A Father's Betrayal

by Gabriella Gillespie

  It was nice sitting with my sister again after all those years. It was like we had never been apart; in fact it felt as though we had a stronger bond. We both had different strengths and we fed off each other.

  We got to know each other’s children; she had two children by then, Ghania and a little boy called Amar. Our children played together for the first time. They bonded instantly and loved each other and squabbled just like we did when we were kids. It was great to watch them while Yas and I told each other almost everything about what had happened in the time we had been apart, good and bad.

  We talked about our children and their births, first teeth, their first steps, first illness, the first words they ever said, their habits. We also spoke about our marriages; I told Yas what I could about mine, while sparing her the gory details of what I knew would really break her heart.

  I only told her what I knew she could handle. She told me about hers and I’m sure she did the same, we both knew the other had struggles and secrets we would never share out of sparing the other the pain.

  She told me about Uncle Jim’s visit to Yemen. She said he had been devastated to see what had happened to us and told her how he had tried everything he could before we left to stop us from leaving. She said he was upset I was away and he didn’t get to see me, and was worried about the way I was being treated.

  Yas told me about her visit back home to England, how all the family was so excited to see her, and how upset they were when she told them she was returning because she couldn’t abandon me. We cried when she told me that Uncle Jim told her he was the proudest dad in the world because of the way we stood by each other, and were always there for each other.

  She also told me about Dad’s new wife Viyza, she had given birth to a baby boy called Abdulla weeks earlier. Viyza was from a family of thugs who ruled the village with their thuggish behaviour. They were not a good or wealthy family and nobody liked or respected them, but they were the only family willing to allow their daughter to marry Dad after what he had done to Amina. Most Yemeni men would prefer their loved ones to stay alive, no matter how hard handed their husbands ruled his house.

  Dad had divorced Amina after nearly killing her. Her family had finally had enough, and that time refused to return her to him. Dad had beaten Amina unconscious, then he threw a bucket of water over her to bring her around, he then dragged her into the kitchen and stuffed her semi-conscious body into the clay oven and tried to set fire to her! Yas said it was only because her clothes were wet from him throwing water over her that he couldn’t set her on fire! When he went off to get more petrol to pour over her she managed to flee the house and escape him!

  Not long after that he divorced Amina and remarried a young girl called Viyza; apparently Dad hadn’t laid a finger on her because he was scared of her brutal brothers and what they would do to him if he did!

  Our sister Nebat had four children by then, all born within months of my children. Yas said Nebat was a rock to her when I was away and was always loyal and kind. She was always there to guide her through the tough times and show her what was needed from her to fit in perfectly in the Yemen society. So much was expected from Yas being the wife of a Yemeni diplomat, and Yas’s health was poor at times, but Nebat was there for her, just as a big sister should be.

  Farouse had two girls by now, and was living in Sanaa with her husband and his horrible mother; Yas told me that although Farouse put on this front that she was always happy and OK, she knew it wasn’t true, she could see that her husband was a nasty, brutal man!

  Our youngest and most educated uncle, Ahmed, had come back from abroad and got married. We had met Uncle Ahmed very briefly in Aden when we first came to Yemen; he was flying off to Russia at the time to go to university. Back then I didn’t even know he was our real uncle because everyone was introduced to us as uncles when we first arrived!

  He was back and had married a young girl who was from outside the family and all the local villages. Her name was Azeza, and she was also one of the very few educated Yemeni girls I’d ever met.

  While I was staying with Yas, Nebat and Farouse came over to visit at the afternoon gatherings, along with many other women, including Azeza. She wasn’t what I was expecting, given that my uncle was considered a catch, but there was something about her that made me like her. She was friendly, and seemed kind and interesting. She spoke her mind in a very quiet, gentle, diplomatic way, while moving her hands as if to hold an audience, or gain your attention. Uncle Ahmed had insisted in choosing his own wife, saying he wanted an educated wife, a wife with a brain, not a slave. Azeza was purely his choice, not his family’s.

  It had been many years since I’d sat in a gathering but it didn’t feel uncomfortable. Yas and I had both become accustomed to what was expected of us to blend in if we wanted to be good mothers. Whilst we sat in that gathering and watched our children play, we knew we had a bigger struggle than ever to save our children from having to one day do the same.

  A few days later I hugged and kissed my sister and her children goodbye as I set off for Dad’s house. This wasn’t a journey I was looking forward to. It was going to be just me and my children at Dad’s village, all my loved ones were now in Sanaa. I knew as always that Dad would show me very little love once I arrived at his house, but I had nowhere else to go.

  Any hope I had of finding help to escape were once against destroyed; I’d tried a number of times while in Sanaa to contact Jehovah’s Witnesses on the number I was given by my friends in Africa but it failed, the number was a dead line. Yas had been furious with me about the whole Jehovah’s Witness thing and smuggling the Bible in Yemen, saying I could have been arrested, and she was right, but I was desperate, I still was, and with my Bible safely in my bag I would never give up. I didn’t enjoy reading the Bible, I couldn’t make heads or tails of it, but it kept me up to date with my English!

