Patrick Zaki: “Thanks to those who supported me, I’m happy”

“I’m still a bit confused, everything is going fast. But now I’m happy, I’m here with my family, with all the people I love. That’s all.” Patrick Zaki tells Corriere della Sera, speaking from his childhood home in Mansoura, Egypt, where he was released yesterday after 670 days of detention. “They didn’t announce that I would be released – says the Egyptian student of the Alma Mater in Bologna – Suddenly they took me to the police station, and they started taking my fingerprints. I didn’t understand what was happening, there were no signs that they were about to release me. I was confused. I cannot say all the details and I prefer not to talk about the conditions of detention. But then I realized there was hope. Hope, you know, is the most difficult thing to keep alive when they take away your freedom. “” I just have to say thank you to Italy – he adds – for being close to me and my family. Thanks to everyone who kept the light on. And the list is very long. Friends all over the world, who have worked hard for me. But also your diplomatic delegation that came to the hearings. Then the University of Bologna. All my fellow masters, but in particular Professor Rita Monticelli. He is my mentor at the Gemma master in Bologna. A person who treated me like a son. And he not only passed on knowledge but also values. Empathy, respect. And listening. And then my sister Marise. But surely this will make someone angry, I’ll stop here “. “Seeing your diplomatic representatives in the courtroom during the hearings gave me strength – reiterates Zaki -. I will never forget all the times when during the visits I was told about the demonstrations, about the squares. And about all the initiatives organized to ask for my release in these nearly two years. It filled me with pride to know that a person of Senator Liliana Segre’s level and moral stature has taken an interest in me. I want to meet her. Absolutely. I hope this will happen as soon as possible. I hope it will happen soon. I can go back to Italy. I don’t know if there is a ban on traveling abroad. For now I know that I can go back to Cairo. I hope to be able to resume my master’s degree in Bologna very soon. I can’t wait to be able to hug my parents again. my friends, my teachers. And there is a place where I would like to go sooner or later, in Italy. In Naples. I’ve never been there. My great-grandmother Adel was from Naples. I don’t speak Italian so well, but accent of that part of the country has always fascinated me. I love Neapolitan authors very much “. In prison I was able to read, Zaki continues, “Dostoevskij, Saramago. And then ‘The brilliant friend’ by Elena Ferrante. My favorite, perhaps. University books, on the other hand, were more complicated to have. I also tried to write a few times but I wasn’t always allowed to keep the block. Writing allows you to re-elaborate, to process what happened. A person close to me taught me this ”. Finally he talks about the award in memory of Maria Grazia Cutuli, the correspondent killed in Afghanistan in 2001, received on November 20 by Corriere della Sera: “It means a lot to me. I don’t deserve it, there are heroes out there who fight, in Egypt, more than me, much more than me. But it is an award for which I sincerely thank, Maria Grazia is very very important to me, and this recognition represents a great support that I have received from Corriere, as an institution. And soon I hope to write my diaries, what I have been through, in the Corriere. Wait for me “.