From Tales of Friends (1)

Osman Fadl Allah

We will not let it defeat us
The spirit within us will not die
Oh my dear friend... Yes, we have left there, as you know. We were not threatened in the literal sense.

We left since the first bullet was fired. I hate the smell of gunpowder and despise weapons. Even the khaki color gives me allergies. I cannot live without laughter, and this trilogy robs me of my dearest possession, which is laughter. I still wake up in the morning. I pray Fajr prayer and recite my daily portion of the Quran. I only modified my recitation from loud to silent because there is no spaciousness in the house where I reside for my voice to echo.

Here, O Osman, we live with four families in two rooms, two courtyards, a communal bathroom, and a shady neem tree. Yes, its me, my brother, my sisters husband who hosted us, and his friend. I wont tell you how many of us there are, fearing the evil eye. Would you believe, my dear rival, that the biggest lie I discovered is the narrowness of the house? This experience taught me that narrowness is in the souls, not in the physical spaces.

If its possible to thank the war, I would thank it for bringing peoples hearts closer. It brought families closer and created new families. I witnessed a love story unfolding passionately between my eldest daughter Haifa and Khaled, her cousin and a teacher at the schools of our new town. They hurried with their invitations to rush their wedding and celebrate it during the days of war. I imagine if Khaled had proposed to my spoiled daughter before the war, she would have definitely rejected him, but now the situation has changed.

I draw my oud during the day to sing for everyone, and the neighbors join us. We sing and experiment with new voices and melodies, and what surprises me is that they enjoy my voice. And when our throats get tired from singing, we turn to our mobile phones to listen to music from West Africa: Senegal, Chad, Nigeria, and even Mali, where the Kenyans have talented singers. And we relax when we hear the voice of Fatoumata Diawara. This is a gesture of gratitude because you introduced me to Fatoumatas voice coming from West Africa, so Im returning it to you with a voice from its East.

Life is beautiful here, enabling us to resist the face of brutal war.
Finally, I give you a journalistic scoop that I am seriously considering settling in my village, which I left as a boy and returned to as a man. I will not return to your Khartoum as a punishment for it, as it betrayed us or they betrayed it. I no longer care about who betrayed and who was betrayed among us.

With love.