Imshee!

Hey all... a year ago I was taking the trip of a lifetime in Egypt. Here's a nonfictional recap of the emotional journey that accompanied the physical one. Hope you dig... :)

I’m thirsty. The heat is something else in Cairo, let me tell you. It could all be psychological, just knowing that to the west of me is the white-out of the Arabian Desert and to the east is the bleached horizon of the Libyan Desert, no picnic either. It’s just intimidating. I mean, I’m from Idaho. The desert to me is the Bruneau Sand Dunes where there are several drinking fountains at the rest area, all of which do not contain bacteria that would use my bowels as an all-day water park.
And I know, I just know, I’m going to get taken like the rube I am for way too many pounds. How much would a local pay? One Egyptian pound? Two? I look at the small grinning man with the stained teeth, take a five pound note out of my pocket and point to the lovely bottles of water. That one, the plastic bottle--one of the smaller ones. It’s a typical size if I was buying one from a vending machine back home, but definitely puny considering the larger bottles on display. The grinning man in the elegant beige galabiyya robes and matching fez-like hat picks up the largest bottle and offers it to me. The crystal blue label has the familiar logo of Nestle written both in English and Arabic. “Best deal, cheap,” he assures me as a fly circles his head in a desultory fashion. Evidently, the sizes come in small, large, and American. Guess who got made?
I sigh. “Three pounds,” I say confidently, holding up my five pound note. In my mind I pretend I’m one of those cops in a 70’s era TV show, offering money for information on Rico’s whereabouts. He nods slightly, his eye on the thin paper crumpled up in my hand. He takes it from me. “Five,” he says, still smiling. “This one five.” He makes the five pound note disappear, even though I can’t see any pockets on his robe. Neat magic trick, that. Cairo 1, Dave 0. Mentally, I count the remaining pounds I have in my head. I have to be more careful. Never, never, never, let them know how much money you have. Small bills, man. Use lots of small bills, just like the Lonely Planet guide said. I only had twelve hours on the flight over to read the damn thing cover to cover, twice. Of course, I used the time wisely to memorize important Arabic phrases like: fee hadsa! (There’s been an accident—perfect for the errant suicide bomber attack), imshee! (go away— an excellent phrase when being chased by wolf-packs of jeering children), and, just for fun, mumkin aradda’a hina? (do you mind if I breastfeed here?—just, you know, to break the ice if anti-American sentiment gets too serious.)
I’m hemorrhaging money every time I leave the hotel. The other members of my tour group have acclimated pretty well to the vagaries of haggling. I absolutely hate it. I’m an introvert by nature anyway and anything over three sentences of small talk with anyone eventually leads to stammering and inane observations on my part. What started out as awkward shyness as a kid has blossomed into full-blown misanthropic cynicism as an adult. I think I’ve decided that a true connection with anyone is impossible. There’s too much “me” and too much “you” for “us” to work. Sometimes I see the Unabomber on TV and I think: did he start out like this? Am I just a couple of bad relationships and a leftist manifesto away from becoming that guy? Am I becoming the Unabomber?
I try to talk to members of my tour group, attempting a semblance of “normal” conversation. My conversations with my tour group have been limited to such brilliant bon mots as “Sure is hot,” “I’m from Idaho,” and “No, really.” Being the only one in my group from Idaho has consequently not reflected well on my home state. Surely the rest of my group is recalling news reports regarding the dismal educational statistics from my state whenever I open my mouth. It’s tough seeing Cairo with a group of strangers who view you with a mixture of uneasiness and pity. I wish I could explain: the others back home aren’t like me. I’m just a lousy representative. I know that. Imshee.
Jason and Mia, the good-looking, corn-fed, amiable couple from Wisconsin that remind me of “Dharma and Greg,” are, predictably, good at haggling. I ask them if they could negotiate a papyrus sale for me. “It’s like buying a used car,” Jason confides, stressing the “ar” sound in that “Fargo” lilt. “You fix a price in your head, and be perfectly willing to walk away if they don’t go for it.” I neglect to tell him how shitty I am at buying used cars.
