Get Educated and Survive
Every year hundreds of Russians and Caucasians leave for Egypt to get religious education, expand their cultural horizons and learn Arabic.
Al-Azhar is an Islamic religious
university in Cairo with more than thousand years of history, the foundry of
divines for the whole Islamic world. Students from more than a hundred
countries study here.
Al-Azhar is not just a university, it is a whole system of institutions and
institutes. A madrasah for boys, an Islamic research Academy, a huge mosque, an
extremely well-stocked library with tens of thousands Arabic handwritten and
printed books, newspaper and journal editorial offices, nine religious and
secular faculties, and even a women’s college.
It is all Free
That is why eyes of the
cigins of faith are fixed on this
very place.
To put it more exactly, you do not have to pay money for the educational
process and attending the lectures. However, the situation inside Egypt has been
very tense for the recent months, and the risk of being arrested with your
family, expelled from the country or disappeared
in Cairo detention facilities is quite high for a
foreigner. Instead of a careless student life, the Dagestanis, Ingushes and
Chechens studying in Egypt face an unpleasant quest. Constant ID inspections, attempts
to get their friends, caught for having no visa or just ‘by mistake’, from police
departments.
Why Egypt, after all?
— Why are you coming to Egy cou’ve been deported?— For many of us that is the oatcts. As for me, I studied in an Ingush village, and my parents didn’t have funds to pay for my education in a university. I wasn’t too well-prepared to enter a university by myself. Besides, I wanted to study religions and languages. My friends told me to join them in Cairo. Al-Azhar has no admission exams. Candidates are just enrolled under their documents. So I came and studied for four years. I have only one year to go now.
— Life was quite easy in Egypt. Softatere. Two or three years ago, when we were just entering the university, it was much calmer here.
— Where else could we go? Jordan is toa?ok the risk. It’s bare soil and sand. You can sleep tight, though. But you can’t go there with your family, the conditions are truly Spartan. Turkey? Too expensive and non-Arabic. Qatar, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia? The visa requirements are too tough.
Delete my Number!
After the meeting with the students they strongly asked me to delete their numbers and messages from my phone. Otherwise, they said, my safety could be compromised as well.
Salafy youth, oppressed and persecuted in their homeland, the Caucasus region, are now targeted by security service agents in Egypt. They are often suspected of ties with ISIS terrorists, raising funds for militants, or being supporters of the ‘Muslim Brotherhood’ banned in Egypt.
Previous months’ terrorist attacks in the country have definitely not brought more peace to the people, police or visitors.
Among their own Kind
One of such flats is inhabited by a Chechen and an Ingush. I asked them how they rubbed through the recent period of the nationwide debates over the established border between Chechnya and Ingushetia – did they quarrel?“Oh, not at all! – the two friends assured me, – we respect other people’s opinions and didn’t even have any argument with radicals over the border matter”. And then the kitchen duty man (on that day it was the Chechen’s turn) brought us some tea.
The indispensable interior
features in students’ flats are a desk thuranic sciences, science of hadith, Arabic and English – all of
these subjects are thoroughly studied by Al-Azhar students.
Some practice graphic arts and plan to go into manual writing of Quranic verses
on mosques.
After classes the students gather inside a big university mosque and, sitting
on soft carpets, discuss theology matters among themselves or with their mentor.
In the evening, here and there you may see ‘hobby clubs’ sitting between the pillars
– those are students and simple Islam believers of various religious schools
talking amicably or doing revisions for their exams.
Student’s Wife
Caucasian women and Russian
wives of Russian Muslims in Egypt wear black niqabs when outside the house. The
women say that no one is going to persecute you for religioue
protects them from street dust and unwanted attention and
shameless (to put it mildly) glances and questions from immodest men around
them.
This is especially important for Russian women. Light facial skin stirs Egyptian
men’s intense interest and wish to flirt.
Once I saw some fully
covered women in a store. Apart from hidden face and loose clothing that even
covered their heels, they were wearing black gloves and black narre re speaking Russian with no accent and
calling each other Nastya and Olesya.
Tamara, the wife of a Chechen student, told me about their life in the strange
land. About how they have to pinch and scrape. For example, she makes bread at
home.
One kilo of meat is ten dollars, and a kilo of sugar costs 60 cents. Fruit and vegetables are quite cheap.
Rumor has it that prices are going up soon. Electricity prices are going tondd to rise by summer. Life in Egypt will get more expensive, while wages will not increase. A new spiral of social tension is coming. People get nervous, and so does the government.
Students’ families feel more and more uncomfortable.
