THEY ARE EDUCATED, talented and ambitious. Egyptian professionals who would feel equally at home in any of the worlds glittering global cities London, Paris, New York, Toronto and boast internationally competitive skills that command premium pay. They are cosmopolitan, and switch between two, three languages with ease and near native fluency.

But these Egyptians are also special in one more way. They have made a decision many of their less fortunate compatriots who queue up every day in front of embassies or, more desperately, pay smugglers to take them far across the sea would probably see as absolutely senseless: They have come back home. While countless others are moving away because they feel they can do more, have more, and even be more abroad, each of the individuals featured in this article have come back to Egypt.

Although there are no official statistics on how many Egyptians abroad are coming back, the head of a leading local recruitment agency suggests the number of returnees is on the rise.

According to Sherif Samy, chairman of Skill-Link, there have been two recent waves of Egyptians returning from abroad: One in the Golden Years of the mid- to late-1990s when business was booming and private sector salaries skyrocketing; the other after 9-11, when Arabs in the West began realizing how their ethnicity could also be a liability.

Every single Egyptian living abroad has the dream of moving back home, claims Samy, saying he feels confident making such a sweeping generalization because his firm talks with thousands of such Egyptians each year. But this move is always tied to a big if, the if of opportunities arising here.

Closely related to this big if is, of course, the big why Why did they come back? The reasons abound. Some return because they feel their degrees and experiences from abroad give them an edge, making them stand out in the local human resource pool. Others want their children to grow up with a clear sense of what being an Egyptian means. Still others return because they want to give a little back to their homeland. And some return because, in monosyllabic words, there is no place like home.

Ashraf Talaat / Egypt Today I like going against the current. There is no sign to say which direction you have to go in, so why should I just do what everyone else is doing? I don’t like being ordinary. That’s so boring— Shady Hassan

The common denominator of the eight men and women featured in the following pages is that they are all privileged Egyptians who have the necessary means to get out fast but, for the time being, are staying put. These are their stories.

Against the odds

Lets do a lap around the track before talking, suggests Shady Hassan as we meet on the edge of the brightly lit track course at Gezirah Club, where he proposed we do our interview. The evening run around the track is a daily ritual for Shady, a way to release stress after a hectic day at the office. He begins walking against the flow in the outermost lane, deftly dodging sweaty runners in Adidas and socialite grandmas in expensive heels.

I like going against the current, he explains, as I struggle to keep up with his long, easy strides. There is no sign to say which direction you have to go in, so why should I just do what everyone else is doing? he asks with a mischievous grin.

So is that his take on life?

Even if I am successful abroad, the fact remains that I am not American, not Canadian, not Swiss. I am only Egyptian, and it is good to be someplace where you can really say ‘I am home.’— Ashraf Naguib

I dont like being ordinary, shrugs the 30-year-old financial analyst. Thats so boring.

Shady identifies himself first and foremost as a creative person. When he was a child, his parents bought him a Lego set. He would spend hours painstakingly building impressive edifices with the multicolored plastic blocks on his bedroom floor, only to demolish them all when complete with a careless sweep of his chubby toddler hands. He would then start all over, building something totally different. It wasnt so much the final product that inspired him as the act of creating it.

Shady graduated from the Lego set to household appliances, becoming a handyman around the house. By his teens, Shady dreamed of being an electrical engineer when he grew up. But a 76 percent on his thanaweya amma exam in 1993 doomed him to the faculty of commerce, English section, at Cairo University. We are victims of an educational system that virtually assigns careers depending on how well you can memorize and spit back textbooks during exam time, he claims.

But Shady is one of those people who dont mind playing the hand they are dealt and making the most of it. After graduation, he landed a cushy job as an analyst in a large financial consulting firm. He was soon disillusioned, however, complaining of being treated as a second-class employee by a demotivating and abusive boss who seemed to only respect made in the West degrees. The notorious khawaga complex strikes again.

So when Shady got a full scholarship to get an MBA in the US, he took the opportunity and ran. One would have thought he would have stayed in the US after graduating, given his early experiences in Egyptian working life. But less than a month after graduating with an almost perfect grade point average from his top-rate university in Atlanta, Georgia, Shady found himself back in Cairo by choice.

Mohsen Allam/Egypt Today Over there, you have to perform your best for a very simple reason: If you don’t you will lose your job very quickly. But in Egypt, people still have this public sector mentality, where no matter how good or bad you are, it won’t make a deifference.— Mahmoud Hegazi

I wanted to come back because I thought I could finally have here the position and respect I wanted. In America, I would be ordinary. Here, I could be extraordinary.

