When business was done, we’d dive into the crowds and commune with our human brethren in the medina. The moment we stepped out of our air-conditioned offices, we were off in search of neighbourhoods so poor they could only exist in the imagination of the destitute south, places that endure only by some miracle, breathe only by the grace of God. We would seek out the most tortuous streets, the narrowest alleys, the riotous confusion, the flood of colours, sounds and smells, the bewildered smiles of the destitute—Al-Masakeen—the relentless patter of the merchants in the souk, whose age-old spiel can still dupe an international conman, the lyrical flights of the beggars, the teeming packs of children, the Bounayes, the walads, the affected indignation of the thieves, the sirakinn, the bleating of fat chaouchs pleading poverty, like ticks feeding on the misery of others, the cursing of the carters, the pleas of the beggars, the toulabs, so piteous that no one ever hears them, the dreamlike pronouncement of the scribes, their ears so full of secrets they would make a saint blush, but more than this, watchful as hawks, we were seeking a glimpse of an Egyptian woman wearing a close-fitting tunic, a headscarf framed by coloured pompoms. If their husbands were nearby, keeping an eye on them, it was all for nothing, they have no control over their wives for all their furious glares, the whistle of their canes, their wives have lots of tricks to give these latent murderers the slip. Then, finally, we’d find a woman who looked as though she has stepped from some furtive dream, a devil in the flesh, hips swaying, arms outspread, full breasts, a mischievous smile, a pair of bewitching eyes. This was what we have been looking for: the living gaze of the Sphinx that sees beyond the Beyond. It is as mysterious, as enchanting as everyday immortality, her eyes flash like lightning, more terrifying than the curse of a pharaoh, were he Tutankhamen himself. What we saw in these women was the reincarnation of Cleopatra, a Malikah worthy of the Caliphs, a houri beloved of Allah, a princess from the Thousand and One Nights, a siren conjured from the troubling world of the djinn. We were all widely travelled, we had all seen the world, but we all agreed that there was nothing on earth more thrilling than the dazzling, kohl-rimmed eyes of an Egyptian woman, glittering with the most ancient mystery in all the world.
Having made our pilgrimage, and with a little ebony scarab or a terracotta sarcophagus for Ophélie packed into my suitcase, we would go our separate ways to different countries, petrified at the prospect of having to face the ruthless realities of the modern world.
But these are memories of a past life, a carefree life. Now I am mired in the past, plunged into a hideous war, crushed by horror, tormented by my own father. Egypt will never again be a dreamlike country, a picture postcard. This was where my father came, his crimes packed up in his suitcase and, from what I can tell, he had a wonderful life, he became a new man here and found a position in the Egyptian secret service. What I need to understand is how, arriving from a hell of your own making, from the bleak horror of life in the camps, does this man adjust to a shimmering world of sweltering sun, gentle humility, affably shambolic poverty, where a hookah and a glass of mint tea are always to hand, a belly dancer’s navel is always at eye level, where your bed is always open to the stars? What does he think, this man? What regrets haunt him? What pleasures can help him forget the pain he so lavishly meted out in the cruel, sinister world of his former life, an absurd, insane, incessant mechanical ballet where every day was reduced to nothingness, to listening to agonised howls bleed through the walls, to watching the columns of black smoke rising into the heavens? I know this man is unscrupulous enough to forgive himself everything, but surely no pity, no compassion, no mercy can absolve such vile, unspeakable things? Or maybe this man is not a man, nor even the shadow of a man, perhaps he is the devil incarnate. My God, who will tell me who my father is?
You quickly realise that the old Egypt, the cheerful, cosmopolitan, raucous, romantic Egypt of Naguib Mahfouz, does not exist anymore. Modern Egypt—Misr—is dominated by twin giants as formidable as the great pyramids: religion and the police — leaving not one square inch where a free man may set foot. If he’s not taken to task by the police — the chorti—he will be by the fanatic, the Irhabi. In Egypt, the police force of the Raïs and the religion of Allah conspire to make life a living hell for every single person. Death and dishonour are the twin tracks of this miserable fate. It is hard to believe that in a country subjugated by faith and fear, things would change so quickly. The last time I was in Cairo, two years ago, when we delivered our most powerful pump, the H56—H for horizontal, 56 the diameter of the outflow in inches — from what I saw then (constantly chaperoned by official guides and escorted by patrols of helpful chortis) intimidation was so gentle, so graceful you might almost have been tempted to convert to Islam and proclaim your joy. We knew at the time that the guides had been taught to misinform us, but even so the noose has clearly been tightened since then. The people who roam the streets now are not men, they are victims seeking some refuge from the police station and the mosque. Egypt has become intolerable, it is no longer a country for men, or even saints, and all the picture postcards in the world cannot change that. I pity any Egyptian who is not a policeman or a fanatic.
I felt anxious as I walked around the city. I was constantly watching my step. Not a gesture, not a look, not a thought was out of place. I wandered past the Ministry of Interior Affairs, the headquarters of the Mukhabarat where my father in his time had been a frequent visitor; this was where they had made his fake papers for him, this was where they had required certain favours in exchange for the hospitality afforded him by King Farouk and later by Nasser. What could they have asked him to do but infiltrate European circles in Cairo, decode secret Nazi documents bought on the black market, develop some sort of chemical weapon and later train Algerian revolutionaries in some anonymous building in the city? I quickly realised I had been spotted — the chaouchs were making a pincer movement, indestructible old bangers would suddenly break down nearby, choufs would diligently pretend to read their newspapers as they watched. I slipped away just in time. Many things have changed here since 1945—the curtains that hang in the windows, the official cars, the suits worn by the civil servants, the complaints of the orderlies, the sound of the sirens — what has not changed is the atmosphere. Hans Schiller, SS officer, would have felt at home here. Then I remembered that the war never really ended in Egypt — if the Egyptians weren’t starting a war, someone else was — wars against the Mamelukes, the Turks, the king, against the British and the French, the war against American imperialism, the wars with Israel, the wars against Islamic terrorists, against the Copts, against the kaffirs, the war against the Great Satan and, worst of all, the war they waged against their own people. Having waged all these wars, there was only one thing for the country to do — make peace with itself, return to the happiness of yesteryear, to the Great Egypt, serene, eternal.