The tent-makers of the Khan el-Khalili Part 1

Feeling brave today, we head out to the Khan el-Khalili, Cairo's oldest and largest souk. Dana and I are traveling with 25 other intrepid adventurers keen to try out our haggling skills and naively believing that these skills have been cultivated in us through some strange process of cultural osmosis. We have after all, been in Egypt for one month now; surely we have picked up some haggling sense.

We are led by three veteran American teachers whose collective experience with Egypt adds up to almost 50 years. Like us "newbie" teachers, these "long-timers" are looking forward to breaking up the monotony of the military imposed curfew. Unlike us though, they have forged relationships with some of the Khan merchants, and they are looking forward to reestablishing those relationships after months of summer holiday travel back to the U.S. The Revolution has been terribly unkind to these merchants, and our veteran guides want to pass the torch on to us in terms of continuing to promote and sustain excellent relationships with some of them. It is a noble goal, and one that the Khan's merchants very much appreciate.

The main tourist entrance to the Khan is daunting. Our driver lets us out in front of one of the many huge mosques that surround the souk. In the courtyard in front of the mosque, hundreds and hundreds of people are milling about, mingling and chatting over strong Turkish coffee and hot tea. We take a narrow walkway to the left, skirting around the courtyard. To the left of us now is a row of worn down cafes and small restaurants selling teas, coffees and felafel pitas. The rectangular seating areas in front of the cafes are sadly empty. Hosts from the cafes stand out in front of their establishments, menus in hand, trying to entice our group in for a seat. We are perhaps the first group of foreign tourists of the day, and we may be the last. Before the Revolution, the Khan el-Khalili rivaled the Great Pyramids in catering to vast numbers of foreign tourists per year. I get the strong sense that today that we are the only group that has yet arrived.

Crowding through the narrow walkway with the cafe hawkers to our left and the mosque on our right, we enter into the Khan. The Khan el-Khalili has been Cairo's main souk for almost 800 years. More or less rectangular in shape and encompassing many city blocks, the Khan is a tangle of narrow, intersecting alleyways lined with every kind of souvenir stall imaginable. Stall owners and shop workers stand before their stores, hoping that passer-bys will make eye contact and strike up a conversation.

"You see something you like, sir, we have everything, yes everything you could ever want. Please come in and let me show you."

"A pashmina for you madam, perhaps an Egyptian perfume jar? Very beautiful, very good quality."

"Please come in for some tea! Everything almost like free today."

"Ah, it is my turn now! Ahmed has the finest leather in the Khan! Ask anyone! Please, please come in!"

For people whose livelihoods are slowly dying a long and tortuous death, the stall hawkers of the Khan are not even remotely close to the most aggressive I have ever experienced. For the most part they are polite, perhaps overly friendly and always smiling. Some seem resigned to simply use their English, which is sadly getting a little rusty.

"You from America?" one merchant asks. He is smiling, and he does not seem to know that he has asked me a very loaded question (no pun intended).

"Yes," I respond hesitantly. 

"I love America. We have missed you very much." He stretches out his hand, vigorously shaking mine. "Please be welcome here."

We are heading to meet Mustafa, a glassmaker that our guides have known for years and years. Mustafa has two small shops in the Khan. The glass shop and the factory (not located within the Khan) that goes with it, he inherited from his father, who inherited it from his father, and so on. He runs the shop and the factory with his older brother. His brother spends most of his time on the factory floor while Mustafa, who speaks excellent English, spends most of his time in the shop. The shop adjacent to the glass stall is run by Mustafa's wife, and she sells ladies apparel. Mustafa warmly greets our trip leaders, shaking the men's hands and giving them a quick peck on first one cheek and then the other; a sign among men of a long-standing relationship. He bows to our female trip leader. 

Our guides introduce us one by one. Mustafa offers us each a tea or coffee. We look around and chat. Business has been slow, of course, but still okay. I note that Mustafa's shop is enclosed by a glass facade and swinging glass doors; air conditioning inside. Compared with the other vendors of the Khan, he is doing alright. Still, the air conditioning is off until we enter the shop.

