I was born in Kha, and my parents and I used to live in the same room, for this was the only room that we had after all. My wooden crib was at the opposite corner from where my parents’ bed was. A few pieces of furniture here and there, a painting with a large bouquet of flowers in it, framed and is hanged on the wall by one of the two windows that led out into a yard, and that’s about it, as far as our personal chambers went. The rest of the dwelling was shared with the neighbors: the common kitchen, rest room and a long-ass corridor along the flats' doors. I see myself sticking my head through the crib’s bars on its side, peeking at my parents lying together. -Mother: - " This is not good, there is no privacy in this living ", my mother would say to my dad. She was around me most of that time and I saw my dad disappearing out of the house to make a living, as soon as he was finished with his morning preparations. I saw him briefly at night while he was turning my pillow around as though to freshen it up for me by making its surface colder on my little sweaty head and neck resting on it. I hated to be awaken in the middle of the night having my dreams interrupted, but then after the procedure was over with, I felt refreshed, and therefore, guilty about being all grouchy at my Dad at night.

We lived in an old apartment’s flat along the long hallway connecting three more families' dwellings into one communal type of living, where the 'chambers' of bath and cooking belonged to all. The kitchen had cockroaches' colonies built up behind the long vertical water-pipes on each wall, and the stoves that were shared between the neighbors led the way to the cooking area with one window in a kitchen-room. Further away in the corner of the kitchen there was a sink commonly used, and shared by all and everybody living in the facility. The garbage-buckets were stuck in the corner under the sink, and occasionally we saw rats playing behind them. Most of the weekdays were spent at the grandmothers, and I was usually back home with my parents only for the weekend. My Mom had to work hard most of her life, for she had no one to rely upon, and therefore, most of my childhood was spent away from her, and at the Grandmoms’.

My father's Mom lived with her sister in a small flat and a kitchen that they both shared. They were the only two sisters that were left. The only two people who were arguing with each other on the daily basis about things that mattered as much as what happened to them during this story. Even though, they had their own viewpoints at what things were and what the world around them was, remaining different in their perspectives at things around them, nevertheless and at the same time, the two were still very close to one another.The only two, who survived, remaining the only people from the rest of that large family, the members of which were either killed at war, or deceased because of the illness and/or some other, natural or not, causes that took care of the rest of that large family.

During the first ten years of my life, most of the time, I saw my mother during the weekends only, but my Dad stopped by at the Grandmoms’ during the weekdays as well. Usually not for long, just to get his belongings, which he kept there, and at the same time to see how I was doing. Each and every time he came, he would leave with an argument over things that mattered to him only. I always took his side on any issue there was and thought of him as he taught me of who he was - the strongest man in the world.