Diary
(16) Thursday Market and Al-Awlaqiah!! Ahmed Seif Hashed
My memoirs.. from the details of my life
(16)
Thursday Market and Al-Awlaqiah!!
Ahmed Seif Hashed
When we were children in the village, we waited impatiently for Thursday, and if fates asked us to wish for what we desire and desire, we would ask her to make all our days a Thursday that does not stop and does not end..
We were overwhelmed with joy as soon as we went to the Thursday market.. We waited for it with longing and eagerness.. For us children, this market was like a festive bazaar or carnival.. Thursday is a bright and special day on weekdays.. If it wasn’t for this day, our days would have been mixed with their streaks.. Thursdays were crowns Our days, and their joyful intervals.. Our coming and going days are meaningless without Thursday.. Thursday is our beautiful space in which we see what we do not see or hear on the other days..
The roar and clamor characterized this place and this joyful day.. It is the place where people gather.. They flock to it from all sides.. They cross long distances, go through the hardships of the terrain, defy the boundaries of division, and meet in the Thursday market.. They greet each other with eagerness and longing. They talk to each other warmly.
The center of the market is crowded with its people, and its edges extend.. It is swarming with people and goods.. buying and selling and life swarming in it.. you hear the roar and murmurs of the market before you see it or reach it.. hustle and bustle and life and diligent activity.. they buy and buy.. they talk and giggle..
Some of them eat breakfast in the morning, some of them drink tea and coffee, and some of them eat lunch in the middle of the day.. There is a café for “Dawla” which is a tall white woman with a beautiful face and tattoos have increased in beauty and elegance.. The pandemic of extremism and puritanism has not yet reached our villages. At that time, the veil was not hit on the faces of women, and it was chastity, innocence and kindness that prevailed without outrage of modesty or being harassed, or the presence of something that spoils innocence and life..
In the Thursday market there was a café for “Rukeez” the kind smiling man, whom you feel familiarity, contentment and comfort when you see him.. what his hands made of food was delicious, and his coffee improves the quality and adjusts the mood.. and there is Hamid, the best of the poor and kind man, who sells cold water and sour lime ; In his melodious voice, he declares, “The Banhais, the Banhais.”
Many people in the market advertise and promote their goods, and sometimes the “Mutreb” climbs a high place in the market, and you hear announcements for mawlids and occasions or what matters to people in a general matter, and the announcement of events begins with “the present knows the absent..” All of these people have left, and today we found ourselves in the presence War, devastation, destruction and blood, among the scoundrels, thieves, criminals and corrupt people.. Oh my God, how beautiful those days were, and how good the people were..!
***
Thursdays were festive holidays for the children who went to the market.. But one of them for me was a day of anger and strife.. The crazy Ali Abdullah Naif, called “Al-Awlakiah” was famous among the children.. He was engulfed by a fit of tension and nervous convulsions.. A movement of emotion suddenly erupted in him. And there is a kind of aggression, and emptying a charge of tension and anger, accompanied by the uttering of swearing and insulting words, and the name “Al-Awlakiah” is evoked in it..
The truth is, we do not know what is the secret of this “Awlaqiyya” in the life of this “madman”!! And what does it have to do with it!! To be named after her!! “Al-Awlakiah” is the closed mystery in the life of this man who is afflicted with a psychological and nervous condition and a kind of “madness”.
I remembered this while reading Naguib Mahfouz’s story “Whisper of Madness”, which he wrote in the thirties of the last century, imitating the situation, in which he tries to answer the question of what is madness?! At the outset, he wrote: “It seems to be a state as mysterious as life and death, and you can tell a great deal about it if you look at it from the outside, but the interior, the essence, is a closed explanation.”
“Al-Majnun” Awlakiah was an obsession with anxiety and fear for the children in the market.. They were terrified of him when they saw him.. and sometimes he would attack and chase them, without reason, especially if he was in a state, attacking and hitting whoever he found in front of him from the children, and continuing his walk without being reproached. no one cares..
Sometimes he was stoned, and he made trespassing movements, which would bring panic and fear to children, and sometimes adults would object to him, shouting at him: “Without madness, you have afflicted the ignorant.” I don’t really know why he does this?! Why is this “madness” aggressive towards children?! Were children ever assaulted, harmed, or provocative?!! I do not know!
And with this “crazy”, I had a story… I don’t know how old I was at the time when I was surprised when he broke the crowd in the market, and hit my head against the back of my head with a strong blow… I don’t know how a “crazy” fit of anger caught me… I fought with him, and the madman was asking Some people intervene to end the fight, and he asks them: Whose son is this madman?!! As the children surrounded us, they watched what was happening.
People intervened and broke up the fight.. It seemed to me that madness works with madness.. I remembered this years ago, and I clashed with some madmen, but I discovered recently that you should not waste much of your time with madmen, or it is okay to fight with them, without Stop looking for those who stand behind them, and their supporters.. If you find them against you, these bastards deserve madness, and even the results, no matter how great and great they are for you, have their merit and some duty to perform..
Al-Awlakiah began to ask about my father, and when they told him, and he was known in the market, he complained to me and said to him:
– You have a crazy son.. Look what your son did to me! ..
He was showing my father his cut shirt, fingernails and scribbling on his hands and some parts of his body! .. However, the children present, including Yassin Abdel Wahhab, helped me with a testimony in my favor, and they testified that “Al-Awlakiah” was the one who started slapping me in the head, and with that testimony, I escaped punishment He was harsh and was waiting for me from my father who was accustomed to strictness and strictness.. From that day on, it was said that Awlakih had stopped being aggressive towards children..
Al-Awlakiah passed away a few years ago, and it was said that he recovered from his psychological state before he died.. but his other illnesses did not give him much time.. I haven’t seen him for a long time.. he left life quietly.. God’s mercy covers him..
***
The innocence in those days was overwhelming, and the freedom of women was greater, and the blackness over women we can only see in the beautiful “Thabit” dress before Wahhabism and the extremist Salafi ideas that came from outside Yemen in the early eighties..
I still remember the words of my aunt “Sunbulah” Umm Abdo Farid with one of the marketers of extremism and puritanism in our villages in those days, as soon as he was trying to greet her with the tip of his fingers, wrapping her with a piece of cloth, the ends of which were folded on the side of his hands and turned on his back from behind..
And she said to him:
– Until yesterday, my son, and you pissed on me.. I used to “piss you off” and “put you down” and today you don’t want to greet me except by force.. I am like your mother.. Where did you come from this religion?!!
It was a harsh protest against this ingratitude and the superficial behavior that this young boy showed against a woman of the age and stature of his mother.. But this ingratitude was done in the name of religion, and they assassinated the innocence and kindness that prevailed..
***
Continued..
The image is of the remains of the ruins of the Thursday market, which faded away or became a trail after an eye..
The photo was taken from one of the Facebook pages, the sons of Al-Qubeta, I no longer remember the exact name of the source
Ahmed Seif Hashed’s Facebook page
