Parkour in Egypt

This essay was made in 2010 when a growing group of youth were organizing into parkour groups in the suburbs of Cairo.

To reach the practice location in Al-Marg most of the practitioners take at least two microbuses and the Metro to the end of their lines.

Parkour migrated to Egypt without any direct contact but through movies such as District 13 and homemade YouTube videos from around the world. According to the participants Egypt was the second middle eastern country to form a parkour group in 2008 and since then has grown to more than 50 members with practices 6 days of the week in 3 areas around Cairo, and even a satellite group in Alexandria.

In central Cairo they must negotiate permission with bowabs and dodge constant traffic so the main practice location is an abandoned government building in Al-Marg, an industrial city on the last metro stop. Parkour is a physical discipline like a martial art with the non-violent goal of being able to run and jump through complex environments quickly.