One Canadian victim from Saskatoon
One of two Canadians aboard doomed EgyptAir flight MS804 was a fiercely intelligent, opinionated businesswoman who doted on her three young sons, a friend said Thursday.
“It’s really sad. I’ve been bombarded with memories of us being together,” said Haleh Banani, of Allen, Texas, as she recalled her friend, Marwa Hamdy. “I got teary eyed several times today. I don’t think it’s hit me yet.
“We’ve taken that flight so many times. I thought about friends who could be on there. It didn’t occur to me there could be someone we knew. It was heartbreaking. It was a dear friend.”
Hamdy, she said, was born and raised in Saskatoon but later relocated with her family to Cairo, where she worked for IBM Corp. as a project manager.
The mother of three boys, aged 11 to 16, was returning to Cairo after visiting family in Paris, Banani said.
“Her son contacted my son and gave him the news and wanted us to pray for his mom,” she said.
Banani said she spoke to Hamdy’s eldest son Thursday afternoon.
“He’s keeping it together,” she said. “I was impressed how confident he was. … I think he’s being very hopeful. He told me he needed to be strong for his younger brothers. The youngest one doesn’t know.”
Banani said her family lived in Cairo from 2006 to 2012 because of her husband’s work in the oil sector and because she wanted her three children to learn Arabic.
Her children attended the same school as Hamdy’s children and the two families became close.
Hamdy was successful at her job and travelled often, Banani said. “She was very intelligent, very well read, always engaged in intellectual discussions, and outspoken.”
She was also an attentive mother, Banani said. “She was always encouraging her kids, being involved with their activities. She was very kind-hearted,” she said. “Even though she was a working mom, she had a great relationship with her boys.”
“I asked her son: ‘How do you want people to remember her?’ ” Banani said. “He said, ‘As a kind loving woman, who helped a lot of people.’ ”