Freedom

My coordination came through from the Egyptians! Ilhammmmmdulillah! So I will be picked up by a driver at 4am and I'm hoping for an uneventful trip back to Gaza, at long last.

I had been told many times to visit Al-Hurriya (Freedom) café in the downtown Bab-al-Luk neighbourhood. It was a Communist hangout in the 1960s and remains a meeting place for the writers and intellectuals of Cairo. They serve bottles of Stella, and sometimes Heineken, and a guy walks around selling packets of crisps for much-needed soakage.

I decided, on what would hopefully be my last night in Cairo, to meet my friend Karl from Malta, who works with Oxfam in Gaza and does a stellar job. He, too, stayed in Gaza during the last war and did excellent advocacy work. He is currently spending a month working in Cairo.

It was great to catch up and have a few beers together in a cool place. Crowded and smoky, with boarded up windows, it looks like not much work has been done to the place since the '60s. The place has character!

I got home after 1am, tipsily packed my bags, and waited for my driver to arrive . . .