This is the first translation we’re publishing of a song in an emerging genre in Egypt known as mahraganat. Literally meaning “festivals,” mahraganat is a style of music that emerged out of music played at street weddings and other celebrations in Cairo’s lower-class neighborhoods. Featuring aggressive beats, shaabi-style keyboard licks, and raw lyrics chanted through auto-tune, it captured the frenetic bustle and in-your-face chaos of Cairo’s popular neighborhoods in a way that the slick Arab pop of Amr Diab and Tamer Hosny never could.
For a while in the early 2010s, mahraganat music was paradoxically everywhere and nowhere in Egypt. Blaring from what seemed like half the taxis, microbuses, motorcycles and tok toks in the country, it was fast becoming the soundtrack to Egypt’s pulsing urban life. At the same time, however, it was banned from the airwaves and denied official recognition due to its perceived vulgarity, and only circulated on USB drives and bootleg CDs. Although in recent years Egypt’s music and film industries have begun to co-opt and cash in on this musical trend, it still retains underground associations and is somewhat less than fully respectable.
Given the fact that mahraganat first came on the scene in the years right before Egypt’s Arab Spring revolution and represented a lower-class aesthetic and perspective that the governing elites preferred to sweep under the rug, there has been a lot of speculation about the political valences of this musical phenomenon. In reality, though, very few mahraganat songs comment on politics at all, and the genre’s major stars have mostly steered clear from political affiliations.
The song we’ve translated here is a partial exception. Adapting the slogan of Egypt’s 2011 Revolution (al-shaab yurid isqat al-nizam – “the people want to topple the regime”), the mahragan “Al Shaab Yurid Khamsa Guinea Raseed” expresses an altogether more quotidian demand: “the people want five Egyptian pounds of phone credit.” Although this titular line brings a certain irreverence to the theme, the song as a whole shares in the optimism of the post-revolution period and exhorts its audience to help build a better future for the country. At the same time, it expresses its aspirations only in general terms, and does not align itself with any specific political platform.
The people want something new | الشعب يريد موضوع جديد |
The people want five pounds phone credit | الشعب يريد خمسة جنيه رصيد |
And gas in the tank | والبنزين في التانك |
I wake up in the morning | وأنا صاحي الصبحية |
In time for my shift | في معاد الدورية |
I try to start the car | بدوّر في العربية |
But it doesn’t want to run, guys | مش عايزة يا ناس تدور |
It’s causing me trouble and my head is confused | عملالي مشكلة ودماغي مبرجلة |
I’m in the middle of the road and going slow | وأنا في وسط الطريق وماشي على البطيء |
The people want five pounds phone credit | الشعب يريد خمسة جنيه رصيد |
Five pounds per person, and that’s in addition to the offer | خمسة جنيه للفرد دا غير يا ناس العرض |
We will fight for the pounds, no matter what | هنحارب على الجنيه لو حتى هيحصل ايه |
Oh girl, what will we do? | يا ستي هنعمل ايه |
We will do what we have to, and the rest we’ll fix | اللي علينا هنعمله والباقي هنعدله |
We’ll start on a new path | هنجيب طريق من أوله |
Wake up, guys, see what happened — the people prevailed | اصحو يا بشر شوفوا اللي حصل الشعب انتصر |
The people want to topple the regime | الشعب يريد إسقاط النظام |
The people are fed up. There’s been enough wickedness, everyone | الشعب تعب بقى يا عالم كفاية شر |
The people have had their say | الشعب قال كلمته |
And Tahrir Square shows their wisdom | والتحرير حكمته |
Whatever the media say | مهما الإعلام قال |
We’re not going back on our word | في كلامنا مش راجعين |
We’re standing our ground | على الأرض مجندين |
For as long as we live | طول ما احنا عايشين |
This is my country where I grew up | هي ديه بلدي اللي اتربيت أنا فيها |
I will live and die here | هأعيش وأموت أنا فيها |
It’s got to take first place, and that’s the final word | لازم تكون قدام، وهو دا الكلام |
I’ll never be able to give [my country] as much as it gives me | ومش هأقدر أديها قد اللي بتدهولي |
I’d like to give it my eyes, and even that wouldn’t be enough | أنا نفسي أديها عيوني، ومش هأقدر أكفيها |
You have to see how I prevail | لازم تشوفوا نصري |
Muslim, Christian, Egyptian | مسلم مسيحي مصري |
We’ll join our hands with yours | أيديكو وأيدينا عليها |
We will live and build | هنعيش ونبني فيها |
And my children will grow up there | وولادي يتربوا فيها |
The people want to topple the regime | الشعب يريد إسقاط النظام |