Late sixties - 1

Memoirs of a six year old girl in Beirut

The view was interesting, two meters up, looking down.  She didn't have much distance to travel, and good thing she didn't, for that was her capacity as a child, a free thinking five year old, with no siblings, living in a sizable three bedroom apartment, in M Building on M. C. Street.  

Her father didn't particularly like it because it wasn't very well hit by the sun, as he would put it two score years after, and the fixtures in the bathroom were of low quality.  But such were the standards in Beirut, in the seventies and such was C's experience finding herself the only child so far, longing to have brothers or sisters of her own, just like her friends did.  

Her friends at the time were scattered in the building and not anywhere else, like say, Furn el Shubbak, or Ashrafiyeh, but all in one place.  Her father had made a connection with one E.H. who was married to a tall authoritative blonde Peruvian of pure European stock.  This E.H.'s daughter were good friends to C.  whereas they came to visit her and she them, in the lower 2nd floor apartment.  

E.H. was a Palestinian whose parents he took good care of, and found them an apartment right beside theirs, in the new modern building, that was built across the street later, and which had a dishwasher and other modern amenities which CH, E.H.'s wife, appreciated very much.  She showed C's mother thoe new installations with easy sliding drawers, a state of the art commodity at the time. 

Another friend was at the 2nd floor too, but the apartment was facing M.C. Street, and it wasn't as big as theirs.  This was L.K.'s apartment, whose father came from the North of Lebanon, from a prominent family, and mother from Aleppo, Syria, had expressions like "Uzz il Qird" and was active in the education of her children.

- How do you know?   How do you know it's 'Al Walada' and not 'Al Waladu' ?  how can you know the ending of the words? asked a five year old L, puzzled at her mother's mysterious wisdom.

C. stood there, watching Mrs K coolly take a pan off the stove, smiling.

- When you're my age, she said with lips almost closed, but smiling, you just know these things.

Of course rules applied in Arabic 'Qawa3id' or grammar.  A subject word would have an ending of 'u' for example, and the 'complement d'objet' or 'maf3oul bihi' an in flexion of 'a'.

***

The D's were neighbors who were friends of friends, more specifically the H's, that C did not particularly associate with, but knew about ad seen in the building.  They were three daughters: K, S and J . One was fashion observant, the other a bit plump, she liked to dress up nonetheless.  They wouldn't become fashion conscious until they became teen agers at the beginning of the civil war.  Their pet was a 'caniche' a poodle, to whom they gave the traditional cut, with a pompom on the tail, a fluffy head hair and furry ankles.  

 

Reviews

[ms. barrie]

this is a very interesting, a very enjoyable read. Very descriptive, i like that you centered this story (chapter) from the little girl's her memoirs also. The fact that you built up your character's personality/appearance, etc. - makes this even more of an enjoyable read. I will be re-visiting this story (continue on to chapter 2) soon. Good start to a story.