My family started to settle in Canada, and Canada started to settle in us. Western music and disco were regular features in our home. Sister L would impress us with her latest dance moves, the older brothers grew sideburns, my mother fell in love with department store shopping. Everyone was so proud of how western they had become and showed off their latest know how and knowledge of western culture. Eventually, Brother K and Brother O disappeared to university in Hamilton, Sister H disappeared too and the number of people living in our home shrunk. This gave Brother R lots of freedom to terrorize me. He would tickle me almost to the point of suffocation. My father would come home, hear my distress and would scream at the top of his lungs for the tickling to stop. Brother R would give me bike rides by letting me sit in front of him on his 10 speed bicycle. He would then go down steep hills and laugh at my terror, then he would veer into on coming traffic to terrorize me even more. I looked up to him and my innocence always betrayed me. To me he was my youngest, coolest and hippest brother. He worked at the local outdoor pool as a lifeguard. His uniform showed his muscular physique, a fitted yellow blue trimmed t-shirt that was stamped with the city of Ottawa logo. He knew girls and they enjoyed him and his humor. He also played basketball and we went to one of his games. I fell asleep through the whole thing, but just being there was impressive. He worked hard at integrating. He would always try to stick out his lower lip and let it hang low as to identify with his view of African Americans, which drove my father crazy. On winter days, he and his friend Gary would grab me and throw me into snow banks that would engulf me completely. He also had a fearsome temper. One day, he and sister L had a fight over who would give me a bath, he grabbed her and shoved her into the wall, breaking the through it. We never fixed that large gaping hole in our drywall. Another day, he was arguing with our father and punched a fist sized hole into another wall. We never fixed that wall either. Like the holes in our walls, fractures in our family unit started to appear.
One night I was playing by our front screen door and in the dark outside I suddenly saw a familiar face. It was loving Sister H holding one finger to her lips hushing me so she could surprise my parents. Looking out further into the street I realized she had a sharply dressed blondish good looking white man with her, he was getting something from a big brown car. He looked very Canadian, the kind that was proper, educated, law abiding, successful, taxpaying, Christian, police man type. The surprise was her re-entry into our lives. I was so young, I never realized she was gone or for how long. Later I learnt what really happened.
One day, Sister H ran to Brother K and said "help me, help me please". He looked out our second story window and found several police cars in front of our home. He asked her "what have you done?". The police came into our home and explained to my Muslim Egyptian father that his oldest and dearest daughter, the apple of his eye married a Christian Canadian and they were there to escort her and her belongings out of the house without incident in spite of any objection he may have. This was Canada and she was free do do what she pleased. My father lost it, he screamed "this is adultery, send us back to Egypt" he then fainted. An ambulance was called, he ended up in the hospital and Sister H was cutoff and exiled from the family. She and her new husband were welcomed back after some time with the condition that this new husband convert to Islam. He pretended he did. She later divorced that man and continued living independently and away from us until that night she came back and introduced us to her second husband and my beloved brother in law Leon. There was much negotiation behind welcoming this second husband, including Leon stating that there is no God but Allah and Mohammed is his profit in Arabic. The official story in Egypt was that Sister H married a Canadian who converted to Islam who renamed himself Assad which means lion in Arabic which is close to Leon. It all makes sense. This was the beginning of the lies we would have to tell to pacify our family back home, otherwise, they would never understand. We loved them and they loved us so dearly. We did not want to disappoint them with things they could never understand.
As this new marriage was normalized, Sister H and Leon would come over often, he would sit me next to him and ask me to translate everything that was being said and I did. Leon also came over every weekend sometimes with Sister H and sometimes without. He came for me, to take me out to Canadian activities which I loved. He was the only one who ever too me out. The activities included, horse back riding, the amusement park, the circus, to the mall to see the Incredible Hulk and Spiderman. We would skate the Rideau Canal together, when I got tired he would drag me behind him with his hands behind his back, then I would get hot chocolate and fudge. He would sometimes take me to an open parking lot, sit me in his lap and let me drive his big brown car. At the end of afternoon activities we would go to a subway shop called Fat Albert. I never went home hungry. He would give me a menu and ask me what I wanted to eat. Every choice I made was countered with "too bad, that's pork, try again" after some trial and error he would laugh and say you are having turkey.
One night I was playing by our front screen door and in the dark outside I suddenly saw a familiar face. It was loving Sister H holding one finger to her lips hushing me so she could surprise my parents. Looking out further into the street I realized she had a sharply dressed blondish good looking white man with her, he was getting something from a big brown car. He looked very Canadian, the kind that was proper, educated, law abiding, successful, taxpaying, Christian, police man type. The surprise was her re-entry into our lives. I was so young, I never realized she was gone or for how long. Later I learnt what really happened.
One day, Sister H ran to Brother K and said "help me, help me please". He looked out our second story window and found several police cars in front of our home. He asked her "what have you done?". The police came into our home and explained to my Muslim Egyptian father that his oldest and dearest daughter, the apple of his eye married a Christian Canadian and they were there to escort her and her belongings out of the house without incident in spite of any objection he may have. This was Canada and she was free do do what she pleased. My father lost it, he screamed "this is adultery, send us back to Egypt" he then fainted. An ambulance was called, he ended up in the hospital and Sister H was cutoff and exiled from the family. She and her new husband were welcomed back after some time with the condition that this new husband convert to Islam. He pretended he did. She later divorced that man and continued living independently and away from us until that night she came back and introduced us to her second husband and my beloved brother in law Leon. There was much negotiation behind welcoming this second husband, including Leon stating that there is no God but Allah and Mohammed is his profit in Arabic. The official story in Egypt was that Sister H married a Canadian who converted to Islam who renamed himself Assad which means lion in Arabic which is close to Leon. It all makes sense. This was the beginning of the lies we would have to tell to pacify our family back home, otherwise, they would never understand. We loved them and they loved us so dearly. We did not want to disappoint them with things they could never understand.
As this new marriage was normalized, Sister H and Leon would come over often, he would sit me next to him and ask me to translate everything that was being said and I did. Leon also came over every weekend sometimes with Sister H and sometimes without. He came for me, to take me out to Canadian activities which I loved. He was the only one who ever too me out. The activities included, horse back riding, the amusement park, the circus, to the mall to see the Incredible Hulk and Spiderman. We would skate the Rideau Canal together, when I got tired he would drag me behind him with his hands behind his back, then I would get hot chocolate and fudge. He would sometimes take me to an open parking lot, sit me in his lap and let me drive his big brown car. At the end of afternoon activities we would go to a subway shop called Fat Albert. I never went home hungry. He would give me a menu and ask me what I wanted to eat. Every choice I made was countered with "too bad, that's pork, try again" after some trial and error he would laugh and say you are having turkey.
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