Jawhara Ahmed Al-Jundi

- I Became a Creative Writer -

What does creative writing mean to me? It is one of my biggest accomplishments as I became more capable of using my imagination and creating characters that speak to reality. I was not aware that this talent was buried inside of me. It never had the chance to grow and prosper. Now, my talent has broken free and has become an essential part of my everyday life. I, now, wake up in the morning with events to put into order in my imagination. I have become a person who precisely knows her life goals. I have become a fruitful tree after a very long autumn.

I met friends who became family. We open up and listen to each other about war events that destroyed us before destroying our houses. We speak about faces that disappeared from our life scenarios. I speak about my own tragedies and private wars that I lived within the bigger war. I speak about my three birds that have no support but me, I have become their mother and father with nobody to support me after all the betrayal I was faced with by the one I thought was my backbone.

I was shaking in the wind of agony. Since I was a little girl, pain has been my most permanent companion. All my rights are pushed to the margins of life. Nothing shares my bed with me but my pain.

After all this injustice, I put my pieces together. I am learning how to write, how to create and draw my life path while also working to make my birds’ lives better. I pray to God for the strength to keep going.

- My Friend’s Story -
A Short Story from An Interview

My friend’s story is very sad and painful. Her dream was for her to be able to take care of herself and her little child who lives with her without having to need anyone’s help. She was a very enduring person despite her illness that eventually drained her and had her hospitalized. With all what she was dealing with, my friend ended up going into a coma. Her husband turned his back on her and married another woman at the time my friend needed him the most.

She still faced everything with patience and she remains standing firmly up until this day. She is a mother of two. The youngest is with her while she has been denied the oldest by her husband for five years so far. How hard is it to be abandoned during illness in this way? He called her “disobedient” and unfit to be a wife. How can a woman be “disobedient” when she is fighting illness on a hospital bed?

I always pray to God that she finds patience and strength until she is reunited with her son.

Corresponding Thoughts to the Story Collection Titled “Blouza: The Blouse” by Reem Mohajed

The war brought the unexpected. We have been plagued with displacement. We forcibly left all our valuables behind. What a gap between where we used to be and where we are today. We used to live one day at the time with the least thought of the future. Now we fear tomorrow more than anything. What will we eat? What will we drink? On the other bank of the river, there are people who set the fire of war and made looting and theft the fuel for more to come.

Is there any hope for us to go back to our cities where we were raised and where we loved most of our lives? More importantly, will we have our valuables back? Will we find them where we left them?

- On 19 Days of Creative Writing -
Thoughts on the 19th Day of Creative Writing

On the first day of this training, I had a lot of fear and anxiety, for I have never done this in my life before. On the second day, I felt desperate. On the third, I felt that everything was beyond difficult. However, on the fourth day, what felt like tight knots came to untangle. As the days passed, fear and anxiety began to go away and I discovered that I am an extremely powerful strong talented woman.

Creative writing has improved my reading and writing skills. As time passed, I created characters with my friends. I fell in love with the characters we created and began to build their details day by day.

I built skills, reached my goals and met young friends who brought my youth back to me. I cannot picture my life without them any longer. It scares me to think of us going separate ways. My beautiful teacher, Sarah, I love you.

- Six Images from Memory -
Thoughts that Followed a Walk in the Neighborhood

When I went out today at 5:00 I saw:

  1. An ATM that reminded me of how we used to be before the war. How we used to be, and how we have been denied so much later.

  2. I saw a restaurant that seemed as if it used to be a house. I felt hungry and wished I lived there. My thoughts wandered further and I began to remember the houses we lived our childhood in. That house/restaurant looks a lot like them.

  3. I saw a children’s rights organization. I felt happy it existed despite all the children who have been denied their rights especially those pushed to beg on the streets.

  4. I saw an international school. I admired its massive architecture. I am sure that not everyone can study in this school. This school is not for those who have very little in their hands.

  5. I saw a big fence. I think it belongs to a factory. I did not ask to make sure.

  6. I saw a street full of car repair shops and car sales. I felt that the streets were full of too many cars.

This exercise made me dig into a memory of mine that I thought I have lost a long time ago.