Tears for Tarshiha

by Olfat Mahmoud

  Being with Mahmoud, who made me laugh and be more joyous, meant the loneliness lifted. I continued living with my friend’s family, while Mahmoud stayed with students in the student union office. We were both anxious to get back to Beirut to our families, but it was difficult with the civil war raging. In time, of course, we came back to the old issue of marriage. We spent most of the next six months in each other’s company but did not live together. I was working in the PRCS medical centre and in the hospital, and Mahmoud was working using his cinematography skills. We wanted to go back home so Mahmoud could talk to my family about our proposed marriage, but that was impossible, as by then the camp was in the grip of the fourth and longest siege by Amal—a siege that was to last six months. It was November 1986.

  In normal circumstances, as was the custom, Mahmoud would have asked my father if we could marry. But because we could not contact him directly from Syria, we rang my brother in Dubai and he gave us his blessing on my father’s behalf unreservedly. With the only impediment now removed, Mahmoud and I were married on 26 December 1986. Dressed in my blue jeans and a lovely peach-coloured blouse I had bought in Australia, we signed the Islamic marriage papers in the presence of the Sheik in Damascus, which meant we were married in religion. There was no formal family party, of course, although we did have a small gathering overseen by my friend, who acted as my guardian. Nor could our marriage be officially registered because neither of us had Syrian residency papers—our UN IDs were valid for Lebanon only. It was only when we returned to Lebanon several months later that we were able to register our marriage on April 1, 1987—so I have two anniversaries.

  While still in Damascus, Mahmoud had found a job and my work for the APHEDA project gave me a small allowance, so we could afford to move into a small flat. We could also afford to buy our dinners to bring home. It was not only cheap, but essential, since I’d never learned to cook as a result of my mother’s refusal to teach her daughters these things. When Mahmoud found out I couldn’t cook he joked that he would give me one month to learn. Then he set about teaching me. Having lived away from his family and culture for so long, he had learned to cook out of necessity and was a patient and good teacher. As my mother predicted I learned kitchen craft quickly and since then I have made sure I spoil Mahmoud with my culinary expertise.

  Even though we were desperately worried about our families, it was a happy time. We were together at last, and in love. In Damascus I had a short reprieve from all the horrors of war. We would spend hours at night talking about everything. He knew what had happened in the camps, but I told him all the details of the war and the siege. He was distressed, of course, as he had lost friends too. But he was very kind and gentle with me, and it was a healing time.

  Early in January 1987, Helen came to Damascus again and, like all of us, found she could not enter Beirut by air, so she travelled overland by road instead. When she arrived, she was not allowed to enter the Burj Barajneh camp to review the various APHEDA projects, because it was still under siege. However, she was able to stay in Mar Elias camp in Beirut and review the projects as best she could from there. While in Beirut, she was able to speak by walkie-talkie to my father in the camp and to Mahmoud’s brother, Ahmed, to let them know we were married. My father had been extremely worried about me being without family in Damascus and as he knew Mahmoud and liked him, he was very happy to hear this news, to know that I was safe and secure in my marriage. We both felt relieved our families knew for sure that we were married as I was soon pregnant. We were ecstatic to be having our first baby.

  When the third Amal siege around the camps was lifted in early April 1987, I decided to take the risk and travel to Beirut to see my family. Mahmoud couldn’t come with me as he had a film assignment. I could not bear to go to the camp alone, so I went first to his brother’s house in Mar Elias camp and then with his mother to Burj. It had been 10 months since I’d seen my family and even though I was accustomed to our misery and poverty, I found it hard to believe what I saw. The camp had been bombed to rubble. More than 80 per cent of the houses had been destroyed and the rest had been badly damaged. No house in our area was undamaged. There was dust and rubble everywhere I looked. Some buildings were still smouldering and those still standing had been riddled by shrapnel blasts and bullets. All the water pipes had been damaged and water seeped through the alleys. The hunger and starvation in the camp was evident too. People were thin and gaunt. When I arrived at our house I was overwhelmed. All the family were pale and ill-looking. I held my mother and just sobbed uncontrollably. I simply couldn’t contain my sorrow. The anger and hatred I’d felt when I departed Lebanon had dissipated, but I could not bear to witness their suffering. My poor family. What had they been through? My baby sister Ghada, and brother Samer, were like little sparrows, so thin. I hugged them to me, praying to make them better with my love. I could see they had been through a terrible time and a terrible war.

