Waafa Mearwy lives with her son Bashar in a small apartment in 6th of October City on the outskirts of Cairo. The city is called Little Syria, because thousands of Syrians fled to this place since anti-government activists began their struggle to topple Syrian President Bashar al-Assad in 2011.

Waafa came to Egypt a few months ago, when two of her son’s friends got killed by snipers near their home in the southern Damascus district of Nahar Aisha. Her two daughters and their husbands still live in Syria.

"When his friends died, the war got under his skin, and Bashar got really depressed. I was so afraid that something like that might happen to him too, that I decided it was better to leave. And now we are here, in Egypt, feeling lost and homesick," she said in an interview with Al-Monitor on July 10.

She shows a picture of two young boys, not older than 16, and starts to cry, while sitting at a table in a Syrian restaurant, waiting for Bashar to finish his 12-hour shift. When some young kids at the end of the street set off fireworks, Waafa looks anxious.