Eighteen Days of Spring in Winter (7 page)

I awoke the next morning to the front door closing. I sat up in bed and listened for the usual sounds. My mother was up, my brother getting up. I couldn't hear my father and I listened for the new sound of Mustafa. A lone flush in the bathroom was all I heard.

My father had probably decided to reinstitute the neighbourhood patrol, alone if he had to. He had got up, put on his clothes and left to walk the boundaries of our neighbourhood and test the residents to see who would join him, who would remain true to his word. I hoped for his sake someone would.

I sat back against my headboard, staring into space, waiting to hear the bathroom door unlock. It did and a minute later my mother came into my room.

She sat on the end of my bed, as she often does. We sat
there for a while, not talking, not looking at each other, just observing the room.

‘We should change the colour,' my mother says to the walls.

‘I don't mind it,' I say.

‘No, when this is over we should decorate,' she continues, taking in more of the room's details. ‘Get a nice bookcase from IKEA for that corner, some nice lighting and it's time you had a double bed,' my mother says.

‘It sounds perfect,' I smile.

‘It will be.'

We return to our silence and our own thoughts.

She breaks the seal first. ‘You should go,' she says.

Instantly, I know what she means. She doesn't have to say any more. She doesn't have to tell me with words where she thinks I should go or why she is letting me. Her eyes have always said so much. She has the most powerful eyes I have ever seen. They communicate where words would fail and tell you all is forgiven, despite my never uttering an apology.

‘Come with me,' I say, more of a plea than a question.

‘No,' she responds, ‘it is enough that you go.'

I pause to digest the thought.

‘Shall I take Salem?' I ask. He has earned it too.

‘He doesn't want to go,' she shrugs. ‘He says he is happy where he is. You are not happy, so you should go.'

And she leaves me alone again, in my room.

I sit there for a while longer, put my glasses on and then make my way to the bathroom. I wash and back in my bedroom put on some simple clothes, no make-up and wrap a plain green scarf around my head, twice and tucked in at the side.

I take out some money from my purse and put it in my pocket along with my mobile, and national identity card, all for emergencies and so they can identify my body later if they need to. Shaking off the morbid thought, I stop at my brother's room and look in on him. He is on his games
console. I give him my pathetic gangster sign. He rolls his eyes, but doesn't blush. I pass the living room and the pillow and blanket are neatly folded at the end of the sofa, my mother in the kitchen making coffee. She watches me leave. She takes in the detail of my walk, my clothes and my quiet confidence.

I get to the bottom of the building staircase and jump out of my skin. Mustafa stands behind me coming from under the stairs.

‘Sophia!' he says, laughing. His head is still bandaged, but he is chirpy, back to his usual self. In his hand is a sack of apples. He heaves it down between his thin legs.

‘You know what your parents did for me last night I can never repay.'

‘They don't expect you to Mustafa. I'm glad you are back on your feet.'

‘Yes,
Alhamdulillah
. Dr Ahmad, your mother, she said I still have to come tonight, for observation … and dinner.'

‘Oh good. I will see you later.'

‘Yes,
inshallah
. Where are you going?' he asks me. Becoming aware of the imposition, he tries to retract the question.

‘Just for a walk,' I say casually.

‘OK, well your father went that way,' he says pointing left. I smile and turn right.

‘Sophia!' I turn back. He throws me an apple. I catch it.

And I walk. I walk for what seems like an eternity. I know where I am going. I am going to Tahrir. But I take my time. No rush. I walk through my neighbourhood and other neighbourhoods, past their patrols, wondering if they too are protecting a fruit-selling newsreader.

People walk around me. Men step in and out of shops, women knock on doors and children play on the road. Cars beeping as they pass and amongst them are sit-ins, words of freedom scribbled hastily on walls and protesters holding signs calling for a new way, as though they have always been a backdrop to my life, a part of this city.

I walk out of those neighbourhoods onto a big road and I continue to walk. Through the traffic, the noise, the shouting. I know my route. I know what I want to pass and what I want to avoid. I pass the Nile. Of course I do, how can I not?

The Nile is an artery running through Cairo. It is a constant reminder to this city of the passage of time. Civilisations have risen and fallen on its banks, and it continues to flow, refusing to divert from its course forward. Much like the people around me. It seemed that suddenly the people of this great city have taken note of what this great river had to teach them.