Despite it all, though, it’s hard not to love Cairo. Even with the haggling. Even with the constant outstretched hands, aggressively and artlessly demanding baksheesh, or tips as we would call it back in the states. It takes some getting used to. Someone holds a door for you, better have a pound or two at the ready. Baksheesh. Someone points out Cleopatra on a Ptolemaic relief? Baksheesh. Walking five feet in Cairo is an instant education.
It’s a staggering behemoth, sprawling and thick, impossibly pulsing with life despite the intense poverty, the heat unfolding in rolls from the surrounding deserts. Ra, the sun god, refuses to go quietly.
Cairo is a shimmering fantasy land of ancient stone edifices resonating with the throbbing power of one of the greatest and most influential civilizations ever to mark their time on this planet. The mixture of the modern is interwoven with a pop artist’s ironic sensibility: ancient mosques thousands of years old breathe in the same air as modern apartment buildings, rows of satellite dishes dotting the sides, all facing one direction, as if they too were pointed towards Mecca. The same buildings are draped in the freshly washed sheets hung out to dry on the clotheslines. It vaguely reminds me of something out of “West Side Story.” The familiar logos of KFC and Pizza Hut are altered, now conveying their greasy messages in the ostentatious line-curve-dots of Arabic. One has to wonder who’s culture is being assimilated here.
Our tour guides, Mohammad and Haney, point out that Cairo is the second most densely populated city in the world, right after Mexico City. The Egyptian people are working on that, Haney says, laughing. “More babies,” he promises, and the bus giggles along with him. Strange contest, I think, looking down onto the streets below, witnessing a redundancy of pedestrians, who, if you believe Haney, are dreaming of shaming Mexico City with their virility.
In a city filled with 14-16 million, you’re going to have some extraordinary traffic concerns. To get around in Cairo, people find a way. The narrow streets teem with busses, taxis, cheaply made cars from Europe and Asia, all hurtling insanely down the sand-covered asphalt. New York and L.A. traffic could be considered the epitome of Victorian refinement and civility in comparison. No dividing lanes, the vehicles race, weaving this way and that in a bizarre recreation of Spain’s running with the bulls. The masses of people not in motorized vehicles navigate their way through traffic by other means. Camels and burros trudge amiably with their carts of melons and bananas, dutifully making the trip to Khan al-Khalili, one of the largest open markets in the world. Old women shuffle beside them, balancing trays of mangos and other fruits on their heads, casually, effortlessly. It’s their birthright.
From the air conditioned bus, I look out, and then have to shut my eyes as a little girl attempts to cross the street in all this madness that seems inspired in a way by Blade Runner—the future and the past cautiously mixed with the grime. Finally, I decide I need to witness this. No need to worry, she’s skilled at this game. Her instincts—and the drivers—are in sync in a way I don’t fully understand. Maybe it’s in the body language. Maybe it’s a half-second of eye contact. Maybe it’s just the work of the gods. She pauses when one car accelerates. A bus slows down and the traffic becomes a choreographed Balanchine affair as she glides through with the flourish of a ballerina. A serenade of car horns ring out and the notes pirouette through the air. I half-expect her to do a plie when she reaches the other side. Pam, the occupational therapist from New Mexico, gives me a funny look when I laugh out loud at this traffic miracle. I consider explaining, but decide just to cut my losses. Putting abstract feelings into words robs the event of its meaning. I don’t know how to communicate how I feel without it sounding lame. And deep down, I have to consider the possibility that my singular experience might not be worth communicating. This might be my real problem, I fear.
I like Pam. As the only black woman in our group, she’s gotten several marriage proposals from random Egyptian men who assume she’s Nubian. I watched as one man tried to use her dreadlocks as a conversation-starter. “Bob Marley,” the man exclaimed and then began to sing, “No woman, no cry…” “That’s the name of the song,” she drawled, shaking her head as she walked. She likes to incorporate purple into her outfits; today she’s wearing a purple and white bandana. I get a William Carlos Williams vibe from her, but the only book I see her with is a guide to chakras. As soon as the bus stops, she’ll hesitate, with a hovering finger floating over a paragraph she just can’t leave behind. And, besides me, she’s the only one in the group that’s single. Yeah, I think she’s cute. Imshee.
