The International Federation of Medi-cal Students’ Associations – Egypt (IFM-SA-Egypt) is an independent, non-gov-ernmental and non-political federation of medical students’ associations in Egypt recognized by Ministry of Solidarity under the number 3115-Alexandria.

IFMSA-Egypt’s history dates back to 1968 and was known as the Egyptian medical

Students’ Associations (EMSA-Egypt) till 2007.

IFMSA-Egypt is run for and by medical students on a non-profit and volun-tary basis. We represent all Egyptian Medical students, through our 23 Local Committeess all over the faculties of Medicine in Egypt.

IFMSA-Egypt is a unique structure, composed of 6 Standing Committees and 3 support divisons, allowing all medical students to simply contribute and have an influence on Global Health.

Our Mission is to offer future Egyptian physicians a comprehensive introduc-tion to public health issues by taking part in the international medical stu-dent community to broaden their sperctrums and reach their full potential.

Editorial TeamDear Readers, We thought a lot about what to write be-cause speaking about Egypt in a few pages leaves you with a sort of hard challenge but also with magnificent sense of honor This magazine is just a hint of the marvelous,

extraordinary and breathtaking journey you will experience in Egypt through IFMSA-Egypt

...Hope you like it .

Editor in chief Eslam FoudaEditors

Esraa AteyaSohaila Elmehiy

Abdel Rahman El BakaryNowrus Emad

Designers

Mohamed MeshrefHassan Aboul-Nour

Mohamed El-dakrory

Editorial Team

Ramy Ahmed Genaid IFMSA-Egypt president

Egypt has been a destination for travelers for more than 7000 years. Since then, it has al-ways been known that what marks us most is neither our monuments, nor our weather, and not even our heritage that was nurtured

by various cultures. It’s our hospitality and our love to people from all over the world. As medical

students from Egypt we are keen on doing our best to show our colleagues from all around IFMSA all the aspects of the Egyp-tian personality. In these few pages we will try to give you glimpse of what is waiting for you in Egypt, not in just our words but in yours as well.

National Exchange officersDear medical students worldwide,

Are you eager to visit the Pyramids and dis-cover secrets of the Pharaohs? tEnjoy snorke-ling in the Red Sea between the exotic fish and coral reefs? Set off on a desert safari and enjoy sand-boarding?Sti l l wondering where to go for IFMSA exchange? IFMSA-Egypt proudly invites you to our homeland to spend one of the best months in your life, where you can find a comfortable stay, re-liable contact persons, magnificent social program and a well-organised internship or research program in one of our 23 faculties of medicine all over Egypt under the supervision of experienced internationally recognized pro-fessors and tutors.Through this magazine we hope you can find all your answers and concerns.

Amr,Karim and Shenawy.

Welcome

The Myth Of Osiris And SethBy : Eslam fouda

The story of Osiris is one of Egypt’s most ancient and interesting myths. It is also one of the most beautiful love stories of all time. It was an important story to the Egyptians because of its primary re-ligious meaning in the ancient Egyptian religion and also because Osiris’ was the king of Egypt who was resurrected as the “King of the dead”.

In the beginning, there was the sky god Geb and his wife the earth goddess Nut. Nut gave birth to four children: Osi-ris, Isis, Set and Nepthys. At the time of Osiris’ birth, a loud voice was heard all over the world, saying, “The lord of all the earth is born.” Osiris was the oldest and so became king of Egypt, and he married his sister Isis. He grew and became a mighty king and taught his people agriculture and animal husbandry. Osiris left to bring his teachings to other lands. While he was away, he left his wife, Isis, in charge. She ruled the country in the same manner. But Osiris had an enemy, his jealous brother Seth.

Seth began scheming against the great king. He aligned himself with Aso, the queen of Ethiopia. But noth-ing could be done while Isis ruled the country because of her extended au-thority. Upon Osiris’ return, an evil plan

was put into action. Seth secretly ac-quired the measurements of Osiris

and began having an amaz-ing decorated box built to fit those measurements. When the box was finished, Seth had a great feast to which he invited Osiris. When the feasting was done, Seth had the box brought out. He promised to give it to whoever fit into it. Each one tried to fit into the

box until it was Osiris’ turn.

