After shouting my mouth off for a few days straight about the effects of the unrest in Cairo and other major cities in Egypt, I’ve been silent for a good long while. Not even a “Yahoooooooo!” after the departure of Mr Mubarak, or should I say the silent slinking off after having given a more than slightly unusual speech to an entirely bemused international community.
Word had spread incredibly rapidly through news channels and those all so pivotal social network tools that Mubarak would be resigning and the speech that he eventually delivered left half the viewers in a depressed slump thinking “That’s what I knew he’d say” and the other half in a depressed slump thinking “I can’t believe he said that.”
Egypt (and the rest of the interested world) woke up the next day in a gloomy mood. How much longer was this going to go on for? There was one however, one single soul who said to me “He’s gone, I can smell it. By the end of today, we’ll be celebrating.” I refuted the joy, assuming the dictator had really, however delusionally, dug himself in for the duration until the promised elections. We struck a wager: A slice of cake from the German Bakery says he leaves by the end of the day/A slice of cake from the German Bakery says he doesn’t. Either way I had cheered myself up – tomorrow there would be cake.
At 6 o’clock in the evening, my friend informed me I had to buy the cake. I told her she was on another planet – I was watching the live updates on the BBC website and there had been no mention. As she said the word ‘cake’, the words “Breaking News” flashed across the screen. Absolutely astounding – and even if I was paying for it now, there was going to be cake. Happy cake. Cake with freedom.
I verified the info. I slammed the lid down on my laptop. I raced out of Sunrise Lodge for the street parties. I phoned friends and we agreed to meet outside, in the midst of the celebrations. There were no celebrations. The streets were quiet. I passed the news on to some people I met and they said “Really?” or “Yeah, I heard.”
I couldn’t believe it. Less than a year ago, Dahab had celebrated Egypt winning the Africa Cup of Nations (footie, of course) with drums and honking of horns, flags, massive groups rabbling their way down the street, chanting football chants. But now Dahab was quiet. To be fair, with the emptying of tourists out of Dahab a lot of the workers had been sent home in addition to those who had left to help protect their houses and families in Cairo and other cities. There was no-one here to celebrate with. For those who were here, the empty cash registers spoke more to their hearts than the empty presidency, for good reason. The president hadn’t ever helped them feed their families or pay their rent before, and that was all they were thinking about now. They watched Suleiman deliver Mubarak’s resignation speech, and they watched Tantawi take up the helm. The future wasn’t yet something to celebrate.
The next day however, there was cake. Good cake. My toddler asked me whose happy birthday it was, as cake is normally only wheeled out for celebrations and I told her it was Egypt’s happy birthday cake. ”Egypt’s happy birthday?” Insha’allah.
Cake Gone
Now it’s a question of time and organisation before the elections in the summer. Dahab just wants its tourists back… and thanks to the flight restrictions of many countries being lifted, bookings are coming back in and the spring looks set to be as good as always.
Winter is over in Dahab, and the long Mubarak winter is over in Egypt. Here’s to the spring.