by Trish Doller
CHAPTER 16
We take our time walking through the Khan, pausing at a shop that offers belly-dancing costumes in every color imaginable. The skimpy outfits seem incongruous in a country where women don’t show much skin, but Adam explains that modern belly dancing has evolved from a form of folk dancing that women did in the presence of other women.
“There are dancers who are held in high regard and tourists pay to see them dance on the Nile dinner cruises,” he says. “And there have been belly-dance competitions on the television, but many Muslims believe the dance is haram and that the dancers are no better than prostitutes.”
“What do you think?”
He shrugs. “Some men find it sexy, but I do not think about it at all.”
I toy with the idea of buying a belly-dance costume for Hannah, then laugh to myself as I imagine how outraged her mother would be. Not so different from the Muslims who think it’s haram.
By the time we reach the restaurant, Mom is standing beside the front door. I give her a hug. “How was your day?”
“A very sweet old lady tried to give me a goat as thanks for a pair of bifocals.”
“A goat? You said yes, right?”
Mom laughs. “This was not a cute little thing like you see on YouTube, Caroline. He was big and beardy and I’m pretty sure he wanted to trample me to death.”
“Sigh.”
Saying the word—instead of actually sighing—is a goofy Hannah-and-me thing, but it makes my mom laugh again. She bumps her shoulder against mine. “If you want to get a pet, you can, but maybe think smaller. Like a goldfish or a bird.”
I remember the birds that Adam and I saw at the Friday Market.
“I can drive you,” he says, and I smile at the way he read my mind.
“Yeah, maybe. Since I can’t have a goat.”
Mom just shakes her head, smiling as she links her arm through mine, and says, “Let’s go eat.”
The restaurant calls to mind the Hanging Church, with ornate wooden carvings on the walls and an arched ceiling painted with arabesque designs. We are seated at a brass-topped table with two wooden chairs and a tiny burgundy velvet couch that I claimed for myself. Adam excuses himself to wash his hands.
“So I asked OneVision to hire a male doctor for the clinic,” Mom says. “And he started today. His name is Jamie and he only just finished his residency—he’s so young—but I think our patients are going to like him.”
“That’s great,” I say. “Now maybe the old man with the cataracts will come back.”
“I hope so.”
Adam returns and Mom asks him to order for us.
“Choose your favorites,” she says. “Or better yet, what you would make if you had the chance.”
The way his eyebrows creep close together as he studies the menu makes me feel bubbly inside. His seriousness is adorable, but I know that as a cook this decision is probably important to him. If Mom wasn’t with us, I’d just sit and stare at him. Instead I show her my market purchases and tell her how I am slowly getting the hang of haggling.
“Very slowly,” Adam says, not looking up from the menu.
“Hush, you.” I reach across the table and give his shoulder a playful shove. “I did okay.”
The waiter arrives and Adam speaks to him in Arabic, then translates. “I have ordered shai—hot tea with sugar and mint—and, to start, a meze plate with hummus, baba ghanoush, feteer meshaltet, gebna makleyah, warak enab, and taameya.”
“I know hummus and baba ghanoush,” Mom says. “But you lost me with the rest.”
“Feteer is a layered pastry that is sweet or savory,” he says. “This one will have cheese, olives, and red peppers as the filling. Gebna makleyah is cheese that has been fried. Warak enab is grape leaves stuffed with rice and beef—”
“Oh, I know this one,” she says. “We just call it stuffed grape leaves.”
Adam nods. “You may know taameya as falafel, but in Egypt we use also fava beans instead of hummus.”
“All of this sounds wonderful,” she says.
“My favorite to eat is gebna, but my favorite to prepare is feteer because there is no end to the combination of ingredients for the filling.”
“Do you cook at home a lot?”
“When everyone in my family is working or at school, my teta—my grandmother—does the cooking. She lives in the apartment next to ours, and, like me, she loves to cook,” he says. “But when I have free time, I try to prepare dishes from other countries of the world. The last time I made jerk chicken from Jamaica.”
