Chapter 18 "Window Views"

May enjoyed “people watching” during breaks from learning Arabic. She sat in her sturdy, brown chair, in McCaine’s room and peered out the soiled, paint speckled, window. She peeked through the barbwire fence that stood two feet high, unevenly concreted into the brick wall. The breeze permitted a dusty, light orange bag to wave to its’ companions who were attached to the rusty yellow tractor, that sat peacefully among four filth covered iron beds, amidst the dirt field.

May was not sure if the family below hung their sheets and their small articles of clothing on the tractor to air out or to dry from their submission to the rain the night before. A rug, covered by the same amount of dirt that lay beneath it, sat draped over the hot pink, broken slide that leaned on the metal frame beds. The sounds of amjads and rickshaws penetrated McCaine’s room through her newly painted white frame window.

May gazed out the window for an hour wondering the character each person acted in life as they walked by that warm afternoon in June. She imagined the man dressed in a white jalabia, carefully walking through the trash lined paths, to be a local store owner or an amjad driver who had taken the day off from work. She wondered if the woman whose dangling earrings, gold wrist ringlets, and clean healed shoes, was on her way to visit friends or to buy baby food from the local pharmacy for her child at home.

She could not imagine why some men wore blue jeans and long sleeves shirts as they walked down the road in the 120 degree heat and she found the men wearing hats rather bizarre. May noticed a man riding an old fashioned bicycle. The small mango filled box attached to his seat swayed as his feet pushed the pedals forward. A donkey driven, flat carriage, passed as its’ owner whipped its’ pelt in an attempt to motivate it to a faster speed. A woman, carrying a baby who swung from right to left mirroring the stride of her feet treading the sand, stopped to fix her rustled auburn tobe.

May noticed dozens of people solemnly marching in the direction of the giant oval mouth that sat atop the local mosque. The voice was a small murmur but could still be heard in the blue room a half mile away. She watched local business owners and random commuters alike begin their zombie-like shuffle towards the giant msqe. It was the second call to wrshp that day.