Brainwashing

Author's name: Khairy Shalaby

I was sitting at the front of the room on the Asyuti sofa and I was assigned to sign the stones from the many pieces of hashish that the teachers had thrown in front of me in the coffee cup saucer. I had been for a long time still captivated by the singing that we had listened to a little while ago on a rare tape on which I had recorded - from a very old record - Mawawil by the famous folk singer “Abdo El Demerdash” in the mid-twentieth century. He was the owner of a café in Kafr El Tama’in in the Gamaliya district, and he only sang there. It was filled with die-hard night owls from all levels due to his overwhelming popularity at the time. He improvised his composition and composing with amazing fundamentalist mastery. Perhaps many people do not know that all the Mawawil sung by “Mohamed Abdel Wahab” were written and composed by “Abdo El Demerdash” and achieved great fame. As for the Mawwal that we listened to a little while ago, it was a masterpiece in every sense of the word. It was a collection of titles of the chapters of the Holy Quran that the artist arranged - with unique skill - in a poetic cluster on the scale of the Mawwal, in which he expresses his love for the Messenger of God, may God bless him and grant him peace.