  In time my mother and my relatives told me what they had experienced after I’d left. The camp residents had been expecting another siege. My mother was able to buy enough rice, sugar, onions, beans, canned fish and meat and other tinned food such as tomatoes and beans to store. But, of course, they could not store vegetables or meat. Because my mother was prepared, my family did not starve, but to this day my sister Hanadi can’t bear lentils or canned beans because for months my family ate these daily. Many people also ran out of cooking gas, forcing them to use wooden doors and window frames as fuel. And, of course, there was no electricity and no light. My family had some candles for a while, but these soon ran out too; they had to make do with makeshift lamps that consisted of a small jar containing some fabric dipped in oil, as a wick. They could rarely go outside the house for a good six months. At first, they were able to hear the news on the radio but in time, the batteries ran out. Mostly they just sat and listened to the bombing.

  Lack of water was a constant problem. During this siege, Amal shut off the water lines to the camp, but the heavy bombing exposed the aquifers under the camp, which meant people were able to gather the muddy water that collected in craters. The quality of this water was dubious, and predictably, many people became ill from drinking it. One time my mother was collecting water from such a place near our house. On her first trip she emptied the water into the containers in the house, then went back to collect more. On her way, she remembered she had left the water in the house uncovered so she went back to cover the water jars. At that moment, a shell hit the very place from where she had been collecting water—life and death was random.

  Another time when the family was inside, three huge rockets hit our house. The two on the first floor caused a lot of damage and the third lodged unexploded between the wall of our house and the house next door, just near where the family was sitting. The instant the rockets hit, all the family ran terrified and screaming from the house. They were sure that at any second, the sitting room would be blown to pieces by the unexploded missile. Eventually, one of the young men in the camp, among the many now experienced in dealing with such ordnance, came and dismantled it. Although our house was badly damaged upstairs, my mother believes God was looking after all of my family during this siege. There were more than 25 people living in our house at the time, and nobody died. My little brother Samir, who was seven, lived in such perpetual terror that, according to my mother, he always slept with his hands on his ears and used to close his eyes tightly when there was bombing. Ghada, then 14, was so scared she would vomit whenever there was fighting. During this fourth siege, many people became so desperate for food they did things that were alien to our culture: slaughtering cats and dogs and horses for food. And, although it did not come to it, religious leaders had given people in the camp permission to eat human flesh. That was how shocking the situation was.

  Whenever there was a ceasefire, women, desperate for food for their families, would try to break through the ring of armed men around the camp. This was very hard f
or them and all the family, but the men couldn’t go as we knew they would be arrested, imprisoned or killed immediately. Sometimes the women would be let out, but when they tried to return with food snipers would often take pot-shots at them. More than 36 women were killed in this way while bringing food to their families. Men, including my father, waited at Haifa Hospital to assist their wives, inside the camp, out of sight of the snipers. There was talk, too, of some of these women being taken to a room outside the camp during this time and raped. Only God knows for sure. This is something we do not talk about.

  My mother, like all the other mothers, suffered terribly. Aware of the huge risks involved, she tried to minimise her shopping trips by carrying huge quantities of shopping on her head. One day, needing flour for bread, our staple food, she carried a 50-kilogram bag of flour back to the camp via the airport road entrance. She told us afterwards: ‘As I walked from the entrance of the camp to the hospital, I felt strange, dizzy, as if I was going to fall. It took me seven to 10 minutes and all the way I felt as if I had the weight of the world on my head and shoulders. I felt as if I would fall both from fatigue and from fear of being killed. When I met your father at the hospital and he took my load, I felt as if my joints had left me.’

