By Abdulla Kamal
Translated by Karim Zidan
(1)
Foreign School Syndrome, or How I Learned to Smoke Hash and Stay Away from Skinny Jeans
On another miserable Thursday night, Khaled and I make our way toward headquarters. Our friend Kamba has a company that sells chat sites and web-hosting services from the ground floor of his apartment building, dubbed The Headquarters, which we used for smoking hash. Khaled says to me, “Douma, it is impossible to have a good time in Cairo without women or money. Money brings the women, and women are expensive.” It matched his signature saying: “Bring me a car and I’ll bring you a babe every night.”
I tell him that babes are part of an integrated system; you join foreign-language schools, make friends with the girls who will transform into babes dressed in skinny jeans, curling their hair and staying out past nine. Babes make friends with other babes, and the only way to be part of that circle is to have parents with enough money to send you to foreign-language schools. The best we can do is smoke hash in Kampa’s miserable HQ.
Kampa utters his timeless phrase, which signals the start of our night: “Everyone cough up five pounds so we can score some hash.” We empty our pockets. Khaled’s phone rings, and he picks up to find Karim on the other end. “Man, we have an in with some babes. We’re going to the After Eight club. Bring cash and come quick.” Without hesitation, Khaled and I pull ourselves together and think about how we can come up with the necessary money for an evening out. Khaled informs me that our friend Ghost knows someone who prints counterfeit money and sells a hundred pounds for 35. We buy 200 pounds and head for the After Eight.
Our childhood friend Karim is part of the Tourism Department at the university, which is filled with babes, unlike the engineering school where Khaled and I go. His college sends him to meetings organized by student-ex- change programs, where he meets foreigners — Americans, mostly — and every once in a while he invites us to parties filled with babes and stuff to drink. We enjoy these late nights but prefer when they take place at the foreigners’ homes, since that’s cheaper.
We arrive at the After Eight. As usual, Karim does not disappoint. There are 30 people with him; three quarters of them are babes. Any one of them could bring our whole neighborhood to a halt without much trouble. There was also that son of a bitch Anthony, who we met for the first time that night. As we’d later say, “He’s the best foreigner you could meet in your whole life. It’s as if he’s one of us.”
(2)
The Luxurious Life, or How the After Eight Taught Me to Care About Logistics
Anthony is a student at the prestigious Northwestern University, which he attends on an academic scholarship. He’s from a poor family in an even poorer state called Maine. His father works at a local bakery, so he spends on himself using funds from the scholarship. He’s highly intelligent and has ambitions to, someday, become the president of the United States.
We feel more comfortable in cabarets than in more expen- sive nightclubs like the After Eight. Like any other club, there is a bar, a dance floor, and loud house music playing in the background. We all know we won’t be able to hook up with any of the women at the After Eight for purely logistical reasons. You need a car, since there is no way you can walk with her on the street if she’s wearing her usual clothes. Then you need money, because you can’t just sit with her on the Corniche or at an open-air shisha café. These women are collectively outside the circle of people we can hook up with. And yet, being here every once in a while means we can live a life that we can’t afford, which is a good thing even if we’re just observers.
In these situations, we resort to our standard plan: we drink until drunk and dance like fools. This time, however, Anthony joined us. He later got in touch with us and came to visit us in Shoubra, the week before he traveled back to the States. He smoked with us, and, in a moment of serenity, we promised him a place to stay if he ever returned.
Two months later, Anthony called to let us know that he was at the airport. We met him downtown and carried his luggage to my apartment. I live on my own in an apart- ment that’s separated from my father’s by a single floor. My father is a righteous religious man who regularly raids my apartment, in order to ensure my safety.
After two weeks of Anthony in my apartment, my father launched a surprise raid and, as a result, kicked Anthony out. I’m used to my father kicking my friends out, and my friends are used to it, too. When we were at the café,
I told Anthony it wasn’t personal, and that my father just didn’t like strangers, especially my friends. He understood and we returned to the apartment.
Three days later, another raid happened, and I realized then that my father would not let this go. We arranged for Anthony to stay in a small room on the roof of Khaled’s apartment building, which was brimming with pigeons.
It was a disgusting room, but Anthony never complained. Between Anthony’s work, our studies, and our evening meetups in his room to smoke hash, life resumed its regular pace.
(3)
The Hash Crisis, Or How We Scammed Waheed the Taxi Driver
Our country was hit with an excruciating hash crisis. A piece of hash that had once cost us 25 pounds now went for 80, and sometimes even 120, if you were lucky enough to find it. What we did then was epic. Anyone we knew who found a “way” would call the rest of us and would pick up an extraordinary amount. We’d go all the way to Al Hay Al Asher (in Nasr City), Obour, and El Nozha un- til a friend traveled to the North Coast to purchase from the Bedouins there. It was a miserable time, and it stayed like that until Anthony got to know Waheed.
