According to my Facebook account, the first discussions between me and Khaled began on 20 December, 2013. Out of the blue, he asked me why a page that I used to prepare for one of the weeklies – covering the secrets of Egypt’s satellite networks – had been suspended. I told him that the magazine couldn’t tolerate the heated topics I had published, especially since it was owned by one of the owners of these networks.

According to my Facebook account, the first discussions between me and Khaled began on 20 December, 2013. Out of the blue, he asked me why a page that I used to prepare for one of the weeklies – covering the secrets of Egypt’s satellite networks – had been suspended. I told him that the magazine couldn’t tolerate the heated topics I had published, especially since it was owned by one of the owners of these networks.

He condemned this and gave me a brief summary of his experience in the complex relationships between newspapers and satellite TV stations. He told me that the solution is to move the page to an unbiased newspaper. He knew that this was impossible, but I didn’t care. I was just happy that he asked about the page. Most of the paper’s readers hadn’t even noticed that it had disappeared, perhaps because I didn’t say anything about this publicly because of the pressure put on my colleagues at the newspaper.

An encyclopedia of culture

With the huge number of comments posted by my colleagues about their relationship with el-Sergani, I felt hesitant about talking about this, although it reveals how closely he used to follow the Egyptian media, and his attention to detail. Compared to others’ experiences with him, it was a very small thing to mention, but the moral support I felt when I realized that I was doing something which deserves to be read was so important to me.

He was a real encyclopedia of journalism and culture and he shared a lot of his knowledge with colleagues. That much was confirmed by the commemoration held for him by the Al-Ahram Foundation at the Omar Makram Mosque on 10 September, where journalists gathered together with writers, intellectuals, and film makers – especially those active in Egypt’s cinematic festivals and associations. They had not forgotten that during the last 20 years and more, el-Sergani had played a vital role in this field.

The conversation between me and el-Sergani that started on Facebook petered out, but we reconnected again when, for six months this year, I became responsible for the administration of the Egyptian Editors’ Association, where he worked as a volunteer with the facilitation committee, tasked with planning the association’s activities in cooperation with the Egyptian Programme for the Development of the Media, the International Editors Network, and the Ethical Journalism Network.

A journalist who cared about his profession

Among the things little known about el-Sergani, even by those who followed the journalism page he started in the al-Dostour newspaper, was his enthusiasm for all activities pertaining to the development of journalism in Egypt, and the credibility of journalists and newspapers alike. He participated in a number of partnerships and was an eloquent speaker who used his deep cultural understanding to help make his ideas clear to any audience.

Another incident brought me together with Khaled el-Sergani last June, which turned out to be the last time I saw him. It was during a conference on the future of editing, held in central Cairo and organized by the Association of Egyptian Editors. I was carrying a collection of poetry called “Aseer al-Qasab.” He, known for his love of books, asked me if he can get a copy of the book and of course no one could say no to a person like him.

The most famous journalist

All those who spoke and wrote about him remembered his love of reading, and his huge library of more than 30,000 volumes. For a long time, people nicknamed him “the book carrier.” People spoke of his many traits: his diverse knowledge and his openness to all cultures.

El-Sergani died on Saturday, September 6, at the age of just 54. Ahmad Jamal, a writer, wrote that “he was a simple, humble, honest, interesting, and a professional reader.” He added that, “during the long years I knew him, more than quarter a century, I never saw him walking around without a bag full of new books or without hundreds of references and ideas which he used to develop all the time.”

Hani Samir, his student at the al-Dostour newspaper, wrote that, “he was a very strict person who often got angry and upset very quickly. He did not know what courtesy was, and the first time you saw him you didn’t want to deal with him or work under him. But after a while, you got to know him and to understand that he had taught many people before, and he was a very knowledgeable person in all fields.

“He was a big book with legs, and the most forgiving person for those who work in journalism.” For his part, Yahya Qallash, a prominent unionist who fought many union-related battles alongside el-Sergani, wrote that he was “a unique person in his generation. He lived a simple life but the depth and though his biases were clear, he was never a person who adhered to rigid theories, and he was always against intellectual stagnation.”

A lot of memorial articles were published for el-Sergani – a very impressive farewell, only matched perhaps by the one for Hani Darwish, a fellow journalist who passed away in 2013. This huge number of articles could be interpreted as an angry response to comments made by some supporters of the Muslim Brotherhood, who seemed to celebrate his death because of his support for the June 30 revolution.

But their comments have largely been ignored, and the virtues of el-Sergani were repeated in all media outlets. He was celebrated as a writer and reader, and he made many people believe that what you leave behind is what you are remembered for.