Cairo during Mubarak

Back in 2009 there was no Facebook in Romania or Egypt but there was Hi5 if somebody remembers, people were not so obsessed with their cellphones and not all was about self image like today. No Instagram and no Iphones, what i had was a black Samsung which slides up, it was extremely popular in that time. I remember youngsters like me were obsessed with the hi5 chat and for us it was what is Facebook today, our only external source of chat with our friends and new people we met.

I was a student in my first year of University in my hometown of Targu Mures, i was studying geography and tourism and i was a pretty happy kid just the fact that i had this fire burning inside me, the desire of traveling and visit new places. I was 19 at that time and never went outside Romania and to tell you the truth i didn't even visited my own country to much. Maybe that's why i signed up for Geography so i can travel here and there, make my dream come true. It was end of May when i took an extreme decision regarding my life, i had one more month to finish my first year when i decided to quit university and i did just that. But for what reason... you will find out!

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Hi5 and Quitting university

In 2009 i was using hi5 and boy it was the bomb, it was the first social media for youngsters which became extremely popular in Romania, of course i had also My Space but in my country almost nobody knew about it. So i spend hours and hours on this chat uploading pictures and having bunch of conversations with my friends or just random people from all over the world. It was a good time now that i remember, i remember you could pick your own song and play it once you sign up, it was really excited application. This is how i met Amir...

Actually my high school friend Mia now we were in the year same class in university she was talking to this guy from Egypt on Yahoo Messenger actually and she was always talking me about it but she had a longtime boyfriend ( now they are all married with a kid ) so she just talked with him for fun, plus her English was not so good so God knows how that conversation went. Anyways one time she invited me to her home to spend the weekend so this was the first time i saw his pictures and got a chance to speak a bit with him, i remember we exchanged yahoo messenger id's and said to each other that will speak again. Of course Mia was aware of it and she was absolutely fine with it, at the end of the day she was in a relationship why should it bother her, right?!

Once i arrived home we started talking, me and Amir. He was a guy a bit older than me, i guess in that time he was 25 and i was 19, he was living in Egypt in a city called Zagazig which i totally had no clue about it. All i knew about him that he was studying computers or something like this and he was living with his mom and brother. We kept on talking and talking day and night for about 8 months time when i took the decision...

I was young and i had crazy dreams and no life experience whatsoever, all i wanted to do was travel the world and never look back. I did not knew other place than Romania, i did not knew about other cultures or traditions. I did spoke exceptional English for an early age thanks to Cartoon Network so i had some skills after all. I was 19 when i took the decision to move away, yes move not travel, i wanted to leave Romania in order to get a better life, new aspirations, new dreams. It was nothing wrong with Romania, i absolutely loved it and i had many friends in that time but one thing i remember i had bad luck in love, i was jumping from relationship to relationship and until this age i only had 2 long relationships, one about 1 year old and the other one 1 year and half but they all went bad and i was always the weakest person in the picture.

Amir was a kind guy, we were talking from sunset to sunrise for so many months, we were in love if you can call it like that. I mean it was virtual love because we never seen eye to eye of course only on web cam but that was different. I saw his family and he saw my mom, there was no day without speaking with him. He had this crazy green eyes and that typical Arabic features that attracted me to him and he was completely different from all the Romanian boys i used to date. After 8 months of chatting we decided to give it a try in real life with me moving there... to Egypt imagine that?! Of course my mom and my family said absolutely No but after a while of saying this to them every day she finally accept it and she did her best to help me, financially and all the rest.

I quit my university and i told everybody i am moving away to Egypt, of course my friends did not took it very well and they were not pleased with this idea, it was like a modern day Catfish ( if you guys watch the show ) i was planning to move to another country for a guy i never met face to face. How crazy is that?!

Packing my bags and first stop Budapest

I still remember my family's words, they were always saying that something bad will happen to me, that i will be kidnapped from the Airport or God knows what other stories they brought everyday. They were scared for me, this was an Arab country i was going to with different customs and religion. But my mind was so fixed on going there and Amir that i couldn't process other things. I did all i had to do and believe me it was a long process, is not easy to move to another country, especially Egypt.

I did not require visa so that was a good thing, i made my passport for 5 years, i translated all my documents into Arabic and this was difficult because in my city in that time they did not had an Arabic translation possibility so they send all my papers to another country for translations and then send it back to Romania, i think took 2 weeks just for the papers. I took out from the city hall a document for marriage abroad so i was ready for everything. Basically i collected all my documents from Romania, all my evidences that one time i was living here. I was so ready to do!

