Khan Al-Khalili

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It was half past two in the afternoon on a September day in 1941, the exact time when civil servants left their government offices. Streams of them came pouring out of the ministry’s doors like a raging torrent. Their minds had long since become preoccupied with a combination of hunger and sheer boredom, and now they all scattered in different directions under the burning glare of the sun.

Ahmad Akif, whose job was at the Ministry of Works, was among them. At this time of day he usually made his way back to al-Sakakini, but today was different: for the first time he was heading toward al-Azhar. He had been living in al-Sakakini for a long time, stretching back many years, whole decades in fact. Those many years constituted a veritable storehouse of memories — memories of childhood, youth, adulthood, and then middle age. The incredible thing was that it had only taken the family just a few days to make up their minds to pack up and leave. They had all felt completely secure in their old house; they had never imagined leaving. But then during the short interval between one evening and noon the next day everyone had started yelling, “A pox on this awful quarter!” Fear and panic had taken over; there was no longer any point in trying to persuade scared folk to change their minds. The old house had soon become a memory of the past, and the new house in Khan al-Khalili was a reality from today and onward into the future. Well might Ahmad Akif quote the phrase, “Praise be to the One who changes things but who never changes Himself!”

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