The Memory Of War Does Not Rust: The Wala'a Story

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"We used to justify to ourselves that it was an emergency situation that would only last for a few weeks, and the ordeal would be over, leaving only the ghost of memories. However, things did not go as expected and it has continued to this day! What should I talk about?! The war, the Yemeni war.

It began with an early morning phone call from my fourth friend. She started the conversation by saying, "Wala'a, do you hear gunshots and shells?"
"Yes, it seems that the conflicting parties over the piece of land adjacent to our house have resumed fighting over it," I replied and dozed off for a while.
She firmly replied, "What piece of land?! It's the war, the coalition countries are bombing us!"
I woke up from my sleep, devoid of any feeling, neither panic nor anticipation nor fear. I passed by the rooms of the house and checked on my siblings, turned on the room light, and repeated to myself, "I will continue my studying, the exam is approaching."

That's how it all started, and I continued to live in the terror of war for a whole month. Many of those around us had parts of their homes destroyed and they rushed to us. Our house was strong and well-built, and its foundation was not affected by the ground vibrations caused by the shells. I did not go to university, did not see the road, and did not know anything during that period except for the news of the dead. It was a tragedy. I barely slept during that month, only a few hours when drowsiness overpowered me. I kept repeating, "We will not leave it. It's our land, not a hotel that we leave when the service is bad."

Things went from bad to worse, and we had to flee. We gathered our families and invited them for lunch, it was the last time we saw them. We pretended to be happy with that meeting, but our eyes showed that we were just acting. I did not look into anyone's eyes, I made sure to say goodbye to everyone at the last possible point where I could part with them. I risked going out in the car that day to drive them.

I didn't sleep, I cleaned and organized the house and picked up the bottles. My mother repeated, "Go to sleep, we have a trip tomorrow." I didn't pay attention to anyone's words, I continued to tidy up every corner of the house and made a phone call to my friend, informing her of my trip and saying, "We'll be back in a week." The week turned into a month, the month became a year, and the year became three years.

The pain of losing family and homeland makes you alert and feel that you are capable, strong, and will never surrender to the policies of miserable rulers. You will not make yourself the victim who settles for muttering prayers of regret and continues to blame.

The airport was bombed by aeroplanes, so we had to travel by land, and here I realized the truth, the truth that there is no land like your land, no home like your home, and no family that can compensate for your own family. We arrived at the Saudi-Yemeni border and waited there for a long time, from 5 am until 11 am. The party that was delaying the process was the Yemeni side.

They try to blackmail the fugitives and demand large sums of money to stamp their passports. That's when I realized that aggression and war are inside and external aggression is only a result. External aggression cannot be achieved without internal empowerment. A few hours made me feel the suffering of a refugee fleeing death to the unknown. That moment is still stuck in my mind. I was caught between imagination and reality, between admission and denial, and it was the real birth, not the biological birth.

A person is born at that moment when he is thrown from the roof of childhood to the rough road, and then I thought that everything had ended and I would remain hostage to that moment. It was not the end, but the beginning. I told my siblings while we were stranded at the border, "There's no longer any good for us in this country. Either we take matters into our own hands, learn, and return to it for the better, or we sit here as homeless people." I didn't know where those words came from at the time, but it began with the loss of our homeland and the start of abandonment.

But! What may seem like a loss to you may be the very thing that will later be responsible for achieving the greatest accomplishments of your life. I did not exert myself in my studies as I did after the war, I did not commit to my prayers - whether voluntary or obligatory - as I did after the war, and I did not scrutinize anything I did as I did after the war. I was without plans and without guidance, relying on the momentary security I was living in. But after realizing that nothing remains except what you strive to keep, I made an effort and began repeating to myself, "Your country is waiting for you, your religion needs you."

I am a person afflicted with the disease of perfectionism, a tilted painting on the wall makes me feel uneasy until I fix it. A tilted painting worries me and robs me of my peace, so what about a country in a state of war? It took a whole year until the nightmares of war stopped and left me with war fantasies. A year of constant sadness and crying that never ceased, to the point where a touching phrase on social media is enough to remind me of the tragedy. The war was a shock, not a danger that disappeared as soon as I left the land.

Yes, it was painful, but the pain is a fruit, and God does not put fruit on a weak branch that cannot bear it. The pain of losing loved ones and the homeland makes you alert and feel that you are capable, strong, and will never surrender to the policies of the miserable rulers.

You will not make yourself the victim who is content with muttering prayers of despair and continues to blame. You realize that you are responsible, shake off the dust of the deception that suggests to you that everything is fine, and rise to carve your path alone, relying only on God. War is hell, there is nothing good to be said about it, and yet it has an unearthly power, never learned by peace, to reveal the greatness in ordinary people."