  Viyza was waiting for us as we arrived; she tried to put on an act that she was happy to see us but I could see straight away she didn’t want us there. She was much younger than Dad, she looked in her late 20s, and there was something about her that made me wary of her, I just didn’t trust her! She was short and thin and although quite pretty, she had a devious look about her!

  Abdulla was cute, and I could understand Dad’s excitement for his only son, he had always wanted a son. Abdulla was doted on by everyone, and it was made clear from day one that he was the only child in that house that was to be shown any love from anyone, as far as my family were concerned my children didn’t exist. They were ignored when they spoke, pushed aside when in the way, and shouted at when they made a noise.

  It was so different being back at the village with my children. The last time I’d lived at Dad’s house I was alone, it was hard even back then, but in many different ways. I had no clue as to what lay in store for us.

  Dad took Tarek to the fields to work with him the next day, he was only around six but that was old enough to do a hard day’s work. I knew Dad was ruthless and moody with my son, and it broke my heart every day sending him off with my father, but that was what young village boys did, and my son was no different.

  I would make sure he was fed and give him what scraps of food I could to tuck into his pockets for the long day ahead, and then I’d send him off with a quick kiss on the head. Tarek was a crazy boy and always doing silly things, but he was strong and healthy, and he was a kind boy with a good heart. He loved his brothers and sisters and would always protect them if he thought danger was around the corner, he acted so much older than his age!

  Issy was my little helper. She would run around and want to do everything with me, she would copy everything I did and attempt to pick up her younger brother and sister to look after them, but she was tiny and they were both so big and heavy! Issy would drag them along and play the big sister in any way she could.

  Sadig and Dobia were still toddlers and just played outside, they didn’t have toys, but they had the sun, stones and dirt and th
at would keep them busy all day!

  Viyza did very little; she took little care of Abdulla and spent most of her time on her sewing machine. She made clothes for the women of the village and many women from other villages. She made good money from her work and although she loved her son, she was ruthless and would never spend a penny of it on him or her house keep. Viyza had a daughter from a previous marriage - she was about eight and lived with Viyza’s mother in our village - and any money she made she hid it away or gave it to her family.

  The house chores rested on me. I would wake at dawn and my children would awake and follow me silently around the house as I cooked and cleaned, I did it all without complaining. There was no use in complaining about anything because when people don’t care about you, they don’t care if you complain or if you are unhappy!

  Viyza was just as cruel as Dad; she became pregnant again within months of having Abdulla and while I was living with them she gave birth to a little girl who Dad called Ismahan. Viyza showed Ismahan no love or affection, everything was about Abdulla.

  As time went by I realised why I didn’t take to her, she was a liar and would blame any mistake she made on me and my children. She complained that my children ate too much and made too much noise, and if she misplaced anything or broke anything she would deny it, putting the blame on us. Dad would never listen to anything I had to say.

  He told me many times that as far as he was concerned I was nothing but a burden to him and so were my children, he just wanted us gone, and the sooner Ziad came and took us the better. I told Dad when I came back from Africa that I didn’t want to go back to Ziad and Dad’s reply was, “Fine, give him his kids back and you can remarry.” That was the end of that discussion!

  He had a vile temper and would explode at the slightest thing, and Viyza never once came under attack from him, it was always me and my children. Dad would scream at us for anything and everything and my children would cower from him just like they did their own father, but up until then he hadn’t laid a finger on them.

  Even though I hated living with Dad and his wife, I hated the thought of going back to my husband more. I never heard from Ziad or any of his family while he was in Africa, although there were many rumours going around about his conflict with his father. I feared the day that Ziad would come back, knowing that sooner or later I would be returned to the monster that had nearly killed me so many times.

  Ziad turned up around a year later. Dad was over the moon to be finally getting rid of us, he couldn’t wait to send me back with my husband. I tried to plead with Dad not to return me but my pleas meant nothing to him. He told me everything that had gone on between Ziad and I was my fault because I was stubborn with a big mouth. He told me to obey my husband and keep my mouth shut! He sent me back without hesitation.

  Unknown to me Ziad had got into so much trouble in Africa we were no longer welcomed back into the family home; his father had disowned him. When we arrived back in his village we were taken to a house next door to his family home where we would live alone. The house was empty; it had nothing, not even a blanket.

  Ziad had come back from Africa with no money and no means to support us, he had spent all his money on what he loved doing most, and now because of his behaviour, we had been banished from the main house; it was his children and I that would pay for his wrong doing.

  The house was big, it was a three storey high building made from mud and old stone. It had a small old stable that had been built on the side of the house by the front door; all that was left of the stable were broken bits of crumbling walls. Straight in front as we opened the front door were big dark stables, to the left were the stairs; they were dark, steep and bendy.

