A puppet can quickly spark controversy; that’s what happened on Saturday evening at the “Meetphool: Mime, Clown and Street performance” event outside the rundown Viennoise Hotel downtown.
We, the audience, were surprised by a sudden maelstrom, a sudden attack by pedestrians, after performers showed up on Mahmoud Bassiony Street with two puppets of Field Marshall Hussein Tantawi and Chief of Staff of the Armed Forces Sami Anan.
This was not the first time the puppets were seen on the city’s streets. They have been often carried in protests against military rule in Tahrir Square since the November clashes on Mohamed Mahmoud Street. Rarely did anyone see them offensive, but last night was different.
The performances started with a clowning show outside the Viennoise Hotel. Some people walked by carelessly, others were curious, and some liked the show and decided to sit through.
Once the clown show was over, another show began, and the growing number of audience members was invited to go into the hotel to attend poetry readings, watch the mime performance, and witness a few other surprises.
One organizer stood on the balcony awaiting the puppet show, which was to come from Tahrir Square accompanied by a march. It seemed pretty exciting, so I decided to photograph people’s interaction with it.
Finally the puppets showed up, carried on the shoulders of two young men. But surprisingly, there was no march. Instead, the puppeteers seemed to be chased by someone, attracting the attention of passersby, who got caught up in an argument that soon turned into a fight. People thought it was a protest against the preliminary results of Egypt’s first post-Mubarak presidential election.
“Do you want a funeral to wail at? We’ve cast our votes, it’s over, let the country calm down,” one of the attackers shouted out loud.
The puppeteers had to run, trying to reach the entrance of the hotel where the other performances were being held. More people started to gather quickly at the hotel’s entrance in a mob-like fashion. They started banging on the building’s door and throwing rocks at the windows.
As more people gathered and some of the audience members came out on the balcony. One was a foreigner, which caused the crowd to shout “spy” at her and force her to hide inside.
Suspicion and feelings of antagonism were rising, and the doorman locked the building’s door from the inside to keep the crowd out. The audience of young people, families who came to see the clown, and some foreigners felt trapped. We could not leave until the crowd calmed down and dispersed.
One of the puppeteers was quite nervous, but told us that this was the safest place for us; if we went down on the street, we would get hurt. We’d have to stay as long as it takes, even if it’s until the next morning. One girl who wanted to leave panicked even more; as for me, it naïvely occurred to me for a second to call the police. They would not show up, I believed, or they would come to detain us, accusing us of trying to "overthrow the regime."
Eventually, a group of friends and intellectuals appeared at the door. They heard about the attack and came to our rescue, trying to convince the mob to let us go; that we were neither spies nor traitors, and that there were no "suspicious" activities happening inside the building.
They succeeded in having us “released;” the crowd was still angry as we walked out. As for the artists’ equipment, the puppets of the Field Marshal and Anan, those were locked in a wardrobe at the hotel, seemingly for a long time to come.
