A Land of Permanent Goodbyes

Only two days after arriving in Raqqa, Fayed, Tareq, and Susan leave. They bring Musa with them as well as Shams and Asil, two neighbor girls. Their parents want them brought to safety, worried that Daesh will take them and marry them off to fighters because they are young and beautiful. They get out just in time: Weeks later, Daesh closes off the city. They pay for seats on a small bus driving them and others to Aleppo, a Syrian city by the border with Turkey. A trip that used to take 2.5 hours now takes 24, as they pass eight checkpoints.

As they drive, Tareq internally says his goodbyes to his homeland. He doesn’t want to leave Syria or his deceased family: “What kind of person abandons his family?” he thinks to himself (78). He has an internal conversation with his brother Salim, telling him that he doesn’t want to leave the family. Salim urges him to go, reminding him that he must take care of Fayed and Susan.

They finally make it to the border, but then it’s a question of whether they will be let into Turkey.