The Australian Occupation(?)

Al-Sayyid Ahmad Abd al-Jawad is a powerful merchant both feared and loved (mostly feared) by his family, but loved, respected, and highly sought after by fellow merchants, government officials, attorneys, and women of Cairo. Amina, Ahmad’s wife, learned early on in their marriage to fear her husband:

It had occurred to her once, during the first year she lived with him, to venture a polite objection to his repeated nights out. His response had been to seize her by the ears and tell her peremptorily in a loud voice, “I’m a man. I’m the one who commands and forbids. I will not accept any criticism of my behavior. All I ask of you is to obey me. Don’t force me to discipline you.”

She learned from this, and from the other lessons that followed, to adapts to everything…in order to escape the glare of his wrathful eye.” (4)

Kamal’s harmless, childish pranks must be hidden from his father, and even Yasin, the eldest, who’s body “resembled his father’s in size and bulk” (16) feared Ahmad as well.

            Ahmad is as loved by those who do not have to endure his tyranny as he is feared by those who do, and is even reprimanded by friends for missing a party because “they had not found the same pleasure in drinking that they did with him. Their party, as they put it, lacked its soul” (83). Despite being either loved or feared (and sometimes both) by, seemingly, all of Cairo, Ahmad has an almost unavoidable adversary: The Australian army. What angered him the most, sadly, was that their “tyranny separated him from the Ezbekiya Garden entertainment district, which he had abandoned in defeat…He could  not stand to expose himself to soldiers who openly plundered people of their possessions and took pleasure in abusing and insulting them without restraint” (12).

            Yasin, who takes after his father in his lust for women, is also forced to abandon the “festivities” of the Ezbekiya entertainment district: “Then the Australians appeared on the field, and Yasin had been obliged to forsake his place of amusement to escape their brutality” (72). He too laments his circumstances: “God curse the Australians! Where are you, Ezbekiya, for me to disperse my care and sorrow in you and draw a little patience from you?” (75).

            Besides interrupting—or only slightly hindering—nights of debauchery and infidelity, the Australian occupation seems to be of little consequence to the people of Cairo. The merchants, thus far, remain unharmed, as do the families and regular townspeople, seemingly, so long as they avoid the entertainment district. I feel like I keep waiting for the Australians to exhibit signs of widespread tyranny, but all Ahmad and Yasin can complain about is the army getting in the way of their escapades. Is Mahfouz simply introducing sporadic moments of tyranny to later fully release the Australians on the people of Cairo, or is this as far as it goes? And if this is “as far as it goes,” then what is Mahfouz saying about Australia’s occupation of Egypt during this time? That their presence was a minor annoyance? That is was necessary because it was a time of war? I feel like I have more questions than answers at this point, but hope to see the actual effects of an occupation, rather than the minor inconvenience the Australians pose to wanton men.