CAIRO - Thousands of children returned to their schools in Cairo and some other governorates Saturday for the first time since the January 25 revolution, many having lost their sense of security and logic. The Interior Ministry provided police patrol cars to guard them lest they should be exposed to danger during the day. No incident was reported. At the privately owned el-Dar el-Beida (Casablanca) Primary School in the Cairo working class district of Hadayek el-Qubba, about 600 children swarmed into the small courtyard with their oversized backpacks, noisily running and playing. Outside the school green gate, two old watchmen sat idly eating sandwiches that were given to them by a worried mother to keep an eye on her children. As hundreds of children were quickly brought to order it soon became clear that many of them bore the unseen fears of the lack of security as policemen have been keeping a low profile after the revolution in which more than 400 Egyptians were killed, nearly a third of them young people. "Get ready for a new school term after the great victory the Egyptians have made on January 25," the headmaster announced through a megaphone as the children lined up in the courtyard for the morning assembly. More than 20 pupils walked to the centre of the courtyard to salute the flag and sing the national anthem ‘Belaadi, Belaadi'. The children repeated after them. "One night, I saw aggressive men coming to my house and wanted to break into it to steal our belongings," a small child named Adel, accompanied by his veiled mother, said before getting into the school. Like the other children, he renders his post-January 25 experience in simple sentences. Maha Hussein, a social studies teacher, told The Gazette that the first classes will be given to explain the goals of the revolution to the children, with teachers trying to help them express themselves. "In the classes the teachers will encourage them to talk about what happened, or to draw pictures or to write about it," Maha said. However, she said that she and her colleagues were in a very embarrassing and contradictory situation. "During the first term, I was telling the pupils about the ex-President Hosni Mubarak's achievements during the war and peace times. But, after the revolution, I do not know what to tell them about the Mubarak regime, or his ex-ruling National Democratic Party (NDP), which have been dismissed by the people as authoritarian and corrupt," Maha said. "Imagine what the contradiction is going to be like," she said. "There are going to be thousands of embarrassing questions coming from the children today," she added. Shaaban Rady, who teaches history to six-grade pupils, said he was worried because the children would ask about the revolution or why Mubarak was deposed. "They will ask me why the Egyptians removed Mubarak, or why they revolted against his regime, and I do not know what to tell them. During the first term, the history textbook taught the children that the ex-President was a war hero and a perfect leader. "But, after the revolution, the children heard and read different negative stories about him and his ministers," Shaaban said, in front of a giant Mubarak portrait that decorated the school's building. The increasingly security concerns among parents have driven teachers' stress levels to record heights and led some mothers to prevent their children from attending the first day of classes, Shaaban said. A handful of worried mothers stood outside the school saying that they would wait for the children until the end of the day. A mother named Aisha complained that there were no policemen guarding the children as the Minister of Interior, Maj. Gen Mahmoud Wagdi, had promised. "The Government ministers are looking after the safety of their children alone. But, they do not care about the security of the people's children, or give importance to them," she said. One mother, asking for anonymity, said that her child was too worried to come to school without her accompanying him. She said that her child was worried that the men who had attacked his home after the January 25 revolt would return and attack the school and take him as a "hostage".