Besides, school education is
a problem. Tamara believes it is very poor here. She grew up in Chechnya between
the wars, where teachers were almost unpaid.
– Teacheritnot demand a high quality
of education. The only goal of education here is to observe formalities, so I have
to hire tutors for my children. We’ve got a woman coming to our home to teach
us Arabic, and a math teacher for the senior kids.
I don’t like the manners of local kids. They totally disrespect their teachers,
run and shout. Complete disorder. My children were shocked at first, but later on
they buddied up with Arab kids, and I’m afraid they’ll get used to act like
that. The mindset is different here. They throw thrash right out of their
balconies. Streets are dirty throughout the year: bags, wraps, paper, plastics,
dusters, food scraps…
It took two years for Tamara’s younger children to become true Egyptians. They speak Arabic better than Chechen. Girls have been wearing hijabs since they were three. They do not like going to the K only private and very cramped. The room is usually an ordinary flat where kids have no space for active games. They are not allowed to go outside as well. As the result, kids almost never leave their flats, both at home and at the kindergarten.
Rapid Action Teams
Russian-speaking students in Egypt have their informal groups, just like those Soviet dissidents used to have. olem in WhatsApp. The messenger is the mai aStudents have their own group, while their wives have another one, with a similar name. Every day there are messages like:
“A police car has just driven by! They’ve entered the house next to ours!”
“I saw them drive by. Sisters, are they breaking into anyone’s house <
“They searched the neighbors’ house yesterday, checked the iqamoot documents.”
“And my husband was stopped on they and place of living”.
“We’re in Taba, a squad car
has just passed tho registration and
are afraid they can take us!” “Maybe, the policemen are just going home” “Please someone take that tuk-tuk guy with the music away! We’re sick of him!”
“Tuk-tuk” is an orange and black
wheeled trailer, used as a private taxi. A “tuk-tuk” can take on board one to three
passengers, and squeezed but pleased, listening to music (or not), they will get
to any remote district of Cairo where you cannot go by public transport.
“Those whose houses are raided, must warn everyone
else here immediately and delete the group from their phones”. “And on your husband’s phone, too”
“When
the police come to raid your house, don’t you have more important thingin pay attention to is keeping yourself
and your kids from being taken to a police station, not looking at your phone”.
We want to get that knowledge
and give it to our children, spread it in our homeland, in the republic – this
is how almost every Al-Azhar student I know describes the goal of their
education. Some want to teach at madrasahs and universities at home.
— When I was learning Islam
in the Caucasus region, I thought there were things you could do and those you
couldn’t. It turns out that it is not that rigid, there are controversies and
you have to see into it, think, come to conclusions and make your choice.
— Can you give an
example of wha?<- /wp:paragraph -->
— For instance, if you touch
a woman accidentally, then under the Shafi‘i school you have to make wudu once again before Salah, while
under the Hanafi school you it is not a must. They refer to the Hadith where the
prophet ( spproached him and he
touched her and started his Namaz. The Shafi‘i school refers to the t that in this case the ablution must be repeated.
In Moscow, the Caucasians who
have arrived from Egypt are immediately taken to an interrogation and
inspection: the police search their belongings, read their phone chats, capture
their fingerprints, take their photos and even demand to take a saliva test.
Besides, border officers ask
them why they haveng have studied,
and how they made a living. They find out and put down every little detail.
Another three or four hours
of the interrogation has ended successfully, and the student can continue his
way and fly to glcome as warm as
this one. The students say that all of this is no reason for dropping out from the university. Perhaps, their thirst for knowledge is stronger than their fear, if they are ready to pay such a high price for it. A link to the website is required when copying the material
“We heard them honk; perhaps the senior tenant turned us up? T
“Yes, sisters, please delete the gro
<
“Exactly, when they came to our house, I didn’t even know where my lske your phone away, and forbid you to look at the screen;
we’ve had a raid once. They can even seize it if they like it”.
The discussion stream intersperses with prayers, Islamic blessings and good
wishes to be careful.
What for
— Here, studying u differently, – Ahmed
says. Thin fraveere is a pile of books
on Sharia law he has scrutinized since September. He has been studying for
three and a half years in total.
These are some of the controversies. But that doesn’t mean we have to cross
swords, we still share the same religion.
Way Home
Students on vacation and graduates of Al-Azhar definitely do not feel lonely in
the Caucasus. They will necessarily be summoned to an interrogation at the FSS
and visited by tr h after they have
returned. Some are even met by FSS officers at the airports in adjacent
regions, like Minvody or Vladikavkaz. An interrogation, a preventive
conversation, and new inspections.