CAIRO – Schoolteacher Ahmed Darwish usually buys dried fruit and nuts, in order to celebrate the holy fasting month of Ramadan; but this year, the world of yameesh, which denotes dried fruit and nuts, seems to have totally changed. As he used his fingers to check the quality of this year's mouthwatering dates, Darwish, in his late thirties, scanned the new names of the different brands. One brand of dates is called ‘Revolution', another ‘Martyrs', a third “January 25” and a fourth ‘Freedom'. “All the brands are expensive, because they stand for something special,” he told the Egyptian Mail in an interview. The Egyptian revolution, which elbowed out Hosni Mubarak and his coterie of corrupt officials and businessmen, seems to be having far-reaching consequences, not only for the country's political system, but also for the names Egyptians give to everything, from their children, streets and squares to the food they eat. From the ‘Facebook' cyberspace café to the ‘Revolution' coffee shop, the “January 25” clothes shop and the Martyrs Tube Station, the Egyptian revolution has had a tremendous impact on Egyptians' lives. This year, as Ramadan approaches, dates have assumed proud revolutionary names, which show that this revolution, for which people were longing for decades, has developed a commercial flavour. The most expensive dates on the markets, the above-mentioned ‘Revolution', sell for LE15 ($2.50) per kilo. “There are enough dates this year and this means the prices have fallen a little,” said Ragab Al-Attar, a well-known dried fruit and nut merchant in Cairo. Inside Al-Attar's huge shop in the crowded downtown Ataba district, clients jostle each other as they rush to buy big bags full of these nutritious and delicious treats. Another kind of date is named after the iconic Tahrir Square, the epicentre of the anger against Mubarak in January and February and a hotbed for the continual protests against the lack of reform these days. The cheapest dates are called ‘Torah Prisoners', reflecting the popular anger at scores of former officials and ministers who are now in Torah Prison in southern Cairo. But none of the brands is named after the former president, who is hospitalised in Sharm el-Sheikh, or his wife and his two sons, although the latter are indeed Torah prisoners. Apart from the Torah prisoners collectively, the martyrs and other revolutionaries are the only people after whom this year's dates have been named. This is a good reason for Darwish, the schoolteacher, to buy as much yameesh as possible, but not the dates named ‘Torah Prisoners'.
