Love | zaidd'or

The Flight of Hope

As I am sitting on my bed here in London on a Sunday night. Expecting it to snow on a summer night from how cold it is outside. I realized that I needed to share an experience that I went through a few weeks ago that I still couldn’t get out of my mind.

After graduating from Milan I wanted to figure out what my next step in life had to be. I had to decide whether staying in Milan is the best viable option for me or is it moving back to the US or The Middle East, or even London, or Paris. So I took a few swift decisions. I booked a flight to Jordan to go see my family, I thought in the meanwhile I would go check out my opportunities in Dubai, and finally I enrolled for a summer course at Central Saint Martins in London.

Now the story begins when I boarded my flight from Dubai to Amman, I was heading to Amman to celebrate Eid with my family – celebrating the end of Ramadan. I had just boarded my flight and I sat on the window seat I asked for. It being a 3-3 airplane (6 seats on each aisle with 3 seats on each side). I realized the seat int he middle in between me and the man sitting on the isle seat was empty. When everyone had boarded the airplane, the flight attendant walked in an old lady, and sat her in that empty seat. We maneuvered to accommodate the old lady I assisted her in buckle her seatbelt as she settled in I went back to watching my movie, but I realized she had asked the man next to her to dial a number for her, over my earphones she I could hear her speaking to her soon and informing him to take good care of his wife, which she repeated 3 times. In those moments, the sun had set and people automatically pulled out their food to break their fast. Zoning back into my movie, I then saw man jump from behind and had a lady a sandwich and then a bottle of water. At that point I said to myself hell to the movie I need to get in and know what was going around me. I packed my iPad took my headphones off and decided to zone in onto the conversation that was going between her and the guy sitting on the aisle seat. I soon realized that the man behind me had asked her if she was fasting and she said “yes” so he automatically cut half of his sandwich and gave it to her, which she kindly denied, he also asked her if she wanted to have some water and that she gently accepted. Then as the conversation went on she informed him that she had just come to Dubai a few days ago and had lot consciousness due to her blood pressure. But due to her fall she had busted her lip, lost a tooth, and scratched her face. She had also informed him that she lives in New York and she was here to visit two of her children that lived in Dubai, and how they were busy with their own lives, and how she has no one else specially after her other son got shot due to some gang violence a few years back. And from how sad she was and her deep morning she had a stroke that affected her brain, and she can no longer see properly anymore. Registering all that I didn’t know what to do, here I was eavesdropping on someone else’s conversation, at the same time I couldn’t help but feel with the woman.

Throughout the flight people kept asking her left and right if she needed anything or any assistance. As soon as the flight landed they had made way for her and she was taken right away. I may never meet those people on the flight again but there was something that happened there that was somehow magical. No one cared about her past, or even who she was, everyone was there to help even if it was taking out of their own food and giving it to her after a long day of fasting. I sat there and wondered how our society was. Was that all for the sake of Ramadan, and then after that we turn into sharks? But I realized that no it has become an automatic instinct that we have because we were raised upon such morals. But its one of those instincts that you somehow brush away, because sadly in our modern society its either eat or be eaten.

I would love to think that the great majority still hold to such morals and ethics. I felt a great need to share this incident which took place around 2 weeks ago because I still can’t get it out of my mind or over it.

Theft and Suicide… A Day In Verona

A week ago a friend of a friend had just visited Milan and while we were having brunch on Saturday afternoon we decided that we should go to visit Verona that night and we would be back to Milan the next day at night. We tried calling car rental companies but none were answering or the prices were obscene -As we were sitting next to the Duomo – we went into one of the hotels there and asked if the know a car rental company. We found a car at a reasonable price, then the same hotel informed us they had another hotel in Verona and if we would like to book with them. We were given a great rate and we saw the pictures it looked like a good 4 star hotel. We hopped into the car an hour later and off we went. Driving on the way there we booked at a restaurant called Osteria la Fontanina. Our plan was to get to the hotel, change, and get to the hotel for our reservation. As soon as we arrived to the hotel we were surprised by how the hotel looked so different from the photos. We decided to suck it up and stay a night, after all it was just one night. We got changed, hoped into the car and off we went to Osteria la Fontanina. It was one of the best meals I have ever had I advise everyone thats going to Verona to go there. AFter the amazing dinner we decided to go back to the hotel early. As we were driving up to the hotel we saw a police car, we were worried as why would a police car be at the hotel at this time at night. We asked the officer he informed us that everything is ok there is nothing to worry about. Being assured by the officer we went up to our rooms, but we were astonished by the amount of people standing next to our rooms, walking faster to see whats going on we realized that it was the room right next to ours’. We asked what was going on and they informed us that they were robbed. All their money, bags, and jewelry were stolen. We didn’t even think about it for a second we didn’t even give them a reply we all sprinted into our rooms in order to check if our belongings were still there. Everything was ok thankfully. The next day three of us decided we want to head into town early to go sightseeing. Our fourth friend wanted to sleep in.
We spent the day in Verona visiting both Juliet and Romeo’s houses and seeing the town. While at Juliet’s house everyone was putting locks on her door and they say its a bad omen to put your name with someone you don’t love. I wanted to join the experience though! So I bought a lock and wrote “me, myself, and I”. The three of us were present and we love each other, so whats the bad omen about that? We then headed to Romeo’s house and I had to take a picture of the door. It was flooded with names of Arabs in love. After a few hours we decided to head back to Milan. But we needed to pass by the hotel to pick up our stuff. As we were going in we see fire trucks, an ambulance, and a police car in front of the hotel. We were surprised again saying what is it this time. It turns out a woman jumped of the ledge into the river in front of the hotel to commit suicide, it had a very fast current as it was raining all week.

Ps. The picture are uploaded in the order they were taken in. Click on the images to enlarge them.