On a quick visit to Esna, Nader Habib interacted with the residents, shared their dreams and suffering -- and their exceptional way of life Setting foot in Esna, a quiet town 33km south of Luxor, is like travelling back in time half a century or more. Its people could plausibly have originated in a Naguib Mahfouz novel: kind and considerate, with a strong sense of community. The buildings are impressive too, though wrinkled, as it were, and weighed down by memories of the past. It was 7am when I arrived at the station, where no one awaited me after a 12-hour journey. And I wasn't sure how to get from the east bank of the Nile, where the station is located, to the west bank. I stood helplessly holding my bag until a voice abruptly interrupted my deliberations: "Where are you headed in Esna?" My reply was meek: "I am looking for the house of the Grandfather Thabet, in front of Mother Dolagi Church." The man, who assured me that everyone knew everyone else here, welcomed me in the city. "We will take a ride in a Toyota truck to the nearest point," he said, "and then I'll tell you how to proceed from there." A few minutes later I was very close to my destination, the man having insisted on paying my fare -- I was already his guest. His name was Ahmed El-Senousi, a computer teacher, and after I turned down his invitation for breakfast, he gave me his phone number and said he hoped we would meet again before I left, offering to walk me the rest of the way. I had been there before, I told him, and should be able to find my way. Refusing the offer of a caleche (horse-drawn cart) ride -- last time, in the company of my uncle, it had turned out to be a rip-off -- I took in the scenery, enjoying the sight of the town waking up to a new day. Later, though having been there before, I was more interested in people than sites, Still, my host still gave me a tour of the city. Our first stop was Esna Temple, where, since time immemorial and up until this day, women having difficulty getting pregnant will come to pray for a child. The edifice sits in a large hole in the ground. Old and imposing, I was thinking, when an Antiquities Authority guard rebuked me for standing in a prohibited zone. No amount of reasoning with him worked, even though foreign tourists were standing in practically the same spot. "They are foreigners," he said, as if this was a sufficient explanation. My host confirmed the prohibition: according to security regulations, to stand there, you must be either a tourist or a policeman. Largely in order not to cause any trouble for my host, I refrained from making a fuss, although I still could not understand the logic of said regulations. Walking around town, later, I ran into Abdel-Latif Abu Zeid, a physical education teacher carrying his little girl, who expressed concern about the future of girls born in Esna: "The thing is, young men leave the city and head north looking for a fair-skinned wife. I have a lot of girls in my school; sometimes I look at them and think, how are they all going to be married? In 15 years or so, this will be what they need to do, but young men here are few, and young men from the north generally don't want to marry a girl from the south. What could be the answer to this problem?" Abu Zeid added that the government should pay more attention to Esna -- create jobs, build factories, and make the city attractive to future generations. Another resident, Injy, shared Abu Zeid's concern. Southern girls have no chance of finding a husband outside the family or the city, which is not the case with boys: "Girls from Esna may have received their education in other towns, such as Assiut or Aswan, yet, they are still restricted by traditions, which may not always be a good thing. The problem is the small-town mentality. Everyone knows everyone. If a girl's engagement is broken, for example, everyone finds out, and many offer their own interpretations. In the end, that girl will find it harder and harder to get a husband." For her part, Manal, another resident still, revealed another aspect of life in Esna: she's engaged and is planning for the wedding. But the reception will be even more expensive than in Cairo. "We have to invite the entire neighbourhood, for we know everyone." On a more positive note, as it turns out, nobody cares in Esna if a girl wears the hijab (head cover) or niqab (full veil); no one asks if you're a Copt or a Muslim. It is a town where tolerance is thoroughly integrated into piety. One can hardly tell Christians apart from Muslims; all are dressed the same way. The poor wear galabiyas while the better-off mostly have Western-style outfits. In the marketplace, there is a small church bearing the names of three peasants who died under Roman persecution, as well as many mausoleums for Muslim saints. Directly overlooking the Nile is the Mausoleum of Ali Nureddin Al-Kelabi. Coptic celebrations are big here. In the festival of Mar Guirguis (Saint George), the Copts take a whole week off, which they spend camping in tents around the Mar Guirguis Monastery in Al-Ruzeikat. "This is the best time of the year," according to Michael Ezzat, whose sister, Riham, said the Mar Guirguis festival is the favourite time of the year for engagements and marriage ceremonies. "At midnight, flocks of pigeons come to the convent to announce the presence of the Martyr Mar Guirguis," Riham describes a scene the locals consider to be a miracle, since pigeons don't normally fly at night. "The pigeons come every year. " There were many Muslims at the convent. Riham told me this was natural, for saints, she said, are the link between God and man: "Everyone prays to the saints to intercede between us and God so that He may forgive us. There is no Christian and Muslim in the eye of God, for He judges people by their deeds." Muslims have their own festival, but they have to travel to attend it. Their favourite saint is Abdel-Rahim Al-Qenawi, and many go every year to Qena to attend his anniversary. I was to leave on the midnight train. Half an hour earlier, I took my bags to the street and found it totally deserted. This is a town that goes to bed early. I walked to the main road and found a Toyota truck that doubles as a service taxi, but the driver wasn't going to take off with one passenger. So I sat in the truck, waiting and waiting, the minutes feeling like hours as they passed. After a while, I was able to persuade him to start off, so he did, but in slow motion, driving leisurely to look for more passengers. The easy life in Esna, I thought. The leisurely pace, the unhurried life, the laidback style, all those things are sorely missed in Cairo. All those things I too will miss. "It left five minutes ago," the station master said when I asked him about the train on arrival. "There is another one in the morning. Were you in a hurry?"
