It is almost summer and everywhere smells like fish, except for right down by the sea where if you hold your nose just right you can smell the sprawling jasmine and the salt water instead.
In the summer, I always hold my nose to avoid the stench of fish and tourists that smell like hairspray and money and French perfume.
The tourists come from Damascus and Aleppo.
Sometimes even Beirut and Amman.
Once I met a man all the way from Doha.
I asked him about the big skyscrapers that I have heard reach all the way up to the heavens, but Baba hushed me quiet before the man could answer me.
Baba does not like for me to talk to
Tourists
Strangers
Men.
He does not want me to talk to anyone that I do not know and even people that I do know he always says,
Jude, skety, and so I bite my tongue and it sometimes tastes even worse
than the way the summer fish smell.
Everyone is saying that there will be fewer visitors from Aleppo this year.
That there is no one left in Aleppo to come.
That everyone who could leave Aleppo already has.
When I ask Mama if this is true, she says, Jude, skety.
Comprehension Questions
1. Who hushes the narrator?
A. Baba.
B. The narrator's mom.
C. The narrator's brother.
A. People have less money to travel.
B. They have better places to go.
C. There is no one left in Aleppo to come.
Your Thoughts
Vocabulary
4. List any vocabulary words below.