I awoke this morning at 8:00am to silence. All I could hear was the chirping of birds. It was a bit ominous and unnerving. Cairo ranks number one in the world for noise pollution so it is a rarity to be able to hear the birds and nothing else. A little while later the silence was broken by the sounds of helicopters over head. I always wonder where all those helicopters are going, or whether it is just an intimidation tactic?

I also realized that this is why we could hear all the shooting at night, because it is so quiet. I knew the shooting was far off in the distance, probably from the bridges or Tahrir Square but you could hear it all night long. I guess there was nothing else to drown out the sound.

When I got up I went to the window, to have a look and see what was going on in the street. I noticed a garbage man out in the street with his huge basket on his back, picking up garbage. I thought to myself ‘yeah, wow, that’s right, none of these guys are working, and we will be drowning in garbage soon’. It reminded me of all the things we take for granted. I had noticed a huge bag of garbage in the street yesterday and although that is a common sight in Cairo it did catch my attention.

I decided to go out and look for food. The market next to my house has been keeping us well supplied but there are a few things like eggs and bread that have not been available there. I thought I would go out and explore, see what is out there, what is open.

The streets were not crowded at all, which was very nice. The further I went the more amazed I became. Not only were there few people on the street, but no police! At all! I knew that the police had withdrawn and left. But I guess I didn’t really conceive of what that meant. There are no police on the street! Since I first came to Egypt in the mid 80’s there have always been police on the street. I had no idea of what it might look like with out police. I passed an embassy and there were no guys with rifles! Their little huts were empty. No people, no police, no cars, the sky was blue! Where am I? This is beautiful!

I went to the main street with all the shops. No traffic, no honking horns. The shops were all closed, boarded up. Most of them had their window painted or covered in newspapers so as not to invite looters. Then I found one shop open, a shoe shop. The proprietor was there very jolly, chatting with everyone. Well why not? Perhaps people need shoes?

Then I saw a sight that I never imagined I would see, people, residents, cleaning the street! I was so moved that tears came to my eyes. This is a very affluent part of town, and there are many poor people working for the affluent people so you never see anyone cleaning or carrying anything for themselves. That’s just not the way it goes. The poor people get tips for doing these tasks. They need the money and the people who have money pay them. But people had taken the initiative, cared enough about their neighborhood to do it themselves!

I don’t think that anyone who has never lived here could really understand the magnitude of what I am saying because in western culture people do everything for themselves. But this is REALLY a huge shift. It was beautiful and empowering. I have always felt that when you have to rely on others to do things for you, you are then disempowered because it is out of your own control. You have to count on others. I also realize this has to do with my western up bringing and is not a very ‘eastern’ philosophy and I respect that. But to see people out there picking up garbage of all things was very moving. It also shows a great determination and shift in consciousness away from the old patterns and that apathy of someone else will do it. This is huge.

I continued on with my outing, discovering more peace amongst the chaos. Although people are actively out gathering food and there is a slight sense of urgency it is mild. People are not over doing. And you find these pockets of peace, shops that are filled with food and just going about business as usual. I found eggs, I found bread, it is all out there you just need to look for it.

This actually reminds me of when I first moved to Egypt, in the mid 80’s. Staples were controlled by the government. We had to buy flour, rice and sugar from the government, at government stores, which meant that we had to stand in line when it was delivered to get it. We of course didn’t stand in line we paid someone else to go and get it. But you couldn’t just walk into a shop and buy these things. There were no imported foods. So mainly we had a ba’al (small local shop) that sold eggs, cheese, oil, pasta…we didn’t have supermarkets that sold everything. I think there was one, or possible two in all of Cairo. Times changed restrictions on imports were lifted. Private companies could produce rice, flour and sugar and huge supermarkets opened. Many on the ba’als went out of business because they couldn’t compete. But there are still a few and it is those places that have what you really need.

I continued my walk, found bread, found more people cleaning the streets. I started taking pictures with my phone, wished I owned a camera, because no one would believe what I was seeing. I was filled with joy knowing that the possibilities for change truly are endless. As the Mayan calendar prophesies we are witnessing out own evolution, the evolution of consciousness.