Happy New Year!

Another year has passed. I'm still in Florida with my mother, but my husband sent me this beautiful picture of the sunset in Ainzara taken on the first day of 2016.

Ainzara, Tripoli, Libya ~ January 1st, 2016
I hope and pray that Libya will find peace this year and move forward to a brighter future.

Happy New Year!

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Below are some of my most popular posts. Enjoy!

A Very Important Guest Post

In the past I've had a few guest posts. Today is another guest, a very dear friend of mine with an important message to the foreign wives of Libyans and also to any Libyans facing issues of inheritance and property rights. She asks that you read her message and pass it on to others in the hopes that her situation will change and other wives of Libyans will not suffer the same fate that she is. Below is her post and includes a video made by her husband. The video is partly in English and partly in Arabic. I'm afraid it's not subtitled, any translations would be appreciated in the comments. Thanks. UPDATED: Translation added below the video.
CUPIDITY SUFFERED BY FOREIGN WIVES MARRIED TO LIBYANS RELATING TO INHERITENCE RIGHTS

I am Susan Sandover married into the Libyan family Shkuka. My husband and I had been married 33 years and had lived a loving, happy life together we were a real team. Last September my husband was diagnosed with lung cancer and in March had pneumonia. At t…
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Old Wive's Tales

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One of the weird things that I discovered when I came here was that 'old wives' tales' prevail. Libyans believe all kinds of weird stuff! Especially when it comes to being pregnant and having kids.
If you're pregnant and you are craving something and you don't get what you are craving for then there's a pretty good chance that your baby is going to have a birthmark! 
If you are over due then you should expect that someone will come and scare you with a fish to make you go into labour. They really believe this - I've had a sister-in-law jump out at me with a fish in her hand! (it didn't work, by the way)When you go into labour you should drink a glass of olive oil to help you squirt that baby right out! (I imagine the doctor or midwife won't be too thrilled about your diarrhea though.)
The list goes on and on.... 
One of the funniest things that happened was when one of my sister-in-laws visited me while she was pregnant and the kids brought out their to…
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Mini Vacay

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About 55 years ago, before my parents got married, my father visited Florida and bought some land. The plan was that once he was married he would move his family to Florida and build a house there one day. 
Time passed, there was marriage and then one child, two, three, four and finally five. My father's work brought him to Florida from time to time. He decided to look into relocating his business. He looked in the vicinity of the land that he had bought, but found it wasn't suitable. The area wasn't built up enough. In the end, my parents found a house in the Tampa Bay area. They decided to keep the land as an investment, possibly to sell in the future. 
From time to time my parents were contacted about the land to say that the city and county were making improvements; streets were paved, sewers, telephone and cable lines installed. My parents paid yearly taxes while they continued to hold on to the land as an investment. A few times they drove out to have a look and ind…
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Eid Greetings

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To all my family and friends who celebrate, I wish you a safe and peaceful Eid al-Adha. 
Allāhu akbar, Allāhu akbar     الله أكبر الله أكبرGod is greatest, God is greatest,
lā ilāha illā-Allāh                      لا إله إلا اللهThere is no god but God
Wallāhu akbar, Allāhu akbar  والله أكبر الله أكبرGod is greatest, God is greatest
walillāhi l-ḥamd                          ولله الحمد  and to God goes all praise.





More information about this Islamic holiday can be found here:Eid al-Adha

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Keep blogging Libyans!

I want to share the link to a small article put out yesterday on the BBC website titled 'The Libyans Blogging for Change' which includes a short video featuring two Libyans; Haider Dawi, 27 year old co-founder of H2O and Khadija Al-Ramali who is co-founder of Project Silphium.
Links here: The Libyans Blogging for Change H20 Project Silphium Blogging in Libya has become increasingly dangerous in the past few years. Many bloggers have been picked up, tortured and even killed. A lot of Libyan bloggers have stopped blogging or are only posting infrequently. It's encouraging to see a resurgence of blogging, even on such a small scale. 
Keep blogging Libyans! 
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How important is a good night's sleep?

