Adieu my sweet friend on your final journey……

My earliest memory of Lubna was when her mother passed away in high school in the mid-80s. I walked into Lubna’s grandparents' house and this lovely girl with blond curly hair in a thick plait running down her back like Rapunzel greeted me. She had wide innocent yet knowing eyes and a tender smile, despite the tragic circumstances. Her voice was soft and composed as I hugged her awkwardly not knowing what to say to someone who had lost their mother.

It was my first funeral. I uttered the traditional Libyan words of condolences that my father taught me. The words felt clipped because I did not really know how to show emotions, I was afraid to show emotions. Yet Lubna kept my hand in hers and sat next to me quietly. Almost like it was her comforting me and not the other way around.

Until her last moment among us in this dimension, she was the same sweet, caring girl and woman.

In the last decade of her life we became very close as we worked together and though younger than me, she could not help herself to mother me. This was in her nature, she would remind me to drink my water, to eat, to leave the office and go home, to stop being a workaholic and to take care of my health. Lubna always checked if I was well and even in the middle of the pandemic she offered to bring supplies to my house when I was stuck abroad in 2020 so that my father would not risk his life!  I am sure all her friends have similar stories, those of a woman with a heart as big as the world and a contagious smile. She was a no-nonsense person and she loved to travel and loved shoes and handbags – she called them her soft spot. She was so elegant and had immense guts.

I was waiting for the world to recover from the pandemic so that I can see her seize her dream and move to a country where she believed she could live a quiet life of service and enjoyment. She longed for peace, predictability, quiet and rest, and I was going to visit and sit on the balcony with her and eat from her famous summer salad and gossip and talk about things not related to war but to love and life. She was tired of ugly.

I texted her last month for our usual social distancing meet up on the beach front park, but she told me: “no I can’t do it this week, I am going to Egypt, let’s meet when I am back!”.  I was surprised, the covid numbers where drastic in Egypt why risk it unless one has a business meeting? and even those now used online conference apps. She explained it was a vacation, that she was excited about, she had become tired of the usual Istanbul destination and now that we had direct flights to Cairo again she wanted to seize the opportunity to reconnect with a place she loved. I was skeptical because in my opinion Turkey had handled the pandemic better, was more organized and frankly had better capabilities in its health sector. But I couldn’t be the boring spoilsport and tell her not to go…. Although that was exactly what I was screaming inside my head. So I told myself Lubna was always careful, knew how to take care of herself and knew what  she was doing.

On the last day of her vacation, I asked her if she was back already and she said “no tomorrow I am supposed to fly back, but I have some bad news Intissar… my PCR test came back positive and so I will need to quarantine in Cairo until I get better!”.

I did not know that it would be the last time I hear her voice. I sent messages every day to cheer her up. Then she stopped reading the messages as the blue WhatsApp ticks did not show up. Her phone’s battery either died or it was switched off. I did not know, but I was angry at the hospital, the doctors and the isolation ward. Lubna was in an induced sedation to help her lungs recover, but I was frustrated that the staff would not allow or arrange for family members to peak at their loved ones on Facetime or WhatsApp just to be able to see them. I was worried that being alone and unable to move would take its toll on her. Yes Lubna was a fighter, but you still needed something to fight for. How can we show her that she had so much to return to? That  so many people loved her if we could not get her to hear us? Covid be damned! The sense of doom gripped my heart.

I have not pieced together her last hours, but I want to believe that she went peacefully into the quiet, beautiful and better place she always sought and that one day I hope we will be united in Heaven to sit down and chat over a summer salad and laugh at the past.

Even in her death, she continued to be of service.  So many people who did not speak with each other for years have reached out to one another for comfort. Tributes from all over Libya and the world are filling out her Facebook  page in the hundreds. The soft-spoken girl had touched so many hearts.

I cried when I heard she had moved on, I have not cried for a long, long, long time;  I have a problem in crying. That was her last gift to me, one of healing, of release of suppressed emotions and trauma, one where I could acknowledge that I missed her very much and will miss her forever. I can’t believe that I won’t be able to call her anymore, nor that my phone will light up with her thoughtful messages, but I know that for her death not to go in vain, I have to act on the lessons learnt: “There is no shame in taking care of yourself, in making yourself a priority, in seeking your happiness and peace of mind. There is no need for me to be heroic, it is ok to remove the shield around my heart to enjoy life. It is ok to be heartbroken, it means you lived and tried”.

