Phone Call

I’ve imagined the conversation so many times. I’ve always been nervous that I wouldn’t know what to say or how to say it, but when the moment actually came, to my surprise, the words appeared out of nowhere quite naturally. Whether my eroded Arabic made choosing words easy, or the traumatic circumstances that prevented goodbyes in the first place allowed small talk to have an ironic comfort, I’m not sure. But it was good.

Bryan and I had talked a couple of times already and sent a dozen or so texts back and forth between North and East Africa. But trying to cram the emotional and sensual experience of reuniting with old friends in a refugee camp of 110, 000 people in a place that shows up on very few maps in the world is not something that can fit into a time-conscious long distance phone call or fifty character text.

When Bryan passed her the phone at first I just heard the background murmur of a tea shop. But then Zainab’s voice pushed to the forefront salaaming me almost shyly, as though she was sitting in the chair across from me and not a thousand miles away. My first reaction was to laugh and she laughed too. And then a tidal wave of emotion swelled over my voice and swallowed it whole. I was suddenly grateful for the physical and cultural gulf still between us, that she couldn’t see my contorted face or hear my voice break. I was afraid she would think, what do you have to cry about, though in my heart of hearts I know she wouldn’t.

How are all your people? And your children?

Praise be to God, we are all well. How is your baby, is she walking yet?

Yes, yes. Hana is walking..

The conversation was laughable. For a moment I could almost doubt that she had ever been running for her life, that she had ever walked for weeks with her babies to get to safety. For a moment I almost thought she really did have all she needed to eat and feed her family.

I have had several conversations like these this week. As Bryan finds (and is found) by friend after friend after friend, a woman who once showed me how to brew coffee properly or who patted my pregnant belly knowingly will ask him if she can use his phone to call me. And almost a year since I last heard her voice, we greet and chat and inquire about each other’s children. We say, God willing, we will see you again soon.  

Bryan is excited. I can hear it in his voice as he rattles off stories of whose families are there safely, what’s available in the market and what people are predicting for the future. He says the situation is bad, very bad, and yet maybe not as dire as we feared. People are hopeful, as though the worst has passed and somehow, in the slowly settling dust, hope is still standing there alive.

Bryan says there are babies everywhere and has reported back about several friends with new little ones. I am amazed and amused by this fact, as is everyone else apparently. I suppose there are limited recreational activities on hand when you are sitting in a refugee camp (or hiding in the bush?). People thank God for his generosity and congratulate us on the blessing we will also receive in January. Many of our friends back home think we are crazy to be thinking of taking a baby and pregnant wife to a refugee camp. But we are in good company it seems.

I’ve felt residual guilt about having been away for so long, for having jumped on a plane in the middle of the night and not come back. At least not yet. But Bryan tells me everyone left not long after we did, not on a plane obviously, but they scattered and lost track of each other too. And as he walks around this camp, stopping by tents and huts to greet former neighbors and teachers and shopkeepers, he witnesses reunions of old friends and relatives, other people who haven’t seen each other for almost a year. It would be absurd and wrong to compare my situation to that of our old friends. The differences are innumerable. But in small ways, ways that for some reason matter to me, those differences may not be as vast as I may have once thought. And that excites me.

One of the people that Bryan ran into a couple days ago was the man who built our house in North Africa. He made it across the border safely along with his wife and children and grandchildren. When Bryan met him again he was busy making bricks for someone else’s house and he and Bryan shared a laugh. “Are you ready to do this all over again?” Bryan asked. “We’re ready!” our friend replied.

I think maybe I am too.