Waheed was a taxi driver who lived in Embaba. He told Anthony that he could pick up any quantity of hash at any time. We knew that he’d tag on an extra 50 pounds every time, but we didn’t mind. The hash was more expensive, but at least it was guaranteed, and, at the time, that was rare. We started making regular trips to Embaba, and he would meet us on Al-Wahda Street. We would give him the money, and he would hand us the hash, then drive us to Shoubra in his taxi to smoke a joint with us.
Once, while Waheed was driving Anthony back to Shou- bra, the car got a flat tire, and he asked Anthony to lend him 120 pounds to fix it. He later called and told him he wouldn’t be returning the money. It was just that simple.
We decided to retrieve the cash no matter what. Khaled remembered the counterfeit bills and suggested we use it to buy 300 pounds worth of hash from Waheed. It would cost us 105 pounds, which was a fair price for a piece
of hash worth 300. We agreed on the plan and called Waheed. We went to meet him, but instead of taking the money in exchange for the hash, he insisted we come to his neighborhood to meet the dealer ourselves. The dealer took the money without hesitation and gave us the hash, then Waheed drove us back to Shoubra after smoking the usual joint on the highway.
It was then that we discovered the pleasure of scamming. The Hash of Victory, as we named it, was the best we’d ever smoked in our lives. During that smoking session, we decided to design a real plan to spend the counterfeit money. The idea was that the three of us would conquer Cairo night life at the lowest of costs.
(4)
A Guide for Spending Counterfeit Money in Night- clubs and Cabarets
We set strict rules for using the money:
Do not spend the counterfeit bills individually;
The bills should be crumpled and placed between real bills to appear used and so that they’d take on the smell of money;
Motivated by my own morality, I added that the money must only be spent in nightclubs and cabarets—“sin should go toward sin.”
We agreed that, if we were ever caught, we would say that it came to us by mistake somehow, and then we would pay in real bills and go about our day in peace.
The plan was complete. “The son of a bitch Abu Sana spent 100 pounds from Uncle Samy,” Khaled said enthusiastically.
“What?” I responded. “Uncle Samy is a poor soul who has children.”
Khaled retorted, “Abu Sana is a pimp.”
We cursed him collectively before going to sleep that night with a clear conscience.
During the next two months, we stayed up late in caba- rets, bought our hash, and got drunk at bars in downtown Cairo using counterfeit money. Not once did we get caught. We finished our exams just as Anthony neared the end of his vacation, and so we decided to come up with a strategy for spending the rest of the counterfeit bills.
Kamba suggested a project involving fake Chinese hymens. He knew plenty of women from the online chat servers he ran, and they’d told him about the secret world of reinstat- ing hymens through surgeries that cost up to 2000 pounds each. He went on Google and showed us some of the ques- tions women posted on medical websites about the surgery and the Chinese hymen. Anthony said he could purchase the hymens from sex stores upon his return and that he’d mail them back to us, hidden between other items. A box with two hymens cost 150 pounds, so we agreed that 1200 pounds would be a reasonable price for a single hymen.
I added that discretion is preferable to scandal, and that the project was primarily a humanitarian one, which was why we should make the prices flexible for difficult cases and for the poor. The plan was set: Anthony would send us the package, and Kamba would supply us with customers who wanted to purchase them.
(5)
The Corrupt Government, or Why I Love the Fact that I Have a Rich Friend Named Abdalla
On the appointed day, Khaled, Abdalla, and I went to the post office to pick up the package, with 4000 pounds of counterfeit money in our pockets. Abdalla works for a pet- rol company and was always flush with cash. And, despite his love of money, he always paid without hesitation in important situations. And so he came with us, in case of an emergency.
We were striking two birds with one stone: spending the counterfeit money, and fulfilling our promise that “sin should go toward sin.” We asked about the package, gave the man the receipt, and handed him the counterfeit money with an air of confidence. He accepted the money and counted it three separate times while we trembled with fear beneath our cool exteriors. He stamped the receipt and handed the package to Abdalla, who accepted it before heading back to his car with us right behind him. He’d placed the package in the trunk of the car and taken his seat behind the wheel when we heard a voice calling to us in a formal tone, “Excuse me, Sir.”
Without even turning in his direction, we knew that he was onto us. Abdalla sped off immediately while I turned to the employee and said in an innocent voice, “How can we help you?” His response was hostile, “This is counterfeit money, Sir.”
We pretended to be surprised. Then Khaled spoke up: “Counterfeit? How is that possible?”
The postal employee responded with an air of finality that belonged on the stage, “In any case, the police have arrived. You shall find out how it is possible.”
We recognized the police officers before the employee could point them out: there had black clothes, mous- taches, and the scent of Cleopatra cigarettes that could be smelled from a mile away.
