Ma'assalama Jamahiriya

Once upon a time, not too far away, there was a country untouched by the menaces of civilization. Life was not a race. Time was not money. Privileges were not dependent on your bank balance. Marketing gimmicks did not fuel your greed. There were no beggars or slums. Streets were safe. Life was simple.

This was the 80s in Great Socialist People's Libyan Arab Jamahiriya as I saw it.

I grew up in Tripoli. And this memoir is of my 12 years in that Mediterranean city. I generalize it to that of the country with the assumption that life is faster and more demanding in the cities. I went to Libya when I was 2 years old, with my family. By the time I was my 5, I had a 2 year old sister and my mother started working. I joined class 1 directly without any pre-schooling or an admission test, and my mother decided to work at the same school. We had one car driven by my father. He would drop my sister at a family friend agreeing to baby-sit her, drop me and my mother at school and go to his office. He would start the return journey around 2pm and pick us all on the way back home. If either one finished the work day late, the others would wait. Afternoons were for grocery, house errands, visiting other families or playing host to families visiting us. Some evenings I had homework but never had a tutor or extra help with academics from my parents. On weekend we would go for a long drive, to the beach or to a family friend in another city. Most of the time was family time, there was no need to plan or schedule such time.

There were no private businesses. There were no branded shops or fancy restaurants. It followed that there were minimal hoardings. Infrastructure was top class. Roads and highways were all state of the art. So were the hospitals, with a nominal 25 cent charge per visit to discourage people from using such premises as hangouts. The city was clean and green. It was soothing to the eyes and ears. Technology seemed to be judiciously applied to enhance living conditions wherever possible, with care taken to prevent rationalization and other vices of modernization.

Shopping centers were government owned. Whatever was available was quality assured, in abundance and affordable by all. There were not too many varieties of one item. For example, you had only one type of milk - no skimmed, low fat, vitamin D enriched, strawberry flavored categories. Still, you could safely assume that it did not have melamine or other toxins. You did not have to check the expiry date before buying. Of course once in a while something as essential as milk or salt would be out of market and no amount of money could give you access to it. You simply learned to live without it for a while.

Most offices (government owned) were staffed with foreigners (non-arabs) with the top level positions held by Libyans. Many Libyans were still not educated, only having attended primary or secondary schooling at most. They were at times given redundant assistant type positions along side their foreign contemporaries. Libyans enjoyed a very high standard of living. They had at a minimum a family owned house, and often also owned a car, mostly Volvo sedan. In the suburbs, huge stretches of lands were farmed primarily by family members. Farmers were one of the richest people. Land seemed fertile, at least in the coastal regions. Fruit bearing trees bent down with the abundant growth on them. The farmers put their produce on their Mazda pick-up trucks and brought them to city center every weekend for sale, with no middlemen involved. Libyans did not often bother to keep their money in banks, it was just easier to keep it stashed under the bed. There was free healthcare, free education, children allowance and unemployment benefits. There was not, however, public taxation.

Libyans valued family life. Polygamy and early marriages were unheard of, unlike many other middle eastern or Islamic countries. With the governments encouragement for population growth, all households were large. Their houses may or may not have had gold panels but they sat on the floor on mattresses. Guests were common at evenings and welcomed by 'gahwa'- Arabian coffee kept on a boil for a long time and poured between two kettles to generate froth, served in small glasses. The meals were simple. Breakfast would be khoubz ( baguette: long thin crisp loaf of bread made from basic lean dough), with or without suplements. Main courses were almost always one–pot dishes and eaten out of a communal bowl. Couscous (semolina preparation cooked in steam of spicy herbs, tomatoes and vegetables) and Sharba (pasta soup) were most popular. Mutton was the most common meat, while chicken was served occasionally.

Women in Libya were free to move around on their own (without a male companion). They could wear a 'burqa' or a mini skirt and not be stared upon. Older Libyan women often donned an outer covering with a rectangular piece of white cloth but younger ones of the same family freely wore brightly colored western outfits. Some chose to wear a scarf on the head even with a skirt. Libyan women were pretty strong physically - at commemorations like birth and deaths, a man just slayed a sheep from his backyard, and the women in the household would skin, piece and cook it in a matter of hours. Educated women were free to work outside the house and could even join the military.

Law and order situation was never a concern. Cars were parked in public spaces, no one had much of a personal garage. Even when we went out of the country for months, the car would be left in a community space. Crimes like murder, rape, robbery, assault, burglary and larceny were also rare. It was heard that the Islamic punishment system was used and thieves would get their limbs amputated, but this was never known to have been practiced. As Asian foreigners we were at times subjected to some frivolous ridicule by street-smart youths, but there was never any harm inflicted. On the other hand, any suspected act against the government was severely punished by public death squad.

Libyans are predominantly Muslims. They took Islam as a very easy part of life. They read the Quraan when they felt like it, foregoing the often restraining preparations we associate with sacred tasks. They perform only the 'farz' prayers, wherever they were when they heard the 'azaan', and 'sunnah' was truly optional and thus almost discarded. There were no fatwas or controversial impositions. Other than public display of affection and eating publicly in Ramadan, there were no stringent social norms. It is hard to believe that an Muslim country comprising of 140 plus tribes would be so free of any religious or cultural fundamentalism.

Today is 1st September. This day was always celebrated as the national day of Libya with lots of fanfare. The fireworks and street lightings on this occasion were exorbitant. But this year onward, things are bound to be different. Whatever the reasons and the motives of the recent revolution, I fear that there is one less serene place in this world.

[*Ma'assalama is Arabic for Goodbye]