‘This is our city now’

It’s strange how quickly a revolution becomes ordinary. For decades, Egypt was the quintessential Middle East police state, but now the sight of freshly sprayed ‘Fuck you Mubarak’ graffiti seems normal. Cairo’s famous traffic gridlock is long gone; the shops are shuttered. Amid the protestors in Tahrir Square, dozens of young and middle-aged men are picking up rubbish and piling it into the scorched carcass of a police truck. ‘Why are we cleaning the streets?’ says one old man. ‘Because this is our city now.’

It’s strange how quickly a revolution becomes ordinary. For decades, Egypt was the quintessential Middle East police state, but now the sight of freshly sprayed ‘Fuck you Mubarak’ graffiti seems normal. Cairo’s famous traffic gridlock is long gone; the shops are shuttered. Amid the protestors in Tahrir Square, dozens of young and middle-aged men are picking up rubbish and piling it into the scorched carcass of a police truck. ‘Why are we cleaning the streets?’ says one old man. ‘Because this is our city now.’

It took just a few hours of fighting on Friday afternoon for the fearsome police state to melt away entirely. In its absence, some people are directing traffic themselves. A boy strolls past, carrying a looted riot shield; young guys swagger around town with baseball bats and one veiled woman has a bizarrely huge chrome-studded truncheon. Outside my hotel, a group of youths armed with iron bars have set up an impromptu patrol to deter thieves. This is vigilante security in a city without police.

‘It’s very safe,’ says one of the hotel staff. ‘Have a nice day.’

Maybe Mubarak, a former air force commander, thought sending two F16s and an attack helicopter to buzz the crowds in Tahrir Square would cow them into obeying the curfew.