“Jerk chicken is one of Casey’s favorites,” Mom says. “We went to Jamaica for our honeymoon and I swear he ate it every day.”
“Have you been to many countries?” Adam asks.
“Just Jamaica and Germany—some of my ancestors were German—but we’ve traveled all over the United States. When Caroline was a little girl, we drove from Ohio to San Francisco, California, stopping at the national parks and monuments.”
The waiter brings a glass teapot with a red spout and gold lotus flowers painted around the belly, and pours the tea into matching glasses.
“I would like to visit America one day,” Adam says. “But I don’t know if it is possible. It costs a lot of money to travel and I have heard that Muslims are unwelcome.”
“That’s not exactly true,” Mom tells him. “There are some Americans who equate Islam with terrorism, but—”
“They are ignorant, then,” he says, cutting her off. “If they knew the truth of Islam, they would understand that those who kill in the name of Allah are not truly Muslim. They bend the scripture to fit their twisted deeds.”
“I know,” she says. “But it’s difficult to convince Americans when they are inundated with TV news about ISIS attacks. And when trying to figure out all the players in the political game gets too complicated, they throw up their hands and blame all Muslims.”
“This is unfair.”
“As unfair as being a woman out walking in Cairo,” I point out.
“It is not the same.” Adam slaps his palm against the table, rattling the glasses, startling me. I’m not afraid of his outburst, but it makes me realize he is still mostly a stranger. He blows out a breath to calm himself as he rakes his fingers through his curls. “I am sorry, Caroline, but none of those men on the street believe you secretly wish to murder them. And our politicians do not appear on television saying how they wish to keep you out of Egypt because you worship in a different way.”
I look into my tea glass, stung by his rebuke—and the truth in his words. Mom is quiet too, and a thread of awkwardness zigzags around the table, connecting all three of us. I glance at Mom, glance at Adam, but none of our gazes quite meet. We’re all embarrassed, and it seems like none of us knows how to lead the conversation back to a comfortable place.
Finally, the waiter arrives with a big circular plate filled with all the things Adam ordered, as well as a smaller plate piled with bread, and I feel a rush of relief. Adam smiles and explains to Mom, as he had with me, that it is customary to use your right hand for eating. “It is especially so when you are all dipping from the same bowl,” he says. “Also, it is okay for you to eat with your fingers.”
We sample all of the foods on the meze plate as Adam tells us the ingredients of each dish. When we try the warak enab, he shares a story about how his grandmother taught him to roll the grape leaves when he was little.
“I have an older cousin who would tease me,” he says. “Asking why do I want to learn to do women’s work. But Teta told me that many of the finest chefs are men, so I did not let my cousin bother me too much.”
Mom drags a bit of bread through the last of the baba ghanoush. “I think my favorite is the taameya.”
“Mine is the gebna,” I say, hoping Adam doesn’t think I chose it just because it’s his favorite. Gebna reminds me of saganaki, the flaming cheese we order from our favorite Greek restaurant back home. “Fried cheese is never a bad choice.”
Our gazes meet and he smiles. “Exactly this.”
The food is barely gone when the waiter whisks away the empty plates and brings another platter, this time heaped with different kinds of kebab. As we eat kofta and lamb and chicken, I envy how much easier it is for Adam to talk to my mother than to me. She is the adult—almost like a chaperone—and her presence puts him at ease.
Following dinner, we walk from the Khan to Wekalet El Ghouri, an arts center inside a sixteenth-century stone complex that also houses a mosque, a Muslim school, and a khanqah, which Adam explains is a place where the Sufi brotherhood once met. “Tonight there is a show, a tanoura dance,” he tells Mom. “If you would like to see it.”
She buys tickets with neither of us knowing what to expect.
