Um Hagob (Hagob’s mother), who was born and lived all her life in Damascus, had never expected that she will end up living in Jerusalem. That happened when Abu Hagob (Hagob’s father) captured her heart sixty years ago. Their story wasn’t one of love at first sight or a marriage that followed a whirlwind romance and a “Rendevouzs”, meetings. Rather, their union was like many others of that era, arranged through one of Abu Hagob’s aunts, who lived in Damascus and had a good relationship with Um Hagob’s parents.
In those days, stealing a glance before the official marriage takes place was forbidden. Love before an official engagement was unheard of, and for a girl to go out with her future groom before marriage was utterly impossible according to the traditions at that time.
The only encounter between Um Hagob’s father and Abu Hagob took place on the fringes of one of the “latter’s” work trips between Jerusalem and Damascus in 1958. During this brief meeting, they finalized all the details in preparation for the wedding that was scheduled to take place in Jerusalem a month later. At that time, “Um Hagob” was still just a girl, not yet fourteen. The families of the bride and groom arranged a modest wedding ceremony, attended by only a few close relatives.
After the ceremony, the newlyweds spent two nights on their honeymoon at a hotel in the city before settling into their new life together in the Armenian Quarter in the Old City of Jerusalem, at Abu Hagob’s parents’ house. That was their new “golden cage” as described in Arabic.
Um Hagob settled into her new life in Jerusalem with ease. She lived with her in-laws until she and Abu Hagob welcomed their second child three years later. That’s when they decided it was time for a change and moved to a larger, independent house outside the old city walls of Jerusalem. In their new neighborhood, Um Hagob met her neighbor, Um Khalil (Khalil’s mother), who lived across the hall. Their bond grew stronger over time, and soon, not a day passed by without Um Hagob visiting her lifelong neighbor. They both had their morning coffee together. After that, each would turn her cup over on the saucer, reading the other’s fortune from the coffee grounds left at the bottom of the cup.
Um Khalil was one of Um Hagob’s closest friends. They would often reminisce about their lives in Damascus and the Katamon neighborhood — one of the most charming suburbs in west Jerusalem, where Um Khalil and her family had long lived before the neighborhood was occupied by Zionist groups in 1948. They both shared many memories. They enjoyed exchanging recipes of traditional Eastern dishes and Levantine sweets. They delighted in competing to recall morning tunes and folk songs that were broadcasted on Arabic radio stations or were sung in certain occasions. They memorized almost every song by heart.
Years passed by, and the bond between Um Hagob and Um Khalil deepened. Their peaceful “mornings” continued without any interruption until that day in June 1967; that year which I chose to call the “Year of Thunder”. On that day, the skies over Jerusalem roared with the thunderous sound of airplanes. The coffee cups slipped from the hands of Um Hagob and Um Khalil before they could discern the patterns left by the coffee grounds. The cups fell on the floor and broke into pieces.
Until that day, Um Hagob’s devotion to Jerusalem remained unwavering. She continued to talk about the beauty of the “City” as if she was a Jerusalemite. Whenever someone asked her if she were happy in Jerusalem, she would reply without hesitance in her Syrian Armenian accent: “Jerusalem is my second home; I love it just as much as I adore Damascus”. The devastation that befell the city weighed heavily on her heart. She was deeply troubled by her inability to visit Damascus to see her parents or for them to visit her in Jerusalem, as they used to do before June 5th of that year.
Her nostalgia for her childhood memories in Damascus grew stronger every time she heard Sabah Fakhri’s famous song “Ya Mal Al-Sham Yalla Ta’ali” playing on the radio. As for Um Khalil, she was not in a better state than Um Hagob. Hence, it was difficult for her to console Um Hagop. Every time she saw tears dropping on Um Hagop’s cheeks silently, she would also recall her tragedy from 1948. The memories of the beautiful times spent with her beloved ones start in Katamon start to flow into her head. Her family members, her friends, now almost all of them were displaced from their homeland and live in exile the same way the two cups of coffee fell on the floor and broke into pieces. Um Khalil at that moment would place her hands on her head and start to hum sadly “Skaba ya dmo’ al-‘ayn, skaba ta’i wahdek wala tjibi hdaba”, while the “primus”, the brass kerosene stove (Babur Al-Kaz) in the background, continues to whistle desperately, trying to capture Um Hagop and Um Khalil attention to the pot of the burnt “Maqlouba” (a traditional Palestinian dish), whose smell had filled the house.
Published on February 18, 2021
