EGYPT: Inshallah

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Before moving to Cairo this summer, I was warned about less-than-reliable landlords, those conveniently punctual characters when it comes to collecting rent who are less prudent when it involves fixing leaks, damaged roofs and other curious mishaps that can befall an Egyptian flat. So it was with skepticism that I called my landlord, hoping, praying that he would do something about the fridge, which rattled a lot but never got any frostier than warm.

‘Someone will be right over.’ Click.

I thought, ‘Sure they will.’ Minutes later, a small cadre of men in overalls, one carrying a tool box, knocked and filed into the kitchen with a spooky degree of seriousness. They screwed and unscrewed, did things with wires and said: ‘It is fixed. Inshallah.’

Inshallah means ‘God willing.’ Everything in Egypt runs on Inshallah. It is an Inshallah country.

I stuck my hand in and felt a slight chill. I smiled; they vanished. That night, the fridge murmured and whined, gasped, shook and died. I called the landlord in the morning. Something has to be done. Inshallah.

‘Someone will be right over. One hour maximum.’

Fifty-nine minutes later, another cadre of men knocked. I opened the door. No one was holding a tool box. But three of them were straining under the weight on a brand new, deluxe, multiple-shelf, self-defrosting fridge. They slid it into place and hauled away the old one, happily grunting and disappearing down the steps. What’s not to like about Cairo? I was emboldened. After waiting a requisite three days, so as not to appear as a pain in the you know where, I called the landlord to inquire about replacing a bathtub that I’m sure the British must have bathed in during colonial rule.

There was a pause; that kind of silence you know will not be followed by the hasty-appearance fix-it men, or even by a polite Inshallah.

— Jeffrey Fleishman in Cairo