“How many of you would like to have a nice dinner while floating the Nile?” Mohammad asks, standing in the center of the aisle, holding onto the railing as our driver hurtles towards our hotel with Mad Max-like vigor. “It’s a very good deal through Gate 1 Travel. Fifty dollars, American, per person. Very nice place. If enough of you would like to go…” All hands go up as the couples ooh and ah over this new addition to the itinerary. Even Pam raises her hand. Fuck. Group-think…overwhelming…me. I want to raise my hand, just to fit in. I realize that by not raising my hand and joining in, I am separating myself from the group. I am becoming the weird one. Anti-social guy. Stuck-up guy. I am cursed with a hyper-awareness of how other people perceive me. It’s like the guy on Dateline that got operated on while he was still awake, but couldn’t tell the doctors because he was paralyzed by the drugs.
Fifty dollars evens out to around 200 Egyptian pounds. I had a little over 300 pounds left and I needed that to buy this add-on visit to the Citadel, an ancient Islamic fortress dating back to 810. I had actually been kind of pissed about the whole deal as it hadn’t been listed on the website itinerary, and had only been offered as an extra add-on after we arrived in Egypt. The more Haney and Mohammad talked it up, the more I had to go. They even drove by it, those bastards, teasing us with the spectacle of the medieval dome and jutting spires. My eyes glazed over in awe. Well, I told myself, counting my money, how many times out of the year do I swing by this neighborhood? And that’s how my budget went from “not so bad” to “shot to hell” in one day.
As Mohammad counts hands, he looks at me twice to make sure that his vision is correct. My hand is not raised. I am NOT going. I mentally beg Pam to lower her hand, my one hope for some solidarity—single people united or some such thing. My brain flash-forwards through a scenario of her not going—we bump into each other… hey, you’re not going too! Imagine that! Yeah, we should have dinner together! And then we found out, wow! We have so much in common and spend the rest of our days traveling and reading about chakras and William Carlos Williams. Hmmm. Nope, not gonna happen. “Okay,” he says. “Looks like most of you are going tonight. We’ll meet in the lobby at 6:00 and Haney will collect the money.” Most of you, I thought. All of you. Except me. A more accurate statement would be, all of you are going, except for the Unabomber sitting at the back of the bus. I was irritating myself. Here Mohammad was, being nice, saying “most of you,” instead of pointing out that there was just one man out, Mr. Socially Awkward, from the great state of Idaho, and I couldn’t help but be angry with him for my own feelings of isolation. Imshee! All of you!
There isn’t one square inch of Cairo not being used. Flies fight for the right to land on your forehead. The buildings are impossibly huddled next to one another and there is an easygoing intimacy as clean and brightly-lit grocery stores sit adjacent to hollowed-out shacks with dirt floors. If there is a demarcation between social classes, it’s not to be found in downtown Cairo.
Main roads lead directly, improbably, into alleyways, all of which are fully utilized by businesses and residents alike. In America, alleyways are a distant afterthought. Here, they snake this way and that, a system of tributaries as essential to Cairo as the Nile. So, finding our hotel, the Royal Sheraton Gardens, down one of these lifeblood tributaries, a skinny, disheveled, malnourished looking alleyway, isn’t too big of a shock. If anything, my personal shock is reserved for how easily a bus as large as ours can be navigated into such a small space. I keep on expecting our driver to accidentally plow over a group of children at arbitrary intervals. Every now and then I’ll check the grill for flattened youths. You’d at least think I’d find a random soccer ball. Something!
There’s snack food in my room, but it’s not complimentary. A one-serving size bag of Funnions will set you back 20 pounds. (That’s five bucks, math fans. At that price, not nearly enough fun.) I had the foresight to pack a box of chewy granola bars, but, tragically enough, I managed to eat them all between my arrival in New York and the subsequent flight over the Atlantic. What can I say? I hadn’t anticipated just how bad EgyptAir’s food would be. I killed the last granola bar somewhere over Morocco.