  Such journeys were often repeated as my mother struggled to feed the family. Later, she blamed her sickness, tiredness and severe arthritis as well as my father’s diabetes, on the constant stress and fear of death and loss they lived with during all those dreadful years between 1982 and 1987.

  By February 1987, Amal had begun to lose its ascendancy and the more Islamist-orientated Lebanese Shi’a movement, Hezbollah, had emerged. It had been actively resisting Israeli occupation since 1982 and by 1987 its military activities against Israel had accelerated. At the same time, in the absence of any effective government services in Lebanon, Hezbollah established a substantial network of clinics, hospitals, schools and social services together with a variety of small enterprises such as supermarkets that served the impoverished Lebanese Shi’a community. Many Shi’a had been opposed to the sieges and attacks on the camps, and some Amal fighters had defected to Hezbollah. It was also a time of anarchy and terror with foreigners the target of kidnappings and attacks. It was no surprise then that when an 8000-strong Syrian armed force was invited back into Beirut by the Lebanese Sunni Muslim Prime Minister, Rashid Karami, to try to impose order, the Palestinians and others in West Beirut welcomed it.

  With a ring of Syrian army checkpoints now around the camp, we started to feel more secure. However, Amal still maintained some checkpoints around the camp which meant our young men were still trapped inside.

  14

  NEW LIFE

  I stayed in Beirut for a month before returning to Beqaa and Mahmoud in early May, where I continued to teach in the School of Nursing, planning to return to Beirut to have my baby with my family in September. When the time came, Mahmoud was away on a filming assignment. I did not have any pain, but I knew the baby was due and, in our culture, it is the custom to clean the house thoroughly before the baby arrives. I worked hard cleaning the flat and I was hoping to get to Beirut the next day before labour started. Around 3 a.m., I stopped cleaning and I slept until 5 a.m. I remember I had a beautiful dream where I was enjoying a walk in a huge garden filled to the brim with flowers. Even though I’d only slept for two hours, I felt joyous and rested when I woke. About 10 minutes after this, I had a colicky feeling in my stomach, but as it was Sunday morning I did not want to wake my neighbours. I was having a conversation with myself about what to do, when the pain started to become more severe. As I was not sure if this was normal, I decided to go next door and ask my neighbour. She explained my ‘colicky feeling’ was contractions and that I would have the baby that day.

  I was so happy that the house was clean! I had a shower and, as I was drying my hair, the contractions started again. Each time I had a contraction I would throw the hairdryer on the bed until it was over; it took me more than an hour to dry my hair and put on my makeup. My neighbour came and asked me what I was thinking, explaining through her laughter, that the kohl, eye shadow and lipstick would be gone before the baby appeared.

  Even though I had helped women in the camp deliver their babies and I knew about labour and delivery from my nursing studies, I was unsure of the pain I could expect with contractions and delivery. Having got myself ready I went to the hospital and, the minute I arrived, the contractions stopped. From fear, I am sure.

  The doctor examined me and said he thought I would have the baby in the evening. He was a friend of Mahmoud’s, having studied with him in Russia, and I was glad he was there with me. About half an hour later, I had such a severe contraction that I could not breathe. The doctor came back several hours later and was surprised I had not progressed with the birth in spite of all of these contractions.

  Bar Elias is a small village in a rural area, and in such places it is a practice that older women, when they know a woman is in labour, go and pray by her bedside. These old women pray to Khadija, Fatima, A’isha and Zinab, and all the other Muslim holy women, to help the young woman as she delivers her child. On this day, several such old women came and sat by my bed, saying prayers from the Koran very loudly. While it was nice in a way, the manner in which they were praying made me think, ‘Oh my God, I’m dying!’