His sojourn abroad allowed him to be the person he imagined himself to be in his own country: Creative, resourceful and above all confident. Now, if someone puts him down, he knows better.

At my old job, I was made to believe I am slow and always making errors. But now I have the degree, the grades and the recommendations to prove otherwise. I have learned not to underestimate myself.

For Shady, the typical Egyptian business is a smaller replica of the Egyptian government: You have a fat cat on top giving orders and there is no room for the small people to voice their opinions. I always came up with new ideas, but it was very frustrating when people didnt even take the time to listen.

He compares this with his perception of America, a country where he thinks its much easier for a little guy to make it big.

Ashraf Talaat / Egypt Today Egypt has so much unfulfilled potential. I truly believe that. But the whole atmosphere right now is very depressing. There is this feeling of apathy, of disempowerment, even among youth like me. But we must have hope that there is hope.— Nada Abdelnour

The sky is really the limit there. You feel you can accomplish anything you put your mind to. There is a freedom to do what you want and be what you want. And when you are free, you have options.

Shadys time abroad has certainly given him more options at home when it comes to work opportunities. He has a position of some responsibility in a field he has grown to love and is making more money than he can spend. At the same time, though, he has not ruled out leaving the country again if he feels undervalued, unappreciated or simply unhappy at work.

Now that he has options, he is keeping them open.

no place like home

Ashraf Naguib is as close as anyone gets to being a citizen of the world. Born in Beijing in 1975 at a time when China was still really communist, he says with a knowing smile Ashraf also called Cyprus, Togo, Malawi, Australia, the Philippines, Thailand, Switzerland, the US and Canada home at one point or another. He has his father, a career ambassador with the Egyptian diplomatic corps, to thank for the many foreign visa stamps on his passport, but he also owes much of his time abroad to his own restlessness.

Khaled Habib/Egypt Today Our advantage is that we have very deep exposure to different cultures and mentalities and so we are able to see different sides in a very holistic manner. It’s about being able to communicate with others, not about being able to merely speak foreign languages, but about understanding how to present your cause in a way others can relate to.—Mona El Naggar

When Ashraf was 13, his father was posted back home to Egypt and Ashraf was enrolled in a private language school. A few months later he realized he was miserable in Egypt. He wanted out.

So he moved, all alone, to a small town in New Jersey called Bayonne, a place where most everyone is Polish, and where last names inevitably end with ski. As far as he knew, he was the only Egyptian in town. But Bayonne was a better fit for him than Cairo, and Ashraf quickly called it home. He had his own apartment, cooked his own meals, did his own laundry and managed to keep his nose clean, steering clear of drugs and alcohol despite the lack of parental supervision.

I just didnt have time to get into trouble, he explains. He worked part-time seven days a week, was captain of the varsity soccer team and an A student to boot.

When it was time to go to college, Ashraf chose to enroll in one of Switzerlands top private universities where he majored in global strategic management. It was a match made in heaven for him, a degree that combined his extensive contact with diverse cultures and his inherent knack for business.

The thought of going back to Egypt to settle never once crossed his mind, and he left for Canada, his sights set on a job in Montreal. It took his mother no less than five weeks to convince him to come to Egypt for a one-week visit.

But people change. This year, Ashraf marks his fifth year in Egypt, the longest he has ever been in any one place. He has started his own company a highly successful venture of project development and management that is responsible for introducing taxi-top advertising to Egypt, among other accomplishments. He has bought himself a villa in one of Cairos gated-communities. And he plans to grow old here.

So why did he come back? Part of the answer lies in Ashraf the businessman. In 1999, he crunched the numbers, analyzed the economic indicators and decided that the country was on an economic growth spurt that looked promising.

Obviously I didnt foresee the liquidity crunches, and the devaluation of the pound. He pauses for a moment. Its a challenge, working here, but if everybody with our skills and education decides not to come back, its never going to get any better. As an Egyptian, I am choosing to stay here and make the best of it.

Overall, Ashraf sees good things down the road for Egypt. We are definitely going through unfavorable circumstances right now, but everything has its ups and downs. The key is developing a strategy for the future. There are lots of things that havent yet been touched in Egypt and there is tremendous room to play around with things as an entrepreneur.

On a personal level, adapting to Egypt after spending all of your life abroad is no mean feat, says Ashraf. Ask him what he misses most about his former life, and he answers the quality of life. A quality of life that is made up, in his mind, by the physical beauty of ones surroundings, like green, dust-free trees and the feeling of warm rain on your face.

