Shooting the Sphinx (10 page)

“Why are you so angry?” Ari couldn't believe that Samir could get so angry. “Say whatever you want, but don't lose your cool.”

“Do you think I have never shot here at the Sphinx?” Samir pointed at the statue. His finger quivered. His cheeks flushed a light purple color.

“The photos are on your website. What's the big deal?”

“If I had wanted to contact anyone at the ministry, I would have done it by now!”

Ari was incredulous. “You haven't spoken to them at all?”

“Of course not!”

“Samir, please stop yelling at me.” Ambling tourists were starting to notice them. Ari tried to diffuse the situation. “In my country it's perfectly normal for me to talk to someone before I fly over their place. Expected even.”

“You do not live in a military country!” With that outburst, Samir walked out to the roadway, got into his car, and drove away.

Ari looked up at the weathered and broken face of the Sphinx. What do I do now? he wondered.

 

Chapter 19

The lights in Samir's office were still on. Ari got out of Hamed's car and looked up at the glowing windows. He had called Samir half a dozen times throughout the evening. No response. He had even tried calling on Hamed's phone, but Samir had hung up on him. Ari had come to the street outside of Samir's office building with the pang of trepidation. What's more, he could even hear Samir's voice on the top floor, shouting.

“Does he always get this angry?” Ari asked Hamed.

Hamed shrugged; the flicker of some past infraction crossed his face. “Cigarette?” was all Hamed would say, taking out his pack.

“No thanks.”

The call to prayer sounded, spurring Ari to go up. With any luck prayer would calm Samir. Ari went in and gingerly stepped onto the old elevator.

He felt it bounce a little under his feet as he closed the cage and pushed the top button. With a scary lurch, Ari rose upward to the distant yelling. It seemed that Samir and his sister were fighting again. Their loud Arabic, mixed with an occasional phrase of English, grew clearer and more distinct as Ari ascended above floors full of empty offices closed for the night.

Samir switched over to English. Must be something he wouldn't want his neighbors to understand, thought Ari.

“Congratulations, Farah! Now that they have fired you, you know for certain you are on their list.” The elevator stopped and Ari let himself out.

“I'm not your baby sister anymore. You may not scold me like this!”

“Do you know what they will do to you?”

Ari tiptoed down the corridor and into Samir's anteroom. Through the open door, Ari saw Samir rolling up his sleeves. He sat addressing Farah, who stood in front of his desk like an employee called on the carpet.

“Look!” Samir showed his sister some burn marks like little circles on his arms. “Look at these!”

“Samir, put your scars away. I've seen them a thousand times.” Farah rolled her eyes at the ceiling.

“Oh, just put them away? Maybe I should drop my pants and show you the real scars? They will use your body for an ashtray, if you are lucky! A beautiful girl like you!”

“Samir, don't be disgusting.”

He composed himself a little and rolled down his sleeves, covering the burn marks on his skin. “How long did you work there?”

“Oh, please, for another job, I could go to Abu Dhabi and make twice the money, tomorrow—”

“Then go! But don't lead them back to me!” Samir pointed at the door and spotted Ari hovering outside. “What are you doing here? Spying on us?”

“Please,” Ari walked in, distracting the two smoldering siblings. “I came to apologize.”

“Not accepted.” Samir snorted with irritable contempt. “I am finished with you.”

“Samir, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to upset you.” At this point Ari could only apologize, but he didn't want to. “It's just that everywhere I've gone, all over the world, it always helps to talk to the top guy.”

“And did he tell you what you want to hear? Your ‘top guy?'”

“No,” Ari had to admit.

“If he does, you will regret it. If Dr. Nejem wants money to film, do you know how much he will ask for? Do you know how much that will cost you?”

Ari hadn't expected it to cost him anything. “No.”

“Now can you begin to comprehend how unprofessional you are?”

“Unprofessional?” Ari bristled in disbelief and looked at Farah as if she would have some opinion about the matter. No one had ever called him that before.

Samir opened his drawer and slapped some papers down on his desk.

