To tell the story of Egyptians with humanity

I'll be honest: sometimes I wonder why I'm a journalist in Egypt.

Cairo is a dirty, polluted, crowded city. The streets are littered with trash; sand incessantly finds its way into my living room; my family is six timezones away. Everyone is always late, it's impossible to get sources to answer their phones, and Tweeps are more reliable fact checkers than state media.

Last night, for the first time in a long time, I was reminded why I bother: it's because I want to tell the story of the Egyptians. It's because of the never-ending Egyptian humor; the smiles in the face of poverty; the perseverance in the face of persecution. It's because of the slow, steady determination that has kept Egyptians and the Egyptian identity intact over millennia, through invasion, occupation, and oppression.

It's because Egyptians inspire me.

Last night BBC correspondent Lyse Doucet spoke at a gathering of Egyptian and American journalists in Cairo. Her frank speech moved me - and others - nearly to tears. She spoke of objectivity; of obligation; of what it means to be a journalist in a conflict zone. She reminded me why I am a journalist, here and now, and why I care about reporting on Egypt.

"When you cover a happy story, cover it with joy," she said. "When you cover a sad story, cover it with compassion."

To be objective does not mean to be heartless. A good journalist must write with humanity.

I've often wondered what, exactly, is my role - as a foreigner and as a journalist - in Egypt. Both foreigners and Egyptians have told me I don't belong here, and both foreigners and Egyptians have told me I tell the story better than anyone else. I've written before about the line between professionalism and humanity, and that's something that comes to mind again and again.

Before Egypt's January uprising, as a foreigner, I was looked upon with suspicion. As a foreigner, I was thanked profusely. After Egypt's January uprising, as a foreigner, I am looked upon with suspicion. As a foreigner, I am thanked profusely.

It's a bit strange sometimes.

As a journalist, I am obligated to tell the truth as I see it at the time. I am obligated to tell both sides of the story. I am obligated to be objective.

But on January 26, 2011 I watched as a group of young men - unarmed, with their hands in the air as they chanted peaceful, peaceful - were without warning attacked with tear gas, tasers, sticks, and firearms by both uniformed and plainclothes police in the streets of downtown Cairo.

What is the other side of that story?

I don't know.

So what can I do, as a foreign journalist in Egypt? I can write. I can tell the truth, and I can tell it with joy and compassion, which so often seems to be lacking from mainstream media. I can tell the stories of a people and a place that have become dear to my heart, and I can do it in a way many other journalists either cannot or will not.

I've been told I have a way with words. I've been told I can draw people into my writing. I can use that way with words, coupled with common sense and a solid understanding of Egypt's politics and people, and I can tell the story of Egyptians.

That's why I'm a journalist in Egypt.

Debating Journalism: Humanity vs. Professionalism

Perched on a rock by the edge of a cliff-side village at sunset, I’m surrounded by a curious group of children. Ranging from about five to nine years of age, they eagerly watch over my shoulder, fascinated by the combination of foreigner, computer, and English. One notices my camera and soon there is a chorus of “Soureeni! Soureeni!” Take a picture of me.

The adults offer to shoo them away, but I don’t mind.

We’re sitting on the edge of the village as an orange and pink sunset colors the sky over the valley below us. Olive trees cover the hillsides, and one-lane roads weave into valleys and over ridges. Clouds move slowly in a heavy sky as energetic 5-year-old Assad is carried off by a smiling father. Within moments he’s back, jumping and laughing and making faces in his sandals and red sweats.

“Mish ‘arfa,” I don’t know, I tell him, and he bursts into laughter before resuming his rapid-fire speech in Arabic.

It’s a comforting way to end a difficult afternoon, with smiles and laughter all around as children and youth and their older counterparts gather to talk with their “international” visitors.

Just a few hours ago I sat down with two young men from this small community in northern Palestine to interview them for a story. As we talked about the changes the village has seen since the death of a 16-year-old member of the community, I discovered both young men are cousins of the boy. Slowly, our conversation shifted as the young men began to talk about their cousin.

Mohamed was shot by IDF soldiers in March 2010 as he ran to help another friend who had been shot. Neither boy had participated in the day’s peaceful demonstration against the neighboring Israeli settlement; neither was politically inclined. They were in the wrong place at the wrong time. The soldiers used live ammunition. Crowd-controlling rubber bullets were absent. The deaths were a shock to the community of 800.

As I listened to Mohamed’s cousins and our conversation drifted far from the limits of my story, the boundary between professionalism and humanity shifted, blurred – I knew the intimate testimony would remain between us. It would never be found in an article.

It is not the first time I’ve faced a situation where the line between journalism and friendship blurs. One of the challenges of being a journalist is keeping perspective and humanity at the same time, and it is not a simple challenge.

Humanity is vital. Personal connections are what make stories real – what can bring a tear to a stranger or solidarity from a reader time zones away. At the same time, one faces the dilemma of losing sight of the end goal. An article which captures pain and emotion without describing it as such is that much more powerful for doing so.

The line between journalism and friendship or between professionalism and humanity is not immovable. It shifts. At times it may not even exist. Yet while some rapport between interviewer and interviewee is vital, crossing the invisible line between them is dangerous to both.

Perhaps those with a strong sense of empathy are not meant for what can be a cut-throat profession. Empathy does not lend to cold analysis, which so often seems to be praised. Yet, is not the absence of humanity more dangerous than the alternative?

My run-in with Egyptian state security

Today I witnessed a fraction of what Egyptian activists face.

Today is the second anniversary of the April 6, 2008 protests, which were the first simultaneous nation-wide protests in Egypt. The 6 April Youth, who became known after the protests, planned another strike for today. It was supposed to be a peaceful protest march from Tahrir Square to the Egyptian Parliament a few blocks away.

