Every time I try to explain it . . . it\u2019s like a family. It was like one big family.<\/p><\/div><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThat was the best thing I\u2019ve ever done,\u201d Helal says of his decision to live in Alexander Hall. \u201cWe had internationals from all over the world, and American students who knew Raleigh and North Carolina. It was an amazing experience to interact and get to know people from different cultures.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Helal served as treasurer for the Alexander Hall Council during his freshman year, and lived in Alexander for four and a half years. \u201cSame room, same roommate,\u201d he says. Students who live in Alexander understand what makes it special, Helal says. \u201cEvery time I try to explain it . . . it\u2019s like a family,\u201d he says. \u201cIt was like one big family.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n So much so that by the time Helal graduated and returned to Egypt, he felt homesick for his friends at NC State. \u201cThose were the best five years of my life,\u201d says Helal, who now handles supply chain issues as a procurement specialist for Mondel\u0113z International, a multinational snack food company.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Many members of Alexander\u2019s \u201cbig family\u201d stayed in touch after they graduated from NC State. Helal\u2019s roommate, Derek Anderson \u201918, is from New Bern, N.C., and Helal came back to North Carolina last year for Anderson\u2019s wedding. There is an Alexander Hall alumni page on Facebook with about 1,000 members.<\/p>\n\n\n\n And so Helal, 28, decided it made sense to have a family reunion. He initially wanted to do it in 2020, but the pandemic squelched that. So they ended up doing it this year, with Helal inviting Alexander Hall alumni to join him in Egypt. He thought he might get 10 people to come, but ended up with a total of 22 (including himself) who made their way to Cairo in July. People came from the United States, Mexico, Australia, England, Finland, Spain and Austria. They spent a couple of days in Cairo, visited the pyramids, took a cruise on the Nile and visited the Red Sea. They didn\u2019t all know each other when the week began, but they bonded over boat rides, camel rides and snorkeling in the Red Sea.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cIt was amazing,\u201d Helal says. \u201cThe best week I\u2019ve had in a very long time. All of them loved it. They enjoyed the food, the Red Sea was amazing \u2014 people were stunned by how beautiful the water was \u2014 and the people here are so welcoming.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n It went so well, in fact, that there is already talk of another reunion, perhaps somewhere in Europe. \u201cIt was a 10 out of 10 trip,\u201d Helal says.<\/p>\n","protected":false,"raw":"\n\n\n\n\n One of the first things that struck Hossam Helal \u201918 when he arrived in Raleigh to study engineering at NC State in 2013 was how green everything was. Having grown up in Giza, Egypt \u2014 about 30 minutes from the famous pyramids \u2014 Helal was used to everything being yellow or tan.<\/p>\n\n\n\n He was also struck by American fast food, which was heavier and more greasy than the food he grew up on. Not that he was complaining, mind you. Bojangles became his favorite (\u201cBy far, 100 percent.\u201d), and he would visit every few days to get a three-piece chicken dinner or a cajun filet sandwich.<\/p>\n\n\n\n But he also felt homesick. He was the first member of his family to come to the United States for college, and the language barrier was greater than he had expected. He knew some English, but struggled to understand jokes and various phrases.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It didn\u2019t take long, though, for NC State to start to feel like home. Much of that was due to his time at Alexander Hall, a dorm near Talley Student Union. Alexander is home to NC State\u2019s Global Village, a place for students interested in interacting with students from other countries and cultures.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Every time I try to explain it . . . it\u2019s like a family. It was like one big family.<\/p><\/div><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n \u201cThat was the best thing I\u2019ve ever done,\u201d Helal says of his decision to live in Alexander Hall. \u201cWe had internationals from all over the world, and American students who knew Raleigh and North Carolina. It was an amazing experience to interact and get to know people from different cultures.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Helal served as treasurer for the Alexander Hall Council during his freshman year, and lived in Alexander for four and a half years. \u201cSame room, same roommate,\u201d he says. Students who live in Alexander understand what makes it special, Helal says. \u201cEvery time I try to explain it . . . it\u2019s like a family,\u201d he says. \u201cIt was like one big family.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n So much so that by the time Helal graduated and returned to Egypt, he felt homesick for his friends at NC State. \u201cThose were the best five years of my life,\u201d says Helal, who now handles supply chain issues as a procurement specialist for Mondel\u0113z International, a multinational snack food company.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Many members of Alexander\u2019s \u201cbig family\u201d stayed in touch after they graduated from NC State. Helal\u2019s roommate, Derek Anderson \u201918, is from New Bern, N.C., and Helal came back to North Carolina last year for Anderson\u2019s wedding. There is an Alexander Hall alumni page on Facebook with about 1,000 members.<\/p>\n\n\n\n And so Helal, 28, decided it made sense to have a family reunion. He initially wanted to do it in 2020, but the pandemic squelched that. So they ended up doing it this year, with Helal inviting Alexander Hall alumni to join him in Egypt. He thought he might get 10 people to come, but ended up with a total of 22 (including himself) who made their way to Cairo in July. People came from the United States, Mexico, Australia, England, Finland, Spain and Austria. They spent a couple of days in Cairo, visited the pyramids, took a cruise on the Nile and visited the Red Sea. They didn\u2019t all know each other when the week began, but they bonded over boat rides, camel rides and snorkeling in the Red Sea.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cIt was amazing,\u201d Helal says. \u201cThe best week I\u2019ve had in a very long time. All of them loved it. They enjoyed the food, the Red Sea was amazing \u2014 people were stunned by how beautiful the water was \u2014 and the people here are so welcoming.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n It went so well, in fact, that there is already talk of another reunion, perhaps somewhere in Europe. \u201cIt was a 10 out of 10 trip,\u201d Helal says.<\/p>\n"},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Alumni from around the world gather in Egypt to celebrate their ties to NC State\u2019s Alexander Hall.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":39,"featured_media":3928,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"views\/single-immersive.blade.php","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"source":"","ncst_custom_author":"","ncst_show_custom_author":false,"ncst_dynamicHeaderBlockName":"ncst\/default-immersive-post-header","ncst_dynamicHeaderData":"{\"backgroundColor\":\"blue_400\",\"caption\":\"Photographs courtesy of Hossam Helal \u201918.\",\"displayCategoryID\":5,\"showAuthor\":true,\"showDate\":true,\"showFeaturedVideo\":false,\"subtitle\":\"Alumni from around the world gather in Egypt to celebrate their ties to NC State\u2019s Alexander Hall.\"}","ncst_content_audit_freq":"","ncst_content_audit_date":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[5,9],"tags":[50,272,393,480,533,984],"_ncst_magazine_issue":[],"class_list":["post-4828","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-best-bets","category-stories","tag-alexander-hall","tag-college-of-engineering","tag-egypt","tag-global-village","tag-hossam-helal","tag-red-sea"],"displayCategory":{"term_id":5,"name":"Best Bets","slug":"best-bets","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":5,"taxonomy":"category","description":"","parent":0,"count":52,"filter":"raw"},"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/magazine.ncsu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4828"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/magazine.ncsu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/magazine.ncsu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/magazine.ncsu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/39"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/magazine.ncsu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4828"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/magazine.ncsu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4828\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5090,"href":"https:\/\/magazine.ncsu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4828\/revisions\/5090"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/magazine.ncsu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3928"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/magazine.ncsu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4828"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/magazine.ncsu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4828"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/magazine.ncsu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4828"},{"taxonomy":"_ncst_magazine_issue","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/magazine.ncsu.edu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/_ncst_magazine_issue?post=4828"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"https:\/\/magazine.ncsu.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/09\/Water-1024x576.jpg\")
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