If you are a person who has ever had an opportunity to be tourist wondering the streets of an unfamiliar land with no language knowledge, you might understand how it feels to ask at a cafe if you can use the toilets in June in Tunis, Tunisia. So I walked downstairs, and before I could realize I had arrived at my destination an Arabic woman in warm clothes and with a floor cleaning equipment welcomed me into the toilets. As I headed towards the cabin she checked out if they were clean and handed me a peace of toilet paper she had carefully torn for me.
When we were washing our hands we saw there was no soap, she apologized and quickly fixed that. As I thanked her for the careful approach, she told me thanks in return and sent me kisses. I replied the same way. She said my mom reminded her of her own mom and came to kiss my mom on the arm around the shoulder. Then she turned her head and I noticed tears in her eyes. I went and hugged her from behind and put my head on her shoulder from behind and tapped on her back. We had a silent moment of understanding and compassion, empathy and togetherness. And I finally left the restroom. In peace of heart. In harmony with my human self. And with a clear understanding that people need to language to understand each other when the heart speaks to a heart- even if the minds thing in Tunisian and Armenian respectively.
