Hello.

Cairo Run 2016

The tremco jolts from one side to another, racing through the highway to Nasr City, Cairo. The firm but tattered leather seats provide little grip and the bodies rock in similar rhythm to the tremco's movements. The stagnant African heat was starting to caught up on us but bearable when a friend opened the window on her side.

Phew. Finally.

As the tremco begins decelerating and approaching our stop, the people began to collect the money and starting to collect their belongings. Few minutes later, we were off to Cairo Festival City Mall by a taxi.

We spent a few hours gallivanting around the mall, bought some bandages and medicine before the marathon on the next morning.

Tipah and I spent the night away with our talks- ranging from small issues until a big one, we didn't even realized that we talked until it was time for morning prayer and getting ready for the day.

We arrived in Maadi by metro at almost seven in the morning, along with other people that will be participating in this event (we all wore the same Cairo Run bright neon T-shirt)

The moment before the marathon was a colourful affair- a massive park that was engulfed in a sea of rainbow umbrellas giving shade to vendors and thousand of participants. Sprawling in every other patch of free space were stalls offering juices and people with groups mostly loitered around, taking pictures and talking while waiting.

Life appeared much slower when we strolled through the sea of people at Maadi Technology Park. There is no pushing or shoving, but rather a few people which decided to be quite problematic, shoving everyone on their way onto the front of the stage, catching up to the music.

"Hey, the participants for 21km will need to go first."

Dinie, Timah and Tipah nodded with determination. Iswari, Syalla and I will be running for 7km, I was hoping to run in 21km category but due to some unfortunate condition, I was thankful to even participate in the marathon.

"Do your best, guys!"

My friends shrieked at me, laughing and holding their breaths as they were ready to run. Some minutes later, the runners in our category were called. With a medium-length blue pole with a GoPro attached on it secured firmly in my hand, Syalla stood beside my left and Iswari was on my right, the siren finally rang.

I sprinted, while recording with Syalla. Iswari was running behind us, taking her sweet time. Other runners were sprinting and some were walking side by side, talking and laughing while enjoying the beautiful fresh morning.

We passed the checkpoints- each checkpoint was lively to say the least. There were people along the road giving you encouragement as you ran. Some drivers were actually gave us support by honking their honks in rhythms.

"Syalla, I swear this is some of the silly thing I've done while I was sick! What was I thinking?"

Syalla chuckled, but based on various beads of sweat covering her face, I could tell that she felt the same. My lungs was parched, begging for me to stop for some air. We stopped by the booth to drink some water for a few seconds before we ran off again.

"Have you seen Iswari?"

I looked behind my shoulder, even went looking by my sides. "No. I guess we will have to meet at the end."

We finished our course in under one hour and I was quite proud with our achievements. The last time I ran in marathon was in Los Angeles, three years ago. With only two weeks of running laps at the stadium, I managed to run again.

"Heck, this was awesome!"

When casually asked to recall the journey, I was surprised by the reality that it's only been a couple of hours. We waited for almost three hours before we met again with Timah, Tipah and Dinie. They were thrilled when reaching the end, exhaustion were obviously etched on their faces.

Cairokee (famous local band) fired up the stage with their hit songs after the marathon ended. They sang along with the other participants under the scorching hot sun while Iswari, Dinie and I were chatting away under some tree.