??? ????? ????? ??????. Ash-shab yurid isqat an-nizam. The people shall bring down the regime.
404. Website not found. What`s happening? What`s going on? What is the meaning of this? How can this be happening?
This can`t be possible. Realization dawned on my face like the biological instinct of a mother when her newborn is in danger. Total static. No phones, no Internet, in a sense our ability to talk stolen.
How dare those pretentious elitist bastards do this? How can they have the audacity to commit this crime against us? After all the malicious acts of injustice committed against use. This is not just a gross miss-use of power. We as a country chose them to lead us because we were promised an era of greatness. Of wellbeing. Of joy. Of peace, fairness and equality. But we have been betrayed our pleas for help swatted away like an annoying fly.
They have drawn the final straw and we will no longer stand this foul oppression anymore. My country was crying out for help. Its children starved and its bountiful lands were being stripped dry by the insatiable greed of the bureaucratic snakes.
I heard the distinct sound of what sounded like an army storming through the city chanting in unison. I thought they had come for me. I decided that if I died that I would not die as a cowardly mouse but as a martyr. As I walked outside ready to face my death one of my friends, Abdul, was running like he had seen a ghost. So I decided to follow him only nodding as he saw me.
We passed the abandoned bakery. A man who had protested about the regime`s tax rate once owned it. We hadn`t seen him in months. His family disappeared soon after.
After a while we finally reached the presidential palace and what I saw was something that I only dreamed about. An assembly. No. A nation united for the same reason. People stood all around the palace stretching beyond the horizon. Their eyes were exactly like that if the baker filled with passion and determination.
As we approached closer we saw that the crowd gravitated towards a make-shift stage which was being used by the government to try to disperse the crowd. Abdul rushed forward and quickly scaled the fence that surrounded the stage, tackling the official, taking the microphone. This gesture was welcomed with cheers from the crowd who looked expectantly at him.
Abdul began ranting about various acts of injustice and tyranny gaining the attention of the crowd and earning him with just cheers. After Abdul finished he left the microphone and various people from the crowd told their stories of lose and sorrow caused by this government and all their speeches ended with the same phrase, ??? ????? ????? ??????. Ash-shab yurid isqat an-nizam. The people shall bring down the regime.
This was our jihad that we had to overcome if we ever wanted justice and peace. Even though the government and their supporters would try discourage us in any way possible we had to stand strong and proud. Even when the baker felt like giving up and the people around him told him to give up he stood to prove them wrong and he left behind a legacy that would not be forgotten for eons to come.
It all happened so fast. My tears fell like the bodies of so many around me. I saw fathers, brothers, mothers killed in front of me. I watched as their bodies convulsed as each bullet tore through their bodies like they were made out of paper. The people started trampling over each other in an attempt to escape the leaden death which was harvesting life wherever it touched.
The hail of bullets stopped and exodus of people stopped and around 60 people lay dead and their surviving loved ones mourned their distorted bodies on the cold gravel. I caught snippets of people`s conversations which consisted along the lines of that this was a bad idea or the baker was wrong.
I who had not once uttered a word since the day my father had been so cruelly taken away from me as I ran away. I stood up and walked past the bodies towards the opposite direction as everyone which caused them to stare and stop with what they were doing. They all wondered what this boy was doing and some even told me to run but I would never run again and I would not let them tarnish my father`s dream.
Several camera crews who had just missed the carnage pointed their cameras at me as I walked towards the stage where Abdul lay in an eternal slumber and picked up the microphone. The shooters were at a lost as how a boy had such powerful courage but would not shoot him while the cameras were there so they had sent men outside to turn off the cameras but it would take those men fifteen minutes to do so.
As I opened my mouth on pure instinct in a half cry half scream I uttered "Rise". As I started to collapse I was steadied by a strange man who recognised me as the bakers` son. He told me that it was okay and that everyone had heard me before I passed out.
As I woke up in hospital I saw strange faces surrounding my bed all who looked very relieved when they saw I was awake. When they asked me questions I only nodded yes or no. During the coming days I learned that I had been in a coma for 3 months and in that time the world had seen what was happening to Egypt and started to intervene. After people had seen the video of what happened outside the presidential palace it had caused outrage in the community and various riots had occurred all around the country in response to my plea for them to rise. The government had stepped down and they were having elections to determine a new government on free of tyranny and corruption.