He layed in the box suspecting nothing. Seth’s accomplices nailed the lid shut and threw it into the Nile River. Osiris was never seen again, walking in the land of the living.

When this news reached Isis, She cut off a length of her hair and put on her dress of mourning and began her journey to find the body of her husband.

Meanwhile, Isis makes her way to the land of Byblos to recover the body of her husband. In Byblos Isis sits by a fountain and talks to no one, except the queen of Byblos’ maidens. To these maidens she is quite pleasant, she told them that she was an Egyptian head-dress-er and braided their hair and breathed on them a wonderful perfume sweeter then the most fragrant flowers. Upon their return to the palace, the queen asks them, how they came by such wonderful perfume. They told her of the beautiful stranger they had met. The queen requested that Isis be brought to the palace where. She was appoint-ed to be the nurse of one of the young princes.

One night Isis built a fire and thrust the child in it. The queen wailed in ter-ror and ran to save the child. Isis turned on the queen and rebuking her sternly, revealed her true identity. Explaining to the queen that with her magic she was tempering the child to be a god. But now his immortality was lost. Isis ex-plained to the queen why she had made the journey to Byblos and her de-sire to have the giant pillar in which her

husband was encased and the queen granted her wish.

The pillar was taken down, and the great box was revealed. Isis took the chest and returned to Egypt but the mighty pillar which was worshiped from that day forward remained in Byblos and when she arrived to Egypt, she opened the box and cried her dead husband and her sister; Nephthys joined her in her sorrow. The sisters turn into Kites and circle the chest screech-ing in mournful tones. But Isis’ thoughts soon turned to her infant son, Horus. She had left him in Buto and now had to retrieve him. She hid the box in a se-cret place, and went after her son.

That night, while hunting by the light of the moon, Seth stumbled upon the finely decorated box. He was blinded with rage at the sight of his brother. He ripped Osiris into fourteen pieces and scattered them throughout Egypt. Isis learns of this new crime, and her grief is renewed. She once again sets out to find her husband’s remains. She used a boat made out of papyrus reeds to conduct her search. It was believed that, because of this, a crocodile would never attack a papyrus boat, fearing that it might contain the mighty god-dess. Where ever she finds a piece of Osiris, she buries it, and builds a shrine in that place. This is the reason that Osiris has so many tombs in Egypt.

In my opinion this story shows us the true meaning of love which can beat all the obstacles.

AL-MOEZZ LI-DIN ALLAH STREET

By: Yassin Omar

Al-Moezz Li-Din Allah street is one of the oldest streets in Cairo, nearly one kilometer long. A UN study found it to have the greatest concentration of medieval architectural treasures in the Islamic world. It is regarded as a wit-ness to the great era of Fatimid Cali-phate in Egypt. The street is named for the fourth Fatimid caliph Abu Tamim Ma’ad Al-Moezz Li-Din Allah who sent his great military leader Jawhar Al-Si-qilli who conquered Egypt to end the Abbasid Caliphate, and founded the city of Cairo and the great Al-Azhar mosque.

Al-Moezz street has two main gates; the northern gate, next to Al-Hakim mosque, is called Al-Futuh Gate, from where the armies go for battles, and the southern gate, next to Mu’ayyad mosque, is called Zuweila Gate with its twin minarets facing old Cairo. Zu-

weila Gate witnessed the famous sto-ry at which Sultan Qutuz responded to the message of Hulago, the leader of Maghoul, by killing the six envoys,”halv-ing them at the waist,” and displaying their heads on the gate.

The area around Al-Moezz Street as well as the main street itself contain many historical buildings showing mag-nificent sets of the Islamic Architecture ranging from the era of Amr Ibn El As, the first Muslim Arab leader to conquer Egypt, to the Tulunid Period, the Fatim-id, Ayyubid, Mamluk, Ottoman over to the Mohamed Ali Era.

New amazing cultural, historical, architectural experiences you never imagined about Egypt are waiting for you at Al-Moezz Li-Din Allah street. En-joyment is guaranteed.

