you say you want a(nother) revolution…?

revolution                                                               © erin dunigan 2013

Because I don’t have a tv, I am not accustomed to the 24-hr a day news stream put forth by the American media outlets. So, I was somewhat shocked to begin hearing that folks who get their news from such outlets were using words like coup and seemed skeptical and somewhat doubtful about the people’s revolution unfolding in Egypt, as opposed to the celebratory sense I got from those actually on the ground in Egypt. 

Here it is, July 4. The day we celebrate our independence – and yet we cannot celebrate with another people’s revolutionary movement, half a world away? This, to me, seems odd, and a bit sad.

Why wouldn’t you be celebrating? I wondered to myself.

Haven’t you seen the images that have been coming from Egypt, the images of hundreds of thousands (and many say millions) of Egyptians taking to the streets to stand for ‘Egypt?’ Can you not see what I’m seeing? How is your view of the same events so different?

Perhaps I got it wrong – perhaps I missed something.

But, upon further checking with friends in Egypt – friends from many different places and sources, the message was clear and it was unanimous – this is a good day for Egypt, for Egyptians. This is a people’s revolution against a sect that had tried to hijack the events of January 2011. So, rather than sit back in resignation, the people decided to take their revolution back.

It is a beautiful story. A story of courage. A story of hope. A story of unity amidst so much diversity – Christian and Muslim, just to name one of the most obvious factors to be seen amongst the protestors.

Of course this is just the beginning. Of course the ‘work of democracy’ is hard and messy and not always linear. Of course it is something that can be hijacked (again) –  but this is precisely what gives these days hope – that the people have awakened from their slumber and have come together to say ‘enough’ – or, in the Arabic slogan for the June 30 re-revolution, تمرد, tamarod, rebel.

It was said during the January 2011 revolution that there were those called couch potatoes, the couch potato party – those who did not come down from their high-rise apartments to join in, but who stayed safely upstairs in their apartments, on their couches – what we might call armchair quarterbacking. Those who did not want to get involved, get messy, or participate in the demonstrations but who preferred to hang back and see how it all played out.

It seems that we in America, sitting in front of our TVs, safely on our couches, are more prone to provide commentary than commendation, to be cynical rather than celebratory.

I wonder if, on this July 4^th, as we celebrate our freedom, hard won, often fought for, if we might also take a moment to celebrate ‘revolution’ – for that too, is in our history, in our heritage.

Revolution – a sudden, radical, or complete change, a fundamental change in the way of thinking about or visualizing something, a change of paradigm.

I wonder if we too might not need a bit more ‘revolution’…

photo: melon cart

melon cart      Cairo, Egypt
© 2009 erin dunigan

enter

Like many images, I didn’t set out to ‘capture’ this one–it just presented itself along the way to somewhere else. An image, quite literally, of the ‘journey’ becoming the destination.

I was in Cairo, Egypt, for two days. In the evening I decided to walk down the street from the seminary where I was staying. What struck me about this house of prayer was the brightness of the yellow, contrasted with the design on the door, of the gate, and the tiled floor–the lines that seemed, in a sense, to draw one into the frame.

At first I walked past. But I was drawn back. It was the open door that compelled me. Drew me in. That is when I made this image.

enter, Cairo Egypt
© 2009 erin dunigan

Day 16: walk like an egyptian

 

sphinx profile

Mina, my host and tour guide in Cairo, warned me that Egyptians are crazy, especially in driving. I thought he was kidding. I thought wrong.

 

There are no lanes on the roads in Cairo. There are also no crosswalks. What I thought was a crazy game of human frogger in Chiang Mai was nothing compared with the Egyptian version–sometimes crossing 6-8 lanes of fairly rapidly moving traffic. It really was impressive to watch, but a bit nerve wracking as well.

In addition to watching human frogger, I did also get to see the pyramids and the sphinx today. Wow.

It was pretty crazy to be seeing something right there before me that I have read and heard about for so long. Pretty awe inspiring.