An odd pair || Aliye & Sofia
@aliyeosmans
Sofia had finally completed all of her recent assignments and refused to take more. She wanted time off; time away. She had chosen a small village outside of the city of Beirut in Ottoman territory; it was somewhere she had visited once a year every year since her first assignment there 3 years prior. There was something so peaceful about the little rural village, something about how remote it was and how connected all the people were. It made her forget who she was in the rest of the world. Her small little paradise. Besides which, the food there was the best she’d ever had. Fresh falafel, mloukhiye, knafeh... If she could eat only food from this region she would.
On the first day of her ‘vacation’ she went to the market to get a fresh manouche bel zataar from the stalls and wander around, breathing in the fresh air filled with the scents of spiced meats and roasting vegetables and fish. As she wandered, she greeted old acquaintances, chatted with local merchants. Only here could she let her guard down. Only here did she feel at ease. At a fruit stall, she came across a particularly beautiful woman whom she had never seen before in the village. “Hello,” she said in the local dialect. “You’re not from around here, are you?”