Children’s Cancer Hospital Egypt 57357 BY : Amr Aboelnaga“A dream you dream alone is only a dream. A dream you dream together is reality. “–John Lennon, That’s literally what happened in Egypt with a dream of building a state of the art children’s cancer hospital [CCHE] that would be free of charge for all children regard-less of race, creed or ability to pay, to alleviate suffering and provide hope to children with cancer and their families. Egyptians and people from all over the world and most particularly in the Arab world have contributed generously to make that dream come to reality wish-ing to improve the future of our coun-tries and our children, both the sick and the healthy. And here we are the CCHE 57357 which has been built completely by donations, stands as a true example of the goodness of mankind and what can be achieved when people work together for a common goal. For, not only is this project attempting to increase the childhood cancer sur-vival rate in Egypt from less than an es-timated 40% to the Western rates of 75-80% overall survival, it is also attempting

to create a new system of healthcare where management and treatment utilize the most scientific approaches practiced today. With 4 years of opera-tion completed, 75% overall survival has been achieved. After the great success the hospital achieved with 187 beds capacity and a large outpatient facility that is able to accommodate 300 patients per day, the Children’s Cancer Hospital Founda-tion which is running this huge project still have four critical challenges to ac-complish to make a successful health sciences facility: 1. A Health Sciences Training Academy for upgrading the CCHE staff as well as providing training opportunities for the country and the region in healthcare.2. Research Institute3. Treatment expansion projects: Tanta (the heart of the crowdly populated Delta in Egypt), 60 bed, and phase 2 building (in Cairo) 350 beds.4. Patient/family guest house and stu-dent/staff residence complex.

1-The pharaohs: The ancient Egyptians who created their own history, their own civilization were truly genius even in the modern age we couldn’t dis-cover all their secrets like mummification, the study of astrology, even the mathematics and geometry.2- Mummies: mentioning mummies is related to horror movies although only great kings and queens were blessed by mummification to save their bodies and save their greatness. You may want to ask how could they do it ??! actually Nobody knows.3- Ahly and Zamalik: the most famous competitor teams in football. We can say that woman may get divorced be-cause she is a fan of Al.Ahly and her husband is a fan of Zamalek. So can you imagine how much they are adored in Egypt ?4-The Pyramids: the amazing structure which puzzled over the whole world. What inside the pyramids? We let you dis-cover it. 5- Oum Kalthoum: the star of the East who wasn’t just a great singer but also, the great Egyptian who travelled around the world to raise money for our military.6- Revolutions: Egypt means revolution and revolution means Egypt. Since 1952 the revolutions became a habit in Egypt so if you walk in the street and you found some protests don’t worry it is one of our new traditions and re-member to have your picture with them.7- Khan alKhalili: No word can describe this place. How can I describe the beauty, the history, the family spirit which dominates the place there. We will let you describe it in your own words .8- The Nile: The main artery which provides Egypt with wa-ter, electricity, fish and fertilized soil.9- Sinai: the land of prophets. The true meaning of beauty with its pure sky and wonderful landscapes, Sinai is heaven on earth. 10- Koshary: this deli-cious combination of rice Macaroni, lentil, onion and tomato sauce makes you don’t want any thing more in this life.

Top Ten Of Egypt By : Sohaila Elmehiy

Saint Catherine of Alexandria was both a princess and a noted schol-ar, who became a Christian around the age of fourteen, and herself converted hundreds of people to Christianity. Her superior intelligence combined with diligent study left her exceedingly well-versed in all the arts and sciences, and in phi-losophy. Having decided to remain a virgin all her life, she announced that she would only marry someone who surpassed her in beauty, intel-ligence, wealth, and dignity. This has been interpreted as an early foreshadowing of her eventual dis-covery of Christ. The Roman Emper-or Maxentius scourged and impris-oned her , Upon his failure to make her yield by way of torture, he tried to win the beautiful and wise prin-cess over by proposing marriage. The saint refused, declaring that her spouse was Jesus Christ, The furious emperor condemned Catherine to death on the spiked breaking wheel, but, at her touch, this instrument of torture was miraculously destroyed. Maxentius finally had her behead-ed. It’s believed that angels car-ried her corpse to Mount Sinai, the Eastern Emperor Justinian had established what is now Saint Catherine’s Monastery which is Located at the foot of Mount Moses, and dating back to the

sixth century, St Catherine’s Monas-tery is considered to be the oldest working Christian monastery in the world and is on the UNESCO world Heritage Site.

