Local couple glad to be home after fleeing Egypt

A local couple was on vacation in Egypt when the demonstrations began breaking out in Cairo last week. Now, they're relieved to be back on American soil after witnessing the uprising.

David and Denise Eby were back in Indiana Thursday afternoon. The Wakarusa couple spent the previous several days in the middle of a revolution in a foreign country.

"It is something I think everybody ought to live through," David said, "It really makes you appreciate the quietness of America when you get back home."

The Eby's began their Egyptian excursion on January 20. On Friday, they arrived in Cairo ready to tour the pyramids, but that never happened. Protestors had plunged the country into chaos and now the fighting is intensifying between anti- and pro-government groups. The Eby's were told not to leave their hotel.  

"On Friday they came in with tanks and surrounded the streets and neighbors began organizing neighborhood watches," David said.

The Eby's were confined to their hotel but they could see the tanks right outside their window, hear gunfire and smell burning.  

"You could hear the gunfire go off during the daytime," said David, "sometimes it was a ways away. Sometimes at night the soldiers would walk down the street right beside us and fire up into the sky to clear the people off the streets."

David says prisoners from the prison had escaped and many of the Egyptians he had contact with were afraid for their families and their homes. The Eby's felt safe because their hotel was protective but if they had ventured outside there was no telling what could have happened.

Despite limited phone service or Internet, the couple was able to arrange to get out of the country. Still, getting to the airport was tough because they had to go through multiple military checkpoints. Then, when they arrived at the airport there were thousands of other people also trying to flee the country.

"It took us an hour just to get through security, which was a big joke," said David, "so many people were lined up in lines right beside each other and they had these machines to check baggage. People were so crowded they would put two, three, four bags on top of each other and just anything to get them to shoved through. There is no way they were looking at them."
 
The Eby's were able to get a Delta flight to Athens and they say when they got there they breathed a big sigh of relief.

"It was a great trip. I'd go back," David said.