Still, despite my hunger, I decide to save myself from any of the embarrassment of meeting the tour group while they’re leaving for their big dinner. Thirty minutes is a safe number and I find a rerun of “Everybody Loves Raymond.” In French! Somehow, it’s funnier.
At 6:30 I pass through the metal detectors and nod towards the uniformed duo of teenage soldiers. They stare impassively poker-faced in their crisp white regalia, hands lazily resting on their machine guns. They’re here to protect me, I repeat to myself as I walk out the door and into the alley. Just like the ubiquitous guards who follow the busses and look underneath them for bombs at random stops. The last thing Egypt wants is an American tourist impaled by nails and other bits of shrapnel from a homemade bomb. Tourism is integral to the Egyptian economy and it wasn’t lost on anyone, from the tourists to the terrorists and everyone in between. It was odd. I felt protected, but mortality was never far from my mind. Anything could happen. Before I left home I jokingly told my friends and family that if they didn’t hear from me in two weeks, to check CNN for my taped pleas for government cooperation with the terrorists. Hah-ha, they would all say, uneasily.
I walk down the alleyway with one goal in mind. I am going to find a falafel stand. And not get lost in the process. Okay, I have two goals. And, also, I hope not to create some sort of international incident. That’s three. I’m not sure how this might happen, but if anyone could inadvertently do such a thing, let’s face it, it’d be me. Say mumkin aradda’a hina to the wrong person, and well, you know how jihads start.
My heart beats a little faster as the Cairenes in the shops next to the hotel try to catch my eye. These aren’t your typical Cairenes. They’re the hucksters looking for American rubes. They’re the ones with overpriced Coke and Pepsi and orange Fanta, weird Arabic Twinkies, and stupid plastic trinkets with images of King Tut and Cleopatra, all made in China. They hover around the tourist spots, the fronts of hotels, and the popular restaurants. I get an awful feeling of satisfaction knowing my tour group is probably plowing through a swarm of them to get to their cruise dinner. I’ve learned not to say much, only a firm “La shukran!” No thanks. Much nicer than imshee. Still, the more persistent ones, usually children, follow you for a bit. Your only defense is to focus on a point and walk away, like you know exactly where you’re going. Interestingly enough, this works equally well on American children.
After focusing on a point, in this case, the main road at the end of the alleyway, I walk forward and make a right. Everything from the buildings to the cars in the street to the people spilling out from the shops and cafes onto the sidewalks and the sides of the road converge to overwhelm my senses. Lucidity melts in the sun. The heat, the rapid fire of people conversing in Arabic, and the vehicles speeding by, horns blaring, all give me the feeling that I’ve been dropped into an immense Skinner box, and if I can only find my way through, I can get my pellet, in this case a pita with falafel. It’s dizzying and scary, but invigorating too. Adrenaline surges through me and I quicken my pace. I learned in New York that the best way to avoid being hassled is to act like you know where you are going. You are Dustin Hoffman in “Midnight Cowboy.” You don’t stop for traffic. Traffic stops for you. Don’t stand around gaping, slack-jawed at the lights and the billboards, hypnotized by the buzzing of various languages zig-zagging in and out of the shops as doors open and shut. You can absorb it all later when you’re at a café.
I pass two blocks in a state of euphoria, breathing in the novelty and wonder of the new. Then it hits me. The danger in acting like you know where you’re going, is that it’s that much easier to get completely, hopelessly lost. I turn around and look for my alleyway only to discover it’s been swallowed up by the massiveness of Cairo. There are no familiar visual markers. There is no frame of reference. I look for a street sign. I find one. And another. And another. All of them in scribbly lines of Arabic that resemble Morse code written out by a drunken sailor on shore leave. Meaningless to my Western eye. Two blocks. I’ve only gone two blocks. I’m going to be okay. It’s just two blocks.
Pressing forward, I begin to mentally check off meaningful landmarks. Green phone. I’ve just passed a green phone. A toy store. With bicycles. A store with a sun-wilted poster of a can of mango juice. Another green phone. Wait a minute. And that’s when I realize…there’s a green phone on every corner. I blink the sweat out of my eyes and hope that I don’t look as panicked as I feel.
