Stepping off the plane in Cairo in 1987 felt like emerging from darkness into light after Saudi Arabia's constraints. What began as a two-year teaching position unfolded into a transformative decade that shaped my professional identity and family life. The contrast was immediate—Cairo's chaotic streets and Alexandria's Mediterranean breezes replacing Jeddah's stifling atmosphere. Through my position at Alexandria University with the USAID-funded English Teacher Training Program (ETTP), I trained future English teachers with renewed purpose, despite facing seasonal challenges and cultural adjustments. As we settled into our apartment overlooking the sea, we began to sync with Egyptian life—its warmth and complexity becoming the backdrop for our family's most formative years.

During this ten=year period, my professional growth accelerated beyond expectations. Starting as a lecturer at Alexandria University, I helped Egyptian education students bridge theory with classroom practice. After transferring to the Alexandria In-Service Training Center, I developed programs for Ministry supervisors that challenged Egypt's entrenched rote-learning methods. When called to Cairo to lead a national training program, I confronted my self-doubts and accepted the opportunity, relocating the family to Cairo to build a countrywide project from scratch. Each step—from working with USAID officials to managing an implementation team—built my confidence, culminating in my appointment as co-director of the successor program during a six-year period of training over 10,000 English teachers in schools throughout Egypt.

Our family thrived amid Cairo's vibrancy. Patti excelled at a top notch international school, eventually earning admission to Macalester College. Joey attended the same school while discovering his passion for skateboarding and building lasting friendships, while young Danny navigated his early school years in his siblings' shadow. Our home in the leafy Maadi suburb became our sanctuary—a place of comfort, safety, and connection to a close-knit expat community. Together we explored Cairo’s ancient sites, wandered through quirky shops, and embraced Egyptian culture while enjoying a Western-style living situation. Even our misadventures—from a home break-in to the typical family tensions that arise in any household with teenagers—strengthened our bonds, creating memories that would reman with us long into the future.

The work was demanding but also highly rewarding, especially for a young manager learning the ropes. Each day brought new challenges—bureaucratic tangles, cultural misunderstandings, political sensitivities—but I witnessed Egyptian teachers transforming classrooms as my leadership capabilities expanded. When our bid for the next funding phase was rejected due to political undercurrents, disappointment quickly transformed into anticipation with a new opportunity in Abu Dhabi. Our final months in Egypt were bittersweet: celebrating Patti's graduation near the pyramids before packing our belongings. I left Egypt not as the university lecturer who had arrived a decade earlier, but as a confident educational leader with a clear vision—having turned a two-year university position into the foundation of a 30-year career in educational management.

Chapter 8 Photo Collage