What an incredible day in history

In honor of the courageous people of Egypt who accomplished the impossible with only the strength of their will and their hopes and dreams of a better future....

Celebratory fireworks over Tahrir Square
*Felipe Trueba/European Pressphoto Agency
(Image taken from the NYT)

"I want to meet Mark Zuckerberg one day and thank him [...] I'm talking on behalf of Egypt. [...] This revolution started online. This revolution started on Facebook. This revolution started [...] in June 2010 when hundreds of thousands of Egyptians started collaborating content. We would post a video on Facebook that would be shared by 60,000 people on their walls within a few hours. I've always said that if you want to liberate a society just give them the Internet. "
- Activist Wael Ghonim

"We are one." - Egyptian Muslim and Christian Pro-Democracy Demonstrators

"President Hosni Mubarak has decided to step down and has handed power to the Supreme Council of the Egyptian Armed Forces." - Omar Suleiman (February 11, 2011, just after 6PM Cairo time)

"Egypt is free!" - Protestors

"We have been able to restore our humanity ... to be free and independent." - Mohamed ElBaradei

"Now, we can breathe fresh air, we can feel our freedom." - Dr. Gamal Heshamt

"The greatest day in Egyptian history." - Ayman Nour

"The word tahrir means liberation. It speaks in our soul that cries out for freedom and for evermore will remind us of the Egyptian people. What they did, the things they stood for and how they changed their country and in doing so changed the world." - President Barack Obama

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"Each time a person stands up for an ideal or acts to improve the lot of others, or strikes out against injustice, he sends forth a tiny ripple of hope, and crossing each other from a million different centers of energy and daring, those ripples build a current that can sweep down the mightiest walls of oppression and resistance." - Robert F. Kennedy (1925 –1968)

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Sout Al Horeya (The Sound of Freedom)

**For a translation of the song click on the red cc button on the bottom of the screen.

Click here for a timeline of the 18 days that changed the world.

Hope out of Darkness

For the past ten days, I have been glued to the television and the internet, soaking up every update on the pro-democracy protesters in Egypt. (More power to them)! When the violence started, it was heartbreaking. As a self proclaimed global citizen, I know that humans are not so different regardless of geography or location. If we push aside politics and the politicians and the small group of religious freaks and fanatics, we all want the same things - peace, freedom, opportunities, nourishment, equality. This image that has gone viral below reinforces that. Taken by an anonymous photographer, it apparently shows a group of Christian Egyptians forming a human shield in Tahrir Square (the epicenter of the Egyptian pro-democracy protests) so that their Muslim countrymen can say their prayers peaceably amidst the violence and chaos yesterday.

When the worst of humanity came to the forefront with the state sponsored thugs, out rises the best of humanity. Purity and beauty in the middle of such horror. It gives me hope....