The Saudi Swan

She caught my attention from the very beginning.

The way she prayed left me mesmerized.

While we would finish our prayers hurridly as if we had something so urgent to do, she would take her

 time praying dedicatedly.  

And while we killed the time chatting away aimlessly, she would take out her Quraán and start reading

oblivious to the noises surrounding her.

She had negative opinions regading men, as most of us, but her views were to the extreme sometimes.

She would tell us not to listen to love songs as they promote unrealistic love among the young.

“Don’t you ever believe this crap. This love doesn’t exist.”

“Romance has disappearead from my life,” she would add sometimes laughingly, especially when she

heard us talking about marriage.    

As days went by, her story began to unravel.

I discovered that she’s divorced with no children.

She won her divorce after a long battle and after she had suffered severely from an ungrateful husband.

That was a tough time for her especially that it coincided with her mom’s death.

She lost a lot during that battle.

But something remaind exceptionally strong in her.

It was her spirit.

She went on her life with her head up.

“I deserve something better,” she would say to herself.

She made use of the free time she had at hand then and started studying diligintly to get her PhD, which

she earned two years after her divorce.

But more important was her relationship with God which underwent a great transformation.

And instead of complaining nonstop to people like many other women, she would confide

her sorrows and disappointments to God.

She started praying devotedly to him, reading Quraán and saying supplications. 

 After a while, I noticed some change in her.

She seemed to me happier than usual.

That was when I knew that she was getting married again.

But this time to a man much better than her ex-husband.

Just like her, he was divorced and a PhD holder.

Moreover, he holds a prestigious position there in the West.

When I asked her about the news, she confirmed them with a big smile.

She added beamingly:”They deceived me into marrying again.”

During the months that followed she was extremely happy packing up her belongings to join up her 

husband.    

 On her last day in our college we threw a big party for her. She was so happy that day as if she had

buried behind her all that was painful in her life and was taking her first step into a totally new

world. And for a moment, I felt that she was non-human with wings flying far away into her own

  worlds. 

It’s true that She left Saudi Arabia for ever but she left behind a great lesson. A lesson of patience,

resorting to God and making the best of what we have.

I really wish her the best in her new life.