elsewhere in Egypt

@ SultanAlQassemi : Al Jazeera: 20,000 protesters in Aswan demand Mubarak steps down #jan25 (900 kilometers /600 miles South of Cairo. Pop. 280,000)

@ SultanAlQassemi : Al Jazeera: More than 500,000 protesters in Mansoura demand Mubarak steps down (120 km/75 miles NE of Cairo. Pop 1.1 million) #Jan25

@ SultanAlQassemi : Al Jazeera: More than 100,00 protesters in Damanhour (160km/99miles NW of Cairo, population 500,000) demand Mubarak steps down

from an Egyptian friend

“Numbers in the square are swelling. This will be the day.”

the one thing the thugs missed on Wednesday

Along with the whip-wielding camel riders and the musclebound goons with Raiders of the Lost Ark swords, they should have added a dozen or so police dressed as mummies, groaning as they lumbered toward the protestors, their arms extended menacingly in front of them.

If not that Wednesday were perhaps the most evil thing I’ve ever seen, it would probably qualify for one of the most ridiculous.

a retroactive nightmare about Wednesday

I’m now in Leipzig, and leaving for Poland in a couple of days. But I plan to be glued to this computer all day today and tomorrow, in contact with everyone I know who knows anything, and sharing with all of you the small pieces of information I have about what is happening.

Let me also say that Wednesday was perhaps the ugliest day I have ever witnessed: both that day and also the ensuing night, during which gunfire was sent into the square from remote and well-placed locations.

Furthermore, let me reflect again on my trip into Cairo from the airport on Wednesday. I was surprised at the time that almost the whole traffic jam in which we were caught was made up of supporters, waving their flags and honking their horns. Then they all pulled off near the Ramses Hilton, the traffic jam was gone, and the final quarter-mile into Zamalek was fast.

In retrospect, it’s clear that the traffic jam in which I was caught was made up of the very same thugs who attacked the square less than an hour later. It was an odd experience that has been retroactively transformed into a truly harrowing memory. They pulled off exactly at the thug assembly point in Ramses, and they very much looked the part.

What were the people in the cars like? Mostly young and burly males, checking cell phones assiduously when they weren’t honking, waving flags, and displaying homemade signs (a surprising number of them in English) saying “No to Al-Jazeera Channel, Yes to Mubarak.”

the food situation in Cairo

Here’s one comment from an American woman I know who is married to an Egyptian and is also a decades-long resident of the city:

“My boab’s [doorman’s] wife says there is bread, and rice and macaroni in the markets, but no flour, and that fruits and vegetables are few, not at all good quality, and higher prices…”

Fidel Castro (!) weighs in

HERE.

Defense Ministry

Another good sign:

“Egyptian Defense Minister Hussein Tantawi and senior army officials visited the square Friday morning and soldiers were checking IDs and performing body searches at its entrances, a sign that Egypt’s most powerful institution was sanctioning the demonstration.”

impressive

“Thousands including families with children flowed over bridges across the Nile into Tahrir Square, a sign that they were not intimidated after the protesters fended off everything thrown at them by pro-Mubarak attackers – storms of hurled concrete, metal rebar and firebombs, fighters on horses and camels and automatic gunfire barrages. The protesters passed through a series of beefed-up checkpoints by the military and the protesters themselves guarding the square. A man sitting in a wheelchair was lifted – wheelchair and all – over the heads of the crowd and he pumped his arms in the air.”

Families with children! Disabled people!

Ahmed Bassiouny, & spreadsheet list of the dead

This comes from Egyptian friends: a Google Spreadsheet where they are trying to compile THE NAMES OF THE DEAD. It’s early and they only have 27 so far, but they have information about cause of death.

Be prepared for sad reading.

One that especially bothers many of my friends is the death of artist and musician Ahmed Bassiouny, a 31-year-old father of two. Last I heard it was through sniper fire.

Graeme Wood’s experience of yesterday

Read it HERE in The Atlantic.

This sounds like it happened very close to where the two AUC students were stopped with “Crusader swords” and “ornate ceremonial knives.”