But the up-and-coming entrepreneur is willing to put up with the pollution, the traffic jams, and the hassles of daily life in Cairo because despite his well-worn passport, Egypt is home.

Even if I am successful abroad, the fact remains that I am not American, not Canadian, not Swiss. I am only Egyptian, and it is good to be someplace where you can really say I am home.

family matters

Mahmoud Hegazi left Egypt when he was 23, a bright-eyed fresh graduate with ambitions of becoming a professor of dairy science engineering in the United States. He came back 42-years-old and married with two daughters, with a string of successful and failed businesses behind him.

During most of Mahmouds 19-year stay in America, he never felt out of place or that he didnt belong. He actively worked to make America feel more like home, becoming a pillar of his local Muslim community in New Jersey, organizing Eid celebrations, hosting an Arabic radio program and appearing on national television programs discussing Islam in America.

A man who feels hard work is nothing less than a divine dictate part and parcel of being a good Muslim Mahmoud built a very comfortable life for his family in the States. His experience was an American dream come true: work hard, aim high and success will come.

It was only when Mahmouds two daughters, Nermine and Nada, began going to school and interacting more and more with the native youth culture that Mahmoud felt his American dream could very quickly be turning into a nightmare. His kids were both less than 10 years old at the time, but he wasnt about to take any chances. So Mahmoud shut down his business, closed his bank account, packed the bags and bought one-way tickets to Egypt with his family in tow.

As soon as my daughters were born, I tried to teach them Arabic and the fundamentals of Islam, the good and the bad, the halal and the haraam. But it was very difficult. They see what other American kids are doing. The impact of American culture is overwhelming. Even young Egyptians in the US dont hold the same values as Egyptians who grow up here.

Only in Egypt could his young children surrounded by both parents extended families be shielded from the assimilating tendencies of American pop culture.

Mahmoud initially had misgivings about Egypts economic state, but his extensive work experience in the US made it very easy for him to find a good job at home, landing a top managerial position in one of the countrys leading shipping companies.

I am very optimistic about the future of Egypt. If a good number of Egyptians who live abroad make a serious effort at moving back, they will find it is not that bad, and there is a light at the end of the tunnel.

Actually, coming back is almost an obligation, he feels: If Egypt as our homeland cannot benefit from Egyptians who have acquired so much knowledge and experience, that would be a pity.

The biggest benefit these Egyptians can bring is intangible: an excellent work ethic.

Over there, you have to perform your best for a very simple reason: if you dont, you will lose your job very quickly. But in Egypt, people still have this public sector mentality, where if you work in a government office, no matter how good or bad you are, it wont make any difference.

The so-called Protestant work ethic is a misnomer, argues Mahmoud Islam demands the same, if not more.

If we had better religious understanding, we would see people who respected their work more. Westerners are actually better Muslims in this respect. When Muhammad Abduh [a 19th century Islamic modernist and a former Grand Mufti] went to France, he said he found a nation of Muslims in the sense that they work hard.

Of all the things his daughters learned abroad, this sense of responsibility is the one thing Mahmoud hopes they will never forget. Not only their own sake, but also for Egypts.

civic duty

When Nada Abdelnour left Egypt to attend one of Americas most prestigious universities five years ago, there was never any question of not coming back. It wasnt that she didnt enjoy her time abroad, first working on her bachelors, and then her masters degree she loved the newfound freedoms, the new friends, the new possibilities and new challenges.

But Nada inherited from her family a sense of duty that ultimately outweighs everything else. Her father, Mounir Fakhri Abdelnour, is one of parliaments most outspoken and active members, a dyed-in-the wool liberal with leadership roles in the Wafd party. Her great-uncle, Saad Fakhri Abdelnour, was the fifth secretary-general of El-Wafd and paid a price for his principles in Nassers prisons.

My country needs me, says the 23-year-old as we wait for our coffee to be served in one of her favorite haunts in Zamalek. I owe it a lot.

Nada realizes her foreign education is a luxury, a privilege, the vast majority of Egyptians can only dream of. As one of the lucky few that get this chance, she feels it is the least she can do to transform what is a personal asset into a public good for the country. She refuses to be another brain drain statistic.

While Nada, who works with an international NGO that provides funding for local social entrepreneurs, has no plans to follow in the political footsteps of her family, she feels she can contribute in other ways.

