هذا ما فعلته بنا بورسعيد، جعلتنا نسبق أعمارنا بسبع أو ثماني سنوات على الأقل، ونعرف أن في الدنيا ما هو غالٍ كغلاوة آبائنا وأُمهَّاتنا..
That is what Port Said did to us: she made us run seven or eight years ahead of our age, and know that there is something in this world as dear as our fathers and mothers.
From the novel Port Said 68 · Chapter 3
Words of a narrator or a character belong to the novel's world, not to the author's personal views.
Port Said 68
Port Said 68ولد رأسه يصل إلى منتصف صدرك بالكاد وبقدمه صندلٌ لا يزيدُ ثمنُه على ثلاثة جنيهات، ومع هذا كنت ضئيلًا أمامه.. غلبك..
A boy whose head barely reached the middle of your chest, with a sandal on his foot worth no more than three pounds, and yet before him you were small. He beat you.
Port Said 68فهمس للباقين بأن يكمنوا في مواضعهم وزحف وتسلل هو حتى وصل إلى هذا المزغل وسد فَوَّهته بجسده.. تلقى ليس عشرات الطلقات بل المئات من ماسورة المدفع الخارجة منه، وظلَّ منصوبًا عليه حتى بعد أن مات.. فعلٌ لا يحدثٌ ولو من شخصٍ مجنون..
He whispered to the others to stay hidden where they were, then crawled and crept until he reached the embrasure and stopped its mouth with his body. He took not tens of bullets but hundreds from the gun barrel that jutted from it, and stayed propped against it even after he died. An act that would not happen even from a madman.
Port Said 68الثابت أن ضرباتٍ شديدةً كانت تُكال للعدوِّ من موقعٍ ما في بورسعيد ويصاحبها هذا الدوي وهذه الخلخلة، وما عدا ذلك أساطير اخترعها الناس، ولا أدري لماذا تصوروا هذه الآلة أو الآلات التي تفعل ذلك على شكل مدفع وتفنَّنوا في رسم هيئته
What is certain is that heavy blows were being dealt to the enemy from somewhere in Port Said, with this thunder and this shaking of the air; everything else was legend the people invented, and I do not know why they imagined the machine, or machines, that did it as a cannon and took such pains to draw its shape.