By Rana Kamaly, BECAUSE One day in 2005, Mohamed el Lakani decided to stand up. It was his first time to do so in five years. “I was just so sick and tired of sitting in bed or in the wheelchair and having my sisters help me with everything. At that moment, I felt like God was telling me to stand up. I felt an enormous energy taking control of me.” El Lakani is a driven individual who worked since the age of sixteen selling mobile accessories—less out of need and more out of a passion for work. He had started a bachelor’s degree at Ain Shams University. But in 2000, he lost his leg in a massive bus accident that killed the driver, his mother, two aunts, and two cousins. He survived, along with his two sisters and a cousin. The tragedy left him in a coma for months, and then confined him to bed for the next five years. His attempt to stand up again could be called the second event that changed his life. “I asked my sister to bring me the crutches, closed my eyes, prayed….
