02/13/2004
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Fatma’s house seems like a seaport. It’s hard to know who’s in the family and
who isn’t, because the very concept of family is different. It’s open to all,
a place that excludes no one. Our host’s home is considered one of the new generation,
which is to say it has walls. The Saharawi are children of the desert, nomads
by definition, but living in a tent for thirty years can try even those most fanatic
for nomadic culture.
Aisha is this evening’s entertainment coordinator, using the fluent Spanish she
learned in school. After receiving our new names, the next activity is to decorate
ourselves with henna, the natural colorant. Women wear it on their hands and feet,
men on their shoulders. It is applied in a paste along a line drawn on the skin,
or outlines are laid on the skin and filled in. The little man of the house is
Amhed, thirteen, with an extraordinarily mature gaze. Since he first met us, he
has became our shadow and hasn’t lost sight of us even for a minute. He is obviously
already accustomed to responsibility.
“The march lasted twelve days, night and day, especially at night so we couldn’t
be seen. I was sixty when I arrived here. Now I’m ninety. The Moroccan soldiers
chased us, bombarding us. It’s impossible to tell everything we’ve been through:
mothers holding babies, their few possessions loaded onto goats, no clothes,
no food or water. We were very tired. Everything was bad then. I was a member
of the Polisario Front. I was a soldier,” he says, staring proudly off into the
distance, as though it awakes his memory to look at his old comrade from that
ancient journey: the desert.
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At the Auserd refugee camp in Tindouf, Algeria, the hopes and memories of the Saharawi people
from our correspondent
Christian Elia
Fatma’s house seems like a seaport. It’s hard to know who’s in the family and
who isn’t, because the very concept of family is different. It’s open to all,
a place that excludes no one. Our host’s home is considered one of the new generation,
which is to say it has walls. The Saharawi are children of the desert, nomads
by definition, but living in a tent for thirty years can try even those most fanatic
for nomadic culture.The elders of the community continue to look askance at the bricks cooked in
the sun. They are still living in anticipation of the great news: you can go
back home. So they keep everything ready to move at a moment’s notice; on the
march in a few minutes, just as it’s been for centuries. They’ve been awaiting
that moment too long now, and the younger Saharawi have built shelter for their
children, already worn by thirst and hunger, in a place where the mid-day sun
can melt you, but at night the temperature can go below zero centigrade.
The houses are like those you can still find in some rural towns in Italy: a
low wall with a narrow entrance into a courtyard, with four smaller doors opening
onto it. One door is to the kitchen, Fatma’s kingdom, where the only light is
a dangerous camp stove, obviously a donation from some international charity.
Next, there’s a Turkish-style bath with a bright curtain over the doorway. The
rule is simple: when the curtain is up, the bathroom is free; when it’s down,
it’s occupied. The other two doors open onto collective bedrooms, one larger than
the other. In the larger, which serves as a living room, there is a huge carpet
on the floor and comfortable little couches lined against the walls. In the smaller
room, there’s only a carpet. The larger room has been set aside for us, the guests.
The situation is like certain global imbalances: the five of us in a big room,
with the rest of the family, varying in number between six and ten, in the little
one. It seems profoundly unfair to us, but hospitality is sacred to these people.
Fatma seems like the grand priestess of an ancient cult; she presides surrounded
by daughters and grandchildren. She sits like a Buddha behind a low table on which
she prepares tea in a continuous cycle. You get so accustomed to drinking it that
you become disoriented when it’s not there. Fatma boils the water, immerses the
tea, and begins a movement with the glasses that reminds you of magicians or three-card
monte sharps. The tea is poured from one glass into the next until it creates
a froth that rises to the very lip.
“When I fled across the desert, all I had was a jug of water and the clothes
I was wearing. The war took my husband away, but I still had children to raise.
It was hard before the international aid came, but after so many years I’m accustomed
to being alone.” Fatma’s family is unusual. Her sister Aihma lives with her, after
being abandoned by her husband, who went to live with another woman.
A widow and an abandoned woman who raise their children together. You immediately
note a difference from the families in the refugee camp: since there are no males
around, the woman move much more freely. Saharawi culture is tolerant (because
they are nomads, there are no mosques, merely simple piles of stones oriented
toward Mecca), but the heads of household keep their women under strict subjection,
so that females are blocked from relations with outside. In this home, the situation
is different, and you can feel it immediately.
