is not worthy of that necklace. He told me that the only person who has the means to buy that necklace, and who is worthy of it is You. Aziza, the daughter of Al-Moabbad, Sultan of Tunisia. That was the first time I heard your name, Aziza.

He called for his wife and sent her to your palace. He told me that he’s going to make a hefty commission for facilitating the sale of the Sultan’s daughter. His wife came to you as fast as possible with the news. Little did show know that you had more interest in me than in the necklace. She didn’t know, and I didn’t know, that you spent the past four years hearing stories about me from Mai.

Mai was my mother’s former handmaid, she grew up in our family and raised me. One day a travelling poet, like the one I’m disguised as, came to our tribe and started reciting poems about the chivalry and generosity of my father and uncle. My father was so pleased, he told him that the next thing he sees and wants is his. That was Mai. They got married and they left us. I didn’t know at the time what had happened to her, but now I know that she learnt poetry and singing from her husband. And when he died in Alexandria, she met you and came to be your handmaid, filling your lonely nights with stories and songs about our tribes, and especially about me.

I didn’t know that her stories made you fall in love with me, with the idea of me.

When the merchant’s wife came to your palace; When Mai heard the description of the necklace and the man that’s trying to sell it; She knew it was me, and she told you. You knew I would be wary of coming to the palace, so you sent Mai with the merchant’s wife and a guard to accompany me to the palace. And you were right; When I saw Mai, and when she told me her story I let go of all my instincts, and Abou Zeed’s advice.

I followed her to the palace with the sole intention of selling the necklace, until I saw you. If you fell in love with the image of me that you built from Mai’s stories, I fell in love with the image of you I saw there and then.

But, Aziza, Daughter of the Sultan. If it was a different time. If we’d met in a different place. I would’ve told you there and then that I loved you. If only I hadn’t left my heart with my suffering family.

You dismissed the merchant’s wife and told her that you’ll send her their commission. You started talking to me, saying that you were longing for the day you’d meet me. I told you, against my will, that I need to complete the sale of the necklace because I need to feed my brothers that are waiting outside of the city. You told me to wait with you, and asked Mai to prepare a tray of the finest food and sent it with a guard to my brothers.

Yahia tells me now that the guard came to them with the tray of food. When Abou Zeed saw it he knew that I hadn’t followed his advice. Abou Zeed dismissed the guard, and started to think about what to do to get to me. The guard took the tray that, in his own words, the ingrateful Arabs refused and gave it to his poor children.

My brothers were starving. Marey was walking in between the trees outside the city, when he saw a bunch of dates that fell on the ground. He picked them up and had a few, when the workers on the gardens jumped him. Marey tried to fight off the seven workers, and Abou Zeed ran to his help; But not before he got stabbed in his guts. Abou Zeed took off the sword he had hidden in his Rababa and fought the workers off the bleeding Marey. In a fit of rage he slashed his sword at the workers. He went first for the servant that stabbed Marey and stabbed him directly in the heart. He then shifted his attention to the three who tried to fight him, killing them in three swift movements. He ran after the three that ran and did not stop until he had taken his revenge.

A dozen guards who were patrolling the area came quickly on the sounds off the fight. They saw Abou Zeed with his bloody sword and surrounded him, raising their weapons. Abou Zeed looked around. He saw the bodies of the servants on the ground, and Yahia kneeling onto Marey trying to stop the bleeding. Abou Zeed lowered his sword and raised Allam’s Koffeiyah instead. The guards recognized the Koffeiyah immediately and stood down. They handcuffed Abou Zeed and my two brothers and marched them through the city.

Meanwhile, we heard the ruckus going on outside of the palace gates. You, Aziza, sent Mai to know what’s happening. I sometimes wish she hadn’t come back. That we would enjoy those few minutes again in your garden with the bloss of ingorance. You not being Aziza the daughter of Tunisia’s Sultan, and me not being Younis of the Helalies.

She came back with the news. Three Arabs killed some servants outside of the city, and of course when Mai saw them being marched through the city she recognised Abou Zeed and the two princes of Helal that she had helped raise. They were being taken to the court of the head of the army, El-Zanaty Khalifa, the fiercest and most noble warrior west of The Nile.

We hurried after them, and when we caught up with them I ran to check on my wounded younger brother. The guards knew I was with them and captured me as well. You couldn’t enter the court with us due to the people following the convoy of guards and prisoners. But in there, El-Zanaty Khalifa called for Allam and when he came they started interrogating us.

El-Zanaty started: “Who are you?”.

“Three travelling poets, exploring God’s earth with His grace, and their elderly servant Masood”, Abou Zeed replied.

