They say that home will always be our safety , but what if mine wasn’t? I’m sending you a message from the unknown. I hope it reach you.
5:10 am- Wad Madni.
My eyes slowly opened when I heard the Azan from a mile. He was calling us to the prayer and I had to get up and get ready for the prayer. Our house is very close to the mosque , and we always started our day hearing the praying calling. I have to call my younger brother and tell him its prayer time and soon we will have to go to school at 7 am. Our home was very small and not very loving but my little brother and I , always made it a good place to be at. Our home was one bedroom only with a kitchen and something called Al bakhana , it could be described as a bathroom but not really one. Our whole home was build by the mud and we had a big yard when there was a separated room , kitchen and the bkhana . Our door was always open and people always visited us and greeted us , if I look at my right I will find a small wall separate our house from our neighbors. It was such a strange thing, as if we were a small world and we all were family, but now I need to get up for the prayer. My mother is waiting.
My mother was already awake and ready with the tea, my mother didn’t smile so much and I never knew why ; but she was very loving and maybe she didn’t show her love through her smile. My day started with the prayer and when my little brother and myself were in our way to the mosque , we greeted my uncles and neighbors. They always waved and smiled at me and it always made my day start good . Whenever me and my little brother go the mosque we have to say hello to my uncle Omer , he was such a warm and funny person . He always joked with us and told us we are good boys and our mother did a good job raising us. Uncle Omer always sat with uncle Ibrahim near the grocery shop , I always heard them dropping jokes and laugh together . They are very friendly and kind people and they always smiled to everybody. I loved being around them because they taught me about life. Uncle Omer loved me a lot , he always joked and was there for me ; he even once told me that im much smarter and different than brothers and i never understood what he meant. I believe uncle Omer was having fertility issue , he never had children and he was married once , i believe . I was told he was my father youngest brother and the kindest . He was also very close to my father.
I don’t know much or remember much about my father other then , he was killed. One day someone came and told me this and I never asked further questions. I don’t remember anything from him because he wasn’t around my life so much, my mother never spoke about him and she never told us how did she met. I had to grow up and figure out by myself that my father wasn’t around. I was mainly raised by my eldest brother and my mother. My eldest brother worked as lumper and he didn’t earn much but he never gave us any money. I know you are wondering how did we live , well we were very poor and my mother did her best to bring us food. We never had fancy food or meat , we mostly ate cheap and available vegetables in our local market , But despite the lack of materiel things ; we were actually very happy but without laughing noises . We didn’t think we need much to be happy , I was very happy to wake up everyday and going to the mosque with my little brother and greet everyone in our way. Indeed we were very poor , but we were rich in loving live and the moment . We never had tomorrow, it always here and now. Tomorrow was always between god’s hands.
Everyday was full of joy and happiness despite the cruelty my little brother and I , saw from our older and eldest brothers towards my mother. They never gave her money or kindness, and my mother was a woman of dignity and grace although she had nothing in this life expect us. I believe I never saw a woman like her in my life before. She was a strong willed woman who refused vile behaviors from others .She was very sharp and intelligent woman with a very strong personality that refuse to give up or let life sway her under her feet. I think my mother came from a rich and educated family but they always abasement us . I never understood why, some things in this life are much bigger than my understanding and ideas. One of the things that ill never understand is hate and ego , why does my mother family hates her and us? did she do something to them so they hate her ? but why they hate us as well? what did we do to them? Maybe I’m too young to understand humans and this world. All I know , its strange thing to be a born in a world that is full of love and hate simultaneously. Everyone is a family but also enemies. black and white goes hand to hand. this is so much knowledge for a 9 years old boy.
