Another Photo Diary

These pictures don't have any specific theme or anything. I just took some random pictures that don't really fit in with anything else so we'll just call this a photo diary. 

An All Grown Up Arabic notebook with the new Libyan flag on it as well as a very elegantly drawn black bald eagle.

This is a fruit stand that is near our house. That's my mom picking fruit. My mom actually hates this store because it has a little room you have to go inside to pay for your stuff. The room is insanely small and dark and stuffy and she is always afraid that the owner will close the door and lock her in. We call it 'the witch store'.

During Gadaffi's time in power, he made an effort to put public housing projects right in the middle of the high-class neighborhoods. These apartments were provided by the government. These are some of those apartment buildings on what is considered to be the highest-class street in Benghazi, Dubai Street. It's also in front of this great bakery so while my mom was getting bread I took this picture. 

My aunt gave me this perfume for my birthday. It's 'Miss Dolly Cherry' and it's obviously a really bad knockoff of 'Miss Dior Cherie.' I like how everything is just a little bit off in the name to let you know what it's supposed to be without giving you the illusion that it's the real thing. It reminds me of that episode of 30 Rock where Liz gets sick after eating too much chuckle burger in Stone Mountain, Georgia so Jack goes out and brings her 'Peppy Bismilk' for her stomach.

After about 4 months of no rain, it has been raining nonstop here. The roads flood. This is not bad at all compared to some of the places I've been. The weird things is, I don't ever remember taking this picture. Also, this makes it look like we drive on the right side of the road and we don't, although there are really no rules when it comes to the way Libyans drive. If traffic is really bad, people start driving on the sidewalk.

Thus begins the pictures of things I found at the mall. This is a man modeling a satin pajama set. He looks so relaxed and ready for his spotlight.

When I was in middle school, I bet you my mom would have totally done this to a pair of my jeans. When I bought shoes that my mom didn't think were good because of their color, I would come home from school to find my shoes spray painted. I still have a bunch of shirts with random button assortments on them to hide a stain or a mark that wouldn't go away.

At least she would never make this.

Driving by a protest calling for stability.

The same witch store, but this time you can see more of Libya.

A little cafe stand made to look like a Nutella jar. It's a secretly unwritten rule that it's for men only though. 

Yeah so I bet this is what you all thought living in Libya would look like. I couldn't believe it when I saw it because this is the first time, but here is dry desert land with a herd of camels eating. 

okay

I guess there comes a time in every foreign-kid-growing-up-in-America’s life when they are forced to confront their identity. I was and constantly still am always reminded of the fact that I am not and will never be, an American. I only lived there, grew up there, made friends and went to school there. I only spoke the language and I only for the most part, adopted the mindset. But I was not American, I was Libyan. With these constant reminders, I spent the entirety of my life accepting that fact. There was no use hiding it, I was who I was. My parents didn't belong to America and neither did I. If America wanted, they could have kicked us out at any moment, but Libya, Libya was where I belonged, where I would always be welcome.

From my short three month visits when I was younger, I never saw Libya as much. It was just a place where I reconnected with my family and when I say ‘reconnect’, I actually mean sit around a table with my family while my sisters and I exchanged awkward glances. Then the revolution happened and I was suddenly welcome to live in Libya more than ever. I was supposed to find it to be my home, as cheesy as that sounds. I had a citizenship and centuries of ancestors that could prove my background to be identical to those around me.

Once I got here, I was more confused than ever. Sure I got better at speaking the language and I slowly began to talk to my cousins instead of clinging to my sisters and whispering jokes in English. I even began to dress like them and caring about things that I never cared about before. I brought out tea and cookies on a silver tray with napkins folded just right to old women who were always somehow related to me. I practiced the customs and I did what I supposed to do in a sense, but after a while I just got so tired. Whenever people talk, I always find something to disagree with. I pretend like I actually did say something in response and make up the whole argument in my head, and by the time that I am done getting my fake last word in, my time to talk has passed. I don’t like a lot of the principles and the traditions that everyone here bases their entire lives upon. I don’t feel Libyan. I know I should and I know that being Libyan isn't’ all about the way that the few people I talk to live their lives. It isn't about a group of people’s disgust at something that I believe in. But for the most part, I can’t really identify myself as Libyan here.

It was so easy to say it in America. The second that someone made their two eyebrows one by furrowing them and asking, “so what are you?” the answer would already have already glided out of my mouth. When I’m here, the people notice that I don’t speak with the accent and they ask the exact same question, but this time, the answer doesn't come out so easily.

I don’t feel Libyan in the same sense that I never felt American. All I know is that I am still learning, but for now I will take comfort in the fact that the house that my mom grew up in is ten minutes away and the grave where my dad buried his own father is within walking distance. The fish market where my dad played soccer at age ten and the college where my mom studied are all here. I still don’t know what I am, but I’m doing okay. 

One of the teachers that my sisters were very close to, and one that I had the privilege of meeting a few times, had been shot and killed.
He was an American. He was shot for being American.