I thank Al Ahram
for its campaign against ugliness that muslim brotherhood spread on walls and
smeared with black, that looks like their black consciences, seats in parks and
waiting places of public transport buses… they wrote words the least to
describe with is that they represent disobedience to God who said “And We have
certainly honored the children of Adam” while they humiliate the human and
attack his honor… atop of this is the national honor that is not less sacred
than the family honor if not way exceeding it.
I wished if Al
Ahram can continue its campaign, not only to remove ugliness and muslim
brotherhood pollution, but also to exceed this to face all aspects of urban
ugliness in our beloved Egypt… specially in the historic neighborhoods of its
big and medium cities… there are even some villages – they are in hundreds – that
include architectural historic sights.
In my opinion, such
campaigns concerned with common sense, conscience and man’s relation to the
environment surrounding him have become mandatory after the culture of ugliness
– if we can say – has spread in every field… and in such regard, those who possess
wealth and education have passed all limits more than common people who barely
sustain themselves… moreover, one sees those poor people inhabiting graveyards
and lanes – trying to improve their environment by planting a Convolvulus tree or
castorbean, or filling clay pots with cactus and brushing the land and
springing it with water before they lay their mat down to sit on.
As to those
supposedly wealthy and educated, one finds some of them inhabiting luxurious
houses containing million-worth expensive furniture while the door entrance and
stairs before their houses are filthy dirty and they often abstain from paying
their share in maintenance and cleaning dues.
Fighting ugliness
does not necessitate raising the economic standard of living for people as many
– as I just said – are rich in money but poor in sense… such fighting starts
from the family then education stages… also media – specially the visual one –
has an important role to play in such regard.
We will not be
able to overcome this tough era of Mubarak and musilm brotherhood unless we
have a vision for comprehensive renaissance where sense and conscience are the
most important factors… then once the system of aesthetic values is
established, it will be easier to deliver such system to the eyes, ears and
minds on the individual level and to all sectors of the society on the national
level… we were astonished and had enough of what muslim brotherhood did and
still do of ugly pollution as I mentioned… however, I believe there is
something more serious than those black writings… black in both look and
meaning.
I here mean what
muslim brotherhood students did in the Egyptian universities as they not only
wrote their obscene words but also exceeded this into a series of actions that
reveal how ugliness is deep rooted in their very social, psychological and
mental composition… for they first brutally assaulted their colleagues and professors…
it even happened that some female students wearing Hijab and Niqab gathered in
front of the home residence of their dean and cursed her and her family with
the worst and most obscene words… then they exceeded this into burning green
trees and damaging lighting poles… they even went on smashing cars of people
inhabiting the nearby streets and wrote their obscene words on buildings’
entrances.
This is the real
ugliness… you can imagine how a human – any human – can do such thing as
setting fire in a beautiful green tree… adding to this that this so-called
human claims that he represents religion… we do have a highly important social,
conscience, cultural and civilization mission that requires people of knowledge
and experience to sit to plan how to eradicate such ugliness, in culture, style
and behavior… also how to replace such ugliness with aesthetic sense.
We lived with
innate artists in our old villages… we used to see them drawing primitive
shapes over the entrances of homes after builders had finished their work that
contained simple beautiful shapes by laying the bricks in courses in certain
forms… we also lived with those who weaved palm trees’ foliage into making beautiful
baskets of many kinds and shapes… we also lived with those whose job was to
shave for animals… those barbers had their own taste in shaving the camels’
tail and back; meaning the area extending from the end of the back hump until
above the two thighs… one can see them drawing triangles, circles, stars and
other shapes on the camels’ skin using their artistic shaving… the same applied
to donkeys and other draft domesticated animals… in our villages, trees were
almost sacred; whether the one standing in front of the house or the other one
erecting on top of the field.
We had
conciliation with our environment… anyone of us – those who lived their
childhood and adolescence in such atmosphere – still yearns to see a willow
tree dropping its leaves over the water stream and to taste a sycamore fig that
was ripened by getting cut as its scent and taste were too beautiful to
describe…
I believe it is
not bad to go a little bit astray and say that in our villages, we used to
notice this thing of covering unripe fruits, after they reap them and put them
in flat baskets made of dry branches of pomegranate, with cudweeds’ branches that
grow naturally at the banks of water canals… fruits tended to perfectly ripen
in shape and taste… later we knew that there is an aromatic oil that emanates
from cudweeds on those fruits and that turns sugar inside them from Fructose
into Glucose or the opposite… I do not remember.
Ugliness had no
way to our composition until those creatures that forbid singing, drawing,
photographing and sculpture existed and spread… those creatures that find guilt
in expressing the feelings no matter the form such expression takes… those ugly
creatures with their out-of-gluttony obese bodies and shaggy beards
Being ugly is
inseparable of other horrible characters… as the one who sneaks out in the dead
of night to smear all surfaces with black writing obscene words is the same
thief attacking people’s properties and honor or he would not have waited until
it is dark to do such awful deed… also the abnormal one who burns the green
tree is the same person who finds no shame in assaulting his professors… etc.
Al Ahram campaign
against ugliness has to continue… moreover, it has to extend and act on broader
and deeper levels hoping we can bring back the noble beautiful face of our
beloved Egypt.
Translated into
English by: Dalia Elnaggar
This article was
published in Al Ahram newspaper on January 16, 2014.
To see the original
article, go to:
#alahram
#ahmed_elgammal #Egypt #muslim_brotherhood #ugliness
