A Game of Two Halves

I was walking down the Girgarish Road and on the palm-tree lined grassy knoll, perhaps the only one on this fine road, some kids were playing football with a ball that was so flaccid that they may as well have been kicking a plastic carrier bag. When life gives you a crap football you play a crap game of football, I suppose. Football was indeed in the air and it puzzled me what the boys were doing outside when at that very moment the final of the African Nations Cup was being played out between Egypt and the Ivory Coast. Perhaps the boys just lost interest after Libya so predictably and ignominiously departed the competition in the first round. As Farag said, apparently irony-free, "The national team needs more funding!" 'Hmm,' I thought 'I wonder where they might be able to get that from.' There is no lack of enthusiasm for the game. There is even a football pitch on one of Tripoli's busiest roundabouts. Ball control is to be exercised carefully and Chris Waddle style penalties evidenced in the semi-final of the World Cup are not to be encouraged. But if the kids with the superannuated condom for a ball weren't interested, the rest of Tripoli was gripped. For once the roads were almost empty and as I walked past the strip of take-aways and cheap restaurants where they sell tabunas, schwarmas and folded Libyan pizzas, a horde of Libyan waiters, cooks and chefs who had dubiously switched allegiance to Egypt emerged to taunt the predominantly black African servers in the pizza bar next door. Egypt had scored. Calm was restored until slowly the familiar agonizing realization set in amongst the Libyans via the template of the action replay. The Africans burst out waving their hands above their heads in glee. The goal had been disallowed. In the gloating stakes it was one-one and there was everything to play for.
Of course, not all Libyans had switched their support to Egypt. I think that in their heart of hearts Libyans are first Muslims, then Arabs, then Libyans and finally, reluctantly, Africans. But when it comes to football, they are not always in their heart of hearts and the Libyan identity shoves its way to the top rung. There is some mild bitterness in relations which goes a little deeper than the last three football encounters in recent memory (Egypt won twice and Libya once). Along with sub-Saharan Africans, Egyptians make up the largest part of Libya's migrant grey economy. Egyptians are particularly visible in the construction industry. Last summer, when I remarked to a colleague that I was amazed that the Egyptian workers were toiling away on the construction of a new office block under a 43 degree midday sun, he replied "Well, they built the pyramids, didn't they?" with a chuckle. More recently, a friend Hasan was telling me that violent crime was almost non-existent. I agreed that that seemed to be the case, but pointed out that our driver, Aymen, had that very week been stabbed in the stomach by four evidently drug-crazed youths trying to steal his dilapidated old Roadstar car stereo. "Yes", Hasan replied "But I would bet you that they were Egyptians. There is no way of knowing if this tabloid-without-the-tabloid anti-immigrant knee-jerk reaction is in fact an accurate one as it happened so quickly. Suffice to say that Aymen has made a full recovery and still listens to the Koran on the radio.
The out-sourcing of hard manual labour to people from poorer countries is a global phenomenon. In London there are Czech scaffolders and in the Czech Republic there are Ukranians scaffolders. For all I know, there are Phillipinos and Indians (who are sometimes not too fond of each other) doing the same work in the Ukraine, although I doubt it. It does beg the question, although it isn't one which will need to be answered any time soon, 'What will we do when there are no people poor enough to do our dirty work for us?'
In Tripoli, the Wadi, a dry valley below the Gurgi and Girgarish Road is the de facto job centre for migrant workers. They sit on the pavements in their droves with the tools of their semi-skilled labour at their feet. Some have spades, hoes, jack-hammers, sledge-hammers, screwdrivers, sometimes just a coil of wire and often nothing at all. The Wadi is the place to go if you want some manpower to help with building your house. In Libya, no-one buys a house when they get married - everyone builds one, as it's cheaper. A German friend told me that she knew a man who had confided in her that he was desperate to lose his virginity and was actually married but his father-in-law would not allow them to sleep together until he had finished building his house. I think a Wadi worker gets about ten dinars (about 7 US dollars) for a day's work, when you get a day's work. Living ten to a house on a diet of bread, tuna and couscous, it is a hard life and you can see it on their faces. I asked an Egyptian if he didn't mind the lack of personal space that comes sharing a room with four other people, and he came back with the standard "No, we are all brothers!" reply. A noble sentiment but, personally, I don't particularly want to sleep on top of my brothers.
There will have been some Egyptian smiles (along with a few African grimaces) on Saturday morning though. In the end Egypt won, miraculously rescuing a penalty shoot-out from the jaws of defeat. Despite its unfairness, there is something about the penalty shoot-out which everyone, even those who despise football and refuse to countenance the passion, faith and hope that it gives people, can understand. Everyone has to watch, even the girls with painted faces who wouldn't know the offside rule if it hit them over the head with a corner flag. Everyone has to watch, except for those who just can't bear to.
The Ivory Coast's Didier Drogba, on a reported salary at Chelsea of 5,000,000 euros a year, perhaps Africa's greatest player, had his penalty saved. And how many of the game's most technically gifted players have we seen failing to score in penalty shoot-outs, to complete what is technically the simplest of tasks? Platini, Maradona, Beckham, Baggio; the list is endless. There is something there, something about fallibility, that everyone can understand.