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by Saeed Al-Mehairbi |
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ISALC, Lewis and Clark College
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by Saeed Al-Mehairbi |
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My family and I used to spend our vacation on our farm in Liwa Oasis, which is two hours from the city of Abu Dhabi, in my country, the United Arab Emirates. It is really a nice place. We prefer to spend our vacation there because life is very simple and calm. For example, it is not modernized like other cities; the greenness of farms spreads all over the land. Therefore, many people in my country like to spend their vacation in this same place. In Liwa Oasis, I spent most of my childhood, so I have many beautiful memories of my family and friends there. However, I won't ever forget that day when my family's car engine blew when I was driving alone around the sand dunes. It was a great lesson for me and I keep this incident in mind even today.
On a very hot summer day, I was sitting home on the farm, and I was getting bored. Really, there was nothing new to do. Usually, my father fed and milked the camels, while my sister helped my mother in the kitchen, cooking the food. My brother and I sometimes went hunting. On that day, my family was gone, walking outside. I started walking among the beautiful trees, observing the butterflies flying from one place to another and listening to the birds twittering around me. The sun was shining while blue sky prevailed. It was a nice day, but I got bored, and I wanted to do something exciting. While I was walking, I observed the family car keys and the cell phone hanging on the tree where they were always kept. After a while, this idea came to my mind to go wheeling around the sand dunes. It was just 30 minutes away and I drove away towards the desert. Suddenly, I remembered my father had told me not to drive the car because it was overheating, but I didn't pay attention to that and I kept driving. It is really interesting to drive in the desert, where there is no traffic light or police man to give you a ticket. Therefore, you feel freer to drive. While driving I remembered the racers who ascend the sand dunes in their cars, so I tried to do the same thing. When I tried to do that, the engine blew, so I couldn't drive anymore.
At that time, I really felt lonely when I was sitting on the sand dunes waiting for help. Therefore, I was confused and I didn't know what to do. I wished I had brought the cell phone. It started getting dark and I started getting afraid, not because of the dark, but because of many dangerous animals that move in the dark. It is really a dangerous place because someone might lose his or her life by one bite from venomous animals, like snakes. While I was looking at the moon and stars, I remembered when my father had told me about the scorpion that bit me in my eye when I was a child, and at that time there we no doctor around, so I had to be driven an hour to reach the hospital. I would have lost my eye if the doctor hadn't helped me at the right time. Now, was starting to get cold. Also, I had nothing to do other than count the time. I was thinking how I would face my father with this mistake and how he might punish me.
After a while, I observed a car approaching me. It was my father's car. After his arrival, I felt both relieved and afraid at the same time. I started sweating. When he got out of the car, he was gazing at me with an angry face. I thought he was going to hit me, but he didn't. We were silent for a few moments. "Are you OK?" my father asked with a touch of irony in this voice. I nodded my head. After that he told me to get in the car. I was surprised at that time that he didn't do anything to me, but I was quite sure that he just wamted to give me a rest until the next day.
In the morning, my mother told me that my father wanted me in his room. I knocked on the door. "Come in," said my father. I entered the room with my eyes looking down. "You know that you did something wrong yesterday and you exposed yourself to danger, is that right?" I was looking down with a shamed face. "Can you tell me who would have helped you if I had not come?" It was the most embarrassing moment in my life, when I was listening to those questions without answering them. Now I know that I did something wrong, so I know why my father was reprimanding me. And I learned that a person must be cautious to avoid danger. It was a very useful experience for me. We should know that listening to our elders my save our life.
Created by: krauss@lclark.edu
Updated: 9/24/99