Zabbaleen
The Zabbaleen ( ', ) is a word which literally means "garbage people" in Egyptian Arabic. The contemporary use of the word in Egyptian Arabic is to mean "garbage collectors". In cultural contexts, the word refers to teenagers and adults who have served as Cairo's informal garbage collectors since approximately the 1940s. The Zabbaleen (singular: ', ) are also known as Zarraba (singular: Zarrab), which means "pig-pen operators." The word ' came from the Egyptian Arabic word ' (, ) which means "garbage".
Zabbaleen
Egypt is a Muslim-majority country. However, over 90 percent of the Zabbaleen community in the Mokattam village are Coptic Christians. Communities where almost everyone is Christian are rare to find in Egypt outside of the Zabbaleen community of Mokattam. According to Engi Wassef, in her commentary in her documentary film "Marina of the Zabbaleen", many people in the Zabbaleen village say that even if they could live outside of the village or buy a house elsewhere, they would not because they are happy to live within their own religious community and freely practice their religion.