I have always been interested in development work. There are so many problems in Egypt that need to be addressed: poverty, gender inequality, human rights.

She recalls one of her college courses on Middle Eastern economics, taught by an energetic professor originally from Libya. He argued that despite the regions many messy problems, the Middle East could replicate East Asias miracle given sound economic and political management. But this miracle needs the skills and patience of each countrys human resources.

Egypt has so much unfulfilled potential. I truly believe that. But the whole atmosphere right now is very depressing. There is this feeling of apathy, of disempowerment, even among youth like me. But we must have hope that there is hope.

the root of the matter

In the year he immigrated to Canada, Amr Shadi came back to Egypt for a leisurely five-month vacation. The next year, he came for three months. The year after, he came for two. As the years passed, the months became weeks, the weeks days, and then he simply stopped coming. He was more than okay with letting the memories of hot Cairo summers and childhood friends remain just that memories to be called on in moments of nostalgia, but certainly not be relived.

Today, Amr lives happily with his family in one of Cairos leafy suburbs, and its the cold, biting winters of Canada that have become distant memories. He cant tell you why he came back, but he can tell you why he is staying: the reason is a 14-month-old bundle of joy named Yassin, a little boy with curly brown hair and eight teeth. His son.

Amr read somewhere he doesnt remember where exactly that roots mold a big part of a persons character. And he wants Yassin to know where his roots are, because to know where you are from is to know where you are going.

I know many Egyptians that are born and raised in Canada and they are a little mixed up. They dont really feel Egyptian in certain ways; although their families try to instill in them certain values, they dont see these values around them. It is a confusing equation.

Yassins parents feel that being in Egypt will make the task of passing onto their son the principles they hold dear more manageable. They want him to grow up with a respectful understanding of his culture; to learn to love things like the sound of the azaan breaking the stillness of the dawn.

If it werent for these weighty issues of identity and values, Amr says he would have been happy to remain in Canada. Everything is just so much easier there, especially when it comes to work, he feels.

Not that the 28-year-old communications engineering graduate from one of Canadas better universities has much to complain about in that department. A few short years ago, he began a business in his bedroom with a couple of friends that quickly became the only Egyptian company in the innovative field of SMS advertising. But the fact remains it would be much smoother going if he were doing business abroad.

The system [in Canada] doesnt allow for the things that make business here so difficult. The law is implemented and there is transparency and accountability. Here, you have to throw bribes left and right to get anything done. The other problem is human resources we have serious issues trying to find the right people to hire.

And this is not from lack of innate talent, but rather from circumstances imposed by the sorry state of Egyptian higher education: We have super-brilliant folks here and they manage to do well. But take these people and put them in a Western university and just watch. They will be 100 times better than what they are here.

Even so, Amr acknowledges that his situation is better than most. His Canadian passport is a security blanket, the equivalent of a Get Out of Jail free card in Monopoly, he jokes.

People like me are more relaxed about being in the country [Egypt] because we have the option of leaving very easily if we want. We dont have this sense of desperation.

an egyptian dream

Mona El Naggar doesnt believe a person should map out their life in advance, set things like five- and ten-year objectives and other such nonsense. She prefers to play things by ear, to live for the moment. But this can be very difficult, she says, when you are a young woman in Egypt.

The problem with Egypt is that there are so many expectations. Your life has to fit within this general outline of how things should be and you cant stray too much from it. As a woman, for example, you are supposed to get married as soon as you finish your education.

Its not that the 23-year-old journalist doesnt want to get married she just resents how marriage is framed almost like a goal to be achieved, an item to be checked off lifes to-do list. So when she went to the US for college, what struck her most was the freedom there to live ones life whichever way one chose.

You can really push the limits there. You have the ability to dream. It is hard to be a dreamer and live in Egypt. Here, dreams feel too much like dreams, while there you feel you have a chance of actually fulfilling them.

Mona has only been in Egypt for a year and she doesnt regret her decision to return after all, Egypt is her home. But everything that she used to love about her country now merely saddens her. Cairos liveliness seems more and more like just plain noisiness; a culture that once seemed so sure of itself seems increasingly uncertain; faces on the street seem to be frowning more often than smiling.

But what she claims depresses her most is the apathy of most Egyptians, their docile acceptance of their lot in life. The lack of dreams and dreamers, if you will.

It is almost like the collective Egyptian mind has called it a night. We have become not only incapable of creating, but even just imitating. She runs her fingers through her long black hair in frustration, yanking its ends impatiently.

