Egyptian Rafah

As I sat in the car to go to the family home where I would spend the night, I felt so tired and dejected that I was on the verge of tears. That soon passed, however, when I reached the house and met the family who welcomed me in. There was no electricity, and the house was so cold that I could see my breath, but the welcome was warm.

I was met by two girls, half-sisters, Nivene (another Nivene!) aged 18 and Azza aged 22. I quickly discovered that Nivene had just become engaged to my driver, who is her cousin. The girls happily showed me photographs and videos of the engagement party, which happened a week before. As is the style, they had worn heavy make-up, with dramatically painted eyes, and elaborate, bejewelled, full-length dresses. The studio photos were superimposed onto various backgrounds with random phrases in English, such as 'Star Acadmy' . They reminded me of the formal photographs which are so common in Cambodia.

Azza, a sweet and quiet divorcée, took me under her wing and into her confidence, telling me freely about the hardships she has faced in her young life. She asked if I was hungry and, not wanting to be a burden, I said that I was not, although I had eaten nothing but biscuits and crisps all day. She disregarded my answer and, leaving me in the guest living room huddled under a blanket, she got to work in the kitchen. She came back shortly with a large silver tray laden with many small dishes. She had prepared bowls of sliced cucumber and tomatoes, olives, yoghurt, scrambled egg, handcut chips, and handmade falafel and bread. It was a feast.

Having eaten, we joined the rest of the family in the family living room. They were sitting on the typical mattresses that line the walls in most homes and watching television together, as the electricity had returned after nightfall. I underwent quite a grilling from the father of the household about the car accident that morning, made rather awkward by the fact that the driver, his daughter's new fiance, was sitting there. I pled ignorance as I had been sleeping when it happened.

The youngest son, Abut, aged three, their pride, ventured out of one of the bedrooms wearing a resistance balaclava and took great pleasure in repeatedly pretending to shoot me with a comb. The fact that I would obligingly pretend to die every time gave him great pleasure. After a time, another son of about 14 disappeared momentarily and then returned carrying a real automatic rifle. It was passed around a few times, before my driver took it and began to take it apart to clean it.

By now, we had been joined by some more family members, including a gorgeous little boy named Mohaned, who instantly won me over with his cheeky grin. He was the same height as Abut, but seemed much older, so I asked his age and he told me he was six. I said he was a big man, to which he responded, 'Yes, I'm a big man. I even work in the tunnels.' Whether this is true or not, I cannot say.

Azza and I spent the rest of the evening visiting with her relatives in the house next door. On the top floor of the building, four adults and around fifteen children were crowded into a room with bare concrete walls and a corrugated iron roof. They were gathered around a small fire, which they had lit in a tin container.

They welcomed me in and offered me coffee and sunflower seeds, borrowing my phone to make calls, and asking me many inquisitive questions about my life, work, marital status. Upon hearing I was unmarried, one of the men promptly informed me that he was looking for a second wife and asked if I might be interested. I politely declined. He was a kind man, however. When he discovered how long I had been working in human rights, with very little compensation, his facial expression changed quickly from one of initial confusion to one of comprehension. 'Ah', he said, 'I understand. You are working for Allah. Your work is in the name of Allah.'

It was interesting to hear a little of what their lives are like, living so close to the border with Gaza. Living in the Egyptian part of Rafah, they are separated from the rest of the town in Gaza. Though many people on the Egyptian side suffer much the same economic hardship, the landscape is noticeably greener and more developed. I could sense that there is a strong affinity, particularly as some members of the family live in Gaza. They spoke just as passionately about the occupation, resistance, and the war in November as people I have spoken to in Gaza. The lives of the two communities remain connected, mainly by the tunnels. Even the mobile phone network in operation is Jawwal, the Gaza network.

By 9pm, I was exhausted and had well and truly used up all of my Arabic. After a shorter visit with another family, I climbed into the bed that I would share with Azza. Nivene would sleep on a mattress on the floor. The bed and pillow were both rock-hard, but I was so tired that I didn't mind at all. I slept well, though I was awoken a few times during the night by the low whispers of a voice speaking on the phone . . .

The next day, I waited many hours to be collected and brought to the border. Regular phone calls updated me on the situation. In the meantime, I sat in the sunshine, watching the children play hopscotch, marbles, and the inevitable war games. They had fashioned trenches from carpets and wooden crates. When I took my camera out, the fifteen or so kids clamoured to be photographed, the boys mostly posing with pieces of wood, hammered with nails to resemble guns, and fighting over the one plastic rifle they shared. This is my favourite photograph, of a gentle and happy young boy who I had played marbles with the night before. I like that one of the older girls from his family is standing in the doorway, observing.

I was called into the house for lunch, which was one of my favourite dishes, maftuul. Azza, Nivene, and Nivene's mother had prepared two enormous platters of a cous-cous-type grain, loaded with chicken, and accompanied by bowls of broth and a spicy sauce made with finely sliced green chilli peppers. One platter was set out in the living room for the men, and I sat in the kitchen with the women to eat from the other. Everyone takes a spoon and digs in. The women kept piling up the food in front of me, and I was very full by the time they allowed me to stop eating.

After lunch, I returned to the yard, as it was slightly warmer outside than indoors. By this time, all the adults in the family, and some neighbours, had gathered around to sit in the sunshine. One father had to repeatedly reprimand his toddler son, who kept picking up the hens that clucked around the yard by the wings. Another of the boys used a wooden crate, a stick, and some twine to make a trap in an effort to catch one, much to the amusement of the adults sitting around. I was touched by the sight of an older man, the grandfather of a baby girl, who was the only one who could stop her crying. He took her in his lap, where she sat calmly, and made sure to put socks on her tiny feet because of the cold.

Suddenly, the crack of a gun being fired sounded very close to me. Everyone started, then began to laugh as they saw that the 14-year-old had come out of the house brandishing the automatic rifle and begun firing it into the air. I was less amused. The boy in this photograph came and sat beside me, sucking on an empty bullet shell, a trophy recovered from the dirt.

Soon after this, I received a phone call to tell me that I would not be crossing into Gaza today, and that a car was on its way to collect me and bring me back to Cairo. Before I left, Azza generously gave me a present of a gift-set of deodorant, perfume, and shower gel, with a flowery scent. In turn, I gave her a box of Irish chocolates to share with the family. I was quite exhausted by the time the car arrived, so I slept for most of the 7-hour journey back to my other Nivene's house in Dokki. An eventful two days, to say the least!