I wanted Lubna to experience the peace and happiness she wanted, I pray she is in peace now with her loved ones who had preceded her. Yet I find myself hoping that she still will have the  the time to look my way and be with me when I do the things I want with her in mind sort of like a bucket list. She left us too soon, I did not realize how much I loved this wonderful friend, until she was gone. That’s another lesson, don’t’ hold back in in expressing your love to others, ego be damned, if they don’t respond it is on them but you would have shared your heart and planted a seed.

I will miss Lubna every day of my life. Rest in Peace sweet angel. Thank you for having allowed me to walk with you for part of the journey.

Intissar

Photocredit: from her public social media profile.

A Year of Adjustments

Last summer I wrote an introspective post and concluded that the “forced break of Covid 19 has given many of us a grip back on our mad life”!

It’s been a glorious year of self-development, of closures and bold plans, of acceptance, decluttering, lifestyle changes, rediscovering oneself and healing. The journey is not finished but it is so good to be alive and beat the odds … But how did it start?

As I said in my post last year, I have been thinking about it for a while. So it’s not new; but as my burnout started to manifest itself more and more between 2018/2019 and some weight increase creeped up on me changing the model look  to a  tired matronly appearance… I was unable to recognize myself! I also realized it was not as easy to bounce back to good health as I used to do before. With hindsight, I understand that I may have been too harsh on myself and exaggerated how bad I perceived myself in my search of perfection, as no one ever commented negatively except that I was rounder on the edges. But weight gain to me was associated with loss of youth and loss of mobility as ancient sports injuries and accidents flared up. No sports for two years, dehydration, weight gain due to too much food during travel, eating too much chocolate to ease PTSD anxiety from the civil war workaholism.. .  I had truly entered a vicious cycle and needed to break it up.

There I was at the Duty free area at Pearson Toronto airport last March looking to purchase a magazine for the flight,  when my gaze fell on the cover of a book :  “The Self Care Solution: a year of becoming happier, healthier, and fitter – one moment at a time”  by Jennifer Ashton . The title is very smart. A year is not too long to invest to reach all these goals right ? I needed baby steps as a radical change was not going to happen for me. What did Dr Ashton do ? Basically chose to try something new for one month each month. Like drink more water, stop sugar intake, exercise more, walk more, sleep earlier etc. Just one month! That’s bearable right ? no commitments, no pressure, if you don’t like it then no shame. It was a relief! Why did I not think of it before? For me it was either/or .

So I decided there and then to improve my hydration by increasing water intake from one glass of 200ml  water per week to 1.5 liters as a goal per day. Not easy.  I downloaded an app which should remind me at regular intervals to drink water and once I did I would click to log it. Watching my intake rise over time felt like an immense achievement. I finally got into a good routine, but if I skip a day of listening to the prompt then I would lose the momentum again. A year  later and I still have not yet formed the habit of drinking water. If I don’t use the app, I do become dehydrated. So correcting a bad habit needs more time but now I know how it feels to be well hydrated and strive towards that.

My second challenge was to sleep better and earlier. With the advent of the lockdown and loss of framework, I spent weeks binging on Netflix and social media to know about the latest battles in Libya. Sometimes awake for 3 days in a row, worrying ….I felt that I was not breathing properly during sleep.. I never woke rested. So again, I downloaded an app, which promised to analyze my sleep patterns and I discovered that I was snoring, and that I was never fully in deep sleep. I needed to rethink my schedule.

For 4 months when I was living alone in Turkey, I managed to get into a good routine, my skin cleared, it became easier to lose weight. I still snored but the quality of sleep was better. Instead of 4 hrs I slept 6 hrs . Now I am back to my bad habits as I am home in Libya and to my family responsibilities. So I need to think about what can I improve on my routine, to sleep better with other people in the house. How to prioritize my health and my family. Difficult balance but will work it out.