Finally i book my flight from Budapest to Rome and Rome to Cairo, it's going to be a long road until my final destination. And i had to pick a bus from my city to Budapest. This was my first time on a plane as well so i was so excited. Now that i think back i was never scared, there was not a pinch of scare in my body. Is like i knew i was going to be fine...

I packed all my things and the day has come, i still remember it was around 9 am when i had to catch a bus to Budapest, my mom and my cousin came with me until the bus and the goodbye was hard but i was so optimistic about it, in my mind just to arrive there. I jumped on the bus and 10 hours ride until i arrived to Budapest. The road was fine, i always looked outside the window trying to see new things but as i discovered Hungary can be pretty boring because they only have fields, no hills no mountains, so nothing to see. I had a pension reservation for 2 nights there until my flight so the bus left me very close to the main road and i found very easy the place. I checked in and wen to my room for a good night rest. All this time i was on the phone with my mom and i was texting with Amir as well, he was supposed to wait me in Cairo Airport in that date. It was interesting that last day before my flight i had a panic to say at least, for the first time i felt scared and i was thinking what if... what f something will happened and he will not be there in the airport. But i was not backing up, that's not me!

Time came to head up to the airport, the process of checking in and find my gate was pretty easy for a first time traveling abroad. The flight took of and i completely felt in love with it, i wished to always fly, i loved that feeling of being up in the air. My first stop was Rome, Fiumicino Airport, i had to change my terminal and my stop was not so long, about 3 hours or so. But before we got ready to embark they gave us a 2h delay. Once we finally were departing is was late in the night i guess around 10pm and we were supposed to touch down in Cairo at 4am. I was flying with Air France so it was luxury, they gave us blankets and pillows and really good food and drinks. So i was pleased. One hour before landing they pass me a small note in order to write my info's, my name and bla bla but they were all in Arabic. After i learned that, in that time the bird virus was extremely popular in countries inside Africa so the airport was in a quarantine. When i touch down a lot of people were dressed with special outfit like they were astronauts. They took my photo and information and after i went to a special place to buy my visa, which was 20 dollars. It was a touristic visa for 90 days. I picked up my luggage and i went straight to exit...

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Amir and Cairo for the first time

He was there, waiting for me... First thing i noticed that he was so short, too short for my taste but his face was exactly like on the pictures and web cam so that was good. But yeah i got that small disappointment i don't know why. Once i left the airport i felt this wave of heat, heating me on the face, it was more hot then i ever felt and even if it was pitch black i still could see just sand around the airport. This is when it hit me, i was in Cairo. We took a bus until the center of Cairo, we had small conversation i guess we were both shy. We arrived in the center and he took me to big Mosque, it was so huge and a lot of people were there. Many lights this is what i saw first time. He told me i wanted to show you something here in Cairo. It was nice but i told him i am really tired i would like to head home if it's possible.

We took a car and went throw Zagazig, the city about 2h from Cairo. The city where he lived with his family.

Most of the road i felt asleep but i still had a look on the streets of Cairo and everything was completely different from my city, from my country. It was not looking not even similar. I arrived in front of his block and when i got off from the car my foot hit the sand, then i saw all around me sand. And a lot of cats everywhere, and a lot of dirt on the street. We went up, there it was his mother and his brother Noor. His mom was a covered women which she did not spoke English at all but she was very welcoming, his brother spoke a bit English and he seemed fine as well. They showed me my room ( Amir's room ) and i took all my stuff there and then his mom showed me the house. I noticed the house was decorated with a lot of gold motives like a Persian style, the sofas was with golden elements so it was the tables and all the furniture. It was different for me of course, in my apartment in Romania we use modern design so it was new for me. My room was small, with a bed, a closet and a big mirror and a window which showed me all the sand above. Not so much of a view!

I am so sorry i cannot show you guys the pictures i have but in that time i did not held a laptop or a smart phone so all my pictures were taken from a camera so now they are all downloaded on my pc back home in Romania. I only found one picture on my Facebook which i must have uploaded years after. So no pictures for this post unfortunately, you must take my word for it!