  Friends of mine—two female doctors who were there with me—very politely and nicely thanked these old ladies for their prayers and asked them to leave, as they could see I was very frightened. Then I started to bleed and as it was a very small hospital with no ultrasound, my doctor was worried the placenta might be starting to come away from the womb, and that I might need a caesarean. He asked me to stay in bed and be calm, but I was having terrible contractions every two minutes, and soon every minute, so it was pretty difficult to stay calm. However, between each contraction I would rest, and I would dream. They were pleasant dreams, and in one, I saw Mahmoud; and then I knew that I would be all right.

  After many hours, because I was making no progress with the labour, the doctor called for the anaesthetist, but fortunately, surgery was averted when, at 2am, I was taken to the delivery room for a normal delivery. The nurses and doctors kept saying to me, ‘It’s okay, you can scream or cry out’. But I was actually very quiet, saying only, ‘Oh my God, my God, my God’. After an 18-hour-long, very painful labour, our son, Chaker Khazaal, was born.

  Afterwards, I was so completely and utterly exhausted, I just wanted to sleep. They put Chaker in my arms next to me, which was nice, but with a drip in one hand and Chaker in the other, I couldn’t sleep. The doctor had left, and the nurses were busy, so I was alone: and it was the middle of the night. Of course, from the moment he was born Chaker wanted to talk all the time, and he was crying constantly. Then I wanted to cry, too. Fortunately, there was another woman in the room who had also just had a baby, and her mother was there and came to offer me help. I started to cry uncontrollably; I was feeling so alone at the time. This dear woman reassured me, by saying she would look after me as well as her daughter. She took Chaker then, and settled him, after which I was able to rest for a short while. When I woke up, I went to the toilet and promptly fainted. The nurses came running, of course, and put me back to bed. Then early that morning, supported by friends and neighbours, I was discharged. In all, I stayed only five hours in the hospital after the delivery. With Chaker wrapped up tightly, my neighbours took me back to my house and settled me in. In our faith have special prayers for newborn children and my neighbours recited these for Chaker. These prayers settled him and me as well.

  My family was expecting me in Beirut, so when they heard the news, my sister, Amanie and Mahmoud’s mother came the next day. We stayed for one week there and then went to Beirut by service, which at that time took around six hours. I was ready to go home. With winter approaching it was beginning to get very cold in the Beqaa. Besides, I really wanted to be with my family. In Beirut,
my aunts, my grandmother, my mother and sisters all wanted to help me. It was good to be with them in spite of the dreadful circumstances of the camp. When my grandmother, Alia, came to congratulate me on Chaker’s birth, she told me about her own deliveries.

  ‘I was in the field when I had your uncle Ahmad,’ she said. ‘I started to have pain but I wanted to finish what I had started. I finished my work, went home and called my mother-in-law. “Why didn’t you tell anyone?” She scolded me. I told her I had to finish my work. She told me to wash while she went for the midwife.

  ‘We did not have a hospital then and so they put me on a chair with no seat. The midwife told me to push down hard. When I delivered, they caught the baby and cut the cord. By the next morning I was out in the field again. But my family fed me very well. My mother and my mother-in-law made all the food necessary for me to produce milk and to help my uterus contract. I drank lots of cinnamon tea with ginger and crushed mixed almonds, walnuts, pine nuts and pistachio because we believed this helped to contract the uterus. I also had a special drink made with cinnamon sticks, ginger, anise, cumin and coconut called ainar, which helped baby Ahmad and me expel gases and settle our stomachs. The coconut helped my milk to come.

  ‘They made me omelettes with onions and lots of garlic and olive oil because we believed garlic also helps the uterus to contract and that eggs and oil would help me produce more milk. They would also make sweet dishes such as an omelette with sugar on top and also Halaweh made from sesame and sugar, and other flavourings because we believed these things are also excellent for producing milk. At the same time there were foods that I could only eat in small amounts such as cucumber and mulukhiya, a green vegetable high in iron, generally cooked with beef or lamb or chicken rich in protein. Mulukhiya causes loose bowels and we believed the baby would have diarrhoea if we ate too much of this when I was breastfeeding.’