THE AIRPLANE BEGINS ITS DESCENT INTO CAIRO, BUT I don’t even look out the window. I’ve had the shade drawn the whole twelve hours, all the way from the United States, a time in which I didn’t sleep but was not awake either.
Sorrow does that.
I shuffle off the plane in what has become my standard uniform: navy flip-flops and hiking pants that unzip just above the knee to convert into shorts. The hood of my sweatshirt is pulled over my head, my long, unruly curls tucked inside the fabric. If anyone bothered to look at me, they’d see red, gutted eyes and a clenched jaw, not the kind of person they’d want to make conversation with anyway.
The last time I landed in Cairo, it was a different story. I had a window seat then too, and I didn’t close the shade at all. I pressed my face to the smudgy plastic, watched the green band of Nile slice through the billowy, beige fabric of the country. As the aircraft descended, the land appeared to breathe—the mountains, the dunes, the shifting sands. It was like a golden exhale. Even closer to the ground, the light of the city shifted with glass and metal, glowing like a tiger’s-eye stone. My cheeks flushed with warmth; my eyes felt clear and open. I chattered with strangers at baggage claim. I made conversation with the taxi driver.
That was almost a month ago. Before my mother died of Alzheimer’s disease. Before I traveled home to Ohio for a funeral, buried my mom on a snowy day, and flew back to a desert, shrouded in grief and fleece. Before.
But now something else is off, too. At the airport I try calling home from one of the pay phones, just to let my family know that I made it to my destination, but the line is dead. I try each phone. None of them work.
The airport internet café is closed. When I ask how I can get online or make a call, I am met with shrugs. That’s when I notice the men in uniforms, standing in the airport windows.
My eyes are wild now, scanning the crowd. There are businesspeople in suits, women in head scarves, men in galabias that drag along the ground. Children and teenagers, suitcases and strollers. Nobody else seems panicked. But now I pick out soldiers, armed and walking among the travelers. They carry themselves with the unmistakable air of authority, their footfalls purposeful and strong. Though the security is impressively tight at the Cairo airport, I don’t remember such a strong military presence before.
My eye finally lands on a TV, where a crowd is gathering to watch BBC News. The footage shows tanks and rioters, piles of people throwing stones and wrestling each other to the ground. The background of the footage begins to take shape and look familiar. It’s Tahrir Square, just a block from the hostel where I intended to stay.
A red graphic with bold letters flashes across the screen: “Egypt in crisis!” My face blooms hot and red. My eyes water. A tremor quakes through my entire body, and I force myself to remain standing. It is January 25, 2011, the day of rage, the day the Arab Spring ignites.
My mom is dead. I am alone, far from home. And a revolution has begun.