She is not there anymore

In her cramped little kitchen, I learnt many secrets: how to stuff aubergine with nuts and chilli, how to steer the yoghurt on the stove until it boiled and how to repurpose the kitchen items and never throw anything away.

Despite my regular arguments with her about the amount of fat she sneaks into her dishes, I loved to eat at her place. The aroma of her cooking could be smelled three floors down her building and through the entrance in the middle of Al-Midan neighbourhood in the south of Damascus, where she lived her whole life.

On boring days, my grandmother would sit on the long couch that was covered with an arabesque blanket, and look from the living room’s window to observe the bustling life under her flat, and in hope to catch a peddler calling for some fruits or vegetables. She would rush to put a cover on her hair and pop her head out of the window, yelling to get the man’s attention. After a loud argument between them, the seller would come up carrying the requested amount of goods, and my grandmother would pass him the money from behind the apartment’s door. If he ignored her call from the window or didn’t hear her, she would get mad but forget all about it in minutes then start gazing at the buildings in front of her that stacked next to each other without a space to breathe.

“See the first window over there?” she would point out to a window in front of us. “A doctor lives there with his wife, who is a pharmacist and three boys. Over there on the second floor above them is a newlywed couple.”