Postcards from Algeria Part 5

A house in the Casbah, Algiers

We didn’t travel back again for some years due to the atrocities and fear that epitomized the ‘terrorist years’ in the remainder of the 90s when there was civil unrest and people lived in fear of being killed.  We knew it was bad because my mother-in-law wouldn’t hear of us coming to visit.  I can’t profess to know much about the whys and wherefores, but suffice to say that, to this day, people still talk about that era in hushed tones, and very few families remain unaffected by it.

Things had quieted down by 1999 and my husband and I and our 4 children spent the turning of the century in Algeria.  It was my first time in Algeria in the winter and I found it so cold, which was very weird for me, always used to it being so hot.  The weather itself was much milder than what we had left behind in England, but the houses inside were freezing.  Many homes don’t have central heating, but instead one gas fired heater that is fixed in place and is expected to heat the whole home.  As these heaters are usually installed in the hallway just inside the door… this is usually the warmest place in the home!  The houses are built with brick and decorated inside with cool tiles on the floor, and, in some places, on the wall also, which have the purpose of keeping the house cool in the summer, something they do with great effect, but unfortunately they also do a good job of it in the cooler winter months.

On the last days and nights of our stay, the women of the family were busy preparing all sorts of goodies for us to bring back with us.. misamen, mahajab, kalb el louz, and other Algerian delicacies.  On the very last night the whole family descended on my mother-in-law’s flat and didn’t want to leave, so we had my husband’s brother, his wife and 6 children, my husband’s sister, her husband, and their 4 children and my husband’s other brother, his wife and their daughter, plus my mother-in-law and my sister-in-law…..all in a tiny three roomed flat.  Actually they didn’t have all three rooms because they insisted that my husband and I have the one bedroom and would only let us share it with our youngest two children, so the rest of the family crammed into 2 rooms.  The older girls went upstairs to a neighbor to borrow some bedding and she very kindly offered to house them for the night, so that was a mercy.  In England and Ireland we have wall-to-wall carpeting; in Algeria they have wall-to-wall bodies.

We had celebrated Eid in Algeria, and when we arrived back to our local community of Muslims we discovered that they hadn’t had a very good Eid due to controversy and confusion as to when Eid actually was.  So we invited them all to our home a day or two after our return and shared with them all the goodies we had brought back, far too many for us to consume on our own anyway, and all our friends said that it felt like an Eid celebration.

‘On November 10, 2001, heavy rains flooded many parts of Algeria, causing hundreds of deaths and damaging thousands of houses and businesses, mostly in the neighborhoods of Bab el-Oued, Frais Vallon and Beaux Fraisier in western Algiers, capital of the country. The torrential downpour, which ironically followed a national prayer for rain, buried buildings and their occupants under tons of mud sliding with great force from the hills of the city toward the raging sea. The entire staff of several businesses, hundreds of schoolchildren and many commuters were drowned or entombed in mud. As of December 9, 776 people were reported dead and 115 unaccounted for, and 1,500 were made homeless. Hundreds of affected families are observing the Muslim holy month of Ramadan in precarious makeshift housing.’  Azzedine Layachi – Middle East Research and Information Project, http://www.merip.org/mero/mero121101.

My husband arrived in Algiers the day after this flood and watched them dig bodies out of the buildings.  There is one building that was a hammam (Public Baths) which  was filled to the roof with mud, and which they decided to leave intact, bodies and all.  The market where my in-laws used to buy their groceries was washed away as were so many buildings and the landscape of Bab El Oued was changed forever, as were the lives of so many.

As if the country hadn’t been battered and bruised enough, it was hit by a massive earthquake on May 21^st, 2003.  People talked about walking down streets to see one house totally demolished while it’s neighbor was left standing… almost as if some were just handpicked. Temporary settlements of chalets were built to house all those who were homeless and this was in addition to those made homeless by the flood 2 years previous.  To this day I meet people for the first time, who have lost loved ones during this calamity, and what amazes me and also humbles me is their unswerving faith and acceptance in the Divine Will of Allah, and the obvious peace that this brings to them.  