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I got up this morning and started in on the laundry as soon as I'd finished breakfast. I went into the bedroom and pulled the sheets and blankets off the bed so that I could launder them too. As I was doing this I noticed that the sheets on the edge were wet... uuugh... the waterbed has sprung a leak! Yeah, I know what you're thinking... who the heck has a waterbed in this day and age?.. Waterbeds are so 1980s! .. sigh...
This is going to be a problem for a few reasons:
Number one, because there aren't any waterbeds in Libya. We brought the mattress ages ago (in the 80s!) from America and we brought along with it extra spare bits and pieces, but that was twenty odd years ago and the extra bits and pieces are gone now.
Number two - and this is probably the biggest problem of all, I just don't sleep well on a regular bed. I'm used to my comfortable waterbed. I like the way it molds to my back and lets me drift off into sweet sleep. I like that I can adjust the temp…
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Christmas in Libya

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In my family in America Christmas is celebrated for the most part on the eve of Christmas. I think this tradition mostly began because my father was too impatient to wait for Christmas day. My father loved Christmas - I think it was a holiday he anticipated for months before the actual day. He truly had the holiday spirit. As a child I remember that we always opened our gifts at night and often times we had guests, but not always. On Christmas day we usually went to my grandmother's house.

When I was twelve we moved to Florida and slowly our tradition changed. Many people moved to Florida as we did, or pensioners retired to the warm climate of Florida leaving their grown children and other family members in the north. This separation from family is most noticed on holidays. My immediate family was in Florida but my cousins, aunts, uncles and the rest lived far away - too far away to celebrate with us. My parents began to invite people who were alone to join us on Christmas Eve. It …
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A Big Fat Libyan Wedding

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Well, I finally got my invitation to Aisha Kadafy’s wedding. It was a long time coming. You’re probably wondering what on earth this is all about. Well, here’s the story:
Over the years, every once in a while, I would come across someone that would ask me ‘Do you like The Leader (Moamar Kadafy)?’. Of course in Libya talking about the leader has always been a taboo subject. You didn’t even dare to say his name; usually he was just referred to as ‘The Leader’. Of course, all that’s changed now – you can call him whatever you want, and most times it’s not something nice.
So here I would be, faced with this rather awkward question, wondering if the person doing the asking planned to report whatever I said to internal security. I didn’t want to lie and say I loved the man, or that I even liked him. So I finally decided that when faced with this rather inane question I would reply  truthfully ‘No’.
This answer always provoked a look of shock and disbelief. And then I would add ‘I wasn’t …
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You can do whatever you want in Libya

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I stopped at the gas station this morning after I dropped the kids off at school. There were only 4 cars in front of me. The long lines that we've experienced at the pumps for the past few months are gone. 
There was a woman in the car in front of mine. She pulled up to the pump and pushed two empty containers out the window at the pump attendant. He put the first one on the ground next to the pump and casually began to fill it. The gasoline quickly reached the top and spilled out over the sides of the bottle. As he was putting the cap on the bottle I realized he was also holding a lit cigarette in his hand! He put the filled bottle in the back seat of the woman's car and proceeded to fill the second one, only stopping to take a drag off his cigarette. 
'Excuse me,' I called out from the car window, 'Would you please put out your cigarette? It's very dangerous and you are putting our safety at risk.' He stood there for a minute and looked at me, then he con…
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Facing the Brutal Reality

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The  constant power cuts combined with the hot weather have made life simply miserable. In twenty-four hours our electricity was on for only two. When the power is off during the day you barely have enough energy to do anything more than lay there lethargically waiting for the power to turn back on. Then when it does turn on there is a mad dash to try to get as much done as possible. A friend of mine lamented that she had slept all day long as she hadn't enough energy to do anything in the oppressive heat, but by nightfall the power  was still off so she spent the entire night wide awake in the darkness, unable to accomplish anything. There are still lines for gasoline and cooking gas. According to the news they hope the shortages will be solved soon by the arrival of a tanker in the harbor. We've been through these shortages in the past, unfortunately the same senario keeps repeating. You would think that they would have it figured out by now. Many people complain and say it&…
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