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My parents left Cairo, Egypt to move to Longwood, Florida at the end of the 20th century. I grew up around black bears, deer and raccoons instead of donkeys, camels and pigeons. Rather than seeing the pyramids from our high-rise window in Maadi, I saw a frog-filled swamp and heard their mating songs every night as opposed to the anxious honking of Misr. The people around me were fair-skinned and often blonde. My curls were a source of humor for my friend group. The out of control baby hairs. How massive my hair would get after it dried from the pool. Despite feeling out of place, painting lanterns for Ramadan instead of Santa Claus, with the help of the weirdos who connected with my strangeness, I conjured a beautiful childhood for myself which took home in the wildness of Floridian nature. A different kind of chaos then Cairo, the chaos of things dying and living over a pile of fallen leaves. Disorder which attracts Earth worms and explorative children, not tourists. 

After graduating college, I knew I had to leave Florida. Although, I made my way as best as I could - this settlement my parents chose for me was not the garden in which I would bloom. My sister graciously took me in. She too had left as soon as she could to move to NYC. I slept in the same bed as her for a year until I was able to afford my own rent. For several years, I toiled away in the healthcare industry - thinking my only value to society could be to help others. Eventually, that paradigm broke during COVID when I realized a) I wasn’t an essential worker and b) I didn’t want to be an essential worker. 

In 2017, I met one of my best friends Meriam who changed my life. One day, we were walking along Eastern Parkway and I told her about a diss track I wrote about Drake, which was mostly an ode to Kendrick Lamar. I started rapping it to her and she was like “What are you doing in healthcare?” That was the beginning of our writing partnership. Up to that point, I had been writing poetry and was going to open mics occasionally - but at that stage it became a regular habit. Something that was always a part of me, which I finally decided to commit to. 

From there, the rest is history and is still being written. I left healthcare to work in music in the hip-hop and R&B space. I met my other best friend Jazzy who inspired me to start DJing again, a dream I had killed in college. Now, I’m on the journey to share all these songs, all these stories, all these words, and all these images I have in my head. The quest to bring my imagination to life and to live as freely as possible. Now I know the answer to the question “What happens to a dream deferred?”...it’ll only die if you let it.

Thank you for reading. Thank you for listening. Thank you for watching. The value of getting to share my art is not lost on me. I appreciate every moment.