Winner of the “One Thousand Nights and Awakening” literary contest
This was over eight years ago, before the statue of the Beauty and the Gazelle was stolen from the heart of the city. She was the last naked woman to parade along Tripoli’s history. I was in the car with my father. He is a traditional man from ElKedoua, a rural region 40 kilometers outside of Tripoli. Despite all the obstacles standing in his path, my father had done well for himself. He had grown up to be a doctor, although he had once desired to become a pilot. Every time he saw a plane cruising the sky he would yell, “Look at that plane! Do you see it? Isn’t it just stunning!”
I remember the shape of his black and narrow eyes, as well as the dark bags under them. I didn’t understand them until recently, when my dreams turned into nightmares that belied their true nature until right before the end.
During my teenage years, we used to hang around the Park of the Gazelle singing songs ...Read more