I worked at the gates for the Commissioner.
For every 10 loads I carried, I got 2 boxes of cigarettes.
I would also get soda cans from the prisoners who were in for forgery.
That was until I received my sentence.
“What happened?” asked the officer.
“I got 6 years,” I said.
“I have a question for you,” he said. “Were you selling drugs?”
“Yes,” I answered, “But I wasn’t selling them when they arrested me because I was pregnant. But they didn’t want me to stop. The officer I was working for wanted me to keep doing it.”
“Do you want to work?” he asked.
“Yes.”
“Are you sure you can do it?”
“Yes, I’m sure.”
He got me to redo the tiles in the visiting room and clean the commissioner's office and room.
I was doing all right.
I was working two jobs and I was saving money.

My husband didn’t visit me for 3 months.
No one visited me. No one brought me anything to sleep on.
I used to sleep on the floor and kept my things in a locked bag.
I then got a bed on the third floor which I turned into a supermarket.
I kept the chips and soda there. I was saving them for my children.
My husband was surprised when he came to visit me.
“What is all this? I don’t even have a single cigarette!”
“Are you not working?” I asked.
“No, I quit,” he said.
“Where did you get all this?”
“I’m working. How would you know when you haven’t been visiting me?”
He thought I bought these things from the money I saved before prison.
He couldn’t believe it.
He only believed I was working in there when he met the woman I was working with.
I was helping her unload cartons.
“You found a job so quickly,” he said.
“I had to. I have to depend on myself,” I said.
My mother-in-law sent me food.
I told my husband to buy me things with the money I gave him.
I asked for a fan and some pots.
He visited me again.
I gave him 200 LE and 10 boxes of cigarettes.
His mother told him to keep 3 and sell the rest.
I gave him another 100 LE so he could bring me honey, cheese and tahini.
Those things weren’t sold in the canteen.
I later asked him to bring me cooking pots, a heater, and a radio.

I couldn’t work at the gates after I got injured.
I was taken to the hospital.
The officer asked if I was all right when he saw me.
“I’m tired of unloading,” I said.
“Do you want to work in the kitchen?” he asked.
He took me to the kitchen supervisor and I worked there until I got out.
I used to work in the kitchen 3 days week.
I would trade the pieces of meat I got for cigarettes.
I wasn’t profiting as much as I profited from unloading.

I was making more profit before.
I was saving some money for the paperwork when it was time to get out.
I asked my husband if he could do the paperwork for me and he said he could.
“Go to the officer and tell him you’re my husband.”
He went to the officer and did the paperwork.
The officer told him I was getting an early release for good behavior.
A month later the officer told me I’d be getting out in a few days.
I was getting out in a week.
The secretary asked me if I told my family that I was getting out.
“No, I’m surprising them,” I said.
“Who will bring you something to wear then?”
She got me an abaya and left it in my name.
“Pick it up from Mr. Mamdouh. Tell him someone left me an abaya.”
She called my husband and told him that I was getting out.
He told her he’d come pick me up.
“Do you not want to tell them so you could find out if he remarried?” she asked.
“I know he did,” I said.
“Don’t take any rash decisions. You don’t want to lose your children,” she said.
He was waiting for me outside.
My friends did my hair and dyed it with henna.
We stayed with our mother-in-law for a while.
She kept trying to convince me to let my husband marry that woman legally.
He could marry her if he wanted. I just wanted my children.
“I don’t want her anymore. I told her I’d leave her when you came out,” he said.