Egyptian Revolution Part 3

The next morning I was feeling a bit better, but I was still out of it. At some point in the afternoon I went to the roof of my building with my Dad, which was one of the tallest in the area and look around the city. There was sporadic gunfire and shouts all across town, but we couldn’t see anything. All we saw were empty streets, and wild roaming dogs, who could now wander freely. But something happened that I’ll never forget. On my own street, the one I’ve walked down thousands of times over my life, one I thought was just a boring, regular road, rolled a heavy duty tank. Even when the revolution was all over and I walked down that road again, I still can’t imagine a deadly tank rolling down it. By that night the looting had become a serious issue. Nobody worried about being attacked by police, or a rioter, they worried about a thug breaking into your house, or mugging you in the street. A group of men had tried breaking into my building, but were prevented from entering by the building’s hired guards. Vigilante crews began to form to keep looters off the street. They wore white armbands, and usually carried some rudimentary weapon like a cricket bat, or a kitchen knife tied to a broom.

There was a marine who lived across the hall from me, who I saw with two big duffel bags hugging his family and leaving to report to his base. Because he was with the government, SWAT-like troopers were posted outside my buildings. They carried huge automatic weapons, and wore night-vision goggles. They would stay up all night guarding the place, and their presence lightened the mood of everyone in the building. The residents would sometimes meet and talk about random things just to talk to other people. We were getting somewhat restless, hardly ever leaving out apartments, and only communicating through telephone.