AS A CHILD GROWING UP IN EGYPT, I learned that politics could put you in jail, if not simply get you vanished away. I learned this early on from the way my parents, their friends and our relatives distinguished what could or couldn’t be said. If we broached a subject that was out of bounds, we were brought to silence by stern eye contact from an elder. Rumours were rife about what happened to a classmate’s father; we heard snippets of things but knew we could never ask outright. There were subjects never to be addressed.
Things didn’t change much, even as Egypt became more open in the early 2000s with the arrival of the internet and widespread access to mobile phones. The government had so successfully indoctrinated citizens – partly through patronage, partly through fear – that few dared to speak out, even if asked to. As a journalist working in the country from the age of 18, I was quick to learn the red lines, as we referred to them – the clear parameters of what could or could not be broached. Red lines were tiptoed toward and never crossed. But the Egyptian revolution of 2011 changed this in fundamental ways.
It was a surprise to everyone that the revolution unfurled with the speed and impact that it did, even though there were indications throughout 2010 that something in the political landscape and imagination was shifting – the result of a confluence of predicaments and events. In the span of six months, between the summer and winter of 2010, power cuts had become daily occurrences and the prices of basic commodities rocketed. People felt pressured by the economic difficulties of managing the basic needs of their everyday lives.
Adding to the backdrop of all this were protests raging in nearby Tunisia, which Egyptians watched closely via satellite television. The atmosphere in my home city of Cairo, and across many of the country’s 27 other governorates, was tense. You could feel it in the air.
In January 2011,