Mount St. Catherine: Mount Cathe-rine is the highest peak in Egypt with a height of 2,642m(8668 feet). It has a great collection of red granite rocks with 10 million year-old black volcanic rock formations. The inter-connected labyrinth of valleys were created by the rains and melting snow. It’s a more challenging expe-rience with more spectacular views than Mount Sinai. Climbing Mount Catherine is a moderately challeng-ing 1 day trek. You will need to be able to walk uphill for a period of 5 – 6 hours and then have the knees to descend continuously for a further 2 - 3 hours (no major issue for a regular walker). Once you reach the sum-mit you can enjoy the panoramic

360 degrees view of the high mountain region of

Sinai.

Epic journey in EgyptBy : Omar Hesham

Ramadan; it’s not just a religious occasion, it is a cultur-al festival. The whole country is covered with colorful lights, it’s like being in a 30 day carnival. It’s the month of generosity and kindness. Children buy Ramadan lantern (fanos). Mothers cook the most delicious kinds of food, sweets and drinks. They share their food with friends, neighbors, poor people and their relatives. Each family invites the people they know in order to have breakfast (Iftar) together. All kinds of charity ac-tivities reach their peak in this month.

Eid-El-Fetr (The lesser feast); amazing generous Ram-adan ends with three days feast called Eid-El-Fetr, in which people celebrate the end of fasting that lasted for 30 days. These three days are full of family visits, picnics, BBQ’s and charity. The whole idea of the feast is the spread of happiness among people, plus..., any kind of problems become forgotten.

El-Moulid; a public religious festival and one the most spectacular traditions for Muslims in Egypt. It means “Birth”. One of the biggest Moulids of the year is the celebration of prophet Mohamed’s birthday besides Moulid “El Sayed El Badawy” & “El Sayeda Zeinab”. People buy lots of occasional candies such as Hum-museyya, Semsemeyya, Sudaneyya. “Moulid dolls” or “ Aroset El Moulid” is a main part of this occasion. Chil-dren watch the “Tanoura dance” and play in amuse-ment parks.

Eid-El-Adha (feast of sacrifice); new clothes, toys, presents, it’s Eid-El-Adha. People make special efforts

to play and listen to a sermon at the mosque. You can see the happiness in children’s eyes, holding lots of money as a present from their parents & relatives, this is called “Eideyya”, they buy whatever they want. Many people travel to Mecca for Hajj, and may purchase an animal known as “Udhiya” if they can financially afford it and give its meat for poor people, orphans and an-yone in need.

The Real Taste Of JoyBy :Esraa Ateya

Another SRT to tell By : Amir Hamdy After a successful first SRT and amazing feedback the OC got from all the participants, IFMSA-Egypt exchange team was real-ly enthusiastic and eager to make another story to tell but even much better, they decided to make it a lifetime unforgettable experience. Under the glistening oriental sun and over the beautiful Red Sea coast, IFMSA-Egypt held a memorable gathering of 70 medical students from all over the world for its Sub-Regional Training for the 2nd year in row. Dedicated to the train-ing of exchange people of the IFMSA, the 2nd IFM-SA-Egypt SRT brought to together a series of work-shops, training sessions and small working groups

in a collective program in a period of 3 unforgetta-ble days joining sessions, workshops and parties you wouldn’t miss. The SRT took place on the coastal city of Ras Sudr right on the dazzling blue Red Sea in Paradise beach hotel to where the trip was destined on the 9th of May Cairo International Airport to breath taking Red Sea resort for an opportunity to introduce all the partic-ipants to the global envi-ronment of the IFMSA. 15 Training sessions to de-velop and nurture various skills members would utilize during their IFMSA journey ranging from communi-cation and presentation skills to leadership ,design-ing skills and external rep-resentation. The training in the SRT program were car-ried out by 9 great IFMSA trainers including IFMSA TO members and Internation-al Teams members who conducted various IFMSA training topics in an awe-some way that amazed the attendance. Alongside the training held in our SRT, Small Work-ing Groups and workshops