Without wasting any time, the officers moved in our di- rection and asked the employee, “Where is the counterfeit money?” Without hesitation, he handed them the 4000 pounds. The officer took the money, then wet a finger in his mouth and wiped one of the bills, which removed its color. He turned toward us, a look of victory etched on his face. “Is this your money?”
We knew our answer wouldn’t make any difference. I cursed the officer’s routine procedure under my breath while Khaled answered, “Yes.”
They took us to the Abedeen police station to be presented to their superior officer. On the way, one of the officers turned and asked us, “You’re engineers and seem to be from good families. So what are you doing with counterfeit money?”
Sticking to the plan we’d laid out, we said that we had no idea it was counterfeit money and that we’d come by the money accidentally somewhere. The officer turned our IDs over in his hand and said in a meaningful tone, “I’ll sort this situation out with my superior officer, don’t worry. It doesn’t benefit me to see your lives ruined.” Then he added that “you all come from good families, after all.” Picking up on the signs, we replied in a single voice, “We are in your hands.”
In this situation, I came to value the fact that I have a rich friend named Abdalla. I called and told him that we were at the Abedeen police station and that we needed 5000 pounds: 4000 to pay the post office, and another 1000 for the police.
We arrived at the station, and the officers went to meet the head officer with our IDs in hand. A representative of the post office had arrived before us. The officers returned after a short while and informed us that the “situation has been sorted,” and that it was time for us to meet with their supervisor.
(6) The Interrogation Room, or How Actor Ahmed Zaki Mind-fucked All Cops
I’ve learned from personal experience that police officers have limited imaginations — ones that don’t match the dramatized depictions of officers as seen in Ahmed Zaki’s movies. We entered the room and met senior officer Amin, who sat in a wide chair behind his desk. There
was a computer there, and an ashtray with a lit Marlboro Light that was sending up plumes of smoke in front of his face, as though he were trying to be mysterious.
He asked us who the money belonged to. We hesitated slightly, so we wouldn’t give contradictory statements, but Khaled quickly spoke up and claimed the money was his. The officer asked how he’d ended up with the money, to which Khaled said that he found it amidst a stack of cash at home and didn’t know exactly where it had come from. The officer lectured us about how we came from good families and worked respectable jobs. Tired of hearing it, I interrupted, “One of our friends is coming now with the money we owe the post office. We already said we don’t know where the counterfeit money came from so, on that note, can we just let this slide?”
To our surprise, the officer didn’t flex his authority over us. I couldn’t tell whether he was just uninterested in our case, or whether the other officers sorting out the situation had paid him off.
The officer called one of his underlings and handed him our IDs. “Take them with you to wait for their friend. Check their criminal records, too. If there’s nothing there, take the money and tell them to screw off.” Never had the words “screw off” filled me with such relief and happiness.
We left with the guard and sat on a small wooden bench beside a desk and a metal cupboard for storing paperwork — remnants from Pres. Nasser’s era. We were seated in the far corner next to the holding cells. We heard screams from inside a cell, but no one around us took any notice. We asked the guard about the screams, and he said, “That’s a young man on drugs who keeps banging his head on the wall to hurt himself. I swear to God, even if he dies, we’re not letting him out of this place.”
His words, coupled with the dark grey walls, the government offices, the stench of cigarettes, the tea, and the mustached officers was making me feel seriously constrict- ed. My life flashed before my eyes, and I thought about my failures and wasted youth. Then Abdalla arrived with the money: 4000 for the post office, 1000 for the officers.
(7)
Kampa’s Theory of our Arrest
Two months later, we were sitting at Kampa’s place smoking hash, surrounded by boxes of fake Chinese hymens that Kampa had failed to sell to his supposed chat-room customers. He laughed hysterically whenever he remembered the situation. Between me and Khaled, our phones showed 35 missed calls from Abdalla, who kept calling us demanding — for the millionth time— the 5000 pounds he had lent us.
Khaled and I were talking about the same topic from two months ago, as though it were an eternal dialogue that would not end. I told him that we shouldn’t have broken the rules that we’d set, since the one time we’d done so was the time that we’d got caught.
As usual, Khaled’s face was etched with a look of unease at my explanation, as though he was convinced there was something left unsaid. I thought so, too.
Kampa took a long drag from the joint, then said in a careless tone that didn’t match his great discovery, “Nah, it isn’t that. Back then, you had Anthony with you.” Sensing our confusion, he added, after another long drag from the joint, “Man, no one questions a foreigner’s money, while you two motherfuckers are naturally suspicious.”
We paused for a moment to consider this, eyeing each other. Then, we burst into an uncontrollable fit of laughter, pausing only to cough whenever the joint passed before us.
Translation first appeared in the Summer 2020 issue of ArabLit Quarterly.