Like many of the glass merchants here, Mustafa makes his creations with a thin, almost papery kind of glass that shimmers in the light. Most of his creations, baubles, ornaments, perfume holders, goblets, and tea pots are made of colored glass; rose, emerald, and sapphire. They are all beautiful, and I know more or less at the outset of our visit with Mustafa that we shall not emerge from his shop empty handed.

And we don't. Many interesting events happen while we are chatting with Mustafa. Somehow, almost mystically, we purchase a water pitcher and silver-rimmed glass set (less than $50). Two of our trip leaders make arrangements with Mustafa to visit his brother at the factory and to take the first steps into learning how to blow glass. Dana drinks the strongest Turkish coffee she has ever had in her life and avoids drinking any of the nuclear-strong dregs at the bottom of the cup. As we bid Mustafa and his wife farewell, perhaps the most interesting aspect of our day becomes public knowledge. Unbeknownst to most of the group, including me, we are off now on a real adventure into the part of the Khan where Egyptians, not tourists shop; and we are searching for Tariq, the finest tent-maker in all of Cairo.

*This week's photos by Dana and Kyle Purpura

The Curfew

In late May and early April, 1992, Los Angeles residents experienced rioting in the wake of the Rodney King verdict. Looting was widespread and arsonists' flames seemed to pop up on every corner. The LA police force was not prepared for the huge scale of the civil unrest, and so Mayor Tom Bradley called in the National Guard, imposing a dusk-to-dawn curfew. The ferocity and widespread nature of the riots, combined with the extraordinary decision on the Mayor's part to impose a curfew, scared the hell out of a lot of residents accustomed to a relatively easy pace of life and the rule of law. I know. I was one of them.

I remember vividly the troops deploying in the neighborhoods experiencing the worst of the violence; armored personnel carriers disgorging thousands of helmeted, battle-ready soldiers, weapons locked and loaded. The men in uniform had orders to fire on anyone engaged in looting or arson. It all scared the living hell out of me; none of these kinds of things ever happened in Ohio, my boyhood home.

I was 26 years old when the riots occured and frightened as I was, I had some semblance of style; style that was about to be cramped by the imposition of an evening curfew. In the evenings I wanted to be out with friends to see and be seen. I certainly did not want to be cooped up in my tiny apartment. On the first night of the curfew, zombified after having watched live news broadcasts for most of the day, I went to bed early-ish.

I awoke early the next day naively planning to go to the bank and do a little grocery shopping. Looking back, I really do not know what I was thinking. Young and dumb is an excuse only up to a certain point, after which the person in question is just plain dumb. And on the second day of the curfew, that dumb person was me. I drove to the bank first. The bank was absolutely packed with people, frenzied customers rushing each of the harried tellers, angrily demanding to withdraw as much money as possible. I had never witnessed a run on a bank. "So this is what one looks like," I remember thinking to myself. The grocery store was worse. There I saw hoarding of the first magnitude, shopping carts careening through the aisles with some customers randomly scooping items into their baskets.

With no fresh supply of money and no groceries, I returned home, passing a couple of military checkpoints along the way. I felt like the fabric of society was ripping apart. For me, that second day was the worst. Fortunately, calmer minds prevailed throughout much of the LA Basin, and the curfew was lifted after just five days.

The Egyptian curfew, my second experience with such a thing, is now two weeks old, having been imposed by the interim government as a measure to deal with the "anti-coup" protests. Nearly a thousand people have died in the past two weeks, and the government really does not seem to want this kind of bloodshed to continue; they also do not want a Syrian-style civil war. To the government and the military leadership supporting the government, a curfew seems a good option to allow for things to simmer down a little.

