CAIRO: “EL-Hara el-Nazifa”, meaning “The Clean Alley” is not a name for a new youth campaign. It is actually the official name of an alley at el-Darb el-Ahmar area in Cairo.
The special thing about this alley is that it is indeed really clean, a rare situation in crowded Cairo. Its floor is paved in tiles and the street is surprisingly quiet and vast. Even so quiet that it makes you anxious to know the real story behind its name, found on a blue sign at the alley in both Arabic and English.
When a Youm7 reporter asked a resident of the alley about the story of the name, she told him that ever since they were born, they recognized the alley by this name. She told the reporter to ask one of the old residents of the alley for the true story about the alley’s name.
Two other alley’s residents were interviewed of which one was an engineer called Nabil Rashed, who seemed to be the right person to ask. He said that when he came to live in The Clean Alley 20 years ago, he was also surprised by the alley’s name.
When he asked people, he found out that it was called so as a way of sarcasm because before it was paved, it was full of wet mud during winter as a result of rain. However, as awareness started to rise among people they decided to clean it up.
Another citizen, Hanafy Gaber who owns about half of the alley’s buildings, said that this story was not true. As a 62 years old man born and raised in the alley, he knew that name of the alley was inherited though generations.
Gaber said that the ownership of the alley was transferred from a Russian man to the Ministry of Endowments that started selling it part by part. Hanafy’s family started buying large parts of it.
He also said that he had maps that go back to the British occupation of Egypt mentioning the name Clean Alley in English and in French.
Egyptians love being sarcastic and to make up stories and start believing them, Gaber added. The alley just became cleaner after being paved and because buildings were renewed.
