Two years ago I embarked on one of the most incredible adventures of my life so far. I was 20 years old and it was my first time in Africa. I boarded a plane in Frankfurt and my destination was Cairo, a city with so many sides, so much history, and countless little wonders.

I remember sitting alone at the boarding gate after a long sleepless night, wondering what I would encounter in Cairo, a place I had so often imagined and visited in dreams. From Fustat to Ottoman province, from the slums of Mokattam to the mighty Pyramids,  I learned that Cairo is only a word used to describe the multiplicity of small systems that are part of a unity. I also learned it is essential to understand this in order to enjoy this, one of the most populated cities in the world.

I got lost in slums, met new people at bazaars, saw the mighty Pyramids standing silent in the desert, I admired the courage of Egyptians to introduce changes in their society, I marvelled at the sheer beauty of the Nile, but most importantly, I was able to observe a metropolis in flux.
Panta rhei - Everything flows.

Each picture is a slice of a time in which this city is being born again. Abdel Fattah al Sisi was elected President of Egypt in 2014 (just three weeks after I left the country) following the ousting of the first democratically elected President of Egypt, Mohamed Morsi. In 2011 Hosni Mubarak resigned to his post after 18 days of intense protests during the Egyptian Revolution. One thing is for sure: Egyptians are willing to give their lives for their country. Even if it means until their last breath.

My trip to Egypt changed the way I look at the world. Traveller and explorer Ibn Battuta wonderfully described it in one phrase: "travelling, it leaves you speechless, then turns you into a storyteller." In this occasion I will let pictures tell the stories.

NDP headquarters (Hosni Mubarak's party) set ablaze during the Friday of Anger, Egyptian Revolution, 2011.

A couple in Al Azhar Park. Facebook played a major role in the Egyptian Revolution of 2011.

A seed vendor in Khan el Khalili.

A girl holding Aish, Egyptian flat bread.

Sunset in Al Azhar Park.

Cairo Necropolis, also City of the Dead. Dense grid of tombs and mausoleums from Ottoman times where people live and work amongst the dead.

Coptic Cairo scene.

Blessing, Coptic Cairo. Copts are the largest religious minority in the country.

Streets of Coptic Cairo.

A young boy participates in a political rally outside Khan el Khalili.

My uncle Ulises and the immensity at the Giza Plateau.

A young boy working at the Pyramids. Tourism has decreased since the unrest in 2011.

Mokattam, home of the garbage-collecting Zabaleen people.

Mokattam street scene.

Mokattam street scene.

Children playing in a rusty swing, Mokattam.

A little girl in the Mokattam slums.

Men performing Tanoura, a Sufi dance.

Tanoura Performer.

The painter of Al Muizz street. I'll never forget his benevolent eyes.

A city in flux: Boats on the Nile.