The next days i felt a bit scared to go outside i don't know why, so it took me at least 3 days until i went out. It was extremely hot ( around 50 degrees ) and Amir told me nobody goes out during the day, the life starts in the night after 7 pm when all the shops open and everybody is on the streets. So we went out after 7pm, i did not knew how to dress, all i had were my clothes from home which was short pants and dressed. But all i saw on the street were this women wearing cover on all the body, they were covered all in black even with gloves. But i did not paid attention i wore my dresses and didn't realized that in a way i need to respect their culture. I was too young and i did not had a knowledge on religion and cultures.

Zagazig was a nice city with a long river separating the city from the new to the old side of the town. Lots of huge mosques and terrible traffic. Cars, people and camels and cows they were all passing the street in the same time, amazing in a bad way. I never seen something like that in my life. Amir was pretty nice with me, he was trying to show me everything, what to do, what to see there. Every place i noticed pictures with the president Mubarak, if it was a small shop or a huge portrait of himself on the streets, he was literally everywhere. I guess this is what dictatorship means!

Another thing i noticed were huge statues with Ramses all over the place, but this statues were enormous. And they had this reddish color to them. I felt to attracted to this statues that i always loved to see them around the city.

His family were super cool with me, his mom was teaching me to cook Arabic foods and Amir he was teaching me to write Arabic. So far so good! After a month or so i said i am bored of this city so i wanted to travel to Cairo to see the pyramids and of course my birthday was soon coming. Amir agreed and on my birthday we went to Cairo!

Pyramids, the Nile and Obama

On the second of June we went very early to Cairo, we jumped on the car and i was so excited to arrive there and see what this city has to offer. The sun was so hot you barely could have sat outside but this did not matter in that time, all i wanted is to see the pyramids. Once we arrived in Cairo i saw a sign directing to the Giza plathou which was the place where the ancient pyramids were and we went straight to them. When we arrived there we noticed a bunch of cars and the road closed, Amir went to ask what is happening and if we can go inside. He came back with bad news, it seemed like president Barack Obama who was just elected for president a couple of months ago, was in Cairo and on that day he wanted to visit the pyramids. So it was impossible in that day to enter inside. Instead of this we went on one of the famous bridges over the Nile river.

I cannot explain in words how amazing was the view from there, you could have see all Cairo from there, the river was separating the city in two sides. The Nile was so impressive and extremely huge, it definitely made up for the pyramids.

And then Amir took me a place where i could see the pyramid of Cheops ( the biggest one ) from far. It was an impressive view, one i still remember this day. In that day i had a blast in Cairo, i visited some mosques, some museums and we spend all day on the streets exploring the city. Late in the night we came home in Zagazig and it was first time i felt happy since i was in Egypt. The next days and weeks i spend in Zagazig were normal, Amir went to work and university daily and i sat at home with his mother cooking and talking or watching Tv. He came home from work and we went out for a walk or dinner and that was all, another day same activities.

After a while i missed home and i felt like i want to return, i couldn't get use to the life there so it took all of me to tell Amir that i want to return, actually i did not told him the real truth, i said that my mom is not feeling well so i would return for a couple of weeks in Romania and then come back. The truth was that i was never ever going to return there. Don't get me wrong i love Cairo and Egypt but is not the place for me, i mean back in 2009 it was not the place for me, i was too young to become a wife and marry at an early age so thank God my sensed came to me and i decided to return home.

Before coming back i did got a chance to visit the pyramids and many other things in Cairo which forever i will hold on my heart. It was my first experience abroad and i learn a bunch of things good and bad which today made me the person i am for sure. I do not by any mean to write all the details or the stories that took place there so i hope i could gave you guys a nice story about my first travel and as an advise don't go to a country for a guy you never have met, i don't know it sounds so cliche but is true, watch Catfish the tv show and you will know more.

Where are they now

In 2016 in August i am in Turkey living here more than an year, i am in a happy relationship with a Turkish guy i met in Portugal. Since Cairo i traveled the world, discovered new cultures and religions, i became a Buddhist and i love to travel to Muslim countries.

Amir he is married and i guess he was a son now, what i saw from his Facebook pictures, we do not keep in touch at all. After i left Egypt we kept in touch for a while but soon our bond break and never heard from him since.

His brother Noor his married as well and sometimes i keep in touch with him but very rare. He told me when Amir married but that's all i don't have more information about them.

All in all was a great experience and i wish to return to Egypt very soon, there are many things yet to be discovered there so this is my plan to go back maybe with Muhammet and explore the city together. After i left Cairo a revolution started which led to the resignation of president Mubarak and life in prison, he stood on his chair more than 25 years and turned that country into a dictatorship.