Seeing the evening news reports about the struggle for power in Egypt may bring to mind pictures like the one to the right. Earlier this year, students from our school submitted an article about Egypt that showed many of the positive reasons why this country is one of the most advanced in the Arab world, and one of the United States' closest allies. To most of the people in the U-City Family, these are events far away from here, but for one of our staff members there is daily worry that family and friends may be affected by the protests, rationing, and political strife.
Mr. Mousa (Room 127), our resident Arabic instructor still has close family living in Egypt. His mother, two brothers, and two sisters live in and around the Cairo area. They are affected daily by the food and fuel rationing, and are living with the curfews and other rules imposed during the public demonstrations that are occuring. According to Mr. Mousa, "transportation and other services are severly limited every day, and the 16 million residents of Cairo sometimes only subsist on one small meal per day. Life in other parts of Egypt seems to be relatively normal, but there are over 75 million people in the country who will be facing a change in leadership the likes of which have not been seen in over 30 years since Mubarak took office." After coming to the United States five years ago, Mr. Mousa and his family have been extremely happy to be here. He enjoys teaching Arabic to our students, and is excited to be including current events into his lessons.
"Now is a good time for changing the political way of the Middle East countries," says Mr. Mousa. He is hoping for peaceful changes that will let the governments listen to the people and offer free elections. What he sees now is "just a first step in the right direction for a democratic life for my family there." He would like to see other regional countries not try to corrupt Egyptian officials or parties with "dirty" money, or make Egypt look badly during this time of change. Egypt is one of the biggest countries in the Middle East and has modern urban areas, but there are still many parts of the rural country that are behind the times. Helping the people who live there to understand and grow during this change will also be a hard task. Also remember that there are American soldiers stationed there as part of the Multinational Forces Observers (MFO.org). Mr. Scribner was stationed there in 2009 for a year.
For more information on this story, watch your local news or stop by room 127. Everyone in our U-City Family should take this unique opportunity to speak to Mr. Mousa about his experience growing up in Egypt, and stop by and provide him some encouragement during these trying days!
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