“Here is the permission from the military censor, stamped and signed!” Samir flipped over the next page. “Here is the permission from the head of the crew union, stamped and signed!” He turned over the next. “Here is the approval of the script from the minister of the interior, stamped and signed! And the social censor, who makes sure we are not filming anything against morality, but that is the easiest one, because we pay him not to show up on set. You have waited for one entire day in the back of the airport. Do you now know what is involved in getting all of these permissions?” Samir scooped up all the papers in his hand. “You are only beginning to understand! It takes six weeks, at a minimum! Here, take them and go! Get out of my office! GO!”

Samir tossed the papers down onto his desk, and they slid across the barren glass top toward Ari, who picked them up and looked at the black Arabic words floating around on the pages.

“But, Samir, I can't even read these,” he protested.

“And if you could you would read that the permissions may only be given to an Egyptian company, and that these permissions do not even belong to your movie!”

“I can't do this job without you.” Ari was getting irritated, coming close to his own boiling point. Samir can't talk to me like this, he thought as he commanded every muscle in his face not to react.

“These are the property of my company.” Samir pointed down at the papers. “I could not give them to you even though I want to. They are now worthless, like your empty American smile! Take them and get out!”

Ari slammed his hand down on the desk to anchor himself from Samir's onslaught.

“Do know what's really unprofessional?” Ari's voice started to rise. “A million times more unprofessional than what I did?” Ari scooped up the papers defiantly. “GIVING UP!” He yelled at the top of his lungs. “NOT GETTING THE SHOT!”

Ari had a big voice, very big, which he seldom used. Samir blinked, surprised by the outburst, never expecting it, his anger incapacitated by an even greater one. Farah smirked, nodding in enjoyment.

There was nothing, short of violence, left for Ari now except to make an exit. So he walked out.

 

Chapter 20

Ari bounded down the stairs and out into the street clutching the permission papers in his hand. Hamed jumped out of his car and opened the door. Stopping himself, Ari leaned against the car door and looked at the precious and yet potentially worthless papers.

“Give me a minute, Hamed.” Ari knew he couldn't drive away and leave. What would he say to Beth? To Frank? To the studio? To the whole crew that was coming over? And the movie stars that would follow them? The whole mess would rest only on Ari's shoulders.

Ari started to pace back and forth in front of the building's entrance. Samir had opened up such fury in him at everything he'd been through since getting off the plane: the customs guards who took the camera, the whispering women from the Press Ministry, the minister of defense, the tourist police.

He knew he had to go back up and say something. He looked at the permits that tied him to Samir. What could he do? Offer Samir more money? No, he wasn't ready to go that far. He kicked the air, muttering to himself, wanting to break something.

“These people are impossible. Can I get my camera?
Inshallah
. Can I fly a helicopter?
Inshallah
. Can I shoot a shot?
Inshallah
.” Ari paced past the front door of the building. Samir's sister stood inside the doorway watching him.

“When does anything happen around here?” Ari sputtered to himself. “When does anybody actually do something? Can I get a cup of coffee?”

“
Inshallah
,” they both said simultaneously, she mocking him.

“That was a very dramatic scene. But what are you going to do now? He's very stubborn, my brother. He's not going to come down here to the street to see you, Mr.…?”

“Basher. Ari.” He studied her knowing brown eyes. She seemed to understand his predicament better than he did.

“But will you go back upstairs to beg and grovel at his feet?”

“What would you do?” he asked.

“Even Samir can't yell forever.” She tilted her face upward toward her brother's office, her long dark hair splaying down behind her shoulders. “He will soon run out of breath.”

Ari caught the scent of some wild flower essence in the night air. “Why does he get so angry? It's not smart.”

“Well, he was not always that way. He was … very sweet as a boy. But that is a question for another time.” She stepped out of the doorway. “I will leave you to your predicament. Don't worry yourself too much. I have come to believe that if Samir is
not
yelling at me, I'm doing something wrong.”

