At the end of a narrow downtown alley by the After Eight club, where men play dominoes in the middle of the passageway and the smell of coffee, shishas and cigarettes lingers in the air, there is a food-cart called “Umm Dahab”, or Mother of Dahab. As the name of the business conveys, the food-cart and its owner are beacons of light in the area. I sit down with the owner, Dahab, a woman in her thirties who has a bachelors degree in foreign trade but has chosen to open up her shop selling liver sandwiches and quick meals in the middle of what some women might describe as a potentially dangerous place to be a woman, particularly alone or at night – the streets of downtown Cairo. As we start the interview, one man from the dominoes table in the adjacent café calls out to Dahab. Ever so coolly, she turns round and shouts back, “I'll be right with you, Koko. I'm just finishing up an interview. Don't be jealous.” Then she turns to me again and laughingly says, as she fixes her veil, “that was quite normal. I've been here for 11 years now. Everybody here knows me and treats me like family. Some people don't like me because I have a college degree and have moved into their territory, but 70 per cent of the people here have welcomed me.” Dahab becomes more serious when she starts talking about the café owner next door, who is more of a guardian to her than a neighbour. “He supported me from the very beginning in my business, and I owe him a lot,” she says. Her eyes gaze through her glasses, which reflect her little shop and the three tables standing outside, waiting for customers. “I used to wear contact lenses and make-up. But it made me feel uncomfortable. Why am I doing this to myself, I would ask. So it was no make-up and back to the glasses. I have never had to face sexual harassment in this area or outside of it because God is always with me,” she said. Dahab says that she used to work in marketing and public relations at a company owned by former minister for information Anas Al-Fekki. “It was a very good company where employees were appreciated. I was a marketing representative. But it takes a lot of effort, and you need to have a lot of connections, to really make it in that kind of job. As I didn't have the right kind of connections, I had to go and knock on the doors of people whom I did not really identify with. I also had to reach a monthly target, which was exhausting. Today, I am earning more with my food-cart than I ever did at the company.” This seems astonishing, since running a food-cart seems harder and more exhausting than sitting behind a desk in a company. But Dahab is ready with her answer. “I wanted to do something, to have my own project, my own work, and my own company,” she said. “If I don't want to open today, I don't. If I feel like taking the day off tomorrow, I can. Clients come to me, and I don't have to go to them. I know exactly what I have to offer. I have rice, vegetables, fried chicken, liver, and sausages. It's that simple. This is the service I offer people, and they know my opening times. So they come to me to eat the things I offer them,” she added. “When I started the business, I did not have everything figured out. But God was always by my side. I bought the shop with all the utilities I needed. I could not even cook back then, but anyone who cannot find anything else to do can always open a coffee shop or a food-cart for sandwiches.” The cart is called Mother of Dahab because of the love and respect Dahab feels for her mother, who supported her from day one and sometimes even helps out in the business. It puzzles me that her family would let her pursue her dream, but Dahab says that “my family welcomed my business. We are from Tanta, but we live in Cairo. They know that I can look after myself, so they have no worries about me. The only thing they were afraid of was that I might lose my temper if I was harassed!” Hygiene is a high priority, and Dahab says that she treats her shop like her own kitchen. “I keep it squeaky-clean because you can't expect people to come if things are dirty or greasy,” she says. While business is on the low side at the moment because of the curfew, causing Dahab to shut up shop early, she says that she has customers from every social class. “I love the mix,” she says. “I am happy because I have learnt a lot from this job. I understand the attitudes of each socioeconomic class from the way they deal with each other and with me. I have learnt how to read people's eyes. I have realised who my real friends are and who will be ready to stand by me should I ever be in trouble. I have been able to understand that one should never look at what other people have. I have understood that one should be forgiving because you never know when you might need someone. I have also learnt how to control my actions and attitude towards people in the area and how to set limits,” she says. Dahab has also been receiving a lot of attention from the country's media. “People are happy when young people do things to stand on their own two feet. But there a lot of other, bigger success stories out there. Egypt's young people achieve amazing things, and if people looked they would see that. I think the edge in my story is the fact that I have a bachelors degree in foreign trade and can call myself educated. But I still chose to put all that behind me and to start again from the bottom,” she says.
