Tahrir Pilgrimage Part Deux

Ever-present in the background surrounding Tahrir Square is the burnt remains of Mubarak's National Democratic Party headquarters. Sitting along the Nile next to the Hilton Hotel, personally I remember it as being nothing special. Just a looming, ugly concrete rectangular structure that in a sense characterized the regime's stagnation, oppression, and disconnect with its own people who are vibrant, colorful, and full of life. Now it seems to serve as a constant reminder of the darker days of the revolution, of the sacrifices made and the lives paid. Simultaneously a visual scar of suffering and pain and yet a symbol of victory and the end of an era. Since I've been here I've heard from several people that they hope that the building doesn't get taken down.

Black marks of smoke line the broken windows, charred skeletons of buses and cars sit in the parking lot, papers and torn books cover the grounds, graffitied phrases taunt the shadows of the regime's former authority. Peering through the closed gate I felt like I was on the set of a movie. A movie I had been watching unfold before me for weeks, but never able to grasp, fully comprehend or believe because it was so magnificent and at times too heart-wrenching to bare. Watching the building succomb to the lick of flames on Al-Jazeera just a few weeks ago, and then standing next to its hollowed remains was to say the very least, surreal.