The third challenge was regaining my fitness and especially my six pack 👀. It was there but I could not see it anymore. I have a competitive streak but was afraid to jump back into sports and make the injuries worse. Plus the gyms were closed. So I called my coach and asked her if she would do 101 training in my house 3 times per week at 9 am in the morning. I asked her if we could do the exercises with alternative motions that would be like physiotherapy to restore mobility.  We began in June. It was  slow and painful but the day I was able to kneel down properly again was a celebration. Coach D was getting married so she stopped working with me after two months and I did not know what to do so continued to dance to Bollywood music instead. My theory was that if I was  moving this is good.

The next challenge was to do a full health check up and sort things out. I was relieved to find out that some things were reversible with lifestyle changes and that if I dedicated my time to physiotherapy and healing my injuries, I could even learn to ski again.  I had started using a cane since my vacations to Rome and Tokyo in  2019 👎. I called it my sexy cane and used it as a fashion accessory sort of like the old mafia bosses and sheikhs. But nothing screams old like a walking aid that is not used in hiking situations. I stopped using the cane in autumn of 2020. The day I was able to cross my legs again and get up on my own from a sitting position on the floor and do a plank was the day I was proverbially reborn. I had forgotten all these things which are natural to people. I discovered that I had numerous food intolerances and allergies which were the main cause of what had happened to me since 2016 and which kept getting worse. Here again I initially used a food app but  it was too time consuming, seeing a nutritionist was healthier and more useful. Learning to eat gluten free and remove sugar, meat, bread etc…. and seeing the weight diminish, the hair stop falling, the skin becoming supple like it was a few years ago, the neuralgia decrease and the edema go away was a source of joy.  Seeing myself lose fat and gain muscle felt like regaining the pre civil war Intissar. I was not obese, but I was not comfortable in my own skin anymore.  I tried reintroducing the forbidden foods in April 2020, but all my intolerances and pain flared up. It seems I may need to change my diet for a long time if not for life. This is a bit sad as I love beautiful, rich , tasty food and meat and pasta and bread and cheese and Nutella 💖but I will need to learn alternative tastes. 

Here we are in May 2021. I only lost 8 kg during this journey but the difference is massive. I struggle with the forbidden foods at times and binged for a couple of weeks but when I saw the damage I had to readjust. My physiotherapist is not near me so I need to find someone else who could help me continue to improve my posture.

My other challenge was to reconnect with friends who were not from the inner sanctum;  to go back to the kinder person  I was before the bitterness of war. So every week I would call someone and catch up with their news. It was sweet and cathartic. I used the time to seek closure whether in person or to forgive those who wronged me. I was also open to establish if I was the one who had  wronged them. I tried to work on my grief about my mother but I still have not been able to access that part properly so we shall revisit soon. 

I thought I needed to find a partner now that I had the time, but I discovered that I was not interested because I would rather be fiercely fit 💪 Talking to someone who was not interested in activities and travel and sports and culture and life was just not interesting. I discovered that the  old geezers wanted a young chick and the young men wanted also a young chick. I was not really a spring chicken anymore. I tried meeting  people from my generation online  and was shocked to find how old they looked on the outside. Sorry but I am superficial ! So I caught myself thinking : “OMG I cannot be that OLD” . Is this how I am perceived ? I am not sure about that. So anyway dating is not on the menu, but my six pack is.

Another set of decisions/ resolutions I had made at the beginning of the pandemic:

Not to buy new clothes, shoes, make up, hard copy books, accessories, bags ,  electronics,  jewelry, magazines, stationary etc…..until I finished all the beauty products, read the books and magazine , used all the stationery, worn out the shoes/clothes/bags/electronics etc..As for jewelry I did not need any.  I was curious how much I will save and could I go back to being a minimalist ?

I also thought of recording my experience with the beauty products I was using until they ended. Most were purchased on a whim because I was bored in duty free shops between London, Tokyo, New York, Washington, Paris, Malta, Rome, Toronto, Chicago, Istanbul, Beirut and Madrid etc….. I was going to document how they felt and did they work. It made me feel like a potential social media influencer.😎

Over a year later this is the result :

Jewelry : 1 ring

Bags: 1 cheap sport’s bag

Magazines : 7

Books : 5 hard copies only ( but tons of e-books).