This is a catastrophe because we are living in a global society and we have to be able to compete as a country with global standards. Look at what happened with the World Cup bid; our biggest problem there was that we didnt know how to market ourselves.

She feels hope lies in people with backgrounds like hers people who, having lived in other countries, know that there is no one right way to do things.

Our advantage is that we have received very deep exposure to different cultures and mentalities and so we are able to see different sides in a very holistic manner. Its about being able to communicate with others not about being able to merely speak foreign languages, but about understanding how to present your cause in a way others can relate to.

Mona plans on sticking around for a while because it is not in her nature to give up easily on a country she holds so dear. For her, its also about daring to dream in the face of reality.

Your location shouldnt define what you do or dont do. You are going to suffer frustration anywhere you are, so you have to work with what you have. Nothing stops us from doing what we want except ourselves.

Reality check

Nadim El-Gabbani is tanned and relaxed after a six-month stint in Cyprus fixing up his familys sailboat and working as a journalist. Between trips to the kitchen in his Maadi apartment to look in on the chili con carne he is cooking up, he tells me he went to Cyprus for a much-needed break after graduating from his Ivy League university in New York. Now he is in Egypt on what is a so far disheartening job hunt. Joining us for dinner and the interview is a good friend of his, Samy El-Semman, who is also recently back in Egypt after studying and working in the US for a number of years.

Over the chili and homemade corn bread, Nadim and Samy are more than happy to share their thoughts on the good, the bad and the ugly of life back in Egypt. And they have many.

For starters, both scoff at the idea that their degrees from abroad make them more attractive hires for potential employers.

I have actually been told by an interviewer that hiring me would create a political problem with the rest of the people in the office with Egyptian degrees, Nadim tells me between bites of cornbread. He thought they would feel too intimidated or something. He shakes his head in disbelief or disgust.

Samy, who manages parts of his familys businesses, agrees with Nadim, but adds another ironic twist: Even if you have a world-class education, you are still seen by Egyptian employers as not on par with foreigners with the same level of education, if not less. The khawaga complex rears its ugly head yet again.

But seriously, a topnotch foreign education is really a double-edged sword, they explain. It makes you more likely, and able, to pack up and leave if the local work ride gets too bumpy.

Its like you have this idea of your education as a costly investment and you want it to pay off and you have a higher threshold of success. If you dont achieve it, you pack up and go. Thousands of our most qualified people want to leave the country. You see, when you hit your head against walls enough times, it begins to hurt and you move on.

For Nadim, Egypt is like an old habit you just cant rid yourself of: Egypt is not something you love or hate. It is a feeling you have deep inside of you when you walk out of the airport and feel that hot air hit you and you know you are home. You walk down the streets and see people like yourself. We might not really belong anywhere, but Egypt is as close as it gets.

Samy agrees: Most Egyptians, even if they are doing well abroad, wish that they could be doing whatever it is they are doing in Egypt. They are not abroad because they are simply escaping the country or they just dont like it, but because they had a hard time. The feeling of wanting to be successful in your own country is not patriotism: it is something much more basic than that.

Nadim is quick to add that such sentiments, however noble, are not enough to persuade someone to stay or return.

It is great to fantasize about all the improvements and great stuff that could happen in the country within the next two generations, but I am not waiting. I would love to make a life here, I love this place. I am just not sure how much I am willing to take before I call it quits.

So, what exactly is wrong with Egypt?

It is a hierarchical system where precedence and seniority mean everything and where young people are not really given a chance, answers Nadim, who is 23. As a young adult, it doesnt matter what you know, but only how long you have served. At my age in the West, you have a much broader range of options. Education and hard work are better rewarded there.

Samy, 25, agrees: We have been exposed to what a person can do given the right circumstances and the right amount of effort on his part. I just want to wake up and know that whatever effort I do that day wont be squandered on some bureaucrat. If I am to work hard, I want to see results.

The two young men realize the damaging effects of the brain drain on the productivity of a developing country like Egypt, but say personal decisions to return or stay away are rarely, if ever, made with abstract things like national macro-economic indicators in mind.

I am not going to say everyone dreams of making a difference, but people in general want to be a productive element in their country. It is a very attractive idea in theory, but in reality it is very difficult. And not everyone will keep on trying forever. You have to ask yourself whether or not you are being who you want to be. The answer to that question is what determines whether you stay or not. Samy pauses for a moment, looking down into his empty coffee mug.

Here it is the right place, but the wrong circumstances. Over there, it was the wrong place, but the right circumstances. et