 |
Al-Ahram Weekly 12 - 18 August 1999 Issue No. 442 
|
||
Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
| ||
|
Al-Ahram Weekly 12 - 18 August 1999 Issue No. 442
|
||
| Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
| ||
Train of thought
By George Bahgory
Egypt Region International Economy Opinion Culture Profile Books Features Travel Living Sports Time Out Chronicles People Cartoons Letters
During my lifetime, I have painted as I sat at windows and upon balconies, looking down from the roofs of tall buildings or from airplanes. But never before have I, like an ant, descended into the heart of the earth to paint there. It occurred to me, as I went down the flight of stairs leading to the underground station, that once again I was in Paris. Yet one glance into the kind faces of my compatriots filling all the train carriages, and looking out of train windows, immediately told me where I was. As I sketched their faces, the women shied away with a smile, the young men were overwhelmed with joy, the children showed their fascination, but the older generation, shrouded in themselves, looked on with disinterest.
I began my trip at Abdel-Nasser Station, named after the president I loved. I was happy to see his portrait painted in the same style as that used to paint the walls of the Pompidou Centre in Paris: dots, small triangles and squares. I bought a ticket to travel on the new line which runs from Al-Gam'a (University Station) to Shubra Al-Kheima. I scooped my change out of the hollow beneath the ticket window. The underground assistant said in a firm voice: "You must change when you get to Sadat." I said to myself, "In that case, I will have to love Sadat as well."
As I sat on the platform and started sketching, a young man came along with a look of keen interest in his eyes. He deliberately missed two or three trains. Two students with their school bags dangling from their shoulders joined us. All five of us fell under the spell of art. No one thought of catching a train. I discovered that the first young man was fond of drawing. He asked me several questions. The other two were interested mainly in finding any pastime to occupy their hours of hooky.
The next newcomer was the policeman with his long rifle under his arm. He said in his Upper Egyptian accent, which incidentally is also my own: "You have been here for a long time. I was watching you when you were on the other platform, and you had better hurry and get on the next train or else I will have to report you to the police." For a moment, I was tempted to give him a good lesson in the rights of citizens, or just to tell him off, explaining that I too had been doing my work as a journalist and an artist. But the train arrived at that very moment. Its doors slid open before my eyes with a beckoning hiss, saving the day, and I jumped into the carriage.
I turned to a crisp new page in my sketchbook. Instead of drawing the people at the station waiting to take the train, I was now able to draw them sitting opposite me in the train, or standing, arms raised, clutching the large rings that dangle from the ceiling. I was pleased with the change, and the train glided swiftly and violently through the dark cylindre hewn in the belly of the earth.
Besides Nasser and Sadat, we passed Saad Zaghloul, Mubarak and Orabi one by one. The history of Egypt's great leaders was revived and I thought of those men, who never dreamed that their names would be given to stations on Cairo's underground network, where millions of their compatriots go to and fro day and night. I wondered when there would be stations named in honour of Abdel-Wahab, Umm Kulthoum, Abduh El-Hamouli, Sayed Darwish, Saleh Abdel-Hayy, Farid El-Atrash, Abdel-Halim Hafez, Mohamed Fawzi, Leila Murad, Naguib Mahfouz, Tewfik El-Hakim or Taha Hussein.
The sketches remained unfinished as the scenes changed with dizzying rapidity. The passengers were engaged in a constant, intense battle: the faces changed, but the crowds pressed on relentlessly, coming, going, rising, descending at every station. Passengers who got on or off at Mubarak Station were mostly heading to or coming from the Ramses railway station. They came from rural areas, or were teachers working in remote villages, but all were in a great rush to catch another train to Banha or Zaqaziq. At Shubra Al-Kheima, I noticed a marked increase in the number of young female university students, most of them veiled. They sat opposite me, their books held tightly against their chests as they watched in silent amusement. One talked to me aggressively, with mocking, mischievous glances; another turned her back on me as though art was a sin.
Numerous passengers broke the silence imposed by the unearthly wail of the train and voiced their comments. One of them suddenly remembered that he had seen me on television last Ramadan. A young woman said "I know, that's El-Seguini," but another quickly dismissed her remark, asserting that I was Beethoven "because his hair is long". I was pleased with the two comments, and both had a positive impact on my drawings on that train trip.
After several stations, from Ataba to Mar Girgis, then Sayeda Zeinab to Hadayeq El-Maadi, my work improved significantly. With the constant change in directions, I became totally disoriented. I felt I was drifting aimlessly underground. My pad was filled with rapid sketches, which needed further work in terms of artistic technique, study and contemplation within the confines of my atelier.
Suddenly, I discovered that I had misplaced my ticket, and decided to act as I normally do in such situation on the Paris metro: simply to exit at any station. The lengthy journey had rendered me somewhat claustrophobic, and the crowd was pressing in on all sides, as though I had been put there to keep them entertained.
My ticket problem proved a real bother at the gate. I pushed the turnstile with all my strength, but the bars would not allow me to slip out. The gate refused to open, screeching in scandalised protest, and I stood, trapped inside, barred from my freedom. The guard who had been keeping watch from a distance suddenly materialised beside me. He had the stern look of someone about to execute a particularly harsh sentence on a villain caught in the act. I reacted to his anger with patience and humour, and eventually something like a smile came to his lips. I explained to him that I did not break the law deliberately, and promised to buy a new ticket if he released me.
At last I was out, and could breathe freely. But there, in front of me, was another subject I could not forsake. A woman was moving towards the gate, with a pan of stuffed vegetables on her head. She made two acrobatic movements, the first to keep the pan balanced on her head, and the other a graceful movement by which she slipped the ticket into the slot in the turnstile. To register all the movements, I had to sit on the landing, with an old newspaper spread beneath me. As I sat absorbed in my work, a passenger rushed up, snatched my hand and pressed it warmly, forcing me to rise to my feet. But when I sank back onto the step, he began to speak, determined to disrupt my train of thought with his kindness: "What a surprise, the artist is here! What modesty and simplicity! But you must not sit like this on the station platform! Come, let me invite you to a café or a restaurant -- a place suitable to your position!"
