Saturday: Breaking The Silence

Over 10,000 participants racing around the Pyramids

This one is for you, Michelle!

Young Egyptians breaking the silence

Race Day finally arrived with a hotel lobby full of pink & white shirts and hats as the Delegation boarded the buses and prepared for the morning. The Komen staff had labored many long hours in conjunction with the BCFE group here for this big day. The crew had hoped for around 400 participants, but they were so pleased that the registration count was well over 3,000. Little did they know what we were about to see. As we turned the corner into the entrance road that carries you up to the pyramids, traffic was at a stand still. A sea of people were heading to the starting line. We were beside buses loaded with young Egyptian women with their head scarves and their race t-shirts on, all smiling and waving at us. Everyone on our bus just kept saying how unbelievable it was and we were speechless. The starting line was full of an eclectic mix of participants - young men doing their warm-ups, teenage girls in their matching pink head scarves, traditional women in their black burkas with their t-shirt pinned to their backs! And even more amazing was seeing the Egyptian women wearing the pink survivor shirts which meant they were no longer ashamed to say that they had once had breast cancer. They now estimate 10,000 participants were making history on race day and there could not have been a better historical backdrop to change history once again. This was a day that breast cancer was blown out of the closet in Egypt!