Shoes : one pair only

Beauty products : 2 lipsticks, one eyeliner, one mascara  and deodorants to replace those that I finished.

Clothes : 3 tracksuits and 1 dress and 1 anorak .

Accessories : one pair of gloves to replace the one that I lost. 2 prescription glasses as I lost/broke the old ones during the year.

Only the ring and magazines were unnecessary. I am proud of myself, even though I was unemployed and spending from my savings on health treatment for 4 months I still managed to save money. I read somewhere that you always needed to keep emergency money equivalent to 6 months of salary in your savings to wait out in comfort until you find a suitable job. I am super grateful.

I begun the decluttering journey since 2018, it is still ongoing. I hope to finish in 2021. Donating and or selling everything that is not needed. I discovered my stash of ancient postage stamps and coins and money, one day I will sit down to arrange them. Maybe I have an unknown fortune? That’s for 2022.

I have only started to look for employment in February this year… and I hope my plans pan out. But work life balance is going to be one of my priorities now.👌 No more suicide missions to complete deadlines that no one has really asked from you. My mother’s death has shown me that life is ephemeral and  Covid19 has demonstrated also  that everything can stop and be taken from you. Your life in the span of a second can start to revolve around 100 square meters of your home and nothing else. And if you are an IDP you don’t even have that luxury.

I am going to try the social influencer thingy … as in posting the products I finished this past year next, if you want to see them check my Instagram..... 

It has been a year of adjustments !
 

A Time for Introspection

For the last two years I have been constantly thinking and wishing for a long break. For a time where I would not have any deadlines, where I would be able to spend time at home, be with family, complete my library, re-arrange my papers,  scan the family albums, exercise more, eat healthy, cook, dance, try to find love, write my book, study etc... be normal!  I wanted to leave behind the cynicism that has creeped slowly into my life like a climbing weed and so I promised myself that as soon as I finish the next goalpost I will be able to take a couple of months off. But the goalpost was always moving forward.... 

There is a saying " be careful what you wish for ...lest it becomes true!". Indeed, when battle fatigue was settling in and "what next?" was growing as question in my head followed by the  "if I don't do something I will end up alone!" becoming more than just a cliche, and I  found myself collecting more auto-immune diseases in one decade then during most of my lifetime; I knew something had to happen to get out of this vicious cycle. 

The first sign was that after years of a successful, loved and respected project the funding partner decided to not extend anymore. It is a very normal action in the development sector and we had discussed this eventuality. But somehow I thought it  would be in a mythical future. The surprising thing was that I was not upset  at the prospect of unemployment for an unknown period of time - after all we are a country at war and stable jobs are not the norm - I told myself.  I begun planning  for all the activities on my bucket list - we all have one stashed somewhere 😀.  Then just as I was heading towards putting my vacation plans into reality the world pressed the brake pedals in March 2020.  I will come back to this shortly. 

Though I worked hard for the last three decades, bordering on perfectionism and addiction to completing deadlines, I had a sacrosanct time (in summer usually) when everything stopped so I could travel with my mother for our annual pilgrimage to her home and family in Syria. This meant I would not see a single email or shred of work for the duration of the vacation. It was priceless! I don't know what happened,  but at some point early on in this decade something changed and I turned into the most hard core workaholic of all times. It is telling that by March 2020 I had 75 days of untaken vacation privilege to which I had to reluctantly say goodbye.  Some people say it's your fault for not taking time off,  use it or lose it... but when you have responsibilities and dependents in a country at war you don't always have this luxury. Why? because you need to prove impact and success  if you combine that with hardline principles it means you literally won't raise your head to breathe. With hindsight I can see I was headed for burnout and that I did not need to be such an idealist.