I have to say that I agreed with that option for the first few days. When interim president Adly Mansour announced the curfew, I felt a keen sense of relief. Being 47 years old, I no longer possess any style, and so an evening curfew fairly well fits into my ordinary evening routine; or so I thought. Style or no style, after a two weeks of being in by 7:00 p.m. every night, I am now very tired of the curfew. I feel limited and confined. I cannot even go out for an evening stroll for fear of being stopped, questioned, and probably arrested.

But it is not all about me. The curfew is slowly killing an already anemic economy. Depending upon who you ask, the Egyptian unemployment rate is currently hovering somewhere between 13% and 20%, and it is rising. Like many cultures shaped by an arid climate, Egyptian society is predominantly a late night culture. Late meal times help famlies to avoid living in stifflingly hot houses during the heat of the day. It is not uncommon for Egyptian families to have their main evening meal at 9 or 10 p.m. This is also prime time for local restaurants and cafes, not to mention grocery stores and supermarkets. All of the economic activity that accompanies a late night culture has now been shut down for the most part, and local businesses are considering shedding jobs in the wake of seeing their business decline by 50% to 75 %.

On August 24th a small miracle happens and local officials, sensing a rapid decline in support for the anti-coup movement (and perhaps also responding to recent news articles about the economic impact of the curfew), announce a relaxation of the dusk-to-dawn travel ban. Shops, restaurants and cafes can remain open until 9 p.m. One of our friends comes over for an impromptu, celebratory dinner. We eat and chat, joking about our newfound two hours of relative freedom. After the meal, we walk our friend back to his flat. It is the first time we have been out of our apartment after 7 p.m. in over two weeks. Call us silly, but we feel as if we have just won a major struggle to enhance our civil liberties. I cannot help but wonder whether Egyptian nationals feel the same way.

* This week's photos courtesy of Dana Purpura

The Sands of Time

There has been some form of cultural organization in this place for at least 8000 years. At that time most of the great Sahara Desert was not yet great, being occupied mostly by dry grasslands. Desertification, hastened in part by overgrazing, was just beginning to establish itself. Long ago, here in the Nile Valley, a number of independent, small societies began to coalesce. It is here, in the broad river valley that stretches endlessly from the lush jungles of equatorial Africa to the wide delta emptying into the Mediterranean, that the nation of Egypt was born.

If legend is to be believed, two of these small, independent Nile valley societies grew prosperous, becoming small kingdoms. The Nile, a broad, azure ribbon meandering through arid and semi-arid regions, brought fertile soil to these kingdoms, it's gradual and regular flooding depositing fresh earth every year. The gentle flooding was regular enough to allow ancient farmers to use the river as a basis by which to distinguish the seasons; the development of a calendar was not far off. The river also served as a trade route, connecting the two small kingdoms and bonding them in ways that even conquest could not accomplish. 

Time passed. The kingdoms continued to grow. Monarchs grew powerful. Let's call the southern kingdom 'Upper Egypt,' because of its relatively higher land elevation. Let's call the northern kingdom 'Lower Egypt.' It's location in the Nile delta was at a lower land elevation in comparison to its southern neighbor.  As their status and prestige grew, the powerful monarchs of their respective kingdoms each chose a unique crown, a symbol of their success: for the ruler of the southern kingdom, an alabaster, oblong skull-cap of sorts, elongated and stretched at the top; for the ruler of the northern kingdom, a crimson cylinder with a sprout at the front and a high cowl at the back.

Some time around five thousand years ago, the people of the two successful Nile kingdoms united under one king and one unified crown, the pharaoh's crown that we recognize today; this being made up of the basic elements of the separate crowns worn by the monarchs of pre-historic Egyptian kingdoms shrouded by the sands of time.

