Homeland

The nicest memories that I keep remembering are my childhood memories. They are simple, natural and whenever I remember them, they make me feel happy.

The best childhood memory I have is the season of picking olive trees. Back-home, in Palestine, olive tree farming is very popular and most people have olive tree farms. Olive trees need a lot of care and attention so you achieve a good harvest during the picking season.

People prepare well for this season and families gather to help each other, because it's a hard job, but not for kids. We used to go with our family to pick olive trees on the weekends. We would wake up very early, around 5 am, because this is the time when an active farmer usually wakes up. My grandfather used to lead the crew. He had a pickup truck and we used to sit in the back of the truck. When we reached the farm, we would have a quick breakfast and go straight to the work.

My father used a ladder to pick the olives from the high parts of the tree, and my grandmother, mom, and aunts picked from the lower part of the tree. My grandfather used to take care of the olives and put them in special bags. We continued this job until the afternoon.

Now, the best part of the day for me was when my mom and my aunts started to prepare food for us on the farm. They lit a fire and started frying potatoes, eggs, and tomatoes. I loved the fried potatoes they used to make. After eating and getting full, we used to drink a cup of tea which was also fresh and made on the fire.

After we finished eating, we continued working until the evening and then, people would start going back to their homes.

Picking olives sounds like hard work and it is. However we used to have a lot of fun while doing this work because it's group work and we used to talk, joke and sing all the time.