Aisha is twenty, Fatma’s elder daughter, and she has dark, sly eyes and an open
smile. She’s a chatterbox and loves to have fun. She can’t study any longer because
of persistent rheumatism, a result, Fatma says, of childhood maladies that never
received treatment. Because she is an orphan with no dowry and therefore offers
little appeal as a wife, her future lies between these walls. After our first
meeting, the family decreed that our names were too difficult to pronounce. In
a few seconds we were all re-baptized with more familiar names, bestowed with
much laughter,: Ali, Mohammed, and so on.
Aisha is this evening’s entertainment coordinator, using the fluent Spanish she
learned in school. After receiving our new names, the next activity is to decorate
ourselves with henna, the natural colorant. Women wear it on their hands and feet,
men on their shoulders. It is applied in a paste along a line drawn on the skin,
or outlines are laid on the skin and filled in. The little man of the house is
Amhed, thirteen, with an extraordinarily mature gaze. Since he first met us, he
has became our shadow and hasn’t lost sight of us even for a minute. He is obviously
already accustomed to responsibility.“When I’m big, I want to be a doctor so I can help my people,” he announces,
puffed with pride. “I’ll go to Algeria or Cuba to study and then come back to
cure anyone who needs it.” He clearly believes what he says. Mohammed, 23, recently
returned from Havana, where the government sponsored his studies. He was thirteen
when he left. He has come to visit with Fatma, with whom he is related, as is
virtually everyone here in Auserd. He wears a slightly lost expression, but you
can see that he’s proud to be surrounded by a crowd of children and babies who
hang on his every word, asking him to tell the story of ten years of his life
in a few minutes. Amhed stares at him, enraptured, as though looking at himself
a few years in the future.
Here, there is no work for a man: either he manages to study abroad thanks to
an international program, or he devotes himself to commerce, on which you can
barely get by. The only hope is to work for the government, but that’s a privilege
reserved for very few. Visitors are coming and going from the house at a dizzying
pace, but there is little time for greetings because Aisha, as spirited as any
other teenage girl in the world, has already attached two cables to an old car
battery in a mysterious way that manages to power an ancient radio. A faded cassette
goes in, and before we know it we’re in the middle of an impassioned dance.
Saharawi women dance covered with a veil, but their movements are breathtakingly
graceful and light. These young people want to have fun, and whenever talk turns
to war, they participate and speak their minds, but it’s obvious they can’t wait
to get back to their lives. Fatma, on the other hand, grows somber, with a veil
of sadness in her eyes. The war has taken too much away from her for her to forget
so quickly.
It’s the same for Mustafà, one of the old men in the camp. He is always seated
outside the provincial government’s seat, an old building that houses the Polisario
Front’s offices. “I have been living here thirty years, but I was born in the
Western Sahara. I was a nomadic shepherd. I had many camels, but I had to leave
them behind to save my life. They were left back there when the Moroccans came,
I couldn’t bring them with me. Many men, women, and children died crossing the
desert; I couldn’t worry about the animals. We came all this way on foot.”
“The march lasted twelve days, night and day, especially at night so we couldn’t
be seen. I was sixty when I arrived here. Now I’m ninety. The Moroccan soldiers
chased us, bombarding us. It’s impossible to tell everything we’ve been through:
mothers holding babies, their few possessions loaded onto goats, no clothes,
no food or water. We were very tired. Everything was bad then. I was a member
of the Polisario Front. I was a soldier,” he says, staring proudly off into the
distance, as though it awakes his memory to look at his old comrade from that
ancient journey: the desert.“We had to build walled houses because of the situation. They’re warmer in the
winter. But I prefer our tents, I have always lived in a tent. For thirty years
our traditions have remained the same; nothing has changed, despite the situation.
Nothing will change until we can go back home. I have never lost hope of going
back home, “ he says with surprising determination.
We are still wandering around the refugee camp when Amhed, our shadow, alerts
us that dinner is ready. As usual, we will not dine with them tonight. It’s a
tradition, they say, but the anguish of knowing that they will wait to eat our
leftovers shuts down our stomachs. The war takes away everything: hopes and dreams.
The Saharawi have not surrendered. They keep on fighting with life, waiting for
a better one, perhaps in their very own homes. When we departed, Mustafà was still
in his place, looking out at the desert.
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