“I haven’t seen poets killing seven able bodied workers of mine before”, said El-Zanaty.

“Fighting is one of my few talents, my lord”, Abou Zeed replied. “If you give me back my Rababa and my sword, I can show you a few more“.

Allam laughed and said “I also haven’t seen servants talking to lords of the land like that before“.

“Forgive him, my lord“, Yahia replied. “Seeing his masters in such a predicament Masood forgot his place“.

“Predicament!“ El-Zanat shouted. “This is a flesh wound that would surely heal. Is a flesh wound to a travelling poet worth the lives of seven of my finest servants?”

“If this wasn’t a flesh wound, your head itself wouldn’t have been worth it. My lord.“ Abou Zeed replied.

“I think I believe you, Allam“ El-Zanaty said. “So I’ll ask them one more time. Who are you?”

“Three travelling poets, discovering God’s earth with His grace“ I replied.

“Three travelling poets who killed my servants are useless to me”. El-Zanaty looked at his guards and ordered them to execute us.

They took us back outside. We were lead to a public place, where people gathered around to watch and a noose was set up. I could see the merchant and his wife amongst the people, mourning the probable loss of their commission. I could see you and Mai in the back, not knowing what to do.

El-Zanaty signaled to one of his guards. The guard held Abou Zeed and lead him to the noose. He wrapped it around his neck, when Yahia shouted.

“People of Tunis. Don’t you have any regard for stature? Since when do servants come before their masters?“

The crowd murmured and people started nodding in approval. El Zanaty signalled to his guard, and he took Abou Zeed back. He took Yahia instead, lead him to the noose, and wrapped it around his neck. I shouted.

“People of Tunis. Don’t you have any regard for rank? Since when do youngsters come before their elders?“

The crowd again murmured and nodded in approval. El-Zanaty signaled, and the guard took me instead. He lead me to the noose and wrapped it around my neck when Marey shouted.

“People of Tunis. Don’t you have any mercy? Do you leave the injured to suffer while the healthy are being executed?“

For the third time the crowd agreed. But this time they started asking, who are those people so eager to die first.

El-Zanaty asked, “For the third and final time, Who are you?“

“They are Younis, Yahia, and Marey. Sons of King Sarhan, brother of Sultan Hassan of Jereed of Helal”, You replied.

You told them about Mai. You told them about the necklace that no one in Tunis had ever seen something like before as a proof of who we were. We had no other option but to tell the truth. The partial truth.

Knowing who they had in custody now, Allam and El-Zanaty Khalifa knew that they couldn’t just execute us. They ordered our servant Masood to go back home to our tribe and ask for ransom, and for blood money as a compensation for the killed servants.

They never knew that he was Abou Zeed El-Helaly, the finest warrior of The Helaly Tribes. And when he promised to come back with 360 thousand pieces of silver, they never knew that he meant the 360 thousand pieces of silver plated helmets of our finest soldiers.

He went home, alone. Just like the sands revealed to Yahia in the abandoned monastery. He gathered the war council for all the tribes, and they decided to move. Not just the army, but also all of their lives to Tunisia. They were desperate. The conditions haven’t gotten any better since we had left on our journey.

I know this because he slipped behind the gates of Tunis yesterday. Him and my mother because she was so desperate to see us. After all, it has been seven years since we left home. They came here, to the prison attached with the royal palace. You fought to keep us here instead of in El-Zanaty Khalifa’s prison because you were afraid that he would kill us.

Tunis has been under seige for the past year and a half. I know that El-Zanaty is winning key battles one after another, but the fact that Abou Zeed was here to check on us yesterday means that he has a plan to win this war once and forever.

You asked me, Aziza, to tell you my story again. This was my story.

I came from far away lands. No food, no water, no money. My only friend, is my solitude.

And you’re telling me you love me, what is there to love? And what is love, without my freedom?

Aziza, daughter of The Sultan. If it was a different time. If we had met in a different place. I would’ve fell in love with you there and then.

If only I hadn’t left my heart with my family.

Music:

Younis - Mohamed Mounir

Younis Karoake - Mohamed Mounir

Mizmar Taksim - Aswan Music & Dance Ensemble

Sabr Ya Alam - Aswan Music & Dance Ensemble

Lamony - Asaal Music

Sayyidi Rabab (Egypt) - Yosuf Majed

View Details

The story behind the story of Younis. Why I chose it to be the first episode of the podcast. What The Helaly Epic stands for in Egyptian Culture. What intrigued me about The Epic. And, the possible future of this podcast.

Story: ouatie.fm/stories/younis.