Emotions

Today was probably the most eventfully uneventful day. I can't write for too long, Salah wants to sleep. It's 1 AM and we are going to wake up in 4 hours.

We woke up past 9 AM for the first time. After breakfast, we were riding a high energy and we repacked our bags, determined to make it to Rafah. The reality was bleak though. After two hours of scheming and planning, it was clear that there was no way of evading the Egyptian security forcesa.

We took a cab/metro to downtown Cairo around 3 PM to catch up with fellow activists at the Journalists Syndicate. The crowd was mixed with Egyptians and foreigners and everyone was chanting and yelling to the top of their lungs. We caught up with Noha, the young American girl from California that was hit by the police yesterday. She called us up to a journalist's office. We passed over the video of the punch. It was then that we were called by a frantic Nancy -our regional coordinator. Nancy told us that the situation had changed and there had been a break in the negociations.

Out of 1360 delegates, Suzanne Mubarak, wife of the President, promised to organize two buses from Cairo to Gaza. This means roughly 110 people from the world, out of which there would be seven Canadian candidates, and out of that only two from Western Canada. Anybody who has ever been to Gaza was scratched off the eligibility list. That reduced the number to around 30 Canadians. A collective decision was made to allow our regional coordinator, Nancy, and a member of the Mazen family (a Palestinian family of three from Vernon). Salah, Abdu and I came to our own conclusions that those two would do a great job of representing Western Canada. 

This basically put a nail in the coffin for us. People would go into Gaza, but we would not be part of the trip. We were disappointed. Collectively though, we felt this was the right decision and we passed on some of our funding to Nancy and the Mazen family.

When we returned home, we got news that Canadian delegates were not happy with the lack of consultations with the delegation nor with the decision to choose who gets in and who is left out. Also, there was knowledge that some countries had small delegations and they had not yet decided if anybody would or could represent their country. Hence, more uncertainty. It all comes down to tomorrow morning; two buses will depart for Rafah at 7 AM from the Garage.

With lady Fate packed between our toothbrush and our boxers, we pray that we'll be able onto those buses.

TC

(I have some pictures from today that I will post at a later time)