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Mohamed Ayman is working for a new Egypt

For Mohamed Ayman, February 11, 2011, was a day of 鈥渢otal euphoria鈥�.

Along with tens of thousands of others, Ayman spent that day鈥攁nd the 16 days and nights previous鈥攊n Cairo鈥檚 Tahrir Square, protesting the regime of Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak. When Mubarak resigned that afternoon, Ayman sent an email to a New York Times reporter for whom he鈥檇 volunteered as a translator during the protests. In it he wrote, simply, 鈥淲elcome to the new Egypt.鈥�

鈥淭hat was really the feeling then,鈥� Ayman recalls. 鈥淭hat we were going to be something like Singapore in just a couple of years.鈥�

Prior to the protests, the 19-year-old from Assyut, a small city in southern Egypt, had imagined himself working on marketing or in the financial industry. But the revolution crystallized for him what he really wanted to do: to 鈥渂ring my interests in history and politics into one place, and figure out how I can work in and be a part of this new Egypt.鈥�

Ayman decided then and there to make a 180-degree pivot, switching to international development studies. All that was left was to figure out where鈥攖hough the story of how he made that decision is less dramatic: 鈥淚 made an Excel spreadsheet.鈥�

Ayman came to Saint Mary鈥檚 after comparing programs and universities across Europe and North America, evaluating academic factors, lifestyle factors (he preferred to live in a smaller city with a larger student population), and cost. The name that stood out after he crunched his preferred factors was Saint Mary鈥檚.

Since arriving, his studies have focused on issues and ideas relevant to the past and present of his home country, including religious extremism, terrorism, and how Egypt can yet fulfill the promise of the 2011 Revolution. In particular, he鈥檚 interested in raising what he calls the 鈥渓ow bar鈥� we have in the west when we discuss issues related to terrorism, Islam, and the Arab world, and our readiness to embrace stereotypes.

鈥淪o much international media is fixated on terrorism, and yet the discussion we have about it is based on deep misunderstanding and ignorance about the people and places involved,鈥� he says. 鈥淲e鈥檙e at the point that we believe the only way to stop a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun.鈥�

鈥淪o much international media is fixated on terrorism, and yet the discussion we have about it is based on deep misunderstanding and ignorance about the people and places involved.鈥�

Ayman鈥檚 studies have focused on revealing the true complexity of political and religious conflicts, tracing the evolution of the Egyptian Islamic Jihad, a terrorist group that emerged during the 1970s and later became a founding member of al-Qaida. He argues that western colonial interests in the Middle East, and western support to oppressive regimes, have been a major reason that these organzations have grown so powerful.
 

Ayman will be coming back to Canada to pursue graduate studies, but for now, he鈥檚 back home, looking for work with a non-profit or non-governmental organization. The 鈥渘ew Egypt鈥� hasn鈥檛 materialized the way so many had hoped it would鈥攂ut Ayman is committed to seeing it become a reality, eventually.