Caledoniyya

While today’s PhotoHunt theme is Dark, the story accompanying this image is quite the opposite, and reaffirms the belief that miracles can, and do, occur.

The following image was captured at Qasr al-Azraq in Jordan, two years ago:

In the background is Sana, a Palestinian lady who assuaged my travel sickness for the duration of the desert tour with tales of utmost awe and tragedy.

In 1948 her family was compelled to flee Palestine, and while her father went to fight, her young mother fled to Egypt.

Despite clasping to the hope that her husband might one day find her and return, her hopes were dashed when she was informed that he had died in battle.

Inconsolable, she dedicated herself to raising her children and never re-married.

One day, several years later, she was sitting outside her house when a man rode past on a bicycle.

It was her husband.

Somehow, as is wont in wartime, the wrong identification had been given; yet fate ensured that on that day, in that town, in Egypt, at exactly that time, Sana’s father would ride past and be reunited with her mother.

While I have little doubt that my synopsis of the story does a vast disservice to the tragically beautiful manner in which Sana conveyed the tale, I believe this image reveals more than Sana.

The tale of Sana’s parents reaffirms the notion of hope and fate, and so too does it bring light into the darkness of life.