Plain Talk
By
Mursi Saad El-Din
This is not an obituary of Hosny Guindy; it is an appraisal of his life and work, both of which I claim to have observed and participated in. Hosny and his family, Moushira and Yasmeen, live in the same block of flats we do. They were close friends of my son, his wife and daughter Menna. Hence, we also became friends by proxy as it were.
Hosny Guindy had two battles to fight during his lifetime, and he fought in both with gusto and perseverance: the battle of illness and the battle of work. In the former he tried to stem the creeping ailment, he bore it stoically and gallantly. How many a crisis he had to fight against. And with tenacity and will power he managed to pull through and come out of them, somewhat enfeebled, but still ticking with life.
But eventually the frail body became even frailer and was drained of its stamina; its resistance waned and finally he succumbed and fell like a soldier in a battle field. He lost the battle for his life.
But there was the other battle which Hosny won with flying colours. It was the battle of the Weekly, his baby. The Weekly was his creation which he watched grow up day after day, year after year. He tended it like a horticulturist observing the rose tree, whose seeds he had sown, flower and branch out, producing roses of different colours. That was a noble battle which Hosny won against all odds. And I feel proud that I was with him from the start. I remember when he, with one or two people, including Samir Sobhi, one of the greatest lay-out editors, began to plan for this new venture. I remember how, under Hosny's leadership, we began to put the mosaics together; here the local page, the foreign section, culture and sports, tourism and heritage. It was like stitching a multi-colour eiderdown.
When we first started, we had two offices, one on the fourth floor which, as Ahram's foreign desk editor, Hosny shared with a colleague, and another on the seventh floor where I was squeezed in with a number of young, freshly graduated youngsters, mostly women. It seems that in Egypt women are more interested in and prone to qualifying in mass media.
The challenge was great and the selection of the staff was far from being an easy task. We were looking for young people who combined a fair knowledge of English and a journalistic flair. At first we made use of translators, then under the guidance of Hosny, a group of efficient journalists emerged, Amira, Omayma, Reem, Nevine, Rehab, Shereen and others. Hosny created a school of journalism without an equal. The Weekly was the first to change modernisation from a motto to reality. All the young people around me use their computers, some even their own laptops. The offices of the Weekly are a feast for the eye.
Al-Ahram Weekly is more than a successful newspaper. It is an institution, a solid memorial to a great fighter who was able to make a dream come true. I feel, as I am sure many of my colleagues do, pride in being witness, indeed a participant in the realisation of that dream. But there was yet another dream that Hosny nurtured and which we often discussed. He wanted the Weekly to become a daily. I believe that we, his colleagues and staff, should endeavour to do so. I know that he would like us to undertake this task.
Now Hosny, the creator and bulwark of the Weekly, is gone. We shall miss him dearly. The Weekly will not be the same without him. I personally have lost a great friend who valued friendship. When his secretary Nora was emptying his drawers she came across two photographs. Crying, she handed them to me; they were photos of my son, his friend, who had died over four years ago. I held them and cried.
