Watching Ateyyat El Abnoudy's documentary from 1975, The Sandwich, was a 12 minute ethnographic delight. I was delighted to see a part of Egyptian rural life, that had a romantic notion of the past to it, and that was far removed from Cairo's modern metropolitan life that I had grown up with. I wondered if things were still the same, in that part of rural Egypt.
I decided to dedicate this post to a documentary from a past era, as I find it both necessary and inspiring to watch classics, like The Sandwich. Egyptian documentaries are difficult to get hold of. It sometimes seems like trying to find a pin in a haystack, that I was thrilled to have attended a whole evening of Egyptian documentaries and art films, during the Egypt in Focus event, hosted by Land in Focus.
The Sandwich documents the slow paced life of a rural village in Egypt, starting off with a classic bread-making sequence, which was one of my favourite scenes. I could have indulged in that scene for a bit longer.
The second sequence that I enjoyed watching was of a goat boy, who was in the process of milking a goat, having offered it a piece of bread from the earlier scene. The goat boy then poured the milk into his piece of bread, creating a sandwich, as the title of the film goes.
The third sequence I liked was that of the train arriving, and the village children running to the crossing, excited by its arrival. It portrayed a moment of joyful simplicity of life.
I've heard that before the 2011 revolutionary events in Egypt, Arab people tended to look back with certain nostalgia to better moments or eras. I hope that the swifting sands in the Middle East may bring a rediscovery of the glory of the Arab people.
ReplyDeleteAlejo yes you are right. There was a tendency to look at the past with nostalgia. I think now in Egypt, there is a surfacing of interesting ideas in all areas, thanks to their new found freedom.
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