The French, as always, have a word for it: decalage.
This means, roughly, the time difference between two points on the globe. Or more generally, the transition you experience when shuttling between two cultures, two mindsets. For the better part of a century after it opened in 1869, the journey by ship down the Suez Canal represented a decalage for generations of travellers.
Port Said, on Egypt's Mediterranean coast, was the starting point for a rite of passage from Europe to Africa and Asia. Cut off from the rest of Egypt by water on all sides, Port Said existed in its own time and space - a place where continents met and co-existed. For the first half of the twentieth century Port Said was a world city, situated at the cross roads of the world.
Hazelle Jackson, London, 2010
