Ahmed Nabil, documentary filmmaker, Alexandria, Egypt

"To access a memory one has to enter the past and activate it through the present. Then there will be no past, nor is the newly activated moment a present time. It is a threshold time lying in the middle of both; thus deep time (past present and future) can now be neglected".​

This is an excerpt of a text that was written by Ahmed Elghoneimy. Elghoneimy is a filmmaker and a close friend of mine. As he mentions, the main references for these very lines are two oeuvres. Henri Bergson's "Matter and Memory", and Jalal Toufic's "Âshûrâ': This Blood Spilled in My Veins". The full text can be read at hwp-everythingelse.com. Ahmed was generous enough to send me a draft of his text earlier. The impact of these lines is still vivid in my memory since the first time I read them. I found the nexus he made with Kiarostami's "Close-Up" charcter Hossain Sabzian very interesting. As the main motive of Sabzian to impersonate Mohsen Makhmalbaf was the fact that he was under the "spell" of his films. In other words, under the spell of his own memory about Makhmalbaf's films. “Tell him The Cyclist is a part of me". 

Dealing with the memory is always interesting for me. In this context, I would like to shed the light upon some feedback from two kind ladies. They have recently watched "17 Fouad Street" and were generous enough to write me some inspiring emails. Reading and rereading these emails gave me ideas about how we treat our memories. And how we get to believe that certain details really existed in the past. However, maybe they did not.

​The first one came from Madiha Doss. Doss is an Egyptian professor of linguistics. She watched the film online and then wrote me  back the following;

"I found it (a) very subtle picture of Alexandria, in which you avoided the most frequent cliché on this city which is nostalgia and especially nostalgia of things which are of pure imagination sometimes. Your film expresses a delicate sadness emanating from a series of exclusions: the exclusion of an aging Armenian, and his solitude as well as the social exclusion of aging women of the Alexandrian middle class."

The other feedback was that of Helen Garabedian Dodge, who stumbled upon the trailer and had doubts that this might be her father's shop;

"To whom it may concern. I believe it was my father, Wadie Garabedian, and his brother, Dikran, who first started with Elpar Shoes on Rue Fouad.  He started around 1949/50 and ended in 1961. From the outside the shop looks exactly like my father's shop, with the big windows and especially upstairs, all made of wood, where he and his brother and his only worker, Ahmad, worked to make shoes and belts.  My father did very well and was the personal shoe maker to Queen Nariman.  He would go to the palace with the forms or lasts of her feet to make the perfect hand made shoe for her.  I can't believe I am seeing the old shop, but I would love to be able to see the video.  Is there any way you could send me a link?".

I sent her a link to watch the film and I told her that I don't think that this is her father's shop. As I assume I know relatively well the history of "Edourad Chaussures". So she wrote back:

"My father's old shop was called Elpar shoes.  Do you happen to know if Elpar shoes is still there on Rue Fouad?  If it still exists, then obviously your shop is not what was once his.  If not, there is a very good chance.  Do you know the history of your shop?  My sister remember that the front door was on a different side.  Really, I was about fifteen when we left and don't remember that well, but memories do play tricks on us.  It seems so similar.  My sister also said that Atheneos was across the street?  Are you close to Rue Fouad and Rue Nebi Daniel?  No matter what, I think this is all very interesting and I wish you the very best."

I later encountered my Armenian Egyptian friend Gary Bohjelian, who has kindly clarified for me that "Elpar shoes" was actually another Armenian shoes vendor, three or four shops away from "Edourad Chaussures", on the same side of rue Fouad. He, however, confirmed that it was owned by the Armenian family Garabedian. So I got back to Helen with this piece of information and with some curiosity about her background and the history of her family. So she wrote me back the following charming text;

"Ya Ahmad Nabil, so, we left in 1961.  I used to go to the EGC which used to be the English Girls College and which became the El Nasr Girls College.  That way we could keep the same uniforms with the same initials on the pockets.  We lived within walking distance of my dad's shop, Elpar shoes. We lived in the Lebon Building on Rue Fouad, at the corner of Rue Fouad and Rue Sidi Metwali.   My father was Armenian, my mother was English and they met in Alexandria during the war as she was a nurse on the Queen Mary which was a troop ship and used to dock in the harbor of Alexandria.  They met there and got married.  She was very enamored with Alexandria and so that became our home.  Sidi Bishr was our beach.  I loved it all and miss everything about those sublime days in Alex.  Half of my heart is there.  I remember Ramleh Station and all the delicious pastry shops like Pastroudis, Atheneos, Delice, and the Brazilian Coffee Stores!! No place like this on earth!".

She also added;

"I know things have changed a lot and it is not the beautiful city we used to know as kids, but it will always be my home town.  I am now an American and my parents are both gone, but when ever any of my American friends see anything about Alexandria they always send it to me and tell me it's about my city.  I still speak Arabic to a degree, but slowly, and I cook some Arabic food.  My English mother learned to cook Arabic food like a dream and I MISS it terribly. Since leaving Egypt I have never gone back.  I have a wonderful husband and two glorious sons who know a few words of Arabic and would LOVE to see where I grew up".

"To access a memory one has to enter the past and activate it through the present. Then there will be no past, nor is the newly activated moment a present time. It is a threshold time lying in the middle of both; thus deep time (past present and future) can now be neglected".​

قام الأستاذ محمد خان بالأمس بوداعي وداعًا خاصًا قبيل رحيله عن عالمنا اليوم. وسوف أظل فخورًا بهذا الأمر. فبالأمس لم أكن نفسيًا في أفضل حال. بدون سبب محدد تولد لدي شعور عام بالاحباط والقلق وعدم القدرة على الانجاز. تنتابني مثل تلك الحالات أحيانًا، حينها أحاول المقاومة بطرق شتى. أنجح أحيانًا وأفشل كثيرًا فألجأ إلى النوم أو مشاهدة الأفلام الروائية (حيث يتطلب التسجيلي مزاجًا رائقًا) أو قراءة عمل أدبي روائي. ولكن بالأمس فشلت محاولات تغيير المزاج إلى الأفضل وساعد في هذا جو الصيف الحار وقرار الحي الذي أسكن فيه بإقامة حفل ساهر بأغاني المهرجانات لطلبة الثانوية العامة. قررت اللجوء إلى حلقات بلال فضل "الموهوبون في الأرض". شاهدت حلقة أنغام ثم حلقة محمد خان. كان مدخل فضل إلى الحلقة هو قدرة خان على مواصلة الإبداع ونجاحه في إسكات حملات الانتقاد والتشهير -على مدار سنوات- بمواصلة العمل

المناقشة بعد العرض الأول لأفلام مشروع بلازا بالقاعة الكبرى في مكتبة الإسكندرية. المتكلمون من اليمين بالترتيب محمد خان، أحمد نبيل، عماد ماهر، عبدالله شركس، هيثم دياب، محمود عبدالحكيم، تسنيم مصطفى، شريف نجيب وإسلام كمال. تصوير أحمد الغنيمي