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I've been in and around Tahrir Sq for most of the day - Egypt's first May Day for decades to be held in relatively free conditions.Ìý

In the taxi there was the official trade union conference blaring from the radio, and it sounded like they, too were trying to come up with a tone differentiating their event from it's usual atmosphere - which was as befits a state run union full of factory managers in a dictatorship. Someone even denounced Mubarak.

On the square they've begun to go way beyond this.

From around 1pm there were contingents turning up usually as follows: about 60 people; home made banners congratulating the workers of District X for celebrating 1 May. Usually fronted by broad chested, well turned out - ie skilled and non precarious - middle aged manual workers. Then their sons and a few wives, or occasionally with the white collar workers,Ìýwomen employees. They would chant for a bit then join the throng, about 10,000 strong by the end.

I interviewed numerous people speaking in Arabic - I have still gotta get translations so I summarise:Ìý

Maintenance manager from a small town wandering around with his son dressed in the football colours of Spain: nothing has changed economically but we're happy to be here.

Ticket collector from the subway: dressed in the t-shirt of the new independent union federation, linking arms with his buddies: we want the old bosses to be kicked out of the enterprises; a minimum wage and the reversal of privatisations. Almost word for word a guy - again a middle manager - from the Cairo Gas Co, who adds that the revolution is now "my whole life" as it will determine my children's fate.

There is no singing of the International, and the only people carrying red flags are the newly "out" Communist Party (are they Russians, asks one old geezer, adding: Are you Russian?) - and the newly formed Democratic Labour Party - which is a project involving the far left and the Indy union leaders.

Mostly people carry Egyptian flags: and sing the national anthem. Plus there is a bit of football regalia. A young ultra from Zamalek FC tells me how he came with four thousand football fans on the 28 January, in defiance of people in the club hierarchy who told them the protesters were foreign agents.

"Why don't you ask me about football?" he says, when I begin quizzing him on the social dynamics of urban poverty. OK then, I ask him how Zamalek are doing. "The problem is the fans are spending too much time talking about the revolution and not enough about football".

It's clear that the football ultras, who never got on well with the cops, were one of the conduIts for bringing the urban poor onto the streets.

I ask a couple of older workers what they did on Jan25th: "We came down here with our workmates. Gradually other industries came down here and the strange thing is, though we all work in separate industries, we now know each other's faces."

Despite this, the independent unions are at a very rudimentary stage. Most have this mixture of wage demands, demands against particular corrupt bosses and things they want to happen to the structure of their industry: they are hyper specific. They do not see themselves as opposed to, or separate from the educated professionals who led the revolution.

This latter group is, as I have written before, increasingly perturbed by the strength of the Muslim Brotherhood, it's alleged close relationship with the army, and the benefit both derive from the speed of the elections.

One activist, a female human rights worker and part of the newly formed Social Democratic Party told me of the hurdles you have to jump to get on the ballot paper: register 5,000 members and publish the entire list in two national newspapers. The estimated cost is equivalent to 200,000 GBP.

She was not worried by the proliferation of new parties. Only the election timing, which seems to her designed to deliver a majority for the old elite and the Muslim Brotherhood.

Increasingly liberal intellectuals are beginning to talk about an "Ataturk model" - ie making the army the guarantor of the secular constitution as in Turkey; they look wistfully at Tunisia, whose transition is being more heavily influenced by the international community, NGOs etc. I recommend the novels of Orhan Pamuk to them, on the pros and cons of Turkish military secularism.

As the military police moved people off the central reservation at dusk, it was peaceful and jokey. One veteran traffic cop told us: "it's chaotic now, with all the traffic and the marchers; but we are saying nothing now; later we will impose order". He meant later in the political process, I think.

Few among the protesters and activists doubt an imposition of order is one potential outcome, hence some would rather have it Ataturk style than Ahmadinejad style.Ìý

Among the workers though, the thinking remains for many at the horizon of their own lives and workplace. They are still stunned to be standing there amid communists, social democrats and everything in-between, totally free of their old bosses, who they allege used the state run union to spy on them and dispense corruption.

The doctors' strike has been called for 10 May after a rancourous mass meeting lasting 5 hours in which the Muslim Brotherhood argued against the strike but got overturned, amid acrimony, by the largely young, secular membership (including many female doctors), with a lot of pushing and shoving on the platform.

As far as I can tell that is they only trouble there's been here, though after I left there were reports on Twitter that some people objected to having a music party in the square out of respect for its martyrs. [Update 1900 local: it seems there was some trouble and the police intervened, leading the stage to be dismantled, as the crowd had swelled to around 50,000. Thanks to the non-effectiveness of loperamide against the bug I have caught, I could not stay.]

However up to the time I left the first May Day in Egypt was chilled out and its sheer ordinariness what was extraordinary.