At this point I recall something I had read in a guide on writing, by comics auteur Alan Moore. Encouraging timid writers to take chances, he advised them to “jump off cliffs” and to “knit yourself a helicopter” before you hit the ground. There’s a certain insane magic to those words, I always thought, and now I had the chance to test their validity. I couldn’t be that far away. What kind of complete idiot would I have to be to not be able to locate a falafel stand in the heart of Cairo? No, I have to push forward. I would jump off a cliff and worry about knitting myself a helicopter later.
A feral-looking dirty-white kitten runs down an alleyway. For some reason I follow. I pass what looks like an Egyptian version of Wal-Greens. If there is a sidewalk, it’s misplaced. Perhaps an excavation might locate it, I thought. The crumbled husk of a building is haunted by kids, darting in and around blackened pillars, contestants in the universal game of hide and seek. One little boy, a lousy hider, tries scrunching behind a rock and when he is immediately caught, lets out a howl of indignation. I smile, because my son Chazz used to do that when he was younger. A few of them stare curiously at me as I walk past. Unexpectedly, I wave. In my suitcase, back at the hotel, I had packed a plastic Albertson’s sack with an assortment of Hot Wheels and Matchbox cars to give to kids asking for baksheesh, but I had forgotten to bring them with me for this excursion. If I had them, I’d give them the whole bag. I want to give them the whole bag. The little one, the howler, stops howling, looks at me and waves back. He’s the only one that does this.
Across the alleyway, there is a hole-in-the-wall café with a couple of plastic tables and chairs. The smell of earth, like the potatoes under the sink back home, combine with the smells of frying oil and tobacco. A thin, mustached man in an apron, dotted with stains, sits in one of the chairs, watching me approach. An old woman is behind the counter, looking at me intensely. The man takes a drag from a sheesha water pipe, a contraption that resembles an elaborate bong. It has a hose connected to it, kind of like an oxygen tank. If you tilt your head, it could pass as a George Lucas droid. R5-Huuka. Behind him is a reader board that, from the way the Arabic lines are arranged reminds me of a menu. There is a line-dot-dash-curve, then white space, then, a couple of symbols sequestered clear to the right, off by themselves. Item... price? A picture of a fried, brownish-green falafel wedge cements it. Howard Carter, discovering Tut’s crib, couldn’t be any giddier.
The man gets up and crushes his cigarette out on a small metal lid. Inquisitive eyes meet mine. Something tells me tourists usually don’t find there way down here. He says something to me in Arabic. The tone of his last word ascends slightly higher than the other words. His eyebrows rise, trying to pull a response out of me. A question. He’s just asked me a question.
“Uh…” I grin stupidly. There’s something ironic about an anti-social English major unable to communicate through speech or writing. Someday, this will make one of those funny anecdotes that people send in to Reader’s Digest. “I… I’m sorry,” I say, and truly mean it. I’m dyin’ here. “I don’t know Arabic. I’m…” Stammering. That’s what I’m doing. And making a jack-ass out of myself. Finally, I figure out that I have a tremendous visual aid to help me.
Pointing towards the poster, I ask, “Falafel?” My voice and face become a parody of inquisitiveness. As I smile and raise my eyebrows, I feel like I’m doing charades. And if you think it’s easy, you try “acting out” falafel.
He chirps back smiling, “Falafel!” I think he’s figured me out. “Ta'amiyya,” he intones. “Falafel...ta’amiyaa.”
“Ta’amiyaa...” I repeat, nodding excitedly, and we erupt into laughter.
He mumbles something in Arabic and looks at me expectantly. I squint my eyes to indicate confusion, brain hurting, but I stop after self-consciously realizing that I might instead be conveying disgust. “I don’t understand,” I carefully enunciate, knowing full well that that’s not going to help matters.
His eyes light up and he holds up his right hand. “Falafel,” he starts, then extends his index finger. “One…two…three…”
“Oh! Numbers! Three! Three falafel!” This is the freakiest Sesame Street episode ever. The Count would be so proud.
