Neighbours

I miss my neighbours back in Benghazi... I miss the family atmosphere... that's been making me get flashbacks of things that happened and how it was being a neighbour in Benghazi...

Back in 1985, when I was 6 years old...we had a horrible car accident... baba was taking us home from school...we were all injured... but I was the only one who had to stay at the hospital for a major operation to remove glass from my leg...anyway... I have vague memories of most of what happened... but what I remember most is the arabic comics our neighbour used to bring me in hospital... for me... they were "different" ... I'd only read English comics and stories... these were "new" :-)... I still remember this lady... she'd come and babysit me... and sometimes even sleep over when my mum had to go back to be with my brothers and dad... such a dear... God bless you Ubla Amaal...

I also remember when someone knocked on our door one evening to tell my Dad that our car that had been stolen a year and half earlier was found in a town called Derna ! This was the home town of one of our neighbours...so baba went with big bro and one of their sons to get the car... to this day... baba cannot forget the hospitality that he was met with by our neighbour's extended family there...

Big bro got married in Feb 2004... our neighbours were all dying to be here in Egypt to see S "their son" who'd left Libya 6 years earlier and never gone back since... when we got back to Benghazi after the wedding ... our neighbours made us one of the warmest parties I've ever been part of ...

Neighbours in Benghazi are about "being there for each other" ... they're about sharing with each other... they're almost family...

When someone's new to the building, the ladies get together and plan a "lamma" to welcome the "new lady" .... when someone gives birth... the same happens... when someone dies everyone is there to share your grief... in 3ashoura... I remember going up and down our building giving out plates of my mother's yummy 3ashoura... and we'd get loads of the traditional Benghazian boiled beans and chick peas... in weddings neighbours are always invited... sometimes it's even quite crazy when you're invited to your neighbour's cousin's wedding !!! Ahh.. Libyan weddings ... but that's another story altogether... needs a separate post!

I guess it isn't all as perfect as I make it sound... maybe I am a little nostalgic... but I do miss my neighbours... maybe because here in Alexandria I hardly know them ... even though I've been here for almost a year now... it feels weird to not really know our neighbours... I mean they're only 8 flats! Back in Benghazi, our building had 38 flats... and you can say almost everybody knew everybody... we weren't all "friends" but you knew the people who lived with you in your "big house"...

"And serve Allah. Ascribe no thing as partner unto Him. (Show) kindness unto parents, and unto near kindred, and orphans, and the needy, and unto the neighbour who is of kin (unto you) and the neighbour who is not of kin, and the fellow-traveller and the wayfarer and (the slaves) whom your right hands possess. Lo! Allah loveth not such as are proud and boastful" (An-Nisaa:36)