AUSTRALIA

During the first three years of our stay in Australia I gave birth to two beautiful children, Yasmin and Azzam. Yasmin was born thirteen months before Azzam. I took leave from my teaching position and looked after my family.
When I first got to know Fawaz in Greece I felt he was an old soul and that we had already shared time together, maybe in another life. I once asked him before I decided to marry him about his finances and why he hadn't saved any money after living and working overseas for twelve years. The answer he gave me touched a deep part of my soul and I knew he would be a caring and loyal partner. His earnings were accumulated and used to support his family of twelve siblings and his beloved invalid father whom he adored. He had lived a spartan life in Greece, no smoking or alcohol and he was the eldest of thirteen children and he felt a big responsibility towards them. Fawaz managed to set one brother up in a carpentary shop and pay his father's private hospital fees for a year after a horrific motor accident had taken the use of his legs. He paid for land and built two rooms for his family which meant they could leave their one room mud brick rented accommodation. Writing poetry was his first love and he had previously published his poems in Russian and Lithuanian. He was world travelled, having worked on ships and visiting most of the worlds continents.
Sometimes I felt we were brought together in this life to complete unfinished business because trouble seemed to follow us wherever we moved. Suffice to say, we decided to try our luck and a chance at real happiness in his home country of Syria. On our first trip to Syria we stayed for nine months then returned to Australia.
Six months later in the year 1989 we left for the last time intending to live and raise our children in his homeland.
The trip to the airport and the flight overseas was the most gut wrenching experience I had ever experienced. You see, my family and Fawaz were never to see eye to eye. There was a lot of ill will between them. I felt so overwhelmed with sadness during those years that I actually fell into a deep depression.
I was torn between my love and duty to Fawaz, isolation from my family and the yearning to be a part of their life.
Fawaz had an extremely persuasive and deep emotional control over me. I was vulnerable and believed him when he said we had to leave Australia without my family knowing. He was by that time my whole world, the father of my children, my only friend and confidant. I saw my family in the wrong for isolating me because of their intense dislike of my husband. I was told I was always welcome to visit them but it was given with an emphasis on the "I."
On the morning of our departure I wrote a letter to my mother and posted it at the airport. Part of my heart was sealed with that letter.
I told her how much I loved her and the family and was so sorry to leave without goodbye. The previous Sunday I had arranged an afternoon at my sister's home and my sisters, mother and I spent the last day together, unbeknownst to them, for many years. I cuddled each of them and didn't want to let them go.
Whilst sitting in the plane and listening to the song Memories from the musical Cats I managed to finally cry and the tears streamed their way down my cheeks landing on my heart, which in turn caught them and held them, giving me strength for the years that followed.

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