Ari watched her walk away. Tight jeans; flat, practical boots; a black leather jacket—she looked less student and more biker chic than she had last time, he thought. She disappeared around the corner.

“Hey, hey, hold on!” Ari started to jog after her. “Maybe you could help me talk to him.” Ari rounded the corner to see four men get out of a parked car and surround Farah. She pushed on through them and kept walking. They ran up and started taunting her in Arabic. One of them made a circle around her face with his finger as he spoke, then tapped her on the top of the head. Ari guessed he was mocking her for wearing no hijab. She ducked out from under his touch and spouted an Arabic tirade at him.

The men just laughed. The bold one started to pinch her on the breasts and on the butt, then the others joined in. She swatted their hands away but couldn't repel every grope. This delighted them. They bellowed with laughter.

Ari couldn't comprehend such behavior. It seemed so teenage for men until the bold one, the first to have touched her hair, grabbed her into a headlock. His hand at her throat, he expertly choked off her breath. With dead seriousness, he muttered some sort of threat in her ear.

Ari sprang from his stupor of disbelief and without thinking found himself running toward them.

“Let her go!” he demanded.

The thugs looked at him in amazement for a few seconds. Farah gulped down a great breath of air.

Then Ari yelled indignantly, “Help! Police! Help! Police! Police!” expecting the four thugs to flee into the night. Instead they burst out laughing, unfazed by him in the slightest.

Ari shifted the film permits to his left hand, then reached in to grab Farah by the wrist. He yanked her away. This made the thugs angry and they grabbed her back. Ari saw a fist with a signet ring on the middle finger coming straight at his head. He felt the ring bite into his temple, and his head bounce sideways. He spun around and down. He saw the permission papers fly up in the air as his vision went gray, becoming two little narrow cones of sight.

To keep from blacking out, he dropped to his knees and put his head down. A car engine roared, coming closer. He looked up. The only thing he could see were two headlights aimed straight at his face. He knew he would be run over, killed in a second. But the tires screeched. The grille stopped a foot from his head.

The thugs jumped out of the way. Hamed's voice yelled in Arabic. Ari could hear the words, “American!” and “Hollywood!” Ari's tunnel vision started to widen. It was Hamed's car.

Ari felt Hamed grab him by the arm and lift him to his feet. Hamed, brandishing an old piece of pipe, swiped at the air with a swoosh. The thugs backed away. Two of them still had a hold of Farah. She screamed when she saw Ari's face.

“What's wrong?” Ari asked, just noticing that there was blood dripping off the tip of his nose. From above came the rhythm of metal clanking. Ari looked up: an old woman was leaning out the window banging two pots together. She was making a cry of alarm. Windows opened up above them. Outraged, women of all ages leaned out banging their pots on their window ledges.

Farah tried to squirm loose. The thugs waved at Ari for him to go away.

“No, not without her!” Ari pointed at Farah.

Hamed banged his pipe on the sidewalk. Men, too, started yelling from balconies above. The entire street seemed to be hanging out the windows. The thugs started to back away from the sheer noise raining down upon them. Across the street, twenty young people ran out of a building following a familiar young man with long hair.

“Rami! Rami!” yelled Farah.

It was the singer and his band of protesters.

“Farah!” Rami yelled back, and his gang dashed across the street, swarming around the thugs, who had to let Farah go. The thugs and protesters exchanged a few kicks and punches. Experienced street fighters, the thugs made a formation, but against twenty they couldn't hold out.

A protester with a camera filmed the fighting.

Farah yelled out in Arabic, pointing at the thugs' faces, “
Kamyra lifa! Kamyra lifa! Kamyra lifa!”
which Ari took to mean “film them.” Everyone joined in with her chant, including Ari until he realized that his film permits were underfoot. Ari sank to his knees, trying to gather up the precious papers.

The documentarian stuck the camera in the thugs' faces and shouted questions at them. They tried to grab it. The protesters pushed them away.

Rami stepped forward to speak, and the melee settled down. In the relative lull, Ari crawled around snatching up papers.