Since then, unity among the people of Egypt has ebbed and flowed like the steady flooding of the Nile. The unity forged five thousand years ago came to an end a thousand years later with the coming of a group of either immigrants or invaders that the ancient Egyptians called the Hyksos. The Hyksos were probably a Semitic people pushed into Egypt from the area we would call the Middle East. Strong Egyptian pharaohs were eventually able to drive out the Hyksos, but there would be other invaders hundreds of years later coming at fairly frequent intervals; invaders from North Africa, invaders from the southern parts of Africa, invaders from the nearby Assyrian Empire, and finally invaders from the mighty Persian Empire. All of the invaders brought a demise of Egyptian unity long since established. Invaders brought new technologies and new ideas, however. There was the inevitable intermingling of peoples. Egyptians changed and adapted, ultimately renewing their unity and identity.

Then came Alexander and his fellow Hellenes. Wealthy Egyptians once again adapted, but this time they took on Greek customs and social mores. Egypt became a part of the Hellenic world and the Mediterranean world. A period of gradual urbanization followed as well as a gradual demise of old ways and customs. The powerful city of Alexandria, with its renown library and lighthouse, one of the seven wonders of the ancient world, was born. More intermingling ensued. Even today, the women of Alexandria are considered by Egyptians to be among the most beautiful in all of Egypt with their ebon hair, smooth olive skin and hazel/green eyes.

Then came the Romans, and Egypt became a colony within one of the largest empires the world had yet seen. Yet even more intermingling occurred. During the Roman period, Christianity quickly and quietly spread to the area. A unique Coptic Christian community developed independently of the church in Rome. Within a half a millenia, Rome became a distant memory for the people of Egypt, but the Coptic Church remained.

Some 800 years after the Romans first arrived, the prophet Mohammad began his preaching, developing a following on the Arabian Peninsula that would soon gather sufficient strength to spread throughout the Middle East and North Africa. Islam came to Egypt quickly through a clever combination of Arab conquest and conversion. More intermingling occurred with the coming of the Arabs. Intermarried or not, the Egyptian aristocracy had to be conquered, but ordinary Egyptian farmers found comfort in the words of the Quran and the egalitarianism of Islam. People converted by the thousands. Today, Egyptians are predominantly Muslim. 

The Kurds came generations later to establish a kingdom within the larger Muslim kingdom. Then came the Turks, followed by the Ottomans. Each successive wave of conquest brought more intermarriage. 

Some 200 years ago, an upstart, Albanian general named Muhammad Ali, wrested control away from Ottoman rule and founded the Kingdom of Egypt, a monarchy that was to continue until the Egyptian Revolution of 1952 and the coming of Gamal Abdel Nasser. Although initially successful, the monarchs of Egypt became embroiled in European politics, intimately and inextricably enmeshed in European disputes. Close ties with Europe and the end of World War II would prove to be these rulers' undoing as a wave of anti-monarchical fervor gripped Egyptians in the early 1950s. 

The revolution of 1952 was orchestrated by a council of generals, chief among these being General Nasser. A republic was declared in 1953, and one of the ruling generals became the republic's first president. Within a year, he had been removed in favor of Nasser. Calling himself a 'president,' Nasser ruled until his fatal heart attack in 1970. After Nasser's death his protege, Anwar Sadat, presided over Egypt.  I remember Sadat, the man who signed a controversial peace agreement with his Israeli counterpart, Menachem Begin; an agreement that would ultimately contribute to Sadat's assassination in 1981. Enter Hosni Mubarak, Sadat's successor. Mr. Mubarak ruled Egypt from 1981 until the Arab Spring Revolution of 2011. The Revolution ended with the first-ever democratic elections in Egypt and the first democratically elected President, Mohamed Morsi. 

Of all the various Egyptian governments to which I have referred, Morsi's government has had perhaps the shortest life span, lasting just a little over one year. Today, Morsi is being held by the interim government to answer for crimes he allegedly committed in 2011. Where he is being held is unknown. Ironically enough Morsi's predecessor, Hosni Mubarak, has been held under house arrest since Morsi took office. Mubarak is being held in a heavily protected military hospital located just a few short kilometers from where I write. Rumors in the local press, swirling like the sands along either side of the Nile, indicate that he is due to be released by the interim government any day now.