Egyptian Revolution Part 2

On my second night back in Cairo, the chaos from downtown had spread to the “westernized” area of the city I lived in. It was exhilarating and horrifying both at the same time. It was an extremely surreal experience. For the lack of a better explanation, in the movie Black Hawk Down, there was sporadic gunfire off in the distance throughout most of the movie, this was a lot like that. It was made even more surreal by the terrible cold I was undergoing at the time. I would wake up in the middle of the night, wide awake, and try and watch tv shows to pass the time until I got tired. The gunfire would just continue back and forth while I watched Aqua Teen Hunger Force and ate Mac and Cheese. People were still clueless as to what was going to happen, but we we’re slowly starting to realize that it wasn’t going to blow over anytime soon. I remember calling my friend who lived near the center of downtown, and him telling me he had a rifle. His father and uncles had gone out to protect the street from looters, and he had been left behind to guard the house and the rest of his family. I thought it was crazy that just a week and a half ago we were just hanging out like normal high-schoolers, and now we were in this unbelievable situation, but I wasn’t freaked out, nobody seemed freaked out. I would occasionally go to my balcony and look into the street. I was on the second floor and I remember being a little frightened that a looter would see me looking around and try to rob my apartment for some reason. That second night seems to me now like one of the longest of my life.