So let's get back to when the world shut down in March. I was on the return journey home and became stranded on the final leg. I watched as the world was taken in a frenzy of death, illness and economic woes due to the Covid19 pandemic. I also watched as people tried to adjust to lockdown and social distancing. I read avidly about people learning new languages, starting a degree, cooking. spending time with their families, reading, having dance parties on Zoom, exercising on rooftops and balconies etc..The point was they were at home not somewhere in between. I did not have the heart to cook and I did not have the place to exercise on the balcony  what with it being freezing and windy!   I did not feel settled enough to learn something new, after all, I just lost my job yet had to ensure the office was closed down properly while  my country was at war and facing a pandemic. I feared for my family's life and I had none of the material things which I wanted with me during a lockdown. So I binged on #Neflix, chatted with my BFF, read some books on #Kindle and started eating jars of Nutella ! This situation lasted until I arrived safely home  on 15 May, 2020. That is my official lockdown date; before that was purgatory. 

So on May 16, I wake up at home, facing a self imposed, self isolation for 14 days, exhausted with two more weeks of Ramadan to go but somehow full of hope. For the first time, I had nowhere to hurry to. I could take my time. I had all the time in the world if I survived the civil war raging outside. Time was the most expensive commodity. My mother always used to mention an Arabic proverb which said that : "time is like a sword, if you don't cut it, it will cut you". I can still hear her words ringing in my head. 

I have been at home for a little over two months now. I relish talking to my father and experiencing the teenage tantrums of  my niece. Watching TV together, arguing about silly things, sitting in the balcony looking at the blue sky , cuddling with the cat, reading my stash of books, using my expensive face creams, discovering mum's recipes..My father would share with me vacancy links but all I could think about  was: not now, I am not ready. It's been a trip into memory lane but also mindfulness and decluttering. I had read so much about these two topics but putting them into practice was a struggle. So I thought I would begin with my beauty products and it was when I found a lovely jar of bath crystals and had a relaxing foot bath  that  the extent of how much I had  neglected my own well being hit me. There while soaking my feet and reading a book on a log lost civilisation, I started crying. Why was this activity no longer something I did regularly? I had those crystals since 2017! It took three years, unemployment and a global pandemic for them to find their way to me. 

It was a time for introspection!.... This was not right, it must run deeper than just plain workaholism.... As I had more time I discovered so many little things where I shortchanged myself:  being inactive, ignoring medical issues, ignoring sports injuries, not sleeping enough, tons of clothes since with their price tags in the closet, hair products, jewellery and accessories which I completely forgot. But the problem was not just personal material and body issues but also friendships that somehow fell of the radar and yet were important.. All this I discovered because I put everyone else before me and I was trying to push aside my mother's tragic death... not mourning meant there was unfinished business. Not having closures means you ruminate about the past constantly. Trauma was deepening and accumulating. The good thing I finally was accepting and acknowledging this which means it was easier to do something about it. 

The forced break of Covid19 has given many of us a grip back on our mad life. As much as it is scary what is happening to our world, planet and everything we know as much as I like to see this shake up with  a silver lining if we try and keep our distance. 

I gave myself the right to just enjoy being at home and daydream, read, think, explore very deep within my soul what and who  is it that is important to me

The answer will help shape the next decade of my life....

Operation Going Back to Tripoli

It's been exactly two months since I returned to Tripoli on one of the numerous repatriation flights for Libyan travellers stranded overseas.
I spent 66 days in Istanbul!
Days when I felt my life had stopped and where I had one goal only in sight namely to go back home.

To that end once the first couple of weeks had elapsed, I started project "Going back to Tripoli":

• I inquired at the Consulate  3 times a week about any updates and started following their Facebook page.
• I joined a Facebook group called "الليبيين العالقين في اسطنبول"  i.e Libyans stranded in Istanbul to get live news about what is going on and the situation of repatriation flights. There are thousands of Libyans on this page and being able to commiserate, cheer each other up, find out how to get things while in lockdown and any updates from back home as everyone knows someone who knows someone .....This page was my lifeline. It has recently been renamed as "Libyan Conversations in Turkey" as most of the original founders and admins are now back home and so it now serves Libyans in a more general way. 
• I tapped into my contacts for any info on how I could be included on one of the official non-commercial flight back home - but I was not a VIP and therefore that never panned out.
• When I gave up on normal transport I checked with my travel insurance if they would cover the cost of hiring a private jet  -> I know, sounds crazy right but it could have worked ....

