- Yes, mother, we made cakes, but my wife made them alone; The boys didn’t want to help her.
Yes, I remember those days when the family house was filled with my children, brothers, and our wives, one and two days before Eid, making cakes and various Eid sweets. The house was filled with the burden of the smell of baking and the smell of sweets, and I do not forget my father, who always asked for calm throughout the year, except for these two nights. Yes, I remember. Eid night, the night when no one sleeps, and darkness fills the family home, laughter rises, children compete with each other in games in which we often participate, and in the background are Eid songs that were broadcast on television, or we played them through the tape recorder or computer.
I will never forget, mother, your categorical orders for the children to end playing and start bathing, after the clock passed midnight, and the children’s evasion of you, giving priority to one another so that those who were late would enjoy more play and sip more of the ecstasy of amusement.
Yes, mother, I live this spirit, while I am far from it in my imagination, and I tell it to the children, not so that they remember it, but so that I do not forget myself, so that I do not forget that spirit, these faces, and this joyful atmosphere in a state of mourning that is identical with the words of the Prophet, may God bless him and grant him peace. I remember. That innocent situation between the children as they took out their new clothes from their bags to show each other the clothes they had acquired to go to the Eid prayer, then to the parks. I will not forget the children’s frequent complaints about new shoes, and I will not forget your magical treatment of putting cotton in the back of the shoes so that they do not It hurts the child, with golden advice to take off his shoes when he arrives at the park so that he can play without the pain that new shoes may cause him.
I will never forget, mother, your categorical orders to the children to end playing and start bathing, after the hour passed midnight, and the children’s evasion of you, giving priority to one another so that those who stayed behind would enjoy more play and sip more of the thrill of amusement. When the dawn prayer approached, the preparations for going down to Prayer, and it was always your responsibility to wake up the tired, sleeping children after his mother had given up on waking him up. Your embrace and your “patting down” on the child had the effect of magic, because you had a goat and a wealth of tenderness that allowed you to command and be obeyed, and I still remember my father. May God have mercy on him, and he is waiting for us in the car with my brothers after they go ahead to prepare the cars so that they can go to the Amr bin Al-Aas Mosque, which we used to pray in, even before we got married, where the largest gathering in the area and neighboring neighborhoods is, and where the children find guidance and sweets, which makes them their own. Those who ask to pray in the mosque in particular.
Those dates, my mother, that you always carried while we were going out for the dawn prayer, following the example of the Prophet, who instituted breaking the fast after the dawn call to prayer, still taste in my mouth despite the passing of the years. It is as if the dates were the same, even if their type was different. Those dates were the feast, my mother. It is the dividing line between caution in eating after the call to prayer for thirty days and that joy in fulfilling God’s obligation and carrying out His commands. That is the Sunnah that the Prophet did not abandon, and by which he requires his followers. These children are concerned with that, to make them happy, and to obtain the reward after the reward. I will not forget my mother. The children played in the mosque’s courtyard until people arrived for Eid prayers, and after the Eid, how happy I was with that line in which the children were standing waiting for their grandfather to perform Eid prayers, and their mothers would stand with them in line to receive his generosity to everyone.
Alienation, mother, is a journey that does not take us far from our homelands, but rather it is a journey that takes us away from our souls, so we become bodies whose souls hang in the pastures of youth, and in the memories of the company of family, friends, and neighbors.
Yes, mother, we will pray in the Sultan Ahmed Mosque, as we have been accustomed to in the past ten years. The mosque is as beautiful and spiritual as it is. It brings together the spirit that we miss, and which everyone in the Egyptian and Arab community searches for. In the Sultan Ahmed Mosque, each one of us sees what he wants to see in his memories. Each one of us sees his family whom he deprived of, and his friends with whom he grew up, separated by distances, needs, and problems. Everyone is escaping, mother, from his reality to create a reality in his imagination, and we are all like extending our palms to the water to reach his mouth and what it is, no matter how friendly, and no matter how much love. And no matter how long the ten years lasted, no matter how close the bonds were, and no matter how close the connections and hearts became, mother, this spirit that left us and the breeze that deprived us cannot be replaced by anything. Even if gifts and sweets are distributed to the children, even if laughter grows louder, and even if friends embrace, something is always missing.
Exile, mother, is a journey that does not take us far from our homelands, but rather it is a journey that takes us away from our souls, so we become bodies whose souls hang in the pastures of youth, and in the memories of the company of family, friends and neighbors, big and small, great and gentle, those memories that leave in our hearts a deep trace of nostalgia. Despite the picturesque natural landscapes of this charming country, and despite the fact that this good country and its good people embrace us as Egyptians, and we receive from them such warmth that our foreignness is made easy for us, and despite the fact that we meet our Arab brothers in our prayer places and parks, which makes us in a state of warmth that includes everyone, yet all He feels that he has jumped into the unknown, and joy and delight are mixed with anticipation mixed with the challenge of victory over oneself and the fulfillment of hopes, so that our fight represents for our children a beacon in their new society, and reassures them of their future so that they can move forward in it with a steady path, and let every expatriate support his brother more than this gathering is for the performance of prayer and the implementation of obedience, Hello. Hello, it looks like the line was cut off.
The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial position of Al Jazeera.