  There was no electricity in this house, although most of the bigger villages had electric by then. The room on the middle floor was so badly damaged it was uninhabitable and therefore closed; only the top floor was safe to live in. On the top floor there were four rooms, to the left was a small kitchen that had a clay oven and a tiny cemented piece on the floor by the outer wall with a hole and a pipe that went outside, that was my sink. Straight ahead was a long room with loads of little wooden windows that opened up and looked over the village and the front door, also the back of the house. Next to that was a big long toilet that had a hole on the floor right at the other end, and to the right of the stairs was a little room that also had a few wooden windows that overlooked the back of the house, all of these rooms were joined by a tiny hallway that was on the top of the stairs.

  The long room became Ziad’s room where he slept alone, calling me only when he wanted to satisfy his needs, while the small room became the room where I would sleep with my children.

  Although Ziad had dishonoured his family name, my children and I had done nothing wrong so the sisters didn’t push us aside. As soon as we got there they came over and gave me a few things to keep us going. They told me Ziad’s father was furious with him and wanted them to have nothing more to do with him. However, Nasser Ziad had a soft spot for my son Tarek, therefore he would allow them to give us a little help.

  The sisters and Ulfah were the only family that spoke to us and I soon understood how Ulfah must have felt when she was banished by the family. I was looked upon as if I was the one who had done wrong, not only by the family but by other people of the village. I was ignored when I walked through the village; people would turn away from me to avoid speaking to me.

  I soon realised how difficult life would become in the village being made an outcast by everyone. Once considered an important member of a rich family and able to gain access to everything available to the Ziad family, we were now unable to even share the same water as them. I needed to fetch water from the wells that were miles away in the fields, while Ziad’s family had theirs delivered next door by the truck load. I also wasn’t allowed to collect food or crops from their many fields in the harvest times.

  Ziad would wake up every morning as usual and go through his daily routine of grooming himself to perfection, and then he would head off down to the village, or head into Rada’a where he would always find a way to make a bit of money for himself. He could never find money for his children’s food, even though he would always come home with plenty of ghat and alcohol for himself. Because he had been banished from the family nobody would give him work. Everybody was too scared to employ Nasser Ziad’s son without permission from the big man himself, and that was never going to happen! Ziad’s father wanted him to suffer for the embarrassment he had caused him; he wanted him homeless and penniless to teach a lesson to anyone else that ever dared to cross him!

  It was then the years of collecting gold showed me its use. I started selling my gold piece by piece, to buy food for my family.

  I tried to stay out of Ziad’s way the best I could; I realised very soon after moving to that house that the space we lived in was small and there was nowhere to run or hide, so I did as I was told, when I was told. Although his brutal abuse continued towards me, it was not as vicious as it was in Africa, just different.

  His behaviour towards his children depended on his mood that day, sometimes he would take them into the village for a walk with him, and then other times he wouldn’t even speak to them. He would ignore their sibling fights on some days, and then on other days he would threaten them and hit them. We were always on edge with him, not knowing what the day would bring. All I could do was shield my children from their father when he turned nasty, and give them as much love as I possibly could. What worried me the most was I had no say into what happened to my children’s future and would never be able to protect them from their fate in Yemen.

  Tarek was put into the village school but Issy wasn’t allowed; as far as everyone was concerned she was just a girl, and education wasn’t important for her. As far as her father was concerned she would be ready for marriage in a few years. I became pregnant not long after Ziad came back from Africa with my fifth child, it was inevitable. I’d asked for birth control many times
but Ziad would laugh at me or just ignore me. It was a huge difference from the last time I was pregnant in the village with Tarek and Issy. Everyone was so happy for me then; this time nobody cared, in fact they looked upon me as if I had done something wrong by getting pregnant, but from the second I realised I was pregnant I knew I had to protect my baby.

  It was when I moved back to Ziad’s village that I first met Thahaba, another one of the sisters that I’d never met before. She was really a niece of theirs from grandmother Dobia’s older daughter. Thahaba, who was from a Sudanese father, had married and lived away from the family, and had only come back when her grandmother Dobia died. She had grown up calling her grandmother ‘mother’ and her aunts ‘sisters’ because her mother had died when she was very young.

  Thahaba was kind and generous and had a good heart, she was one of the very few who still spoke to me and we got on great; I was soon going to her with all my problems. I didn’t tell her everything, but I could run to her house when things got too much for me. She had a small mud house at the bottom of the hill where she lived alone, she was divorced and had a small son called Mohammed who lived between her and her ex-husband. She was financially supported by her family from her father’s side.

  Although she was young and beautiful she had refused to remarry and was not giving in to any pressure from her mother’s side of her family. She didn’t get on much with Nasser Ziad, but refused to tell me the real reasons why, saying it was just sibling squabbles. Thahaba was the one I went to with my problems; aside from Umie Ayesha, she was the one person in the village who I could rely on not to let us down if I needed a shoulder to cry on.

  Umie Ayesha had always been there for us and she was always bringing us little things, but there was only so much she could do. Ziad’s father had put a limit on what help she could and couldn’t give us. I knew she adored my children and I could see that being apart from them broke her heart just as much as it did theirs. She would find little chores for Tarek to do, that way she could pay him money and say it was because he had done work for her.