Flight Tracking Radar Tweep 😎

• I started following all the radar gurus on social media who monitored flights in and out of Libya. The airspace was still super busy so how come I could not get one single place home? by hook or by crook?                         

• I started looking for options to travel by sea and contacted transport merchant ships for a chance to get on board as a passenger. Apparently even if I could get past the Turkish authorities I would not be allowed to disembark in Libya... plus it was a cargo ship full of sailors and no women. Negative too.

• Then when my desperation grew  worse I contacted private international flight operators. I finally settled on one company who quoted a price that if I shared it with 5 other passengers maximum  would at this point be affordable. Basically I would spend the savings meticulously put aside for my big summer vacation around Europe; but I figured it was worth it since no vacation will be possible in 2020 what with the COVID19 situation. The plan was how to discreetly recruit 5 other passengers without creating a ruckus around me. After postings on Twitter and Facebook and phone calls to different friends and family members I managed to get hold of 5 others willing to share the cost of chartering  our  private jet. Unfortunately by then Libyan Aviation Authority stopped allowing private jets with Libyan travellers on board (unless you are VIP of course) and so after we paid the invoice as prerequisite for starting the process, the operator could not get the permit to land anymore. I tried very hard with all my contacts to get a special clearance even showing that we will abide by any rigorous quarantine requested from us to no avail. That was a hard blow, to start the re-imbursement process after our hopes were raised.

• At this point Libyan authorities had finally come up with a plan. You take a COVID19 test, then quarantine at the designated hotels in Istanbul for 14 days then take another test and if both are negative you get sent home. I thought it was a waste of public money but hey who was to talk!  The problem ? It was not easy, how to get on the rota? I had already registered but needed to wait for my name to  be listed and paired with hotel. There were thousands of  people still before me already distributed in 13 hotels. 
• As the war on Tripoli became more intense with casualties mounting, my anguish increased exponentially. By now I started following the accounts of rescue ships in the Mediterranean Sea in case I could get a ride on them. I dabbled with looking into the people smuggling business but I was not even sure it existed in the reverse direction as in from North to South. I was aghast at how were all these illegal migrants who took to the sea able to get in touch with patrons.  I looked into ordering a Thuraya phone in the event that I do find a way back by sea. That's when I realised that I did not know any bandits or criminals and have had no dealings of that sort ever in my life. A gap that needed to be filled to thrive in today's Libya. I remembered almost ironically my colleague's remark when I became stranded at the beginning. " Do your best to get as soon as possible home Intissar, but don't get mixed up with pirates ! " I desperately needed a pirate now but did not know any unfortunately. 
• Those two intense months were quasi unreal, I made some friends online thru social media which helped preserve my sanity even though I was in daily contact with my family and BFFs and I am forever grateful for these people. Maybe it was the same for them as they were all stuck in or outside Libya and wanting to move on with their lives. I also received immense support from followers on Twitter and Facebook.

• Then, I  turned to another option, there was talk of repatriation via private flights to Benghazi and I was ready to get on any of them and then worry about the more than 1000 km drive back to Tripoli across major combat frontlines and desert land but it never materialised. I tried traveling to other countries where repatriation to Libya was sooner on the schedule but this proved impossible.
• I even looked into getting a place on an Air Ambulance but was unsuccessful.
• The likelihood of not being at home and something grave happening was killing me  bit by bit and the prospect of not being in control of my destiny almost gave me a heart attack. Project Going back to #Tripoli looked like it was not bearing fruits. The holy month of Ramadan had begun. I had never missed a Ramadan at home unless I was taking an exam abroad. The nightmare staring at me in the face was untenable!
• That's when my body gave out and experienced "stroke like" symptoms. Imagine calling an ambulance in the midst of a pandemic in a foreign land and going to the ER and being referred to a neurosurgeon all within one day only before finally entering the quarantine hotel to start your journey home. It was not even a choice, I took the path home and left the medical decision to God and to after the Covid situation is under control world-wide. Now was the time to be with family, feel their love, share what they are enduring.... Time to look inward. 

