32 The Queens Courier • october 23, 2014 for breaking news visit www.queenscourier.com moral courage s Nashwa El-Sayed shares her story of childhood abduction to Egypt, escape and return to Queens in a video through the Moral Courage Project. Photos © Moral Courage Project 2014. THE WAY BACK Ridgewood woman recounts childhood abduction to Egypt, escape in YouTube video BY CRISTABELLE TUMOLA ctumola@queenscourier.com/@CristabelleT She found the courage to escape. She then found the courage to share her story. Nashwa El-Sayed was abducted to Egypt from Queens at the age of 2 by her father. After suffering from abuse, years of separation from her mother and an impending arranged marriage at the age of 17, she was finally able to leave the country and return to America. El-Sayed, now 24, and living in Ridgewood, has since graduated from Queens College with a degree in international relations and recounted her tale, hoping others in her situation will do the same. “Hopefully they see it as something that can change lives,” she said. Though El-Sayed has shared her story before, she is telling it in a new medium: video. The Moral Courage Project, an educational nonprofit started in 2008, posted a video of El-Sayed’s story, “How one young woman escaped childhood abuse and a forced marriage,” on its YouTube channel last month. The nonprofit mentors, teaches and provides role models for people who want to build up moral courage, or do “the right thing in the face of your fears,” according to Adam Grannick, multimedia producer with the Moral Courage Project. It showcases its role models through videos it creates for its YouTube channel, Moral Courage TV. They are “everyday people” from a middle-schooler facing a bully to corporate whistleblowers and everyone in between. Launched in April 2012, the videos are accompanied by related social media posts to bring awareness to whatever issue they highlight and can each have their own look, depending on the story. Since filmmakers didn’t have footage from El-Sayed’s childhood, her video featured animation. “Animation usually takes away from the seriousness of a story, but this one was not the case,” El-Sayed said. El-Sayed’s story begins on Father’s Day 1993 — the day she was taken. She was living in Richmond Hill at the time, and her Egyptian father and American mother were in the process of filing for divorce. “My mother knew deep down that she wasn’t going to see me again,” El-Sayed said in the video. A couple of years after landing in Egypt, El-Sayed was living in Alexandria with her father and a stepmother who physically and emotionally abused her. She also had to be “a pious Muslim girl who should not be seen in public, who should not speak in public.” At around age 9, she found some relief when her father divorced the woman. He soon married another woman who also tried to abuse El-Sayed, but she retaliated and the woman never tried it again. Photo courtesy of NashwaElSayed Also at 9 years old, she saw her mother for the first time since she was abducted. That moment was when she knew there was another place she belonged to and that she could study what she wanted. Her mother from then on would send her items from the U.S. — media, such as music from the Backstreet Boys; toys, such as Barbies; new gadgets, such as CD players; and school supplies, such as glitter. El-Sayed’s father promised she could go to college in America as long as she got good grades. But during her final year of high school, her father told her that he found her a husband and that she was going to meet him on her wedding day in four months.
QC10232014
To see the actual publication please follow the link above