Hosam El Sokkari is not new to change or, to be more accurate, to dramatic career shifts.
Over more than 40 years, the 63-year-old trained pharmacologist has been a cartoonist, science and technology writer, and broadcaster for Deutshe Welle Arabic radio and the BBC.
In his BBC years, El Sokkari raced up the ranks to launch the corporation's first non-English online service in 1999 and later became head of the BBC's Arabic section. He also established himself as a newspaper columnist in his native Egypt.
During the pandemic, he created a “Sokkari Salon” on YouTube on which to debate social, political and various taboo issues.
But stand-up comedy?
“Last August, I decided to revive my deep interest in acting,” El Sokkari tells The National in Cairo. “I took several workshops, but one day in October I woke up and told myself that I want to watch a stand-up comedy live.
“I have always enjoyed the art in London where I lived most of my life. But that was my first exposure in Egypt. After the show, I felt that I had a reservoir of experiences and stories that I could share on a stand-up comedy stage.”
Two months later, he launched himself on to the relatively new but expanding world of stand-up comedy in Egypt. The first of the three solo gigs he has done was on December 19 at a small venue in the Cairo suburb of Maadi.
He called it The Finnish Experience, with material drawn from his experiences in the north European nation, where he worked in the 1980s when he was in his early 20s.
“The three shows were sold out and I got positive feedback,” he says. “My material is different from what many stand-up comedians use in Egypt, which is often interaction with the audience that's laced with mockery and bullying.
“Many people were surprised I decided to do stand-up on the grounds that it is not viewed as a respected form of art in Egypt but that's probably because their notion of stand-up is just mockery or bullying. Mind you, we also have a culture that views too much laughter as an ominous sign or a possible prelude to a tragic event.”
El Sokkari's involvement in the performing arts did not start with stand-up. As a Cairo University student, he did stage acting and won a prize in 1984 for his role in the one-act drama The Writer and the Beggar by late Egyptian playwright Ali Salem.
Finland was the first country El Sokkari travelled to and the material of his show is focused on his reaction as an Arab to life in a Nordic country where nearly everything is different from Egypt.
“Nature there is different and so is the culture,” he says. “The funny part is the self-effacing material of me dealing with life there and my attempts to understand the culture and the nuances of the Finnish language.”
Putting further skill to good use, Mr El Sokkari developed his encounters with skinheads in Finland into a comic strip that became regular features in the Helsinki newspaper Aamulehti.
His dabbling in stand-up is part of a journey of discovery after decades of working in corporate bodies such as the BBC and Yahoo!
“Much of my decision to take up stand-up is rooted in my desire to be more independent,” he says. “I don't want the creative side of me to disappear. It's like the joy I found in radio after many years in television. Radio offers more leeway and involves less technology. You edit yourself and you select the music.”
He plans to take his stand-up show elsewhere in Egypt and abroad. “I really want to enjoy my creative journey,” he muses. He has also started auditioning for film roles.
However, stand-up comedy in Egypt, a country of 108 million where freedom of expression is greatly curtailed, is hardly the platform for critiquing politics or touching on sensitive topics such and religion.
It's standard practice for comedians to sign a document pledging not to deal with politics or religion in stand-up shows.