The music begins first, mostly drums and a wooden instrument that makes me think of the recorders my class learned to play in elementary school. It has a wider bell at the bottom, and when I ask Adam what it’s called, he says it is a mizmar. Then the performers—whirling dervishes—come out, wearing white turbans and costumes with wide, full skirts decorated in a rainbow of colors. They start to dance, spinning in a way that makes the skirts flare out into circles. Round and round they whirl—how they don’t get dizzy and fall down is a mystery—song after song. Sometimes they carry props that look like bedazzled drums, and other times they hold large circles of fabric that match their skirts, spinning the circles over their heads as they whirl. I snap a few photos with my phone—the dervishes a blur—and clap along with the audience around us. My elbow bumps repeatedly against Adam’s arm, and when I glance up, I catch him watching me.
The air around us feels electric as our eyes meet, and I can’t stop myself from smiling at him. He tips his chin toward the performance, his eyes still met with mine. “You should watch the dance.”
“I should,” I say, forcing my attention back on the dervishes, but every time I sneak a peek at Adam (too often), he is looking at me.
It is late when we arrive at our apartment, the sun long gone. Mom insists that Adam drop us off at the building instead of accompanying us upstairs, but he still opens the car door for us.
“Those dancers were amazing.” Mom twirls on the sidewalk and hands him a Casey Kelly–sized tip. “Thank you for inviting me, and for giving Caroline and me more than your fair share of time.”
“The pleasure was mine.” Adam touches his hand to his chest, over his heart, and glances at me. “Good night.”
I’m following my mother to the elevator when my phone buzzes in my pocket.
Will you need a driver again soon?
Over my shoulder I see Adam leaning against the car, waiting for my reply. I smile to myself as I type the answer. Yes.
CHAPTER 17
I would like to show you something different,” Adam says as I lock the front door behind me. Usually I meet him down on the street, at the car, but today he came upstairs. “But it is better to take the metro, which means we must walk to the station.”
I’ve ridden the subway in New York with my parents, so I have no trouble with the idea of taking public transportation, but I am a little nervous about being packed in a train with a bunch of Egyptian men, a fear I share out loud.
“So the first two cars on the metro are only for women,” he says as the elevator descends. “I will not allow anyone to harass you, but you may feel more comfortable riding in the women’s car.”
“Where are we going?”
“Tahrir Square,” he says. “It is the place where the Egyptian revolution overthrew the government. In the time since, graffiti artists have made artwork on some of the buildings that is very good and I thought perhaps you might like to see it.”
Sometimes, when we were bored, Owen and I drove out Old Railroad to the Miller Road viaduct, where decades of graffiti was layered on the abutment. Hearts. Stars. Words of insult. Words of love. And a lot of overlapping school colors. I took a picture every time we went and every picture was different from the last.
“Yeah, definitely.”
“The thing you must know . . . do you remember last night how your mother said Americans cannot follow all the players in the political game?”
“Yes.”
“Ever since the revolution, our government has changed, but the game has not,” he says. “Wages have improved, but not enough that we do not struggle. We hoped our country would follow in the footsteps of Tunisia toward a more democratic government, but that has not happened.”
We pause at an intersection for the traffic to pass, then dash across in a gap. A truck driver blares his horn at us.
“The criticism that began a revolution has become unwelcome,” Adam continues. “Homes are raided and Egyptians have been detained by the police—some for years—accused of supporting the opposition. So what I am telling you is that while we are in the square, we must be careful of what we say.”
“Is this—” I lower my voice. “Is this going to be dangerous?”
“I do not think so,” he says. “People will know you are a foreigner by your hair, but we will attract attention by being together in public and using English. Speaking too loudly about the revolution might raise suspicion.”
“So why go?”
“Cairo is my home and now it is yours,” he says. “Should we not be free to go wherever we want?”
There isn’t much comfort in the idea that we simply have a right to visit Tahrir Square, especially not if there’s a chance Adam might be arrested. I don’t want to be responsible for that. And I’m kind of scared. “Maybe—um, maybe we should go somewhere else.”