7:30 PM
I just came back from playing with my younger brother , we tried to steal some glass from my father so we can enter the cinema and have a peak on how the world is actually about, I always had interest in knowledge and I was the only one from my brothers who wanted a better life for myself. I wanted to leave Wad Madani so bad, I felt the world can’t fit my dreams and hopes. We all want something until the world tell us no , then we believe maybe the world know better than us , who are we to speak? who are we to dare to dream? when we have a place that barriers you alive before you take your first scream out of your mother womb. As I was walk back with younger brother we faced our elder brother, as I told you before ; he is always angry and sad. I never understood why he’s angry and sad, we came from the same parents but I am kind and friendly and hes angry and sad. How can the same blood differ? We even have the same features , same eyes , hair, I took my father kind eyes and took my mother beautiful strength. There wasn’t many strong women in our town and others used to shame my mother to her having strnight and refusing to owned. My mother was free woman and freedom was a new word for us. But hey that’s not the point of what I am about to tell you, I apologize . I am 9 and sometimes forget to get to the point. We were in our way back and my elder brother grabbed me from my Glabya and in a very rough and sad tone he scouted me “ WHAT ARE YOU DOING HERE? ARE YOU INSANE? There are men that can take advantage of you! you know if anything happened to you what ill do to you? ill end your life. its very easy for me to do that”… In a soft breathe he continue “ just go home, don’t let mother see you. It’s not easy for her you know. After what happened, she refuses to even walk on the street”.
I ask him without hesitation “ come on! don’t say that, my mother is a strong woman. Nothing in the world can defeat her.” He replies after looking deep into my eyes, as if he soon will eat my flesh “ you are 9.. you don’t understand. there’s bigger things in this world , bigger than your small mind that is filled with pink dreams and knowledge! you understand me? your dreams means nothing in here, not even outside! nobody will even remember you if you die! you hear me?!
I reply him back with a weaken tone and I tried to hold down my tears from falling otherwise I will be dishonored “ NO! I WILL LEAVE THIS SHITTY CITY! and you know what?! I will never come back!! you will never see me!! I will do everything i can in this world , to stay out of here!! from this …. this… shitty place.. horrible place.. I will grow bigger and older and stronger okay!! You can’t take away my dreams like this! just because you said so!!
He take his hands and slap me until I collapse to the floor… “ Your dreams means nothing when the world tells you so, you better believe it alright? it knows better than you. you are 9… what do you know about this world? you know nothing” .. he began to laugh “ HAHAHAHA…stupid kid with dreams, dreams huh? I bet its the English books you read .. Astgterallah. You read the books of infidels. People that doesn’t know allah or anything about him” . My younger brother picks me up and hugs me “ I’m sorry.. I couldn’t defend you. I’m not brave like you .. I guess I will never be”.. I hug my brother back , “I’m okay I guess, I only have a scar to be added to the others huh. I will be okay. Scares is what makes me a man!!” me and my brother laugh together and we notice the time is getting late, we need to run as fast as we can, or that man who lives near us will catch us. My mother says children shouldn’t be near him. I never understood why. Maybe one day we should say hello to him.
Friday 8 PM
The town I live in, it is a shame to cry because men cannot cry and we are the inheritance of the heroes that the history writers told stories about them , about their great achievements that everyone spoke about expect the human emotions. I was asked to be a hero and chin my head high because my father committed honor crime and I shall car
“Once we believe on an idea, this idea became who we are. Many movies has lied to us and made us believe that our calling and dreams in this life happens easily that even like books, we have character development. In my life experience, I had to learn everything from the beginning, as if my parents or school never taught me anything. There was a moments that I felt the world was against me but will it will be with me?..”
As I write these words in my old book that, my father gave me in my hometown, the hometown that I have conflict with. Shall I leave or shall I stay? Is our homes are actually a fairy tale for us? Or it’s our enemy? Why I don’t feel I belong here, and now that I know its part of me that will be forever attached there but it’s also a place that I want to run away from. I take a deep breath and look around the boat, there are five women and three men with me, riding waves with me and heading to the unknown face of death. With all this waves and the unknown , I hold on into the boat because maybe this boat is the life I’m holding on into, maybe it’s the life I was stripped from, it’s the life I was buried before I can have . maybe my life is with this unknown seven people.