I come to Tahrir Square, past the Museum. I stop at the Museum, the traffic gone, the crowd thick. I look at the structure, the building and I wonder if Ramses survived the attack. I wonder if the protesters and the army have fought off the opportunists and the hijackers.

I continued walking now towards the Square. I could feel its pull as it carried me forward, towards liberation. I was confronted by the Egyptian flag. It felt like all other colours had been erased from the city. The flag was draped around people, around poles and cars, used to carry rocks, babies, as a bandage and headscarf.

I saw men praying in front of tanks, some in uniform, some not.

I saw Mubarak in caricature.

I saw banners with a simple message: ‘Go away, we don't want you.'

I saw faces distorted by loss, holding a framed picture, standing around a makeshift memorial to the martyrs. The fake grass marking the resting spot in this city, devoid of any colour except the red, white and black of the nation.

I saw a bride and groom, she in her white dress, he in his rented tuxedo. Their family clapping and singing. I saw the procession behind them as they walked to their future. A procession of well-wishers no amount of invitation cards and the promise of free food could entice.

I saw children with fake blood painted on their faces and men with real blood blinding their vision.

I saw women, young and old, strong and frail.

I saw men, big and strong, small and weak.

I heard screams and cries and laughter.

I saw and heard so much and felt it all.

The images, I will forever carry with me. I will pass them down to my children and tell my children to pass them down to theirs.

I will show them what was good and bad about the revolution. What we did well and how we failed.

I will show them what these days were about and what they came to mean. And I will explain to them the difference.

When they are old enough to understand, I will tell them these days were not about Mubarak, they were not about Egypt. They were about solidarity.

That all it took to start it was one small act of solidarity, one of self-sacrifice.

I will make them understand no matter what came after it, that will never change. It cannot be unwritten.

Overwhelmed, by Tahrir Square, I sat down and wept.

I wept for my people.

I wept for the protesters and I wept for the martyrs.

… for my city.

… for my mother: for her quiet strength.

… for my father: for his good intentions.

… for Salem: his stand.

… for Mustafa: his daily fight.

… for myself: for the loss of my delusions.

And I wept for Khaled.

A young man approached me in his uniform and handed me his handkerchief.

I took it and wiped my tears. I placed it in my pocket and thanked him a thousand thanks. Standing up, I continued around the Square, preparing myself for the long walk home.

Ahead of me a crowd had gathered. I could just make out a pair of legs emerging from beneath them. I pushed myself in amongst them, made my way through them, found myself at the front of them.

The man lying on the floor was missing a shoe. Slowly looking up towards the top of the unmoving body, I saw blood on a shirt and a knife beside an arm. I saw a young man's face strained, eyes closed.

I saw my father kneeling over the body, with his hands red, pressing down on the wound. I stayed like that, watching him until he saw me. He looked like I had always imagined he did in the operating theatre: focused, engrossed, happy.

He looked at me.

We locked eyes. We looked at each other for a long while, each where we should be. Together, locked in a moment of solidarity.

And then he continued with his work and I continued on my way.

The regime fell. You know the rest.

My father and mother put on their surgeons’ white coats and walked to the Square, joining the protests with their colleagues. They were waved off by their daughter and son and met with applause by the crowd when they got to Tahrir.

We, as a family, joined them at Tahrir Square to celebrate, to clean the streets of trash, to wash the walls, to say thank you. And then we sat back to look at what had been achieved.

It was only later I realised what that day had been named. Not the Day of Rage, the Day of Anger, or Departure. Not a day to mourn those passed.

They had called it the Day of Egypt’s Love. I couldn’t think of a better name.

These are my eighteen days of spring in winter, this is my lament. Told because you asked me once, to tell
my
stories.

I started by telling you this is an Egyptian cliché. I told you it is a story of forbidden love, of two energies from different worlds being pulled together, one denying the love between them to the bitter-sweet end.

I told you I am not a poster girl of the revolution, nor its victim. It’s true, I’m not.

I haven’t lied. That is exactly the story I have told. I have told you a story of a young woman falling in love: of how she went from indifference to passion.

Of how she pushed past the barrier of her own fears and those of others.

Of how she embraced the ambiguity, the risk that her love may never be returned.

Of how she found a corner in her own heart to forever carry the true meaning of love.

And it’s true.

She did.

I
did … fall in love.

I fell in love with the revolution.