War Midaq Alley
“woman in the clothes of a man” visits the café, she confronts him. When he dares call her a “fellow wife”, she punches and slaps him, drawing blood and nearly strangling him with his necktie. He flees, but all realize if he does not return, another will. The café returns to its usual atmosphere until Kirsha shouts that no woman will enslave him. Darwish speaks of the evil of “h-o-m-o-s-e-x-u-a-l-i-t-y”, and notes only descendants of Muhammad may enjoy true love.
Several characters help understand the Muslim understanding of marriage. God and his Prophet bless it and the desire for it is nothing to be ashamed of. Afify is fifty years old, ten years a widow, and ready to remarry. Umm Hamida, the matchmaker, arranges a betrothal to a thirty-year-old. Salim Alwan, a rich, middle-aged businessman, is both a workaholic and sexaholic whose daily lunch consists of husked green wheat mixed with pigeon meat and nutmeg, followed at two-hour intervals by tea. This ensures him two hours of sexual pleasure a night. His wife does not share his passion, so he fixes his eye on pretty, young Hamida. He is ready to take her as a lawful second wife—Islam requires only that a man have sufficient wealth to provide for both and treat both equally —but suffers a near-fatal heart attack before a betrothal can be arranged. After his recovery, Alwan resumes thinking about adding a second, more responsive wife. Hamida at this point has freed herself mentally and emotionally from her prior engagement to Abbas Hilu, whose kisses excite her but otherwise leaves her indifferent. She is happy to attract the attention of a handsome stranger and allows him to maneuver her into falling in love with him. He is, in fact, a pimp, and uses talk of love to turn her into the prostitute “Titi”. He refrains from taking her virginity because foreign clients will pay handsomely. Most of her colleagues experience self-loathing, but Hamida has no moral qualms about this new life, and positively enjoys the income and the empowering that solicitation brings.
War Midaq Alley is set in the closing month of World War II in a backwater area, far from any fighting and suffering. All of the characters who comment on the war find in a financial boon—even a gift of God—for their impoverished country. The British Army pays good wages to Egyptian civilian day laborers and circumstances on base make possible lucrative involvement in the black market. These workers wear nice clothing and accessories, eat meat (normally an unaffordable luxury), learn to enjoy wine (proscribed for Muslims), enjoy seeing films and partaking of other forms of entertainment they have never imagined. Likewise, Egyptian women drawn into the workforce as factory laborers experience a liberation that becomes the envy of other girls. Their prosperity and freedom are inspirational.
Egypt is de facto a British colony, but war sentiment as expressed by Kirsha, the alley’s most politically astute member, is pro-German. In part, this is because the war has brought prosperity to Egypt and Germany’s defeat would bring economic depression. In part, it is also admiration for the charismatic figure of Adolf Hitler. Kirsha thinks of him as “the world’s greatest bully”, and admires him precisely because he is cruel and barbaric. He does not, however, consider him and Nazism in terms of the Holocaust, as Western