were conducted including Projects management, re-search opportunities and how to spend a year as an exchange officer introduc-ing participants to the col-laborative process of pro-ducing the best outcomes and solutions to empower our Standing Committee. The journey was conclud-ed on the 12th of May with a group trip to the fabulous wonder of the world, the Giza Pyramids, and a night out with a dazzling atmos-phere and cultural spirit in Khan El Khalili famous ba-zaar. Summing up, the experi-ence was a truly unforget-table one and the skills, knowledge and friendships everyone took home were those to keep forever.

Mohammed Salah “The Egyptian Messi”

By : Ahmed HeshamAfter the huge transfer to Chelsea FC one of the biggest football clubs in England and Europe, Salah undoubtedly proved himself as one of the best in the Egyptian football history. Mohamed Salah Ghaly is an Egyptian footballer who plays as a winger, he was born on the 15th of June 1992 in a small city called Basion, El Gharbia. He graduated from the academy of the Egyp-tian football club Al Mokawloon Al Arab and joined the first team, making his debut being substituted in on the 3rd of May 2010 in a 1-1 draw against Mansoura. During the 2010–2011 season Salah advanced and became a regular in the team. He scored his first goal for them on 25 December 2010 during the 1–1 away draw against Al Ahly SC. He remained a reg-ular for El Mokawloon, playing in every game for the ‘Mountain Wolves’ during the 2010/11 campaign.Swiss Super League side FC Basel had been monitoring Salah during that most impressive of debut seasons and, after meeting club repre-sentatives after a fund-raising friendly in hon-or of the Port Said Stadium disaster, signed a contact just a month later.Salah scored on his unofficial debut on 23 June 2012 against Steaua Bucureşti during a friendly match, a 4–2 defeat. He made his official Basel debut in a UEFA Champions League preliminary stage match against the Norwegian club Molde on 8 August, coming on as a substitute in the 74th min-ute.He made his league debut on 12 August against Thun, playing the full match. He scored his first league goal a week lat-er, the second goal in the 2–0 home win against Lausanne. However, it was his per-formances against Spurs on April 2013 in the

Europa League which truly ena-bled him to make his mark on the continental scene. In aiding Basel to victory over the Londoners, in penalties after the tie finished 4-4 on aggregate, Salah and his club had reached the semi-finals of the tournament.They met Chelsea after that who, under Rafa Benitez, eventually lift-

ed the trophy but a fine strike from the Egyptian youngster

gave them hope of an up-set.

Despite disappointment in Europe, FCB romped to victory in the domestic league while reaching the final of the Swiss Cup. 2013 continued to be a milestone year for Salah, now a full interna-tional for the Pharaohs, as he con-verted his first Champions League strike against Macabi Tel Aviv in August. Drawn in Chelsea’s group, though, they faced a daunting away tie at Stamford Bridge in Jose Mourinho’s first European game back in England. Salah stole the limelight, however, after scoring the equalizer as the Swiss champi-ons defeated the Blues 2-1 in one of the shocks of the season to date. It alerted Liverpool to his qualities and Rodgers is believed to have sent scouts to monitor his situation throughout the season. However, eventually Jose mour-inho managed to clinch the deal, On 23 January 2014 Chelsea an-nounced that a deal had been agreed with Basel to bring Salah to

