You’re right — our life was far from perfect, and we got used to it. But at least I had enough energy and joy to smell every flower on the street. These were the flowers dearest to me.

The Samar flower

Samar gave me and Maimana beautiful purple flowers — one for each of us — every time we met with her. That was our friendship ritual. When Samar didn’t find the flowers, something felt off. The day didn’t feel as good as when she did.

When Samar left Gaza to study, Maimana and I maintained this ritual, so we could feel like Samar was still here. Then this war came and wiped out Gaza with its memories and imperfections and any street blessed with our flower. Maimana, Samar, and I were only left with our memories of the flower.

On October 25, 2023, I found myself alone. They took Maimana and our flowers, as well as my internet connection, which was the only way to connect with Samar.

Why should a story about flowers be this sad?

The yellow flower

I wasn’t an A student who never missed a lecture. In fact, missing lectures was a hobby for me. But whenever I’d go to college, I listened to music and walked past a lonely yellow flower that slowly became my friend. It was my favorite color, and maybe I made her feel less alone.

I miss seeing a yellow as beautiful as hers. The flower was killed alone, with no imprint remaining of its beauty, when the whole college was bombarded.

Grandma’s garden

My grandma’s house is where I grew up and made my childhood memories. That house has magic in it; it makes you feel content, just like a hug.

My grandma would wake up, make breakfast while listening to Sabah Fakhri (a Syrian singer), and then go to the balcony to water her plants and her aloe vera, which she talks about all the time.

Although it wasn’t an actual garden, it was prettier than any garden to me, because it had so much love and effort from my grandma.

This little beauty was too much for us. My grandma’s house was bombarded and nothing was left except rubble and her tears.

Sunflower

I can’t shut up about how much I love sunflowers; they give me hope and warmth.

Unfortunately, this flower is a rare find in Gaza. I was visiting family friends in Khouzaa, an area in east Khan Younis, the first time I saw one. It wasn’t just one — it was a field of sunflowers and I was in disbelief, my eyes full of happiness.

Gaza used to have everything, no matter how rare. Now there is nothing, and at what cost?

Now I’m obliged to stay in Khan Younis. The rarest thing was the possibility of me being here, but now I am. The east is gray. It has no features.

We evacuated to a tent near the beach, where flowers don’t grow.

Basil

My mom got a plant hoping it would restore her happiness and give her a feeling of sweet nostalgia every time she watered it. Even though we were displaced in Rafah in an apartment shared with my mom’s colleague, this plant gave us the feeling of home that we were longing for.

When we had to leave Rafah, the plant was the first thing that my mom took. She hugged it and didn’t care how many bags she was carrying; what mattered most was the plant that made her feel at home.

Al-Mawasi was our next step. Although the feeling of home doesn’t fit in a tent, my mom got a new basil plant — an attempt to stick to the edges of that sweet nostalgia of our lost home.

October

The leaves are supposed to fall, not be bombarded. I was supposed to grow, just like my flowers, but they are being killed. Is it ever going to be my turn?

Maybe heaven is beautiful, because all the beautiful things that we used to have, like the flowers, live there.

We are waiting for an end — of either our lives or this war. Waiting is killing. We are like dying flowers that need to be watered.

From October 2023 to September 2024, it has been over 300 days. I ask myself if this will all look like a Quentin Tarantino movie and end exactly how it started on the 7th of October.

This essay is for every human, for every flower, and for every dream that was brutally demolished and ruined with no one to appreciate it and protect its innocence — and for my beloved Gaza, the city with sweet imperfections.

I hope I live to tell my story, to graduate and grow. But no matter where I am, I will always have an aching nostalgia living inside me: nostalgia for every flower on Gaza Street, for the guy who used to sell lilies on Gaza’s beach, for my grandma’s little garden where I felt the safety and warmth of home. Even if I was on a street full of flowers, I don’t think that I would have enough energy and joy to smell every flower I see.