My luggage finally out of the door

• The 14 days in the La Quinta by Wyndham hotel journey, courtesy of the Libyan Consulate began. This was a complete lockdown even worse than my 50 days alone before. Because then I was in a flat with a scenic view and fresh air. I could visit the sitting room  or the bedroom, stand on the terrace at least. Here in the hotel, I barely went out of my room and you were not allowed to roam the hallways. Because of my food allergies my meals were delivered to me. The hotel was locked from the outside once we all did the COVID test. In a way it was liberating, I now gave myself the right to stop pursuing Operation Going back to Tripoli. I was helpless and I could totally binge on Netflix day and night, or search  for the best way to make my meals palatable. Winter had turned into warm spring, whilst my wardrobe was fitted for the Canadian weather of February. Finally the day my second test came back negative I could relish the dream of boarding that flight home. I did not even worry about how I was going to get from Misrata to Tripoli after we land. One step at a time I told myself. We were still in the thick of the aerial shelling of Tripoli and the frontlines were very fluid and dramatic.

Bob

• I posted  in detail about my trip back home ( check it out if you can read Arabic). I was grateful that I would still get to spend the last third of Ramadan with my family even if I would be mostly self isolating. I dreamt of the delicious home made meals....as cooking on my own had not worked out so well. The heart was not in it,  my focus was only to get to Tripoli. 

Two months since the bus dropped me at the traffic light on the Main Street closest to our house in Tripoli at 10.30 pm and I don't regret for one second picking the route home. Sometimes I felt like a drug dealer, at others like 007 but most of the time I tried to avoid feeling helpless. 

At the end of the day Operation Going Back to Tripoli  did succeed, as thousands of my compatriots, friends and colleagues remain stranded on different continents awaiting their countries procedures. Sadly I had to leave behind my 2 month old friend the cactus Bob as I could not transport him without damaging him. I hope someone from the hotel staff adopted him. 

It has been 5 months since a tiny virus called Corona literally brought the world to a halt and I am blessed to be with my loved ones enjoying a respite in the Tripoli conflict as the guns have fallen silent after 451 days. Let's take a bit of time to breath and recuperate and watch this space for my next installment : A time for introspection soon. 

The bus home !

Stranded in Turkey in the times of Corona

Staying at home

I have lived in or visited ( for more than 3 days)  a total of 34 countries . I  have not counted any  period less nor transit trips nor repeat visits as some places were visited between 5 to 10 times a year.

It is almost like travelling has been my passion since the day I was born! I remember going for weekends to Beirut in the 60s Dakkar in the 70s or London in 2000s.. Yes when I reflect back it seems I led a charmed life - whatever that means –lucky breaks or tragedies.  

For the past 7 years my job required me to travel often to neighbouring countries or to Europe, Asia and North America for meetings, conferences and workshops. It was exciting but also exhausting yet provided an interesting background to my life in Libya during an active civil war. On my final business trip in March 2020, the Covid19 pandemic caught up with me and finally grounded me in Istanbul (Turkey). During seven years of a gruelling war, bombed airports, shelled cities, militia fights and you name it, I always managed to get home. No rockets ever completely stopped the Libyan spirit and our airports always stood back on their feet making up to the best of their abilities for gruelling international flight bans and serving  the Libyan travellers to the limited destinations left to them out of Libya. 

Basically the various Libyan companies operating flights ( Buraq, Libya Airways, Libya Wings, Afriqiyah, Rahila etc….) and even the air ambulance could only fly to : Amman, Alexandria, Khartoum, Nigeria, Tunis, Istanbul and a special foreign charter flight to Malta, + Jeddah during the Hajj season.  Following the Tripoli war of 2014, 99.9% of the world slapped visas on Libyan passport holders and from the above list only, Tunisia exempts us from visa requirement. Tunis and Istanbul became a hub for connecting flights.  Internal travel was also disrupted between Benghazi and Tripoli post April 2019 creating a virtual checkpoint in airspace disrupting lives and livelihoods, because one side of the country had the monopoly on flights to the Middle East while it still was able to fly to Tunis and the other side of the country could only go to Tunis and Istanbul otherwise it will be shot down by the fighter jets of the Libyan National Army operating in Benghazi.  Therefore a de-facto physical division of the country occurred.

