Tasting the Sky: A Palestinian Childhood

In her memoir, Tasting the Sky: A Palestinian Childhood (2007), Palestinian-American author and poet Ibtisam Barakat describes her early childhood in Palestine during the Six-Day War of 1967 and the life-changing effects that follow this pivotal event. Combining richly descriptive prose and free-verse poetry, Ibtisam shares often painful memories of childhood losses, from her home and sense of security to her childhood innocence. Writing from a child’s perspective, Ibtisam transcends politics to poignantly highlight how war negatively impacts ordinary people’s lives. Thanks to the power of education, Ibtisam discovers emotional healing and self-expression through writing. Today, Ibtisam is an educator, writer, and advocate for peace. She has served as a delegate to the third UN conference on the elimination of racism, participated in numerous peace conferences, and now conducts seminars pursuing a peaceful solution to the conflict between Palestine and Israel.

Tasting the Sky is tailored for middle grade and young adult readers, though the memoir contains incidences of sexual assault, violence, and animal slaughter, which readers may find disturbing or triggering. Tasting the Sky received the Arab American National Museum Book Award for Children’s/YA Literature and starred reviews from Booklist, Kirkus, and School Library Journal, which named Tasting the Sky a Best Book of the Year. The memoir was an ALA Notable Children’s Book (2008) and an IRA Teachers’ Choice selection. Pagination in this guide refers to the 2007 Square Fish edition.

Content Warning: Tasting the Sky and this study guide portray war and violence and instances of sexual assault and animal slaughter.

Summary

It is 1981 when Ibtisam, 17 years old, begins her story. She has just visited her post office box—her single source of freedom through her communication with her international pen pals—when her bus is stopped by Israeli soldiers. While the passengers are detained and Ibtisam wonders if her home in Ramallah is still standing, she reflects on her fierce and protective mother, her loving but tormented father, and the uncertainty and fear of life under Israeli occupation. Although her mother urges her to forget the painful past, Ibtisam decides to remember.

Ibtisam flashes back to 1967, when she is three and a half years old. She lives with her mother Mirriam; her father Suleiman; her older brothers Basel, who is six and a half, and Muhammad, a year younger than Basel; and her infant sister Maha. They live in a small home on a hill outside Ramallah, on the West Bank of Palestine. Father is Ibtisam’s idol. One night, Father agitatedly announces that war has started. Villagers flee in terror. The family decides to follow the stream of people to Jordan. Ibtisam, unable to lace the one shoe she manages to put on, gets left behind. She follows strangers through the war-torn darkness, loses her single shoe, and badly injures her feet. Eventually, she reunites with her family, and they cross into Jordan. The terror of being abandoned, however, stays with her.

Mother and the children enter a refugee shelter until the war ends, and then they live with Mother’s new friend and fellow refugee, Hamameh, while Father finds work. Ibtisam receives medical treatment for her injured foot. Mother, worried for their safety, moves them to a shelter inside a school. There, Mother draws Alef, showing Ibtisam the first letter in the Arabic alphabet. Ibtisam loves Alef and considers him a friend. The family receives a permit to return to Ramallah.

They discover that Israeli forces are using the hill outside their home for military training. Mother wants to leave. She places the children in an orphanage and lives there herself, working and studying. Ibtisam and her brothers are miserable in the orphanage, and Ibtisam feels completely alone when the boys are sent to a separate orphanage for fighting. Father makes the house safer for Mother so they can return home. Ibtisam, thrilled to be home, feels free. She and her brothers grow used to the presence of Israeli soldiers. They play with bullet casings and in the soldiers’ trenches. They also play with their beloved baby goat Zuraiq, whom Father has promised never to kill. Mother begins a sewing business, drawing people to the home.

The boys start school. Ibtisam misses them during the day but learns their lessons later. Father, a devout Muslim, announces the boys must be circumcised. The family travels to their ancestral villages to announce the upcoming celebration. Among others, they visit Grandma Fatima, a refugee from the war of 1948.

Ibtisam and her brothers are distraught when Father decides to kill Zuraiq to provide meat for the circumcision feast. They are traumatized by this loss and Father’s lie. The children do understand what circumcision entails, and Ibtisam is shocked and terrified for her brothers as they are forcibly circumcised during the celebration.

Ibtisam starts first grade at the Jalazone Girls’ School. Mother, who regrets not completing her own education, shows Ibtisam uncharacteristic affection as she urges Ibtisam to be first in her class. Ibtisam’s teacher Lilian realizes that Ibtisam has already mastered the lessons and enlists Ibtisam’s help teaching others. Ibtisam feels bad for her classmates from the Jalazone refugee camp, who live in extreme poverty and unsanitary conditions. Ibtisam loves school but refuses to walk home by herself after she is assaulted by an older boy.

In late 1970, when the Egyptian leader Nasser dies, the Israeli military presence increases. Soldiers come to the home and sexually threaten Mother. The family must relocate again. Ibtisam is devastated to leave the only place she feels at home, without knowing if she will return.

Ibtisam returns her story to 1981. She is glad she remembered her childhood, even though its losses are still painful. Ibtisam concludes with a poem to Alef. The power of language and writing—Alef—helps Ibtisam heal emotionally and offers hope for peace.

The Square Fish edition of Tasting the Sky includes a historical note, map, annotated list of further resources, recipe, conversational guide to Arabic, and a Questions for the Author section. Ibtisam’s companion memoir, Balcony on the Moon: Coming of Age in Palestine (2016) continues where Tasting the Sky leaves off, following Ibtisam from childhood into adolescence.