Adrift on the Nile

As the discussion proceeds, the world seems more and more bizarre. Cares and lazy people and clichés. The drugged debate with reddened eyes. The moon has completely disappeared, but the surface of the water glitters as if it were an unfamiliar, smiling, happy face. What does the woman want? What do the smokers want? They say leisure, and she says addiction. It is extraordinary that the boat does not shake with this debate, but only rocks now under footsteps on the gangway. Amm Abduh came, and took the pipe away to change the water. He brought it back and left again. Anis looked at the glitter of the Nile and smiled. He became aware of Samara's voice calling him--and looked over at her, his hands still busy with the water pipe.

"I would like to hear _your_ opinion," she said.

"Miss," he said simply, "get married."

Everybody laughed. "She prefers the role of preacher," said Ragab.

But she was determined not to be embarrassed, and continued with her eyes to urge Anis to speak. But he looked away from her, down at his work. Why do one and one make two?

An annoying woman. Bursting in on us with life's banalities. What does she want? And how can we ever get high with this battle raging all the time!

When she despaired of him, she turned to Mustafa. "I accept that you take your problems seriously in your daily lives--but what about public life?"

"Do you mean national politics?"

"_And_ foreign policy!" she replied.

"And international affairs as well, why not!" said Khalid sarcastically.

She smiled. "And that as well."

"And we must not neglect the politics of the universe either," added Mustafa.

"I see that there are more problems than we imagined!" she said, laughing.

"Now we begin to understand each other," Mustafa went on. "You regret the time we waste in evenings like this one. You consider that it is an escape from our real responsibilities. That were it not for this, we would come up with solutions for the problems of the Arab world and the planet as a whole and the universe as well . . ."

They laughed again. They told Anis that he was the real reason for the sufferings of the world, for the unsolved mysteries of the universe. Mustafa suggested that they throw the water pipe into the Nile, and then divide the work among them. Khalid would concern himself with national policy, and Ali with international affairs, and Mustafa himself with solving the more cosmic difficulties. How would they start? How would they organize themselves? How would they realize socialist ideals on a national democratic basis, without betraying these ideals or oppressing the people? How, after that, would they find a cure for world problems like war and racial discrimination? As for Mustafa, they had to decide whether he would begin by studying science and philosophy or whether he would content himself with meditation, waiting for the ray of light! They also gave careful attention to the challenging obstacles that lay in their path, the dangers awaiting them. Confiscation of personal assets. Imprisonment. Execution. . . .

And then someone complained: "Amazing, how quickly the time has passed . . ."

The moon had disappeared completely, and on the water there remained only a small scrap of the glittering carpet of light. The water pipe had not ceased in its rounds, and neither had Samara stopped laughing.

Thoughts clashed in Anis' head. Thoughts of the first battles of Islam, of the Crusades, of the courts of the Inquisition. The deaths of great lovers and philosophers, the bloody conflicts between Catholics and Protestants, the age of the early Christian martyrs. The founding fathers' voyage to America, the death of Adila and Haniya, his dealings with the street girls; and the whale that had saved Jonah, and Amm Abduh's job, divided as it was between prayer leading and pimping. The silence of the last watch of the night, which he could never describe; and the fleeting, phosphorescent thoughts that glowed for an instant before vanishing forever.

He became aware of Samara's voice; she was asking everyone what they were like in their youth, at the beginning of their lives.

They laughed. Why do they laugh? It is as if their lives had no beginning. Just distant, Stone Age memories. The village, and then the single room and resolution; resolution in the village and the single room. When the moon rose and set without signaling the end of anything.

"When I was a boy," said Khalid, "there was no question without an answer. The world did not go around, and hope stretched out into the future for a hundred million light years."

Ali said: "I remember wondering once why our fear of death hindered our eternal happiness."

"And one day," added Mustafa, "Anis and I nearly died in a revolutionary demonstration!"