Between 15 and 16 March regardless where your city is, if your airport destination was western Libya then you have a become a statistic in airports and countries all over the world. It was 19 March if your airport destination was in eastern Libya. The authorities in the west (I will call them Weststan) gave no initial warning of the land, sea and air closures, while those in the east (whom I will call Eaststan) where a little more lenient and sent a warning  4 days in advance. Neither had any strategy for dealing with the citizens who found themselves, penniless, homeless, paperless, stateless and isolated, during a worldwide pandemic . Classic botched up job no less!

I could not believe how I on earth I managed to find myself on the wrong side of the fence at this most important time in history!

Working from home

Since the plans to celebrate my upcoming freedom from employment and go on a long vacation were shelved due to the increased impact of the  Covid19 contagion, I had an alternative plan namely to enjoy social distancing with the 450 books and 300 magazines purchased in the last 6 years, learn hip-hop, unearth my mother’s cooking recipes and play chess with my dad. None of that happened, I found myself alone in Turkey, stuck at home in winter, struggling to remember how to operate the oven and make a meal with arthritic hands. In 30 days the number of people I spoke to in person can be counted on the fingers of one hand, including the cashier at the market. Thankfully I was able to speak to my father and some friends online . In the first 3 weeks I still had a job and some work to finish so I could pretend that I had a structure to my day and thing will improve and I could go home.

I registered with the Libyan Consulate and gave them my phone number so they could contact me when the repatriation flights start as I had decided to stay in my own place. If you take the accommodation they had started offering you have to give up your passport. Something I would never do considering how hard it is to get a Libyan passport in the current circumstances. Also how can you do social distancing if they would put me up with a total stranger in the same room?

My neighbours

It’s been a long journey from the 16^th of March (I won’t count the days before that as this was the last day I had seen an airport).  I have become accustomed to being a hermit, and so now find myself at a loss for words when I speak to others. The few times I went out for supplies I feared going near people. I had plans to start a distance learning course but did not have the discipline to do it because my energy was drained being angry at how did I get stuck here and I should be home helping and enduring  the war with my father. The prison I had chosen is in one of the housing compounds on the suburbs of Istanbul, mountainous, far away and isolated. The point was I did not want crowds. The highlight of my days became the daily passage of a herd of cows in the valley across my temporary refuge. There are 6 brown cows, 13 mixed colour and  3 brown ones. There are two shepherds. My favourite bull is a brown one with shortish horns. Sometimes I wave to them. On my two-week anniversary in detention I went out to replenish my supplies and enjoy a bicycle ride in the spring. The supermarket is a couple of kilometres away.  I was able to see the cows up close and was a bit afraid of my friend the bull. What if he attacked me? The shepherd looked at me with curiosity because I was singing loudly in the street. That day I bought a cactus and named him Bob. Bob is very low maintenance and won’t mind when I don’t feel like having a conversation.

My friend Bob

I want to go home and have been knocking at different doors, not leaving any stone unturned, but I don’t have any VIP pull, so I have reached the point of looking for pirate ships but I don’t know how to contact pirates! I am living in limbo: neither here nor there! 

It has been a month and  Libya has still not come up with any decent strategy to repatriate the  approximately 7000 citizens stranded abroad, 3000 of whom I was told are in Turkey. Turkey is a lovely country  in ordinary time, but these are extraordinary time and it is the 7th worst hit  Corona country in the world.  It is disheartening to  put the life of Libyan travellers at risk by keeping them prisoners with not choice but to also see the people who were here for a  two day meeting, or medical treatment, a vacation from the madness at home or studying or just passing by like me, be separated from their families, or unable to bury a dead with them, or not able to complete treatment because the hospitals discharged them as non essential treatment, or unable to continue their studies. So many stories intermingled with war, hate speech, sadness, feeling let down by your country and worried about what next as you cannot assess the change that is happening in the world when you are not staying in a familiar place. We are told we need to keep our immune system strong to fight the disease, how is that going to happen I wonder? The other day I looked at my luggage and found that the things of only  a month ago feel like another lifetime.