This Vanity Fair article by Scott Anderson is one of the finest piece of reporting on Egypt I have ever read — the kind of article that makes you want to go out and shoot anyone driving a Jeep Cherokee. It lays bare everything that terrifies elite Egyptians or should be keeping them up at night.
(Thanks Josh).
Update: Well Matthew beat me to it on this one and has a different take. Such are the problems with intercontinental blogging.
I liked it too, Iss. I don’t agree that because an article’s “political” point is commonplace (or fatuous!) that this ruins it. True, it’s not new that life is hard for young men in North Africa; but knowing that doesn’t always have much force until you sense how it affects individual lives (and which I’ve always thought is the main point of journalists). I found enough arresting detail in this piece (some of it unexpected – I’d never heard of shamassa, for example) to come away with a richer picture. Sure there were stereotyped bits (my pet hate is the juxtaposing of some gloomy comment with an anachronistic “welcome to Egypt”) but to me, at any rate, they were blemishes rather than fundamental flaws.
I agree it is a good article.
it has a few mistakes, stuff that comes from being an outsider but you also need to be an outsider to be facinated about all the details, if I try to tell the same story I’d treat half of it as being too normal to warrant story telling.
bzapt. outside perspective is a good thing.
Knowing a few journalists who have worked in Egypt, I was surprised and impressed by how the writer got access to far flung bits of Sinai and interviews with families of men wanted in connection with attacks on tourists. I also can’t help wondering if he used a translator or speaks Arabic. It’s not that I’m doubting his work, but rather wondering why its not done more often if it is in fact possible. If this guy can fly in and do this story, what about the legions of journalists who call Cairo home? Any ideas?