Pray for an Egyptian Lee Kuan Yew

The Egyptian political scene so far looks desolate.

There are too many feeble political parties. They have not been able to come up with an ideology appealing to the masses. None of our existing parties can put forth a candidate of their own for the upcoming presidential elections. None of them have the funds to support a presidential candidate. None of them have the funds to win a majority in the next parliamentary elections.

These parties are not to blame. It takes time for political leaders to mature and recognize how the political game needs to be played.

This does not bode well for Egypt. Why?

Sixty five percent of our population is below the age of thirty five.  Some people see it as a problem. I see it as a gold mine. They need to be given hope and nobody is giving them that. Neither a political party nor a presidential candidate has been able to appeal to our youth.

We luckily now have a constitution which unambiguously defines his or her role, and limiting the term to two four year terms. This might be the first ray of hope that things might be on track. Yet the majority of our youth didn't vote for it. Skeptical as they may be, I foresee it will one day be an invaluable tool in their hands. This is how they will keep our leaders in check.

Therefore, we now must only wait for our presidential elections and hope and pray that our next President is a Lee Kuan Yew. I hope our candidates study this Singaporean leader well. This man managed to rescue Singapore from desolation. He turned it into an Asian economic powerhouse and a vibrant democracy. In this day and age we however can do well without his caning policies and unique autocratic idiosyncrasies. 

The only difference between our future Egyptian president and Lee Kuan Yew (apart from one being a constitutional president and the other a prime minister) is the decade in which they will govern. Mr. Yew didn't have tech savvy, internet connected, social media linked, politically opinionated, and this many economically deprived youth. Ours will. After both revolutions of 25 January and 30 June we all know what our youth are adept at.

I hope our presidential candidates make sure to address the needs and aspirations of our youth as a top priority in their programs. For them employment is their urgent and most imminent need, and a move towards oppression their worst fear. They need a well-defined economic program that will employ the maximum number of our young women and men. They need clear programs of future democratization.

The candidate then may be, may be, able to win over the trust and hearts of our youth.

Believe In Our Youth

These past three years must have been the worst of my life.

The pressures, the burdens, and the sheer daily will power to hang on and not skip country have been enormous. To wake up, and go to work to businesses crumbling because of a depressed economy. To look in to the faces and eyes of your hundreds of lifelong employees and to not fire them because they are your family. To pay them salaries from your life long savings in the belief that life will be one day be good again. Just believing in that is a heck of a burden.

To think of the future of your family. Can I maintain the standard of living I have provided them? Will I be able to provide them for the needs they are accustomed to?

Yet, you and I have held on to our faith that things will get better. You and I did not move to Canada, the USA, or Dubai. We are sticking it out here. Why do we do it midst what most people perceive as total chaos, anarchy, and hopelessness? Because we believe in our genetic composition.

We as, Egyptians have brought to the world one of the most beautiful civilizations humanity has ever known. We have given humanity the breadth of wealth in all sciences while humanity was foraging from trees and hunting wild animals. We built temples and pyramids that have withstood the test of the ages as symbols of our humanity. Those genes live on. We are Egyptians, and we are proud of it. We have been ruled by Monarchs and Queens. Hatshepsut and Nefertiti, and even Cleopatra who we considered our own. We had women rulers, while everywhere else women were held in the abyss of ranks in human society.

Now to put things in to perspective we actually have things going pretty well for us.

Would you please entertain just for a second the thought of what the world would be like if a German General toppled Hitler because he believed he was evil? Sixty million lives would have been saved. Imagine if one of those lives was your son, daughter, wife, sister or mother or father? We have a general who did.

My son goes to college overseas and I don't have to worry that he will be one of the 37 million who had to go to war and die in World War I or of the 60 million who died in World War II. Therefore these are definitely good times.

These are times to think positively. We can debate all day on who should, or should not, be president. We should fight abuses by the police, we should fight for the rights of our women and youth. But we should do all of that believing in our genetic make up and that we shall come out of this better. We need to keep working to bring this country back on track. We need to give hope to the youth who are under 35 who make up 65% of our population.  We need to give the youth who have fled Egypt a reason to come back.

Youth is our hope.

Believe in our youth.

Our Children

 

How far back does your memory go?
Be honest, because we sometimes look back at a picture or a video of our childhood experiences and think we remember it?
“We know that having language can be very important to memories because in having words for our experiences, we can talk about them, repeat them, and structure them” say some experts.
So do we start remembering from 3 or 7?
That is really not the point I am trying to make. For those of you who have children as old as mine, 25, 22, and 2 (that excludes a whole bunch of you) I am asking this question because our eldest children only hear from my friends what great parents we were. They don't remember how great we were!!!!
Mona and I were absolutely great parents. We sacrificed everything for the well being of our children. A sacrifice that was done with a lot of heart, and no misgivings whatsoever. We did it willingly and without the least of regret. Do our children remember those moments? No. We only have the pictures and videos to prove our love? Yes.
When they were old enough to remember fully, they didn't want to be with us. We would implore them to go on this, or that, trip. The answer was always no. We would gladly take their friends along, but the answer was always no.
Now that I have a two year old and watch myself drool, and dribble, over his highness I remember my previous experience with my older children.
My advice now would be the same. Give, give and give and don't expect any appreciation. None is warranted. You are giving because they deserve to be given to. Not because they are your own but because they have no one but you, for the time being.
That’s a fact that sometimes makes me sad, since I now cherish Shams's company, as I did Zein and Aly's,  time together so dearly. But remember that conscious, autobiographical (also known as “explicit”) memories are only the tip of the iceberg. “Implicit,” or unconscious, recollections shape us too. The truly important and formative memories are the ones we don’t have words for — the ones that are logged somewhere deep in our children’s brains. That’s where our kids learn that they are loved, that relationships bring them joy, and that people can be trusted.
No, my children probably won’t always remember the time when we rolled in the grass, or when I carried my daughter day in, day out, to the beach in Agami, and we all laughed. When I swam with Aly in the pool to attack Captain Hook, or when I carry Shams in to his favorite "Aquamium" in Gouna, or when Sabrine and I smother him with kisses on his way to his first day of school.  But what they will remember is that their favorite people always take care of them, relationships are intimate and fun, and life is good.
Peace and love to all of you who are in our shoes!