This project takes its inspiration from a long interview and a study of a number of private social media accounts of men advertising their services as massage therapists on gay dating apps, in a city where intimacy between men is both governed and controlled by the state.
The project unfolding in the following pages constructs a profile of a semifictional protagonist who lives in Cairo and maintains a side business that gives him a dignified income while at the same time constantly putting him in precarious situations, both legally and socially.
The massage bed in this instance is treated as a point of departure and a site for a heterotopia. It is a place for leisure, relaxation, and unproductiveness. But it is also a site where intense labor is being exercised, and where much sweat is being produced. It is also a point where commercial, healing, and erotic values meet.