Postcards from Algeria Part 4

Our visit in 1993 was my first time in Algeria as a Muslim.  We had arranged for our 8 year old daughter to make her first trip to Algeria alone, with the help of Air Algerie who gave her a special bag to wear around her neck with her passport and important documents in it, and who chaperoned her on and off the plane and through customs on the other side.  While we were at the airport I felt so homesick for Algeria that my husband urged me to buy a ticket for myself and our baby son to follow my daughter, which I did, but only when he promised to come and join us for a couple of weeks at the end of our holiday.  When I went home to ring my daughter and tell her the good news, she was anything but enthusiastic!  She was having a whale of a time being totally spoilt and didn’t want me there putting a spanner in the works!

My husband’s family treated me exactly the same, which was very nice, but I found that whereas before their little customs seemed quaint and out-dated, now they weren’t nearly strict enough for my liking!  I found so many contradictions like women wearing their hijaabs outside, but if somebody called them from the window they would put their heads out, without covering up, for all the world to see them.  There were so many things that the society accepted that were incorrect Islamically that I was constantly asking my husband about things, and whether they were Islamically permitted or not. There are things within the culture that are against Islam and these I had to ignore or resist, but there were other things that, while not anti- Islamic, were considered very important within the norms of the society. At times I felt that his family would probably have a lot in common with my own family in Ireland as they both thought we were so strict! As a new Muslim I found it difficult at times to know where Islam began and Algerian culture ended, mainly because they often were so intertwined. 

We are commanded, in Islam, to enjoin the good and forbid the evil, and I try to do so.  But we also have a responsibility to make it as easy as possible for the people we are trying to correct to take our advice.  I knew it would be hard for people to take any correction from someone whom they once knew prayed to Jesus (astaghfirallah).  So I left the corrections to my husband and my 8 year-old daughter, because I knew they would listen to them and accept it more easily from them.  Alhamdulilah Allah blessed me with a husband who feared Him more than upsetting his family and who wasn’t afraid to tell them the truth.  And they found it easier to take things from him, not that they took much to heart! I discovered that most families in Algeria have one or two members who are very much into their practice of the religion, and others who are content enough with just the essential basics.  They often live together in very crowded conditions and have a wonderful ‘live and let live’ attitude to each other, where family comes first and the ties of kinship are inviolable.

Having been stuck inside for a few days during this holiday, one day after coffee I put on my hijab and got ready to go out.  When the family discovered I was just going out to stretch my legs they offered to come with me.  I knew they were only being protective and didn’t really want to go so I told them that this was something I had to do myself, so I put my little son into the pushchair and made my first foray outside alone.  I need not have worried… nobody took a blind bit of notice of me… they were all too busy throwing boussas (kisses) at, and pinching the cheeks of, my blond haired, blue-eyed little son.  I enjoyed those trips out and about breathing in the atmosphere of Algiers, although I can’t say I really enjoyed the 179 steps I had to climb to get back up to the area in which my mother-in-law’s home was situated, or the fact that I had to carry the pushchair and my son the whole way up.  By the time I got indoors the family would fall about laughing at my red face and the fact that I could hardly breathe and would run to get me some cool water to drink.

The women clean the whole home every morning and cook twice a day so they work hard.  The first couple of holidays they wouldn’t even let me in to the bathroom when they were washing MY clothes…. It was too much for me… I was used to better washing powder, a washing machine etc. etc.  This holiday I was determined to try and pull my weight somehow so I jealously guarded my washing and insisted on doing it myself.  I remember my Italian friend rang me one day when I was in the bathroom washing the clothes, and I brought them all with me to the phone because I knew that, as soon as I left them, my sister-in-law would have washed them for me! I also tried my hand at cleaning the floor in the same fashion as they do….bent over from the waist and wiping a cloth along the floor.  This again had my husband’s family in stitches because as soon as I stood up they could see my red face.  I have since found out that you can also use a large squeegee to wipe the cloth across the floor, but I had to learn the hard way.

I would like to make a point of saying that, when I say that the women in my husband's were laughing... they were laughing with me and not at me.  I have always found their self deprecating sense of humour very similar to the Irish one, where we, ourselves tell 'The English man, the Scots man and the Irish man jokes with the Irish man always being the one who's an idiot... or as we say in Ireland... an eejit (far more descriptive I think).  

