Walid Aouni, pumpkin seeds and respect

The first name I heard after joining Cairo Opera House contemporary dance company "Forsan El Shark" was Walid Aouni. From my fellow dancers the following words often appeared when topic went to Walid Aouni: famous director, man of art, a fair leader, an innovative choreographer and scenographer, the father of Modern Dance Company, a great man. I learnt people speak very highly about him and still remember the years of his leadership as the times of golden age of dance companies in Cairo Opera.

I also learnt why. Walid Aouni was the founder of Cairo respected Opera Modern Dance Theatre, from which later my company "Forsan El Shark" appeared. He had an impressive career and collaboration experiance abroad (including making scenography and costumes for the famous Maurice Bejart) and was therefore a very respected man in the dance field in Cairo!

• For a longer biography visit:

http://www.cairoopera.org/walid_aouni.aspx

• Interview and extracts from his works (in arabic):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=umtSTrb85g8

PS! For all estonian readers, Walid Aouni's legacy reminds me of Mait Agu's and as for the character just like the crazy, innovative and controversial Jüri Nael.

Now let me get to my point of this blog. I will describe an incident the other day in opera. I was sitting in the studio at a couch next to the small cupboard of books, always opened under the sun and wind and dust from the window. Noone reads these books, they just stand there. About a month ago I discovered a book by Walid Aouni about modern dance in Cairo Opera, I went through it, but couldn't read it, because it was in french. There were about 10 copies in the cupboard.

Two company girls entered the studio with a bag of snacks in the bag (seeds, nuts etc). They sat down next to me and continued eating, they needed a trash bin, but as there were none close by they reached for the book of Walid Aouni. I was watching their action with open eyes full of surprise and questions. Without thinking too long I took the book from under their pumkin seeds and replaced it with another magazine. They were giggling and told  me, "Don't worry Kaidi, its ok!". Honestly, I was quite shocked by that incident.

In Estonia I grew up with knowing that a book is the second best source of knowledge and intelligence after Your parents. I knew books are sacred and meant to last for decades, they are part of history and amazing manifestations of human nature. Secondly being now a professional dancer for many years anything that deals with dance, especially books, are to be cared for and looked after wisely.

So seeing these girls use the book of Walid Aouni as rubbish bin my instincts sent me to save it! They sure knew what they were doing and knew the book. Seemed they didn't take the book too seriously. For me besides the already sacred essence of a book, it represented and symbolised The Man, Walid Aouni, the father of this company who I never met or spoke to but already have grown to respect. I was more than suprised to see they didn't think like me. Im sure if I spoke at a differnt time with the same girls, they would sure peak highly of him, but in this situation these two things, their "father" and the book were not connected for them. Maybe because the book was in french and they never read it anyways, but even this to me would seem as an excuse.

Later discussing this incident with another egyptian friend from the company, he thought the girls acted normal, nothing special in using a dance book for pumpkin seeds...Seems like respect for authorities and books are not connected to some people in Egypt.