ماشربتش من نيلها [Mashrebtesh Min Nilha] [English translation]

Our motherland is a gift in our hands

We should raise her1 up high as long as we are alive

We are meant to be living in these lands2 for years and years

in peace....

Haven't you ever drunk from the Nile3?

Have you ever tried to sing for her?

Have you ever tried in the peak of your sorrow to wander in her streets and tell her what's wrong with you?

Haven't you wandered in her suburbans?

Haven't you grown up there?

Didn't you have a draw on sand in one of her shores?

Look up inside you and you will find out that she is your friends, your folks

Such relations in my motherland are not easy to be forgotten

Maybe you can't notice that4 'cause you live in her5

'cause neither did you left her, nor were you in a need to long for her6

But those who experienced that and traveled away from her know that she is irreplaceable

When I leave her I long for her,

then I leave everything and come back to her.

And when I'm about to forget she reminds me with a million memories saved in my heart

Our motherland is precious

It will be kept in our eyes7

Our motherland is going to change for better with our hands as long as we love her

We are those to raise her,

to make her, with our hands,

more beautiful for us and for our children with every passing year8

1. She talks about Egypt/ motherland in feminine form (check translator's comment)2. literally: in her3. Literally: from her Nile? (check translator's comment)4. Literally: maybe you forget that5. in your motherland6. not literally translated7. To keep something in eye: to take a good care of it and to protect it like you protect your eyes8. App. translated

• Artist:Sherine Abdel-Wahab