Douera

We took a trip out to visit my husband’s brother who lived in Douera with his family, a journey that took us 3 buses and a walk at the end, ‘we’ being my mother-in-law, sister-in-law, my daughter and my little son.  On all the buses my baby captivated all those around him and had everyone cooing at him.  I had never been to visit this family so it was all new to me and I loved it.  Their home was in the countryside and very basic with no running water, but had wonderful views of the nearby hillsides.  As my son would wake up at 7.00am I would get up and take him outside so that the others could sleep and would meet up with my husband’s sister-in-law sitting on a log outside enjoying the relative cool of the morning.  We would chat and she told me that I was nothing like she expected, being a westerner she assumed I’d be made-up to the gills and walking around on stilettos all the time.  Isn’t it funny how we all have stereotypes in our heads, and how so few people in reality fit those stereotypes.

Douera

 In addition to visiting Douera we also visited family in El Biar, in Douaouda, near the sea, and in Bouharoun where I spent one very memorable night sitting under the fragrant branches of the jasmine tree and sipping mint tea, and chatting with my husband’s sister-in-law and her neighbor until midnight while the men and the children slept.

Postcards from Algeria Part 3

Ghardaia

We took a bus from Laghouat and went the three hours further to Ghardaia, where we had the luxury of staying in a hotel.  I remember being absolutely fascinated by the fact that there was constant water in the taps, and even the trees along the streets were watered, when there were water stoppages in Algiers… right on the Mediterranean Sea! The merchants of Ghardaia are well known for their selling ability and I witnessed this talent first hand.  In Algiers, shopkeepers never seemed to care much if you bought their produce or not, and they certainly weren’t going to go out of their way for you if they could avoid it.  Many of them worked for other people and their jobs were secure.  In Ghardaia however the shopkeepers had a pride in what they sold and I remember one explaining, in great detail, the meanings of the symbols on the intricate pattern of a beautiful rug.  We arrived back to the hotel one evening and saw a tuareg man sitting on the wall outside, who we discovered was waiting for us as he had heard that my husband was interested in buying an ornamental leather sheathed sword, which my husband did buy from him.

Ghardaia

The women fascinated me, and the feeling was obviously mutual.  In Algiers some women wore hijab, others wore ordinary western clothing but it was always modest, and then there were the women, usually the older generation who wore the ‘haik’.  I always thought this was so aptly named as it was a large cream shapeless cloak that the women wore over the top of the their head which fell to their feet, and was totally open at the front so the women usually ‘hiked’ it up under one arm.  To me it seemed to cover everything and nothing.  Some also wore a very small face veil, often edged with lace, which always reminded me of a doily.  One evening, for a laugh, I dressed up in my mother-in-law’s haik and my sister-in-law’s veil, but her face was so obviously a lot more petite than my Irish peasant one, and it was tight so I could only wear it if I held my breath….not the most practical dress for a chatterbox like me.

Ghardaia

In Ghardaia, however, the women were covered from top to toe except for one eye through which they peered at the world… and me…..with a very fixed stare, and they had to turn their whole body to do so, so I would walk past and stare at them and they would stop and turn their body totally to stare back, and so the mutual staring society was in progress.  Again I remember my sister telling me of the time she was walking through the market in Nairobi, Kenya and she saw, coming towards her, one of the strangest sights she had ever seen – a man wearing all the tribal paraphernalia including, much to her bemusement, huge earrings that hung from his earlobes.  Not wanting to be impolite she decided not to stare, but to walk past and then turn around and have a good luck, which she did and found…. him staring back at her!

Ghardaia

Every afternoon everything shut and people went and had a siesta, much to my frustration as I wanted to be out and about.  My husband explained that it was too hot outside at that hour, and I was reminded of the song ‘mad dogs and English men go out in the midday sun.’ While he and our daughter would go for a sleep I would pace up down the hotel room itching to be outside.  My husband suggested I go and sit by the hotel swimming pool, but I lost my nerve when I realized I would be the only person out there alone.

Ghardaia

We visited a beautiful settlement nearby which was totally walled in and could only be accessed through one gate.  I was told that, in days gone by, the men all left the village in the morning to go to work and the gate was closed and the women were free to come and go from their homes without having to wear hijab. 

Ghardaia

I loved Ghardaia and we spent a wonderful few days there, but we couldn’t face the car journey back so we decided to go for the option of flying, until we hit a snag when, as soon as the travel agent saw my foreign passport he said that I would have to pay for my flight in foreign currency!  Yeah…. as if I was likely to bring English sterling to the Sahara.  Despondently we left the agency only to bump into someone my husband  knew from Algiers, and before we knew it…. we were on a flight back to Algiers!

Ghardaia