"Door men of Cairo: the moral gate keepers of a Nation"

You need a lot of waist work in order to circulate in this mad, fascinating city without going totally bananas! And I don´t mean waist work as in for "the stage" or for my work as a professional Dancer. I mean waist work to go around all the mentality issues I just can´t manage to accept because that would mean saying to my brain: "Hey, dude, just stop working for a while, will you?! Thank you."

The 25th of January is after tomorrow and the country is holding its breath towards what might happen as it will be a year after the FIRST STEP of the Egyptian Revolution. A year just flew by like a minute but ACTUAL changes did not come to the light of day yet. Sure there is, apparently, a FREEDOM of speech that was unthinkable before the Revolution yet the same corrupted system and the old prejudices and refusal to QUESTION illogical things still remain untouched.

Muslim brotherhood is on the horizon and, with it, LOTS of doubts and fears regarding the future of Egypt. I say nothing, see nothing. Just FEEL it and OBSERVE.

One of the things that DID NOT change with the FIRST STEP of the Egyptian Revolution was the mentality towards Oriental Dancers - who are seen, more and more, as prostitutes and cold blooded men eaters - and the way WOMEN are still perceived and controlled, even by strangers.

Examples of this are right here, in front of my eyes, on a daily basis.

One of my doormen has been in a spy mission to catch me with male visitors inside my home for quite a while. He waits up for me late at night to check with whom I arrive and if he goes up to my flat with me. He looks dirty at my two cups of cappuccino I buy in the morning, imagining for whom it is the second cup.

He knocks on my door and tries to sneak a peak inside of it every time I receive male friends, giving me that same "dirty" look that warns me : "You bitch, you better be careful about who you invite to your home ´cause I am watching you."

Then there are the less than sublet warnings from neighbours to whom the doorman relates my comings and goings. It seems they are all so worried about the salvation of my soul and the threats of contact of the male part of the population.

Being a FREE Woman, a Foreigner & a DANCER living in Cairo seems to offend lots of people who recognize for themselves the right to put their nose in my LIFE as if I was their possession.

Feels like grabbing a mircrophone and yelling to the building´s residents:

"You folks...GET a LIFE!!!"

Having gone through the start of the Revolution in Egypt and many other personal and professional trials that 2011 brought me, I cannot help but wonder WHERE is all this going.

Change never comes from imposing new LAWS but, first of all, from a shift of consciousness in each individual. That KIND of Revolution is still on the way with no previewed time of arrival.

Hope it will arrive soon. For the sake of Egypt and my mental sanity!