“I would like you to see this.”
Swallowing my hesitation, I nod. “Okay.”
Crossing the El-Rawda bridge on foot is no different from walking through the airport, shopping at al-Gomaa, or trying to go to McDonald’s—almost every man who passes feels the need to lay eyes on me. Some glance. Some blatantly stare. One runs a slow tongue across his lower lip. Having Adam with me makes me feel a little less helpless, but I can’t imagine being an Egyptian woman trying to live a normal life. Do they get up in the morning and plan routes with the least amount of men? Do they wish themselves invisible? Because right now I wish I had that superpower.
Fifteen minutes later we reach the metro station.
As Adam teaches me how to buy a ticket from the automated kiosk, a man comes up and says something to him in a sly voice. Adam keeps his eyes trained on the machine as he responds, but his tone is cold and hard. The other man laughs and offers a parting shot before he melts into the crowd.
“What did he say?”
“Telling you will only make you angry.”
“Then I definitely need to know.”
Adam sighs and for a moment I fear he’s not going to tell me. His face colors when he says, “He called you my American whore. I told him . . . well, I told him what he could do to himself. And that is when he laughed and said I should save it for you.”
“You were right.” My hands tighten into fists and I want to charge into the station, find that guy, and punch him in the face. “And for a place that’s supposed to be so conservative about sex and dating, these guys sure think about it a whole lot. Meanwhile, the foreign whore hasn’t actually ever had sex.”
“You should perhaps lower your voice.”
“Why? Everyone else in Cairo seems perfectly comfortable talking about my sexual experience,” I say. “Why shouldn’t I?”
“It is just that—”
“No, I get it, Adam.” I shove my ticket into the turnstile and snatch it out from the other side. “Be quiet. Be invisible unless some man wants to look at you.”
“I was not going to say that,” he protests. “I was just going to say that with time it will not bother you so much.”
“Are you kidding me?” I say, whirling to face him. He winces, as if he’s embarrassed to be having this conversation in public, which only fuels my anger. “Do you think your sister has actually gotten used
to boys whispering obscene things in her ear? Or that I will ever be able to ignore someone calling me a whore? No woman should have to get over it.”
His shoulders sag. “You are right.”
The thing is, I don’t know if he’s agreeing because he actually believes it or if he just wants me to stop talking about this on a subway platform thick with people who might overhear—until he reaches out and takes my hand, deliberately touching me for the first time. Adam’s palm is warm and a little rough as he guides me to a spot where a large clump of women wait for the train.
“This is where the women’s cars will be when the train arrives,” he says. “The third stop will be Sadat. Exit there and I will find you. Okay?”
“Sadat.” I repeat the name of the stop, even though I don’t want to get on the train without him, don’t want to let go. A hot wind rushes down the platform, announcing the oncoming train. Adam gives my hand a reassuring squeeze, then disappears into the crowd. A middle-aged lady beside me clicks her tongue in disapproval, but an ancient, tiny woman—her brown face carved deep with wrinkles and her uncovered hair the color of a thundercloud—tucks her hand beneath my arm. The train doors slide open and she ushers me into the subway car.
She sits, but I grab hold of the overhead handrail, letting the older ladies—even the tongue clicker—and young mothers have the available seats. The old woman takes a worn copy of the Quran from her bag and reads as the car sways along the track. The air is warm and thick, perfume-sweet and sweaty, and it gets harder to breathe the more crowded the car becomes.
One stop.
Some of the women watch me with curious eyes. Even though my clothes are pretty conservative, my hair is an attention magnet. I consider buying myself a scarf to make me less conspicuous, but my hair is part of who I am and my skin is still white. So I don’t know if that’s the answer at all.
Two stops.
A man with a briefcase tries to barrel his way onto the car. A couple of the women block his entrance while others shout him out. None of it fazes the old lady, who continues reading the Quran.