tonight’s taxi driver

When speaking with secretaries and taxi drivers in Egypt, I often try to turn the subject to politics, as a way of keeping a finger on the pulse of Egyptian public opinion.

Tonight’s taxi driver weighed in readily with his opinion, but was more cheerful about it than most. “Egypt,” he said, with a bit of an overestimate, “is as rich as America, because of the Suez, tourism, and gas. But all the money was stolen by the Mubaraks and their friends. Obama doesn’t steal money. In America, you spread the money around to everyone. That’s what we want here.”

Unlike many of the drivers I’ve had, angry and embittered over high-level embezzlement, this guy seemed willing to call it water under the bridge and forget about it. But he certainly didn’t want things to continue the way they were.

His story is also unusual, though by no means rare in this country. He’s a civil engineer by day, a taxi driver by night (already a bad economic sign). He also told me that one of his friends is a bus driver for AUC.