Sittings are many… they differ according to the
seating you sit on and the kind of people who sit with you.
I have tried sitting over dust, which in turn has many
levels… as there is the sitting over a pile of land rubbles – or Radm in
Arabic – usually piled on top of the field – meaning at the beginning and
entrance to the field – where land is being leveled by al-Qassabiya or
land leveler… it is a known tool used in agriculture that has a box opened from
the front, two long arms caught by the peasant, and two iron rings on the sides
to attach “as-Salb” or the robes tying the cattle pulling al-Qassabiya…
the peasant has to be clever and have an eye sensitive to noticing the
different land levels as he scrapes centimeters from the high-level land to
fill the low-level one in order to level the surface evenly.
Sometimes, the peasant needs part of this land rubbles
or Radm to place it under the feet of his cattle, mix it with the dung,
and turn it into a very fertile home-made manure… or to turn it into bricks
after blending it with the mélange of dung and beans’ hey and pouring it in moulds,
then drying and turning it on the other side… then aligning it in the ovens
where it is being burnt using coal that produces a roaring fire to the extent
that the bricks sometimes melt.
The sitting over land rubbles usually takes place in
the time before sunset with fire on the side crackling in the direction of the
air flow… so that we can sit over the wind breeze; meaning the breeze passes by
us first while we are not bothered by the smoke of the fire… over this fire,
tea is cooked or corncobs are grilled… then talking starts and later takes a
higher tone so that those sitting can hear each other.
There is also that sitting over the dirty dust… it is
the dark dust of the road that sometimes is damp with humidity of unknown-source…
as this humidity could be due to the remains of morning dew… or to sprinkling
clean water to calm the haze of dust… or perhaps due to dirty water sloshed
from a bucket removing water from a basin of sewage… and maybe it is due to recurring
urination of animals passing by… such sitting takes place either in front of the
door of an agricultural cooperative, clinical unit, the house of the village
mayor, or near the graveyard waiting for employees, doctors, a guard, or for
burying the deceased.
From this sitting over the dust that I tried its two
kinds to the other comfortable one over comfy armchairs of palaces… whether
presidential or royal ones… also armchairs of hotels… where one slumps in the
armchair to the extent that his hand cannot reach out to the table to pick the
tea, coffee, desserts, or fruits… and one has to seat himself in a way that
enables his buttocks to rest over the edge of the armchair.
I tried this kind of sitting too and made some
mistakes… most important of them is not paying attention to the cigar or
cigarette ash falling over the trousers and which could be mixed with fire
while my highness is sitting legs crossed… and even if I decided to ignore the
fire that penetrated the outer and inner layers of the cloth, it burns the skin
and perhaps in sensitive parts of the body for the man to snap suddenly as if stung
by a scorpion.
In such funny painful regard, I remember that bitterly
cold morning when I came from Tanta on train, bus, and then on foot… I did not
notice that my shoes were smeared with some soft mud… I had an appointment with
Mr. Mohammed Hassanien Heikal, may he rest in peace, and almost arrived in time
at his house
I sat over the third kind; that is the classy chair
that looks like the strong dining ones… Mr. Heikal used to prefer sitting
behind his desk with the guest sitting in front of him on the other side of the
desk… I noticed that he perceived what lay over my shoes but did not give a
comment until the moment came… I lit up a cigarette – as I have not learnt how
to smoke a cigar yet and could not afford it – and he noticed that I did not
drop the ashes in the crystal ashtray put over the desk… he decisively asked: “are
you dropping something on the carpet?”... I immediately answered: “no… nothing”…
and continued “and even if something dropped, it is ash”… He went on in his decisive
way and said: “do you know what kind of carpet this one is?”… I answered in my
own way – that sometimes is silly – “it looks like the old Kilim my mother used
to put under the chicken in winter”… at this point, Mr. Heikal could not put up
with me any longer or you can say he did not have patience like what happened between
Moses and al-Khidr… he went describing the carpet; its type, age, and
value… then he added: “isn’t it enough that you have mud over your shoes”.
Then our sitting experienced a funnier situation when
he invited me to go out the room to the balcony connected to it as we started
talking about a specific political subject… he guided me to enter the balcony… I
threw myself into the first armchair when I stood up terrified while he was
laughing and saying in a commanding way: relax, Baraka… I did not notice that
there was a bitch of a breed unknown to me sleeping over the armchair… she was
wearing a jacket perhaps made of chamois wrapping around her back to protect
her from cold… and when I sat over her, she panicked, howled, and resisted… Mr.
Heikal said: “do not panic… this is Baraka”… due to my humble upbringing, I said:
“how lucky she is… she wears what I will never wear”.
There is also that sitting over “al-Bursh”;
that is the prison drugget weaved from rough leaves of red fiber with the tea
being cooked over the “taw-taw”… there is also the sitting over Hasira
that could be small for praying… or big to cover the floor of the room… and if
it was bigger, its name changes to Qeyaas with its tips colored with patterns
made out of the imagination of al-Hosari or the man who made this Hasira…
those patterns used to take the form of neighboring triangles or paintings of
camels or plants… and if this Hasira is rectangular with a width not
exceeding a meter and length of about two and a half meters, then it is called Shuqqa…
such kind of Hasira is placed over the entrance of countryside houses,
over Dekka, or over our Baladi settee.
I am sure that those who tried these types of sittings
know that each one of them has its own nature and parties… of peasants and workers…
craftsmen, semi-educated… educated… sick people… Beks, Pashas, ministers, and
rulers as well… not to mention that every sitting has its protocol if one may
say… as first you have to be good at sitting cross-legged and residing over
them bearing some difficulty so that you do not look as if you are haughty…
this is regarding sitting over dust, Hasira, and al-Bursh.
As to sittings in comfortable armchairs, you have to learn
to wait until you are guided to the place suitable for you to sit as there are
some high profile people who have a specific place for them either because of
security issues or because it is nearer to the phones or door to facilitate the
task of the one who enters to whisper in their ears… and in many times, sitting
is arranged according to how important the person is… as there is the one
sitting to the right or to the left of the main character of the sitting… and
that is why it is much better when a card holding the name of the one that
should occupy this chair is put in front of it.
Now we come to the question asking: Why have we been
talking about sitting, its types, and levels?... actually, I wanted to make it
to the account telling the story of a man sitting, stretching his legs and leaning
back to a pillar and when the ruler entered, this man did not sit straight and
went on teaching his lecture… the ruler went mad and wanted to avenge this man…
and so he sent someone with a pouch full of money to this man… the man said: “go
back to you master and tell him that the one who stretches his legs does not
stretch his hand to beg… now I say, you Egyptian, sit and stretch your legs as
long as your law in life to sustain yourself and maintain your dignity is to
work… my dear apologies to my friend Dr. Mohammed Abo el-Ghar.
Translated into English by: Dalia Elnaggar
This article was published in
Almasry alyoum newspaper on September 27, 2017.
To see the original article,
go to:
#almasry_alyoum #ahmed_elgammal
#Egypt
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