The African Society....Respect !

Earlier, about a month or more ago, I was assigned by the company I work for to give a Microsoft Office course in a society that I've never heard about before. It's called the African society.

When I entered the place for the first time, I was really amazed ! It's a sort of an old historical building, with huge rooms having high ceilings, wooden floors and stairs that sound upon stepping on them. Everywhere around, you can find lots of stunning African wooden handcrafts, either statues or faces hanged on the wall, in addition to lots of drawings and even some posters showing the beauty of the black continent.

Two or three weeks later I started giving lectures for African students, from different countries. This course took about a month, during this month I had a great experience dealing with those guys and with the society members. Lots of things there had my respect, but really two main points dazzled me.

The first one, was about the students attending that course, they were from many different countries. It was my first time to deal with a whole class, sometimes in the school of engineering, I explained a course or a lecture to a colleague or a group of colleagues, but a whole class? Never. I was a sort of worried yet very excited for such an experience.

On my way to the first class I began feeling the adrenaline saying: "Hi dude I'm here". I always have this feeling, for a couple of minutes whenever I start presenting or talking to a group of people in public. This time it was different, upon entering the class, I was introduced to the students, for the first time I didn't feel worried, not even a little bit. The students were the kind of people that make you feel relaxed when you look in their faces.

Their faces expressed a mixture of innocence and natural African kindness. I started with a small introduction, then they started asking. I realized that there was something so common between them, they were extremely polite, respectful, having a nice sense of humor. They were eager to learn more and gain information as much as they can.

Most of the courses I attended in different fields, different institutes and different countries, I could always notice a bunch of students attending just to gain a certificate or to satisfy the requirements of a job or a prerequisite of a course or that stuff. There was no such students in that class, they all had the kind of attitude that makes you want to give more. They were always asking about every single detail, they didn't miss a word. They looked like someone fighting to gain more knowledge, though they didn't have good computer skills, nor any easy means of transportation from the places of their accommodation to the society. They were the kind of people that left you no choice, whether to respect them or not. 

The second point was about the society itself, it is really a wonderful nonprofit organization that uses Egyptian resources, and only Egyptian resources, for both the effort made and the income they get. They can easily have like 100 times the income they get now, by having international funding resources, or being under the umbrella of an international leading organization. What prevented that was their will to keep it as a pure Egyptian society, having its fund only from Egyptian resources, helping in the development of African countries, enhancing the skills of the Africans and and increasing their knowledge. It's truly a very decent respectful kind of humanitarian work. 

It was a great experience. One of the best feelings I've ever felt in my life is giving a peace of knowledge for someone, knowing it would be a valuable add-on for him, even if its very simple. 

I've made great friends, so simple, so natural, so African,  maybe we won't meet again but at least we're in contact through mail or social networks. All the admiration for the African Society, All the respect to such students, and All the wishes for a great rise for the beautiful deserving black continent.