Whether at home or abroad, members of Chicago’s Egyptian community are reveling in the triumph of revolution.
“It’s a party,” Ahmed Rehab said, shouting to be heard over a cheering crowd in Cairo.
Rehab, the executive director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations in Chicago, traveled to Egypt in anticipation of the uprising.
“The regime is gone, and gone with it is the theft, embezzlement and corruption,” he said in a phone interview Friday soon after Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak announced he would step down. “Everywhere I walk around Cairo, people are in the streets kissing, hugging, waving flags.”
Ahmed Attiah, who was also among the protesters in Cairo’s Tahrir Square, put his life in Chicago on hold to join his countrymen.
“Although there were a lot of martyrs and people falling in front of us, people continued to fight,” said Attiah, adding that the Egyptian revolutionaries offered a model for peaceful protests around the world.
“Tahrir Square,” he added, “it’s a symbol of Utopia on the Earth right now.”
For Chicagoans who participated in the movement via social media, the success of the Egyptian revolution was no less sweet.
“No matter where they live, Egyptians are so tied to their country,” said Shady Atia, an Egyptian native with family members who remain in the country of his birth.
The Des Plaines resident said he returned to his desk Friday after a morning meeting to find his Facebook account bursting with jubilant posts.
“It’s like holding a winning lottery ticket in your hand,” Atia said. “You just have to cash it in.”
