From Egypt With Love

During the triumphant homecoming from the airport (it is my family's first time in Egypt since 1988), my uncle points out, among endless landmarks, some loopy Arabic on the wall. In red, deliberate characters: "Don't buy American products." I'm initially pleased to witness this simple act of resistance. My uncle adds, however, that despite the widespread resentment of America, no one will ever buy anything Egyptian. This scenario sums up the self-defeating attitude plaguing the Arab world, especially its youth. Little Ahmed, passionately aware of the Middle East's conflicts, still sports a Hilfiger primary colors nightmare. In Egypt, to have any kind of English script displayed means one has tapped into a future, prosperous world. The most popular items of clothing stream together random bits of English, disregarding coherence, with hilarious and sometimes poetic results: "Hanging out all right to the max!" "Why and a half," "Happytown and smile company," "Crazy bike!" One inexplicable T-shirt says, in baby pastel colors: "This isn't a buttermilk belly but a fuel tank for a poop machine." Explain to these people what their clothes mean and they are unimpressed.

Observing Cairo's infrastructure, I'm struck by the beauty rising out of chaos: no rules on the roads, half-empty apartment buildings grouped in random and impractical clusters, effusive colors on clotheslines spider-webbing between facades, women yelling from balconies instead of telephones.

The city follows the plan of an untempered fungus, with squatters as 55 percent of the population, rickety high-rises always threatening to fall over. From its cultural heyday in the 1950s and '60s, when the Soviets and socialism enjoyed omnipresent success, Cairo experienced a slow decline, ravaged by unwinnable wars, ballooning in population. The formerly vibrant life form stopped growing and began to rot. Cairo now has a dubious run-down charm, its old sheen covered in dust.

On my family's farm near the Sakkara pyramids, things get a bit more controversial. Nonchalantly, my uncle mentions that our farm sits between the properties of two famous/infamous (depending on whom you ask) figures: on the right, the nephew of Osama Bin Laden and on the left, the son of the man who assassinated former President Anwar Sadat. I wave to the Bin Ladens as they pass us in their beige Land Rover. They smile back in an unterroristic way. Uncle tells me of the Bin Laden family's size and that Osama is for the most part the black sheep.

Initially reluctant to broach the topic of Sept. 11, 2001 with the farmers, I heard what I did not expect: "Only Boosh we do not like him, American people is good! You listen Michael Jackson?" Everyone in Egypt has seen the demonstrations on television and Michael Moore at the Oscars. The Dixie Chicks and San Francisco are often listed as favorite American things. Al-Jazeera, with 33 million viewers, provides for such collective awareness. Jobless and heavy-stomached on politics, the village men spend their time getting angry in the corner cafe, shishahs (water pipes) in hand. "Look at these incubators of unemployment!" my uncle complains.

In the overwhelming density of faces crowding the sidewalks, gem after gem of awesome genetic mixture circulate. The one merit of perpetual war and colonization is the resulting delta of cultures: Nubian, Turkish, Coptic, Armenian, Arab, Berber, European and African. I get angry that after all this diversity, teenagers fantasize about the bland pores of Britney Spears. Children run alongside our car and smile hysterically, tapping on the windows for attention. If they can tell you're not Egyptian, they yell: "Bery good!" or "Welcome to my country!" Most startling is the volume and timbre of their voices: breathy maturity and huge output, like little belting Streisands. One of the kids opens my mother's door unexpectedly: I follow my immediate instinct to scream and lock the doors, but my mom plays it cool. It turns out he only want to say "hello." Everyone laughs at my pesky fright, which makes me realize I've been harboring a stereotype: my inner orientalist sees the kids of the third world as unpredictable beasts. Luckily, one honest look into their endearing eyes dismantles all prejudice.

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