Page 33 - Issue 62

Ramadan Vol.1 Issue 62 December 2023 ELITE

Kareem

As an Egyptian living away from home who
spent the entirety of her childhood in an
international setting, I have always been proud
to call myself Egyptian. There was this sense of
entitlement - I milked every last drop of my

<grand= heritage - after all I was the daughter
of the <Mother of the Civilisations=. What was
there to not be proud of? What was there to Till when will we romanticise poverty in our
dislike even? I - and if I dare say so, most media; projecting men living the <simple= life
Egyptians - live our entire lives off an image of as void of stress, pure and moral?). What we
Egypt created a thousand years ago: this grand have here in Egypt, is an acute example of
civilisation that brought about thousands of conservative nationalism: there is an
strong- willed soldiers with a lack of filter and unremitting urge for the ordinary citizen to
a universal self-deprecating sense of humour. sacrifice his financial wellbeing for the benefit
As an Egyptian living away from home, family of the country. (Sacrifice, Sacrifice, Sacrifice,
nights consisted of gathering around the TV till when?) This, coupled with the crisis-based
watching comedy movies, Asal Eswed discourse washing over the country (after all,
(Bittersweet) was a staple back then. I can how many times had the small flame of a
almost hear the words of Uncle Helal when he conversation been swiftly thwarted with <this is
said, <we have the concept of Alhamdulillah a global crisis. Everyone else is suffering
(thank God)=. too.=?), means that the gap between the very
It was nauseatingly sweet back then, the wealthy and the poor is ever increasing - and
feelings of entitlement and pride bubbling to no one is ready to say something about it.

the surface covering me with a thick, warm What do we do?
blanket of molasses. Only a thread separates the notions of
I was soon drowned by the bitter honey. ingratitude and discontentment and the act of
Afterall, falling neck-deep into daily life here is actively searching for salvation at the end of
enough to force even the strongest willed to the tunnel instead of consuming the reassuring
think of migrating. apologist explanation that other countries are
I began to doubt that there was truly nothing suffering too (so why don’t you thank God?)
that could fault Om el Donia - began to doubt an echo of the vacant nationalism that feeds
that the notion of Alhamdulillah cuts it. many Egyptians’ sense of entitlement.
No longer did I feel giddy, proud, watching
Saeed and his family find happiness and
contentment as a family regardless of the cruel
struggles they faced daily.
Why were they not angry - livid - at the poor
treatment they received by public officials?
Because the first step to salvation - always -
would be to tear down the curtain of
immoderate laughter and excessive political
contentment in favour of staring the problem
in the eye, I hope to see us rise as a community

33 to, at the very least, ask the right questions.