more on the localized character of street violence

Just received a morning email from the university’s Director of Public Safety: Tahrir Campus is closed, but the Falaki Building is open.

The interesting thing about that is that they are exactly two blocks apart. The Falaki Building is close to the Interior Ministry and right in the thick of where the Mohamed Mahmoud Street problems were last month. But now it’s open, and we even receive practical suggestions about the best route for getting there if we want to go.

The Tahrir Campus, just two blocks up the street: closed. Qasr al-Aini comes straight off of Tahrir Square, and most of the problems are there, and of course the square itself was also cleared yesterday.

I already cited Graeme Wood’s remark that most war zones are also like this in his experience. But it’s my first up-close experience with this sort of highly localized violence, and you won’t be getting much sense of that from news accounts. The city continues to function normally to an often astonishing degree.