Final Friday

Wow! I was so excited and exhausted and busy this weekend that I forgot to Blog! lol
I did a couple more interviews with ABC 25 and Fox 7 = you can find them both linked on my facebook profile.
And the pics from the protests (all days I went) is the link below:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=58474&id=1677137434&l=daf5eb5db8

So I went to Tahrir again on Wednesday night (I think I blogged about this already) and then on Friday dubbed by the protesters as "Final Friday" 2/11/11 my roommate Hassan and I went to the protests in Tahrir. We weren't sure what to expect and in honesty were a bit worried about potential violence. The protesters were ANGRY after the message that was delivered on Thursday night. But we went anyways. This was his first time attending any of the protests or visiting Tahrir since 1/25/11.

We went and it was altogether peaceful although pretty packed. We stayed a couple of hours - but it didn't seem like anything was happening. We had expected a march to the Presidential palace but could see no signs of that happening. So we left, got into a cab and on the way back we noticed big groups of people marching. We asked our cab driver and he said these were the marches to the palace. We looked at each other - got out of the taxi and joined....

At first Hassan (being Egyptian) wasn't sure how I would be treated. I got asked more than a few times if I was Israeli...so he asked me to cover up as much as possible. So I pulled on my Egyptian sock hat I had just bought in Tahrir. Put my kuffeya (scarf) on around my neck and mouth (I brought it becuase it was the Egyptian colors and for a potential tear gas mask just in case - cause we knew not what to expect). But after being greeted more than a few times by Egyptian anyways with the common slogans of "welcome to Egypt" and having my and shaken when they found out I was American -any fear of the protesters Hassan had quickly faded and I was able to remove them.

We marched a few miles to the palace and then arrived to a blockade of tanks and barbed wire in the street about a block away keeping us at a distance. On the way Hassan stopped me on the side of the road and looked me in the face and said "I'm ready to die today for my country. Are you ready to die today for my country?" I knew he was serious - one can never tell what Mubarak has in store for us. But I quickly responded - "The eyes of the world are all on Egypt today - he wouldn't dare be so stupid." After all we had seen every camera crew from Britian to Venezuela out there that day. But even I wasn't sure I was convinced by my own statement. But we marched on into the unknown.

After arriving about 20 minutes later it was the sunset prayer time. So all the protesters grabbed whatever they could - newspapers, flags, their own coats - laid them on the ground and began to pray. After prayer the crowd started to get restless. And so did we. He looked at me and said - we have 2 hours to get home before curfew. After all those disobeying curfew in the streets generally slept in the streets to avoid any trouble. And neither of us had come prepared for that. I told him to stay a little longer. We were only about an hour cab ride from home. And about 20 minutes later - the man came on the megaphone and announced that Mubarak has resigned. The crowd went nuts - dancing, cheering, screaming. It was the most electric feeling I had ever had and I wasn't even Egyptian.

We marched back to Tahrir square for the celebration. It was an amazing night that I will never forget.

However the protesters haven't left Tahrir yet. They are demanding Constitutional reforms from the military....we shall see when this will end....

Until then....