London for a fee reported to be £11 million, with the player scheduled to undergo a medical and agree to personal terms. On 26 January 2014 Chelsea announced the signing of Salah, making him the first Egyptian to sign for the club.About his career with the national team, Salah made his debut for the Egypt national football team on 3 September 2011 in the 2–1 away defeat by Sierra Leone, having previously made 11 appearances for the Egypt U-20 team and Egypt U-23 team, representing Egypt in both 2011 FIFA U-20 World Cup and the 2012 Summer Olympics. He scored his first goal for Egypt’s first team in the 3–0 win against Niger one month later. He later scored a goal in the 93rd minute in stoppage time against Guinea to give Egypt an important 3–2 away victory in a 2014 World Cup qual-ifier. On 9 June 2013, Salah scored a hat-trick and registered an assist as Egypt won their fourth consecutive match in the World Cup qualifiers. In the following match, he scored the goal that sealed qualification for Egypt. Salah later scored his sixth goal in a qualification match to the joint-top scorer among all African teams in the qualification stages. Egyptians pin great hopes on this young talent to end the drought and achieve the dream reaching the world cup in 2018 after 28 years of absence. No doubt this brilliant young talent has a great future ahead, just re-member the name, Salah.

I enjoyed discovering the incredible

Arabic culture, Eid, the specific food,

henna (very much actually), we even went

to a traditional and spectacular wedding! Be-

ing a small part of the happiness and beautiful-

ness of Arabic culture meant a lot for meGeorgiana Pavel .. Romania

My exchange spent in Egypt was a great time

which I really enjoyed. I spent my clerkship at

Internal Department, where I could have

seen patients suffering diseases which are

exotic (as bilharsiosis) or very rare in my

country (hepatitis c). For the first time in

my life I saw situation of health care

system in developing country and I

found out, that it was possible to

do good medicine in bad

conditions .Ludmila Kacicova, Czech Republic

Every day in Egypt was like a surprise. Before going there

I had many expectations. But when I came I’ve realized that it

won’t be as I’v

e expected. Everything here is just d

ifferent. Even

the times goes in

a very different way. When you are floating

on the Nile in a small boat (felucca) when you are standing

near some huge thousands years ago built

monument; or just sitting on the white sand

near the blue sea you just wish the tim

e to

stop .

Justina Abromaviciute .. Lithuania

Testimonials

I am Agnes Kuzior a polish medical student at Uni-

versity of Lodz, it was my holidays between 3rd

and 4th year.

I am very happy that I had a possibility to join

IFMSA-Exchange program! ,My practice took

place in Internal Medicine department, so we

had mostly cases of hepatitis etc, but there were

also other really interesting cases, almost impos-

sible to see in Poland, especially as a third-year

student, like advanced lupus, myeloma multi-

plex, severe nephroblastoma etc. Our super-

vising doctors were open to our suggestions, so

sometimes they took us to other departments, like Surgery & Pediatrics.

The most things I liked in Egypt are (Food, Places, Trips, Situations)

Everything!, I think that medical part of the practice is important, but

we can’t forget, that we live one month in other country, and that we

will know it better than in ANY touristic trip!

I thought that I know Egypt, because so many friends of mine, and my

family members used to go there for holidays, but then I realized, than

non-touristic part of Egypt is so much different than the ‘normal’ one,

and even more interesting!, I wouldn’t lie saying that I loved everything

there: from Food, which is so delicious and cheap (especially the best

thing: koshary!

by the Place: with local night live, tasty sheesha, shops, with great un-

common stuff crazy traffic jam and beautiful Arabic language.

I can’t forget about cities like Ismailia, Cairo, Alex and Port Said, Red

Sea coast – Dahab, Siwa, Mouse Mountain and Pyramid… Everything

was so wonderful!

And finally Situations: Egyptian hospitality is famous in the world, I don’t

remember any place where people were not so nice and helpful. I

mean our friends from IFMSA-Egypt and our doctors, who were always

ready to help us with anything (even non-medical problems), but also

all Egyptians we met, who were always smiling and want to make us

happy in their beautiful country (even if they don’t speak any English!)

I know that my opinion is so enthusiastic, but it’ what I really feel! ,I strong-

ly recommend to all medical students to go for exchange to Egypt! Of

course it’s not place for the people who don’t like sun & hot weath-

er :P and typical European lifestyle,

because in Egypt everything is dif-

ferent. I prefer the Egyptian way of

living, so I was really happy there.

Spędziłam w Egipcie najlepszy

miesiąc mojego życia… naprawdę!

(I spent In Egypt the Best month of

my life…really! :D .

Testimonials