Live Encounters Poetry & Writing 16th Anniversary Volume Six
November- December 2025
Egypt, story by Tim Tomlinson.
I knew a man who’d spent a lot of time in Egypt. He liked people to know that about him, that he’d lived there, in Egypt. That he spoke Arabic, got into scrapes, over legal issues, civil issues. In Egypt. In Egypt he’d been both plaintiff and defendant.
You might not know this, he’d tell you, but in Egypt they wipe their ass with their hand. Their left hand, always the left. Never shake an Egyptian’s left hand, in Egypt or elsewhere, he’d say. Best to keep that as a general policy, no matter where you are. And to remember: if an Egyptian offers you his left hand, well, you, sir (or madam), you have been insulted.
As a guest at dinner parties, not in Egypt but in Manhattan’s Upper East Side or Long Island’s East End, this man would bring and conspicuously place an aluminum bottle alongside his setting at the table—the left side. It resembled a thermos, a plain unadorned gunmetal silver cylinder.
Excuse me, the guest to his left might at some point inevitably say, I’m wondering about the, um … thermos.
Chuckling, this man who’d spent a lot of time in Egypt would explain, No, no, no, that’s not a thermos, you see. It’s an ah-BREE.
That’s the way he said it: ah-BREE.
To which the guest might reply, Oh. And exactly what is an …
ah-BREE, the man who’d spent a lot of time in Egypt would say, tapping a napkin to his lips. Do you know, the man who’d spent a lot of time in Egypt continued, that I’ve spent a lot of time in Egypt? Ah, of course, you don’t know, how could you know, unless you read the papers, or the journals, or visit the bookshops—the good bookshops, mind you, not the ones with the drugstore fiction and the faux-histories by desk-bound academics. I’m talking about the real bookshops, the ones that stock the hefty histories, the from-the-field accounts that test scholarship against lived experience.
Adding, almost as an after-thought, Such as the several I’ve published.
About Egypt, I’m guessing, the guest might say.
Indeed, the man who’d spent a lot of time in Egypt would say, Egypt. And you see, over there, in Egypt—
and this is the part where the man who’d spent a lot of time in Egypt would inform the stranger about Egyptian practices of post-evacuation hygiene. The ah-BREE, he’d explain, contains water, room temperature to warm. When you’ve concluded your business, you reach for the ah-BREE — with your right hand. Then you pour warm water into your left, and you ablute.
So no toilet paper? the dinner guest might say.
Toilet paper! the man who’d spent a lot of time in Egypt would exclaim. To an Egyptian, to half the world for that matter, toilet paper doesn’t exist, even the idea of toilet paper. It’s nonsense. American nonsense. Like dog food. You want to feed your dog, you scrape your plates. You want to wipe your ass, you use your hand. Your left hand. I’ve seen some fool Americans coming out of restaurant bathrooms in Egypt with puzzled looks on their faces and water dripping from their right hands. Their right hands! Fools! And of course, the diners (this is especially true in Cairo), the diners are too polite to call attention to the faux-pas. They might look away and generally provide a wide berth, as if to say, let him or her through, and get them the hell out of here as quickly as possible.
And burn the silverware? the guest might say.
The silverware, the dishware, the tablecloth and table, the man who’d spent a lot of time in Egypt would add. But as I say, the left hand, always the left, and water from the ah-BREE. Followed, of course, with a rigorous soapy scrubbing of both hands, with particular attention paid to the left, especially around the fingernails.
Here, palm in, he’d hold up his left hand for the guest’s inspection. At each fingertip, the barest sliver of white nail edging the flesh.
To the quick, he’d say. For obvious reasons. Those on the right hand you can leave like the fingernails of a Chinese emperor.
If pets were allowed at a host’s home, the man who’d spent a lot of time in Egypt liked to bring his dog, a brown Labrador named Mwt (pronounced “mwt”). Mwt was a well-behaved dog who’d curl beside his master’s chair and wait quietly for a scrap. People would comment on his excellent behavior and inquire after his name.
The man who’d spent a lot of time in Egypt would say, Oh, him? Allow me to introduce Mwt, and the dog’s ears would lift.
People would say, Mutt?
No no no, the man who’d spent a lot of time in Egypt would say, Mwt. M-W-T, Mwt.
Oh, what an … original name.
It’s the pronunciation, the man who’d spent a lot of time in Egypt would say, of the ancient Egyptian hieroglyph for phallus.
You don’t say, people would say.
I do say, the man who’d spent a lot of time in Egypt would explain. You see, I’ve spent a lot of time in Egypt.
He was rather proud of the size of Mwt’s balls, too, which were no larger, no smaller, than your average brown Labrador’s balls, but the man who’d spent a lot of time in Egypt was convinced otherwise, and he liked to indicate their impressive orbicularity to anyone who might be interested. But that’s another story. This story’s about the ah-BREE, and what the ah-BREE can teach us about the way regional customs inform our treatment of assholes.
© Tim Tomlinson
Tim Tomlinson is the author, most recently, of Listening to Fish: Meditations from the Wet World. Other books include This Is Not Happening to You (fiction), and Requiem for the Tree Fort I Set on Fire (poetry). He is the director of New York Writers Workshop, and he teaches in New York University’s Global Liberal Studies.