We first noticed Melhim in a sunny corner of the Military Museum in Damascus. His rakish posture caught my attention: he was sitting askew on a child’s red plastic chair, one leg dangling over one side, the other stretched out straight. If he’d been ten years older you might have expected a cigarette in one hand. Although clearly absorbed in his own thoughts, he had placed in front of his seat some bathroom scales to attract the wandering tourists and a few liras.
I loved the look, so I dug in my handbag for my camera, wanting to capture it. But of course it was lost as soon as I gestured that I wished to take his photo. Immediately, he stood to one side of his chair in a military position, stiffly erect, arms at his side, now acting more like the child he was. Not totally happy with that shot, I asked him to return to his chair, and I took a photo of him sitting, anything but nonchalant now. He looked intently up into the camera lens at me.
That was the beginning of our periodic trips back to the museum to see Melhim. The second visit really determined our commitment to stay in touch with him although we went merely to give him the photos I had taken.
Holding his pictures at arm’s length, Melhim exclaimed to himself, ‘Oh Melhim. Naughty Melhim. Naughty Melhim.’ He had captured my husband’s heart. From then on, most of the photos or memories I have now are of Melhim and Fouad: the two of them chatting together; Fouad fitting on Melhim’s shoulders his first school bag, a green and gold one, and a new blue smock—the unisex uniform for prep kids. Seeing Melhim excited to receive these gifts reminded me of a photo we have of my son, schoolbag on his back and hair brushed back wet for his first day at school, grinning broadly.
It was on that second visit that we learnt that Melhim kept his dad company at the museum. His father, who welcomed us kindly but shyly, cleaned the museum toilets. He kept incense burning in the entrance to the toilets and offered water to weary visitors.
Being a child who was in the area every day, Melhim was well known to the artisans and shopkeepers in the craft market next to the museum. On one trip to see