He laughs and shouts something to the old woman and she reaches into a gray ceramic bowl and starts to knead the falafel paste. Thick, weathered fingers shape the fava bean paste into perfect circles with the skill and precision of an artisan. She sings to herself and drops them in the frying pan, the oil popping and snapping like firecrackers.
The man points towards his chair and motions me towards it. I hesitate. If I could communicate in English how awkward I feel taking somebody’s chair I would. “No thank you,” I would say, then run away and get my own chair. Far, far away. In a basement somewhere. As it is, I don’t have that option. “Shukran,” I say, nervously, taking the seat offered. I feel like such an imperialist. He smiles back, pleased that I’ve taken it. And it’s okay. I’m okay. It occurs to me that I’ve stumbled onto a basic and elemental truth: sometimes people really do want to do nice things for each other.
I sit there trying desperately to maintain my sense of awkwardness. I’m not used to being at ease with anyone. It’s odd. He’s standing next to me, trying to determine, what, if anything, he should say. My inner neuroses rally: Leave now… you’ve had an interesting experience… You know there’s only embarrassment ahead… You know that, don’t you? When have you ever been good at talking with anyone? Do you really think you won’t screw it up? Shit. How did I get so good at sabotaging myself? There’s a hotel room and I belong in there with the doors locked and the lights turned off. What the fuck am I doing here halfway across the world thinking I have the right to tramp down this dirt alley looking for what…someone to talk to me? In Arabic?
“Mustafa…ismee…Mustafa,” he says, pointing to himself. “Ismee?” he says, expectantly, then waits for an answer.
Name…ismee is connected to name. His name is Mustafa. “David…ismee…David,” I say tentatively, unsure of the proper usage of ismee. However it’s supposed to be used, I’m close enough. Mustafa laughs and extends his hand.
“David,” he says. “Mustafa.”
I take his hand and shake it. “Mustafa,” I repeat with a bit of wonder in my voice. Just like that. A piece of a puzzle that I didn’t know I was trying to solve. Mustafa. Ismee.
“Cairo…” Mustafa starts, then halts, trying to think of the words. “Cairo…” he says leadingly, then gives a thumbs up, and follows it with a thumbs down. I may not know Arabic, but I know my Roger Ebert.
I grin, thrusting my thumb in the air empathically. “Cairo… very fine,” I say, using a word I had heard Haney favor. “Very fine,” I repeat and Mustafa grins in return, pleased. A few seconds of silence and he asks, “America…” Eyebrows go up as he offers me the thumbs up or thumbs down choices. Unbidden images of Lindy England pop into my head. Gah! That isn’t America, is it? I think of school kids offering their lawn-mowing money to tsunami victims. Sometimes people really do want to do nice things for each other. I hold out my hand and tilt it back and forth in a tee-totter fashion, the universal sign for so-so. Mustafa’s expression is blank and muted. A few seconds lapse. Then he closes his eyes and roars with laughter. I can honestly say that here, in a city which has robbed me of speech and written language, I have connected with another human being.
We shake hands again. “Shukran, shukran,” I intone, taking the bag of falafel. It was nothing—30 piastres, about one third of a pound. Reaching into my pocket I pull out a five pound note; I have nothing smaller, but I want him to have it. Baksheesh. As I hand it to him, his hands go up and he shakes his head while smiling. “La, la,” he says and it reminds me of music. I blink about a dozen times. Stunned, all I can say is “shukran.”
The group is getting back. The bus has screeched in, no victims yet. Truthfully, I think the bus driver is merely showing off. “See what I can do with a bus? Could you do this with a bus? I don’t think so!” It’s a matter of pride. He’s good. I think I’ll tell him before the trip ends. “You are a good bus driver,” I will say. “American bus drivers could learn from you.”
From the comfort of the lobby, I sit, and watch the group go through the metal detectors, chatting up the highlights of the evening. It’s weird. I don’t feel like running away. There’s a hotel room somewhere and I don’t belong in it right now. I belong here, with people.
Ismee David. I want to talk.