Playing With The Queen Of Hearts

Playing with the queen of hearts
And knowing it ain't really smart
The joker ain't the only fool
Who'll do anything for you

And laying out another lie
And thinking 'bout a life of crime
If that's what I'll have to do
To keep me away from you

Playing with the queen of hearts
Playing with the queen of hearts
Playing with the queen of hearts
Playing with the queen of hearts

We always ate Egyptian at our house, especially Mahshy, stuffed grape leaves, eggplant, and peppers. As a Canadian kid, I hated it. It tasted so slimy and over cooked. I liked Pizza and McDonalds Instead. My family’s views on my eating habits were mixed. My father humored me by taking me to McDonalds at dinner time while my brothers and sisters reeled with disgust at him spoiling me. Mama made great food that everyone was raised on, why should I get special treatment. There was no doubt that I was the youngest spoiled first Canadian born kid to the family. In the absence of my father, Brother K once tried forcing me to eat liver under threat of a spanking, Brother R force fed me eggplant Mahshy by shoving it down my throat. I still don’t eat liver to this day, and can still remember Brother R’s fingers being shoved in my mouth, I gaged repeatedly both times. Some memories are more permanent than others.  

Sister L was the youngest of the sisters, she was fun, kind hearted, extremely loyal, and understanding. She humored me and took care of me like a young loving sister would. They tell me she had monthly birthdays for me until I was one. She made me special food all the time. She made homemade potato chips by slicing potatoes as thin as she could, then frying them in a pan. They were salt and pepper flavor, she tried salt and vinegar flavor too but they came out soggy. She would order vegetarian pizza for me and freeze the slices individually, then she would heat up a slice whenever I started whining for pizza. She was in city parades swirling her baton, she made the paper as a fashion model one time, and she was in track and field in high school. I remember her bouncing around the house singing along to juice Newton’s “Playing with the queen of hearts”.

With all of Sister H’s the mistakes and wrong marriages in mind, the focus was squarely on Sister L no not repeat there errors of the past. Sister L was under surveillance for any sign of trouble. One day she made the mistake of telling our mother that there was a cute guy she liked at school. This put her squarely in line for immediate Muslim marriage to avoid any additional trouble or dishonour she may create for us. Sister H worked at a hotel and met a bearded bespectacled religious Egyptian guy she thought was cute, his name was Ebrahim. He was interested in marriage to an Egyptian girl. Since Sister H was already married he agreed to meet Sister L. My father was in Egypt at the time, and out of fear of a straying daughter, my mother agreed to an engagement between sister L and this Muslim pious man without ever knowing who he was or anything meaningful about him. At the time, the fact that he was Muslim and Egyptian was more than enough qualification to give away her daughter and avoid any chance of dishonour. Sister L complied out of curiosity and loyalty and obedience to her family, she was 19. You see, western values are not the same as Arab values, they are quite different. In the west we value human life, freedom, and independence most of all. In the Arab world we value honour, loyalty, and dignity most of all. For an Arab, honour will trump human life, freedom, and independence every time, even if that means selling out your own daughter. So many daughters have been sold.

The engagement was supposed to be a getting to know you period to determine if they should move forward. As we got to know Ebrahim, we started seeing instability in his character, there was something wrong with him, we didn’t like him. My mother asked Sister L what she thought of the engagement, she responded with “I think I am in love”. Something still drove my mother to end the engagement, so she sent my brother in law Leon to break the news in the absence of my father and brothers. After all, he was one of the family now. He came back and told my mother that it was too late, Sister L was pregnant.

The news of the pregnancy sent my mother into frantic disaster recovery mode. She needed a wedding immediately and before Sister L started to show, otherwise the greatest shame would be all over us. So, without my father, she put on a big wedding, and invited the who’s who of the Egyptian community, including the Egyptian ambassador who actually came to the wedding. Bother O was the photographer. This great open celebration with everyone invited was my mother’s way to save us from wagging tongs and prove that nothing untoward had happened with my sister.  I wanted to sit with her at the head table, but was told children weren’t allowed. Other kids did end up sitting there and I was vexed at the injustice.

The wedding cake was the best wedding cake I ever had, it was pink and other colours I can’t remember. I am not sure if I was just particularly hungry or if it really was that good. There was lots of leftover cake though. Sister L it packed in her fridge at her new apartment with her new husband. She was only a bike ride away from home. I rode my bike there a number of times to get some more cake until one day she told me it spoiled and threw it all out. Her apartment was small, and she was a cute young wife. It was strange to see her playing house at a new home, I rationalized it by thinking I could go see her any time and I had a new place to hide out, watch movies, and be alone with Sister L.

Now that Sister L was married, she and Sister H became regular visitors to our home and our family dynamic expanded to different households, we were growing in Canada and our roots just got a little bit deeper.