Neighbors are a tricky thing; they live so close to you that they can see into the details of your life, screaming kids, arguments with your spouse and the weed tree on the fence line that needs to be removed! They know the worst side of you but also the best, when you pass out cookie/fruit plates around the holidays and give dollar bills to the kids on special occasions.
Reflections by Stephen Coats based on the memoirs of Nancy Coats
24.1976.Land Rover. Gassing
Realizing this closeness over time, I have resolved to strive for peace and good relations when at all possible. I don’t want to be miserable in my own house. After all Jesus did say, “Love your neighbor as yourself”. We play outside as often as we can with our Middle Eastern neighbors, including them in games of tag and sharing grilled meat as it comes off the backyard grill. And on some level I feel a sense of healthy obligation to honor and help our Yemeni neighbors especially as I can remember the days when they did that for me and my family back on the outskirts of Sana’a some 40 years ago. It must have been just as difficult for them to get to know and trust us as it was for us way back then.
Our first and most memorable neighbors were Mohamed and Fatima! At the beginning, it was awkward and foreign. They were right there when we moved in and would remain faithful neighbors for our entire stay in Sana’a. Mohamed was the “guard” that lived in a small house next to our home. He was always very helpful and could often be found singing and talking away! Sometimes too much for mom and dad’s liking. Mohamed helped dad with maintenance on our home, and made sure we had water in the tank. He had other jobs, too, at one point working on a rock truck. As neighbors, like or not, we shared so much—electricity, food, water. Mohamed would often help us communicate with our landlord Hizam. Early on, my mom gave Fatima and Mohamed a food basket for Christmas and we understood at that point we took a big step closer in the neighbor bonding process since they had “eaten our bread.”
Fatima and Bushara.
I remember learning my first Arabic words from Fatima, yelling “Ma Feesh Mokh!” when I made her mad, meaning, “you have no brains!” That phrase was often accompanied with a stone being thrown our way. But more useful was “Yallah, let’s go” anytime we were trying to leave the house. And when we asked someone if they could do something it was “Inshallah,” God Willing. I remember that Mom would go around our house labeling items with the Arabic words so we could learn them. Good thing she didn’t put a “Ma Feesh Mokh” sticker on my forehead!
The next step in “neighborliness” came with the freedom and trust to let us kids play with the neighbor kids outside together in the street by our home in big dirt piles. Soccer was, and is still, the equalizer of all humanity—some kids with a ball and a bunch of feet and there you go, a fun game for all. The standards for safety, fairness, sharing and discipline were something to worry about for a time but we all adjusted, learned, and got along because we had to, and then we wanted to.
By the end of our five years in Yemen, many of the suspicions and walls had come down for me and my family regarding our neighbors. By this time, my mom had helped in the delivery of Fatima’s baby girl, Jamilya, and had watched her grow with joy. They attended wedding parties together, and my mom would even take time to send Fatima a postcard from one of the many countries we would visit on our trips back and forth to the USA.
Mohamed and Jameila.
In my mom’s own words, as she wrote in one of her annual letters home to family, “I had a ‘hafla’ party this spring for the neighbor ladies. It was interesting to see them stuff their sharshifs with all the goodies from the party to take home. I have attended a Yemeni wedding, had my hands painted (with henna), which to them is a sign of joy… So feel I know my neighbors more and am getting better acquainted with their culture.”
After living in our home here in Dearborn for 14 years you would think we would have a good neighbor foundation. A history with our Middle Eastern friends with food plates getting passed endlessly back and forth. Though we have so much more we can do to be better neighbors, it gives me joy walk out the front door and watch my three kids playing tag in the front yard with the neighbor kids.