The Government was ready and in no mood to deal with protesters.

Another American journalist and I met at Ayman Nour's apartment in Zamalek at 10am. As we prepared to head downtown, one of Nour's people gave us a few suggestions: don't wear gold jewelry, and memorize someone's number in case you are arrested and they confiscate your phone. I rolled up my sleeve and wrote a few numbers - without names - on my arm. My friend did the same. My roommate and her roommate - non-political friends - and my editor.

Police standing outside the Journalists Syndicate in downtown Cairo

As our taxi neared Talat Harb street, the government's preparations were obvious. Uniformed police lined the streets. Large green military trucks were parked end to end on side streets, as many as eight in one place, each full of soldiers. The atmosphere was already tense.

Our initial destination point was the al-Ghad party headquarters on Talat Harb street. Before going to the headquarters, however, my companions and I decided to take a look at what was happening in Tahrir.

At around 11am we were walking from Talat Harb through Tahrir Square in downtown Cairo (where the Egyptian Museum and the American University are located). My friend and I stayed a dozen meters in front of our al-Ghad friends, figuring we would have more freedom to snap pictures as 'tourists' if we weren't associated with them.

As it turns out, that wasn't really the case.

I snapped a few pictures of the police lining Tahrir as we entered the square and then turned my camera off. My friend panned her camera around the square and toward the police. Suddenly, three angry men were coming straight toward us. It was immediately clear that these were plain-clothes security, and they were not happy.

Riot police in Tahrir Square

"Give me your camera," said the man in charge. "Give it to me. Let me see." He roughly grabbed my friend's camera, trying to pull it away from her.

"You can't do that!" She said, pulling away from him.

In the few seconds the exchange took, we were surrounded by plain-clothes security. One grabbed my arm, attempting to pull me away from my friend, while the first attempted to pull her camera away again. She held onto her camera and I held on to her, and we tried to walk away. Security blocked our path. "I'm an American citizen! You can't do this to me!" my friend shouted. The security pressed in closer. "Somebody help me! I'm an American citizen!" We were drawing looks from passerby. One of the security men waved his arm and we were completely encircled.

After a few intense minutes of arguing, we were ushered against the wall of the building behind us (Hardees). We were less conspicuous there, but we were still making a scene and the police were not pleased.

They also didn't believe a word that came out of my friend's mouth. They weren't terribly interested in me, possibly because they hadn't seen me taking pictures, but they interrogated my friend endlessly. Where are you from? What is your job? Why are you here? They didn't believe her story - that she was a student and happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time (later, when we saw the same security men in a coffee shop around the corner, the head man said flatly to my friend: "You are a liar").

Finally a female security officer in uniform came over (this is the first time female officers have been deployed during a protest, and later in the day they proved just as brutal as the men). She went through our bags piece by piece. The first man had already taken a copy of my friend's passport (which we never saw again), but I had no identification on me. Looking back, I'm glad - they don't know who I am.

The whole time, my friend had been on the phone with our al-Ghad friends and others, letting them know that while we were being detained, we would be okay. Whatever happened, we did not want our al-Ghad friends to show up: if they did, our story about being in the wrong place at the wrong time would be shot. As it was, the officers were demanding to know who we were on the phone with. "Who is Badawy?" they demanded.

After another ten minutes or so, another plain-clothes officer arrived. He was better dressed and clearly had more authority than the officers who had been dealing with us so far. He was smiling as he ambled over.

"What is the problem?" he asked.

"I've been all over the world, and I've never had problems with the police!" fumed my friend.

"You still don't have trouble with the police," said the man, still smiling amiably. At this point I was shaking, half from nerves and half on purpose. He looked directly at me. "Why are you frightened?" he asked.

Eventually he 'explained' to us that there were demonstrations, and it was a security matter that we weren't allowed to take pictures. After a few more minutes of this back-and-forth, someone said, "okay okay, come this way." We were ushered around the corner onto another street, and when we looked behind us we realized we were no longer being accompanied by security. We were free to go, it seemed.

Needless to say, my friend and I were a bit shaken up. Our encounter with the police had been pretty intense.

What we faced was only a small taste of what Egyptian activists face: as Americans, the regime is less likely to physically harass us.

Even so, we knew going back to the protest was going to be a bad idea. We finally made the decision not to go back into Tahrir. We considered moving to the al-Ghad headquarters, but my friend had a bad feeling about it, and luckily we went with her gut: around the time we would have arrived, there was a confrontation with state security outside the headquarters when Ayman Nour and his supporters attempted to leave the building. They were eventually forced back inside and the door was barricaded for over three hours, with no one allowed out. Ayman Nour's eldest son was briefly detained by security, and the scratches and bruises on his neck are a testament to the way he was manhandled by the plain-clothes officers.

Noor Ayman Nour, eldest son of Ayman Nour, arrested near Talat Harb.
Photo by Al-Jazeera.

It's too soon to really say if the day was successful or not, but... here are some thoughts and facts:

• Over 80 persons were arrested and moved to the police station in Nasr City.
• There were violent confrontations between police and protesters in Tahrir and also outside the parliament; there were even female police beating female protesters, and two women sustained broken arms.
• More than 70 people were locked inside al-Ghad headquarters;
• Violent clashes occurred in Alexandria;
• Mobile phones and gold jewelry were confiscated by security around the parliament;
• ElBaradei was completely absent from the scene, and there is a possibility that this will hurt his reputation here. Already there has been much criticism on both Facebook and Twitter.

I'll get back to you on some of this soon... there's so much I want to say, I don't really know where to begin.