Travel Tales: Thoughts on Egypt

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Seeing what’s happening in Egypt on the TV, I think back to when we made our show there. The price of flour had just gone up and there had been bread riots recently. The army, someone told me, controlled bread distribution. And bread makes up as much as 70% of the average Egyptian’s daily diet (more by some accounts). We wanted to shoot “ful”, the all-too-typical working man’s breakfast for much of Egypt; a watery plate of chick peas and broth, accompanied by a stack of flatbread–usually sold in the street. But our government handler wouldn’t allow it. So our resourceful producer feigned an emergency need for a bathroom and distracted him while we quickly snapped off a quick ful scene. I get what it was all about, now. This humble, dirt cheap, but filling breakfast was (as the government was all too aware) all that stood between maintaining a hated and corrupt status quo–and the uprising we are seeing now. They were afraid. And what they were afraid of has come to pass. What’s next? It certainly doesn’t bode well for us that we’ve been supporting and arming a particular despicable (but obliging) character. Let’s hope the new guys–whoever they are– don’t hold a grudge.

CNN iReport Video: Departures at Cairo Airport